Of all the supporters of the war, Senator Varnum of Massachusetts was one of the steadiest. He was also the highest authority in the Senate on matters pertaining to the militia. When Giles’s bill came under discussion November 16, Varnum began the debate by a speech vehemently hostile to the proposed legislation. He first objected that although the bill purported to call for an army of eighty thousand men, “yet in some of the subsequent sections of it we find that instead of realizing the pleasing prospect of seeing an ample force in the field, the force is to be reduced to an indefinite amount,--which contradiction in terms, inconsistency in principle, and uncertainty in effect, cannot fail to produce mortification and chagrin in every breast.” Varnum objected to drafting men from the militia for two years’ service because the principle of nine months’ service was already established by the common law. If the nation wanted a regular force, why not make it a part of the regular army without a system of drafting militia “unnecessary, unequal, and unjust?” The machinery of classification and draft was “wholly impracticable.” The limit of service to adjoining States abandoned the objects for which the Union existed. The proffered bounties would ruin the recruiting service for the regular army; the proffered exemptions and reductions in term of duty left no permanency to the service. The bill inflicted no penalties and charged no officers with the duty of making the draft. “I consider the whole system as resolving into a recommendation upon the patriotism of the States and Territories and upon the patriotism of the classes.” The justice of Varnum’s criticism could not fairly be questioned. The bill authorized the President “to issue his orders to such officers of the militia as he may think proper,” and left the classification and draft in the hands of these militia officers. Every drafted man who had performed any tour of duty in the militia since the beginning of the war was entitled to deduct a corresponding term from his two years of service; and obviously the demand created for substitutes would stop recruiting for the regular army. Hardly had Varnum sat down when Senator Daggett of Connecticut spoke. “The bill,” said the Connecticut senator, “is incapable of being executed, as well as unconstitutional and unjust. It proceeds entirely upon the idea that the State governments will lend their aid to carry it into effect. If they refuse, it becomes inoperative. Now, sir, will the Executives, who believe it a violation of the Constitution, assist in its execution? I tell you they will not.”