In the Act of July 17, 1862, "defining the pay and emolument of certain officers," a section was inserted declaring that "whenever an officer shall be put under arrest, except at remote military posts, it shall be the duty of the officer by whose orders he is arrested to see that a copy of the charges shall be served upon him within eight days thereafter, and that he shall be brought to trial within ten days thereafter unless the necessities of the service prevent such trial; and then he shall be brought to trial within thirty days after the expiration of said ten days, or the arrest shall cease." The Act reserved the right to try the officer at any time within twelve months after his discharge from arrest, and by a _proviso_ it was made to apply "to all persons now under arrest and waiting trial." The bill had been pending several months, having been originally reported by Senator Wilson before General Stone's arrest.
The provision of the Act applicable to the case of General Stone was only a full enforcement by law of the seventy-ninth article of war, which declared that "no officer or soldier who shall be put in arrest shall continued in confinement more than eight days, or until such time as a court-martial can be assembled." It was a direct violation of the spirit of this article, and a cruel straining of its letter, to consign General Stone to endless or indefinite imprisonment.

Any man of average intelligence in the law--and Secretary Stanton was eminent in his profession--would at once say that the time beyond the eight days allowed for assembling a court- martial must be a reasonable period, and that an officer was entitled to prompt trial, or release from arrest.

The law now passed was imperative.

Withing eight days the arrested officer must be notified of the charges against him, within ten days he must be tried, and "if the necessities of the service prevent a trial" within thirty days after the ten, the officer is entitled to an absolute discharge.
General Stone's case fell within the justice and the mercy of the law.

The eight days within which he should be notified of the charges against him had been long passed; the ten days had certainly expired; but by the construction of the War Department the victim was still in the power that wronged him for thirty days more.