Proclamation No. 1427, February 5, 1918, Including Germans and Austro-Hungarians in the Custody of the War Department within the Term “Enemy” for the Purposes of the Trading with the Enemy Act
By the President of the United States of America
A PROCLAMATION
Whereas paragraph (c) of Section Two of the Act entitled “An Act To define, regulate, and punish trading with the enemy, and for other purposes,” approved October 6, 1917, known as the Trading with the Enemy Act, provides that the word “enemy” as used therein shall be deemed to mean, for the purposes of such trading and of said Act, in addition to the individuals, partnerships or other bodies of individuals or corporations specified in paragraph (a), and in addition to the Government and political or municipal subdivisions, officers, officials, agents or agencies thereof specified in paragraph (b), of said Section Two, the following:
“Such other individuals, or body or class of individuals, as may be natives, citizens, or subjects of any nation with which the United States is at war, other than citizens of the United States, wherever resident or wherever doing business, as the President, if he shall find the safety of the United States or the successful prosecution of the war shall so require, may, by proclamation, include within the term “enemy;’”
And whereas, under the provisions of and by virtue of the power and authority granted in Sections four thousand and sixty-seven, four thousand and sixty-eight, four thousand and sixty-nine, and four thousand and seventy, of the Revised Statutes, and in accordance with proclamations and regulations which have been or which may hereafter [Page 285] be made and established thereunder by the President of the United States, certain alien enemies have been, or may from time to time be, transferred after arrest into the custody of the War Department for detention during the war;
Now, therefore, I, Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States of America, pursuant to the authority vested in me, and in accordance with the provisions of the said Act of October 6, 1917, known as the Trading with the Enemy Act, do hereby find that the safety of the United States and the successful prosecution of the present war require that all natives, citizens or subjects of the German Empire or of the Austro-Hungarian Empire who, by virtue of the provisions of Sections four thousand and sixty-seven, four thousand and sixty-eight, four thousand and sixty-nine, and four thousand and seventy, of the Revised Statutes, and of the proclamations and regulations thereunder, have been heretofore or may be hereafter transferred after arrest into the custody of the War Department for detention during the war, shall be included within the meaning of the word “enemy “for the purposes of the Trading with the Enemy Act and of such trading; and I do hereby proclaim to all whom it may concern that every such alien enemy who is so transferred, after arrest, into the custody of the War Department for detention during the war, shall be and hereby is included within the meaning of the word “enemy” and shall be deemed to constitute an “enemy” for said purposes.
In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.
[seal] Done in the District of Columbia, this 5th day of February, in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and eighteen, and of the independence of the United States the one hundred and forty-second.
By the President:
Frank L. Polk
Acting Secretary of State.