The stand taken by Judge Black and his loyal associates was in the last days of December, 1860. The re-organization of the Cabinet came as a matter of necessity. Mr. John B. Floyd resigned from the War Department, making loud proclamation that his action was based on the President's refusal to surrender the national forts in Charleston Harbor to the Secession government of South Carolina. This manifesto was not necessary to establish Floyd's treasonable intentions toward the government; but, in point of truth, the plea was undoubtedly a pretense, to cover reasons of a more personal character which would at once deprive him of Mr. Buchanan's confidence. There had been irregularities in the War Department tending to compromise Mr. Floyd, for which he was afterwards indicted in the District of Columbia. Mr. Floyd well knew that the first knowledge of these shortcomings would lead to his dismissal from the Cabinet. Whatever Mr. Buchanan's faults as an Executive may have been, his honor in all transactions, both personal and public, was unquestionable, and he was the last man to tolerate the slightest deviation from the path of rigid integrity. Mr. Thompson, the Secretary of the Interior, followed Mr. Floyd after a short interval. Mr. Cobb had left the Treasury a few days before General Cass resigned from the Cabinet, and had gone to Georgia to stimulate her laggard movements in the scheme of destroying the government. His successor was Philip Francis Thomas of Maryland, who entered the Cabinet as a representative of the principles whose announcement had forced General Cass to resign. The change of policy to which the President was now fully committed, forced Mr. Thomas to retire, after a month's service. He frankly stated that he was unable to agree with the President and his chief advisers "in reference to the condition of things in South Carolina," and therefore tendered his resignation. Mr. Thomas adhered to the Union, and always maintained an upright and honorable character, but his course at that crisis deprived him subsequently of a seat in the United-States Senate, though at a later period he served in the House as representative from Maryland.