pursuance of the constitution and laws in force at the date of secession, is the first Monday in August next. By the State laws no action of any official is essential to an election. Officers may be appointed, or if not appointed, or failing to serve, the voters may choose their own officers to conduct the election. An election, therefore, is in no degree dependent on those who at present exercise State authority. So far as we understand the policy of the United States Government, no obstacle exists why the people of Texas. loyal to the Union, should not on the first Monday in August proceed to the election of a governor and legislature. Proper tests of allegiance and fidelity to the Union can be prescribed. This subject, and the action of the people with reference to it, will come at once before the military authorities on their entrance into the State, and it seems entirely proper, therefore, that we should solicit your attention and invoke action in regard to it. Our duty would not have been discharged if we had failed to state to you frankly and urgently the public interests and the public solicitude which we believe alike involved in avoiding the exercise of unnecessary military government in the civil affairs of the State. The machinery of civil government in the State is complete, its authority intact. It possesses all the means of preserving civil order. It is ready to obey the United States Government and enforce its authority and maintain State authority in constitutional subordination to the Union. If there is deemed to be an insurmountable invalidity at present in the civil authorities, permit us most respectfully, but most earnestly, to invoke for your consideration the good policy during the brief period which must elapse until a new State government can be regularly and legitimately obtained, of acquiescing, by proper military orders to that end, in existing de facto State authorities to the extent which may be proper, in preference to themilitary government for civil affairs with an entirely new machinery and order of things. We are most anxious for you to bear in mind our representations of the immense evils which will result from any circumstances which should at once cause a dislocation of the labor of the State. We will allude to this matter in but a single connection: More cotton is planted in Texas than in all other States. The crop is now far toward maturity. Its production involves the interests of all who remain in the State, white or black, and also the manufacturing and general interests of the country. The loss of a few weeks' labor now, or a serious shock to labor during that period, will be the irrecoverable loss of the crop. We conceive, then, that it is of the greatest importance to all that until the status of the negro population is definitely fixed and regulations for their government completed and enforced, they should remain on the plantations and farms where they and their families now are. Should regulations as to wages or other special regulations be deemed imperative, all interests seem to require proper precautions to secure and continue their labor and good order as at present, until the whole subject receives its adjustment. These subjects seem to us so immediately connected with military duties in Texas that we most respectfully solicit all the information you may deem proper in regard to them. If not within you cognizance, we beg leave to ask such direction to them as you think will further the public good.

We have the honor to be, most respectfully, your obedient servants,

ASHBEL SMITH,

Colonel Second Texas Volunteer Infantry,

W. P. BALLINGER,

Commissioners, &c.