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Introduction

As Commander-in-Chief, the president has constitutional authority over the armed forces, but in practice must constantly defer to the wisdom and experience his officers in carrying out military operations. Not an official order nor even a memorandum addressed to one of his subordinates, this document is instead one of a great many documents in Lincoln’s papers that shows the President working out the elements of a plan or a proposition in a form that can be studied and reconsidered.

Abraham Lincoln, Plan of a military campaign
Washington, D.C., [ca. 1 Oct. 1861]
AMs 545/21

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