In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. [SEAL.] Done at the city of Washington, this 17th day of June, A.D. 1865, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-ninth. ANDREW JOHNSON. By the President: WILLIAM H. SEWARD, _Secretary of State_. BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. A PROCLAMATION. Whereas the fourth section of the fourth article of the Constitution of the United States declares that the United States shall guarantee to every State in the Union a republican form of government and shall protect each of them against invasion and domestic violence; and Whereas the President of the United States is by the Constitution made Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy, as well as chief civil executive officer of the United States, and is bound by solemn oath faithfully to execute the office of President of the United States and to take care that the laws be faithfully executed; and Whereas the rebellion which has been waged by a portion of the people of the United States against the properly constituted authorities of the Government thereof in the most violent and revolting form, but whose organized and armed forces have now been almost entirely overcome, has in its revolutionary progress deprived the people of the State of Alabama of all civil government; and Whereas it becomes necessary and proper to carry out and enforce the obligations of the United States to the people of Alabama in securing them in the enjoyment of a republican form of government: