claim upon the indemnity bond given when the duplicate was issued in 1864 we should be prepared to show that the second payment on the original bond was made upon such a state of facts as compelled or at least justified it. The passage of an act simply directing such payment would alone not be sufficient. The bond directed to be given by this bill would afford the Government no protection, since it only provides against repayment of the bond in the future, whereas the payment we should suffer from has already been made.

I suggest that an act be passed directing the Secretary of the Treasury to investigate the entire subject with a view of determining to whom this money should be paid, in a manner to bind, if possible, by the results of the examination the party to whom it has already been paid, and who should refund if another has a better right.

To the House of Representatives:

GROVER CLEVELAND.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, May 30, 1896.

I return without approval House bill No. 6037, entitled “An act grant、 ing a pension to Mrs. Amanda Woodcock."

The bill provides for the granting of a pension to the beneficiary therein named, describing her as the "widow of Robert Woodcock, deceased, late a private in the Fourth United States Volunteer Infantry in the Mexican War."

My action in this case is based upon the following statement concerning the bill from the Pension Bureau:

The bill, if approved, would be inoperative, inasmuch as there was no such organization in the Mexican War as named in the bill (Fourth United States Volunteer Infantry), and the service alleged by the soldier having been in the Fourth Kentucky Volunteer Infantry.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

To the House of Representatives:

EXECUTIVE MANSION, May 30, 1896.

I herewith return without approval House bill No. 4526, entitled "An act granting a pension to Jonathan Scott."

This bill directs that the Secretary of the Interior place upon the pension roll, at the rate of $72 per month, subject to the provisions and limitations of the pension laws, the name of Jonathan Scott, late of Company M, Sixth Regimen Iowa Volunteer Cavalry.

The beneficiary was dropped from the pension roll in October, 1895, after a very thorough examination, for fraud, it appearing to the satisfaction of the Pension Bureau that the disability for which he was pensioned was not due to his army service. There certainly ought to be a strong presumption that the case was fairly and justly determined by the Bureau,

and the evidence strongly tends to support the conclusion reached. If restored to the rolls, such restoration would still be "subject to the provisions and limitations of the pension laws," and he would not be exempt from further investigation if circumstances or newly developed facts justified such a course.

Whatever may be the merits of the case, however, I am advised by the Pension Bureau that the bill, if it becomes a law in its present form, would be inoperative for the reason that the beneficiary is therein described as having been a member of the Sixth Regiment of Iowa Volunteer Cavalry, whereas he actually served in the Fifth Regiment of the Volunteer Cavalry of that State. GROVER CLEVELAND.

To the Senate:

EXECUTIVE MANSION, June 1, 1896.

I herewith return without approval Senate bill No. 149, entitled “An act granting a pension to Helen M. Jacob."

The purpose of this bill is to grant a pension of $12 per month to "Helen M. Jacob, of Rochester, Ind., widow of Benjamin Oden West."

It appears from the records of the War Department that Benjamin O. West served in the Mexican War from January to November in the year 1847. The beneficiary named in this bill was married to him in 1850, and he died in 1856. She was pensioned as his widow, and received such pension from the date of her husband's death until April 17, 1861. On that date she was married to William W. Jacob, whereupon her pension ceased, but two minor children were awarded pensions and continued in receipt of the same until January, 1873, when the youngest child became 16 years of age.

The entire absence of any fixed or reasonable principle or rule regulating private pension legislation at this time suggests the danger of its near approach in many cases to cap ice and favoritism.

Though I have in a number of instances deferred to the judgment of Congress and refrained from interposing objections to bills of this character which seemed to me to be of doubtful merit, I am unwilling to follow such a wide departure from a palpably just pension theory and assent to the establishment of such an unfortunate precedent as this bill involves. There is no duty or obligation due from the Government to a soldier's widow except it be worked out through the deceased soldier. She is pensioned only because he served his country and because through his death she as his wife has lost his support. In other words, she becomes a beneficiary of the Government because she is a soldier's widow. When she marries again, and thus displaces the memory of her soldier husband and surrenders all that belongs to soldier widowhood, she certainly ought not on the death of her second husband to be allowed to claim that she is again the soldier's widow. GROVER CLEVELAND.

To the House of Representatives:

EXECUTIVE MANSION, June 6, 1896.

I hereby return without my approval House bill No. 8293, entitled "An act making appropriations to supply deficiencies in the appropriaions for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1896, and for prior years, and or other purposes."

To the extent that the Constitution has devolved upon the President a participation in legislation I suppose his action on bills presented to him for approval involves a duty to be performed, like others pertaining to his office, with care and circumspection and in full view of his responsibility to the people and his obligation to subserve the public welfare. It is difficult to understand why under the Constitution it should be necessary to submit proposed legislation to Executive scrutiny and approval except to invoke the exercise of Executive judgment and invite independent Executive action.

The unpleasant incidents which accompany the use of the veto power would tempt its avoidance if such a course did not involve an abandonment of constitutional duty and an assent to legislation for which the Executive is not willing to share the responsibility.

I regret that I am constrained to disapprove an important appropriation bill so near the close of the present session of Congress. I have, however, by immediate action after the receipt of the bill, endeavored to delay as little as possible a reconsideration of this proposed legislation, though I am thus obliged to content myself with a less complete expla nation of my objections than would otherwise be submitted.

This bill is in many of its features far removed from a legitimate deficiency bill, and it contains a number of appropriations which seem to me to be exceedingly questionable. Without noticing in detail many of these items, I shall refer to two of them which, in my judgment, justify my action in the preriises.

The bill appropriates $1.027,314.09 for a partial payment upon claims which originated in depredations upon our commerce by French cruisers and vessels during the closing years of the last century. They have become quite familiar to those having Congressional experience, as they have been pressed for recognition and payment, with occasional intervals of repose, for nearly one hundred years.

These claims are based upon the allegations that France, being at war with England, seized and condemned many American vessels and cargoes in violation of the rules of international law and treaty provisions and contrary to the duty she owed to our country as a neutral power and to our citizens; that by reason of these acts claims arose in favor of such of our citizens as were damnified against the French nation, which claims our Government attempted to enforce, and that in concluding a treaty with France in the year 1800 these claims were abandoned or relinquished in consideration of the relinquishment of certain claims which France charged against us.

Upon these statements it is insisted by those interested that we as a nation having reaped a benefit in our escape from these French demands against us through the abandonment of the claims of our citizens against France, the Government became equitably bound as between itself and its citizens to pay the claims thus relinquished.

I do not understand it to be asserted that there exists any legal lia bility against the Government on account of its relation to these claims. At the term of the Supreme Court just finished the Chief Justice, in an opinion concerning them and the action of Congress in appropriating for their payment, said:

We think that payments thus prescribed to be made were purposely brought within the category of payments by way of gratuity-payments of grace and not of right.

From the time the plan was conceived to charge the Government with the payment of these claims they have abided in the atmosphere of controversy. Every proposition presented in their support has been stoutly disputed and every inference suggested in their favor has been promptly challenged.

Thus, inasmuch as it must, I think, be conceded that if a state of war existed between our country and France at the time these depredations were committed our Government was not justified in claiming indemnity for our citizens, it is asserted that we were at the time actually engaged in war with the French nation. This position seems to be sustained by an opinion of the Attorney-General of the United States written in 1798 and by a number of decisions of the Supreme Court delivered soon after that time.

We had certainly abrogated treaties with France, and our cruisers and armed ships were roaming the seas capturing her vessels and property.

So, also, when it is asserted that the validity of these claims was acknowledged in the treaty negotiations by the representatives of France, their declarations to a contrary purport are exhibited.

And when it is alleged that the abandonment of these claims against France was in consideration of great benefits to the Government, it is as confidently alleged that they were in point of fact abandoned because their enforcement was hopeless and that even if any benefit really accrued to us by insistence upon their settlement in the course of diplomatic negotiation such result gave no pretext for taxing the Government with liability to the claimants.

Without noticing other considerations and contentions arising from the alleged origin of these claims, a brief reference to their treatment in the past and the development of their presentation may be useful and pertinent.

It is, I believe, somewhat the fashion in interested quarters to speak of the failure by the Government to pay these claims as such neglect as amounts to repudiation and a denial of justice to citizens who have

suffered. Of course the original claimants have for years been beyond the reach of relief; but as their descendants in each generation become more numerous the volume of advocacy, importunity, and accusation correspondingly increases. If injustice has been done in the refusal of these claims, it began early in the present century and may be charged against men then in public life more conversant than we can be with the facts involved and whose honesty and sense of right ought to be secure from suspicion.

As early as 1802 a committee of the House of Representatives reported the facts connected with these claims, but apparently without recommendation. No action was taken on the report. In 1803 a resolution declaring that indemnity ought to be paid was negatived by a vote of the same body. A favorable committee report was made in 1807, but it seems that no legislative action resulted. In 1818 an adverse report was made to the Senate, followed by the passage of a resolution declaring "that the relief asked by the memorialists and petitioners ought not to be granted." In 1822 and again in 1824 adverse committee reports on the subject were made to the House, concluding with similar resolutions.

The presumption against these claims arising from such unfavorable reports and resolutions and from the failure of Congress to provide for their payment at a time so near the events upon which they are based can not be destroyed by the interested cry of injustice and neglect of the rights of our citizens.

Until 1846 these claims were from time to time pressed upon the attention of Congress with varying fortunes, but never with favorable legislative action. In that year, however, a bill was passed for their ascertainment and satisfaction, and $5,000,000 were appropriated for their payment. This bill was vetoed by President Polk,* who declared that he could "perceive no legal or equitable ground upon which this large appropriation can rest." This veto was sustained by the House of Representatives.

Nine years afterwards, and in 1855, another bill was passed similar to the one last mentioned, and appropriating for the settlement of these claims a like sum of money. This bill was also vetoed, † President Pierce concluding a thorough discussion of its demerits with these words:

In view of what has been said there would seem to be no ground on which to raise a liability of the United States, unless it be the assumption that the United States are to be considered the insurer and the guarantor of all claims, of whatever nature, which any individual citizen may have against a foreign nation.

This veto was also sustained by the House of Representatives.

I think it will be found that in all bills proposed in former times for the payment of these claims the sum to be appropriated for that purpose did not exceed $5,000,000. It is now estimated that those already passed upon, with those still pending for examination in the Court of

*See pp. 2316-2319.

† See pp. 2840-2855.