United States Constitution, Article I, Section 8 reads:

[David Lockmiller]

The Congress shall have the Power . . . To declare War

[David Lockmiller]

Washington had become isolated from the North. On April 20, 1861 Maryland officials ordered the destruction of railroad bridges on lines connecting the capital with Baltimore. Telegraph wires were cut, and mail service to the District ceased.
Troops heading there, among them the Seventh New York and the First Rhode Island regiments, were held up for several days as they sought alternate routes. Later the president remarked, “He who strangles himself, for whatever motive, is not more
unreasonable than were those citizens of Baltimore who, in a single night, destroyed the Baltimore and Ohio railroad, the Northern Central railroad, and the railroad from Baltimore to Philadelphia.”

On April 27, Lincoln explained that “he could have easily have destroyed Baltimore, but that it would have been visiting vengeance upon a large body of loyal citizens, who were the property-holders, for the sake of punishing the mob who had committed the outrage upon the Massachusetts troops, but which mob, as to property, had little or nothing to lose.