The necessity of establishing a system of revision of the audit of postal accounts, in accordance with the laws and regulations which control the adjustment of all other accounts, is conceded. It does not fol low, however, that an additional or Third Comptroller is needed; and it is very evident that the creation of one is neither necessary nor advisable. Whatever increase of clerical force will be required can be made as well in the office of First Comptroller, already established, as in one especially created for this work; and all questions of law which may arise in the adjustment of postal accounts can be decided by the First Comptroller, who is already charged with a duty of revision on appeal. An increase of Comptrollers is very objectionable, because, if made, there would then be no uniformity in the construction of statutes or in the principles of law which the several Comptrollers might adopt. A single Comptroller-General, having the final determination of all questions of law which can arise in all branches of the accounting system, is the only agency by which entire uniformity in the adjustment of public accounts can be secured. Besides discussing the proposed scheme of revision, Mr. Smith, in his report, refers to the necessity of making such changes in the method of accounting to the Auditor by postmasters as will reduce the number of accounts to be separately adjusted; and, in connection with this subject, he estimates that, if the system which regulates the accounting of internal-revenue officers were adopted for postmasters, there would be required "over one million postal warrants annually." This proves that the accounting by postmasters must be different from the accounting by collectors of internal-revenue, but does not prove that there can be no change from the present system; indeed, the report shows that a change is possible, and suggests a plan which is worthy of mature consideration. However, under any system, whatever number of warrants are required can be granted, and be countersigned by the First Comptroller as readily as by any other officer; and hence this point has no direct bearing on the question whether a Third Comptroller should be createdat least none in favor of the creation of such office. Inquiry has occasionally been made concerning (1) the extent of the jurisdiction exercised by the Comptroller, and (2) the value of his printed decisions as authority. The extent of the jurisdiction exercised by the Comptrollers, and the amounts of money involved therein, may be learned from the operations of the Treasury Department. A single decision of the First Comptroller has determined liabilities, past and prospective, amounting to many millions of dollars (Pacific Railroad case, post, 214).* * In the annual report of the First Comptroller of November 15, 1883, it is said that "The accounts of the several [Pacific] railroad companies have not been kept in the Treasury Department in a form to show separately by years, or in the aggregate, In this connection it may be stated that accounts were examined and adjusted by the accounting officers of the Treasury Department, and suits were instituted in the Court of Claims on claims rejected, as follow: Number of accounts. Number of vouchers Amount allowed. Suits in Court of Claims. During the fiscal year 1881 : During the fiscal year 1882: During the fiscal year 1883: 114, 476, 554 00 2,866, 756, 201 81 $3,471, 955, 777 18 Second Comptroller.. 2,811, 258 Commissioner of Customs 28,516 2, 457, 161, 560 15 19, 159, 109 79 Term of 1880-'81. (16 Ct. Cl., pp.74,88,335,515),4. (16 Ct. Cl., pp. 3, 202, 222), 3. (16 Ct. Cl., p. 276), 1. Term of 1881-'82. (17 Ct. Cl., pp.39,47,247,292), 4. (17 Ct. Cl., p. 288), 1. Customs, 0. Term of 1882-'83. (18 Ct. Cl., pp. 448, 458, 706), 3. (18 Ct. Cl., pp. 83, 111, 138, 382, 470, 546, 618, 625, 706), 9. 20, 681, 022 65 Customs, 0.* *This table was prepared by Theophilus J. Minton, a clerk in the Treasury Department. It does not include the accounts settled by the [Sixth] Auditor of the Treasury for the Post-Office Department. the gross amount of each of the three distinct classes of claims for payment above mentioned, but this can be ascertained by the necessary research and examination. There is appended to this report a tabular statement (Appendix A) prepared by the Auditor of the Treasury for the Post-Office Department, and 'showing by years the compensation for mail transportation on the bond-subsidized portions of the Pacific railroads, and the compensation on the non-bond-subsidized portions, including all roads owned, leased, controlled, or operated by the said bond-subsidized Pacific roads, withheld from January 1, 1873, to June 30, 1883, and, in separate columns, showing the amount of one-half of the compensation withheld on the bond-subsidized, and the amount of the whole compensation withheld on the non-bond-subsidized.' From this has been condensed another tabular statement (Appendix B), showing an approximate estimate of the compensation earned for mail transportation, the payment of which has been withheld in the three classes of cases mentioned, as follows: 1. One-half compensation earned on bond-subsidized roads from January 1, 1873, to June 30, 1878... 2. Total compensation earned on non-bond-subsidized roads owned, leased, or operated by subsidized companies from January 1, 1873, to June 30, 1882 ... 3. One-half compensation earned from July 1, 1878, to June 30, 1883, on bond-subsidized roads not covered by the act of May 7, 1878..... Total....... $1,753, 554 79 1,418, 110 84 221,572 01 $3,393, 237 64 "It has not been practicable to obtain data with sufficient accuracy to give even approximate estimates as to the amount of compensation earned by the bond-subsidized railroad companies for services other than mail transportation of the three several classes, and for the separate periods mentioned. But the gross amount will probably equal, if it does not exceed, that for mail transportation. Some idea may thus be obtained of the amounts claimed by the railroad companies, and of the increase necessary in the appropriations hereafter required, if the claims of the companies are to be paid. It will, of course, become necessary to obtain exact statements of the compensation earned, if further legislative action be taken upon the subject." The Hon. Charles J. Folger, Secretary of the Treasury, in his annual report of December 3, 1883, says: "The report of the First Comptroller of the Treasury for this year, beginning at page 8, presents an elaborate statement of the existing relations of the Government and these corporations, and to that report I crave leave to refer. In the mean time it has become apparent that the sinking-fund provided for by the act of May 7, 1878, will be inadequate to meet the objects of that statute." The first movement in Congress to secure to the United States indemnity against loss by reason of the issue of subsidy bonds to the Pacific Railway Companies was made by Mr. Lawrence in the House of Representatives, January 5, 1876. (See Railway Compensation case, post 211, note.) It must be manifest that the Comptrollers exercise a jurisdiction, which, as to the number of cases, the amount of money involved, and the number of persons interested, is much greater in extent than that of any one court of the United States, in fact than that of many of the courts combined. It must be apparent also that as many difficult an important questions of law receive the consideration and decision of Comtrollers as can possibly arise in the highest court of any State, or in courts of extensive jurisdiction of the United States. The Comptrollers are required to give construction to every act of Congress under which money can be paid from the Treasury. This, of course, includes acts authorizing payments to all officers, employés, and agents, from the highest to the lowest, of the United States, to all holders of Government bonds, other public securities, drafts, and checks, to all contractors, and to all others—whether natural or artificial personswho in any form may be claimants against the Government. It is not too much to say that these rights to payments arise under most, if not very nearly all, acts of Congress. The general principles of international law, and of national executive-common-law are thus to be determined by Comptrollers. And as such rights, as regards their transfer, are controlled by the law of the domicile of the holders thereof, Comptrollers must necessarily give construction to all such laws, whether found in treaties, constitutions, statutes, or in civil or common law. Whether the transfer arise by operation of law or by act of the parties, the laws governing such transfer are to be passed upon by the Comptrollers. The law of personal property, contracts, husband and wife, guardian and ward, executors and administrators, corporations, insolvency, trustees, public securities, bills of exchange, and drafts and checks, and, to a large extent, the whole body of law, in all its varied forms, must be considered and administered by Comptrollers. As to the value of the decisions of any Comptroller as authority, it may with propriety be said, that, in all those cases, very numerous and important as they are, and involving vast sums of money as they do, over which no other officer or court has any control or any power to change the result of such decisions, they necessarily become authority for all such questions thereafter arising. Of this character are all those cases— The Hon. Carl Schurz, Secretary of the Interior, in his annual report of November 1, 1877 (page xxx), referring to the bill on this subject, says: "What is known as the Lawrence bill, which passed the House at the first session of the Forty-fourth Congress, requires the Union Pacific Company to pay semi-annually the sum of $994,731, which sum, according to the statement of the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives, is necessary to meet the principal and interest due at maturity of the bonds." This, doubtless, refers to the report made by Mr. Lawrence from the House Judiciary Committee April 25, 1876 (No. 440—1st session 44th Congress). But the learned Secretary of the Interior was mistaken in reference "to the statement of the Judiciary Committee," as may be seen by reference to the debates in the House of Representatives, July 7, 1876, which show that the bill referred to was inadequate, and the reason thereof (Congressional Record, vol. 4, part 5-1st session 44th Congress, page vast in number and involving immense amounts of money-in which decisions are rendered in favor of claimants. Besides these, there are many other cases in which the action of the First Comptroller cannot, in any way, be changed, nor its result be affected by any court or executive officer. Thus, if the First Comptroller decides that an act does not make an appropriation to carry out any given object, he must necessarily refuse to countersign any warrant for the payment of money from the Treasury for such purpose (Rev. Stat., 269; 1 Lawrence, Compt. Dec., 2d ed., App., Ch. XII, 549; Butler's case, 1 Lawrence, Compt. Dec., 2d ed., 25; Tillamook case, Id., 138; Canal case, Id., 141; Conger's case, 2 Id., 35). So, questions arise as to appropriations in many forms, the decision of which questions by the First Comptroller occupies the same position. These are so numerous that their character can only be learned by an examination of decided cases (Coyle's case, post, 517). Many claims are barred by the six years' limitation applicable in the Court of Claims (Rev. Stat., 1069), which claims are not barred when presented to accounting officers. Thus many claims for a refund of moneys paid by proprietors of friction matches in excess of the amount required by the act of July 14, 1870 (16 Stat., 257), are barred in the Court of Claims. (Swift Co. v. United States, 105 U. S., 691; Swift Co. v. United States, 110 U.S.) Whether claims of this character are allowed or rejected by the Comptroller, no court can interpose any objection or grant any relief.* So, other questions are decided by the Comptroller with like effect in still other classes of cases, as may be seen by an examination of his decisions. The First Comptroller settles the accounts of the Treasurer of the United States, and is thus required to finally decide many questions (Di Cesnola's case, 2 Lawrence, Compt. Dec., 2d ed., 159; McAllister's case, Id., 167,183). As a general rule, the Comptroller must necessarily determine the extent of his own jurisdiction, not encroaching upon that of other officers. In some cases if a Comptroller refuse to exercise a jurisdiction which the law has conferred upon him, he may be required to do so by mandamus (ex parte United States, 16 Wall., 699). But whatever may be said, however properly, by courts, in cases requiring of them no decision, in denial of a jurisdiction claimed and exercised by a Comptroller, is of course obiter dictum, having only such weight as may be accorded to its reasoning, and is not authority for accounting officers, precisely as opinions incidentally expressed by a Comptroller as to the jurisdiction of a court cannot determine its extent (McKee's case, 12 Ct. Cl., 505; Power's case, 18 Id., 263; Barnett & Co.'s case, 16 Id., 515; Bank of Greencastle case, 15 Id., 225). This must be so, since, as a general rule, courts cannot control the action of accounting officers, *There are claims of this class, which are barred in the Court of Claims, estimated as probably amounting to $300,000 or more, and on proprietary medicines there is about an equal amount. even if they should adjust and allow a claim over which a court had said that they had no jurisdiction. If that jurisdiction of the Comptroller which is subject to no review is found to need regulation, the authority of Congress must be invoked for this purpose, just as the same authority alone can be invoked to alter the jurisdiction of national courts, except the original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court, which has been established by the Constitution. It cannot be said with any technical or legal accuracy that any action of a Comptroller, in allowing or rejecting claims, is subject to judicial review, or that his decision in any case can be overruled. No appeal lies from such action to any court, nor can it be reviewed by writ of certiorari, writ of error, or other judicial process. In those cases in which courts have jurisdiction in favor of claimants over claims disallowed by a Comptroller, a judicial remedy is simply offered in the exercise of a separate and independent jurisdiction. It has elsewhere been stated that there is not, and cannot be, "under existing legislation, any general system of judicial National common law" (3 Lawrence, Compt. Dec., Introduction, XXII). But in those matters not subject to judicial jurisdiction there is a system of executive National common law, of universal application within the territorial limits of the United States" (id). As to this form of national common law, which is, perhaps, more largely administered through the office of the First Comptroller than any other, the decisions therein rendered may, to the extent stated, be regarded as legal "authority." They, of course, comprehend, among others, those cases in which judicial common law is not adapted to executive administration, because resting on reasons. and policy peculiar to the latter (Reeside's appeal, post, 156). The decisions of the First Comptroller, when, like those of all executive officers charged with a duty of construing and executing statutes, acted upon and adopted in practice, become, in some measure, rules of property. Upon principles of justice and policy, which create the necessity of official comity, the construction thus given to laws by executive officers is generally adopted by courts (3 Lawrence, Compt. Dec., Introduction, XXV, and cases cited). A "construction given by the Treasury Department to any law affecting its arrangements and concerns, is certainly entitled to great respect" (United States v. Dicksou, 15 Pet., 161; United States v. Gilmore, 8 Wall., 330; Five Per Cent. Cases, 110 U. S., 485, and cases cited). As to those decisions in which principles are discussed by a Comptroller which may, but do not, reach the Supreme Court, it may be said. that such decisions occupy precisely the same position as those of any judicial tribunal the decisions of which are subject to like review; that is, their value must rest on their merits, as they may or may not be found to be correct exponents of sound legal principles. Law is the perfection of reason, and "reason is the soul of the law "-Cessante ratione legis, cessat ipsa lex. Every principle of law must rest on a solid rea |