judgments to be reported to it for specific appropriations with which to pay same. (See act September 30, 1890, 26 Stat. 537.) In other words, Congress remained in control over appropriated public money, through the Comptrollers of the Treasury, and the judgments of the courts had nothing to do with such appropriated moneys. Prior to 1855, when the United States consented to be sued, there were several attempts to secure public money from the United States Treasury by means of extraordinary judicial process against public officers, but such attempts were uniformly abortive. (See Brashear v. Mason, 6 How. 92; Decatur v. Paulding, 14 Peters, 497; Reeside v. Walker, 17 How. 273: United States v. Guthrie, 17 How. 284.) The Supreme Court of the United States said in the latter case, in denying a writ of mandamus against the Secretary of the Treasury, that "The only legitimate inquiry for our determination upon the case before us is this, whether, under the organization of the Federal Government, or by any known principle of law, there can be asserted a power in the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Columbia, or in this court, to command the withdrawal of a sum or sums of money from the Treasury of the United States, to be applied in satisfaction of disputed or controverted claims against the United States? This is the question, the very question presented for our determination; and its simple statement would seem to carry with it the most startling considerations--nay, its unavoidable negation, unless this should be prevented by some positive and controlling command: for it would occur, a priori, to every mind that a treasury, not fenced round or shielded by fixed and established modes and rules of administration, but which could be subjected to any number or description of demands, asserted and sustained through the undefined and undefinable discretion of the courts, would constitute a feeble and inadequate provision for the great and inevitable necessities of the Nation. The government under such a régime, or, rather, under such an absence of all rule, would, if practicable at all, be administered not by the great departments ordained by the Constitution and laws, and guided by the modes therein prescribed, but by the uncertain and perhaps contradictory action of the courts, in the enforcement of their views of private interests." Even after the United States had consented to be sued, the Supreme Court of the United States denied a writ of mandamus against the Comptrollers of the Treasury. (United States r. Lynch, 137 U. S. 280.) And while such writs had been allowed in a few instances against other officers of the Government to require payment of some specific appropriation made by Congress (Houston v. Ormes, 252 UV. S. 469, and Smith v. Jackson, 241 Fed. 747, 246 U. S. 388), it was believed when the organic act was enacted that the incorporation in said act of the language contained in laws relating to the auditors and Comptrollers of the Treasury with respect to the finality of their settlements would give the auditor for the Philippine Islands the same immunity from control by extraordinary judicial process. However, experience has demonstrated that said language is not sufficient to give the auditor immunity from control by extraordinary judicial process and to continue the practice existing in the United States with respect to the auditors and comptrollers of the Federal Treasury, for the Supreme Court of the Philippine Islands has recently granted two or three writs of mandamus against the auditor requiring him to countersign warrants drawing money from general appropriations and to pay certain claims. Such control does not now exist in the United States over the acts of the Comptroller General in countersigning warrants chargeable to general appropriations and in paying claims, (See United States v. Lynch, supra, and Carroll Electric Company v. McCarl, 8 Fed. (2d) 910: Skinner & Eddy Corporation r. McCarl, 8 id, 1011.) An exception to the Comptroller General has apparently been made in the last few months as to the pay of Army and Navy officers (McCarl et al. r. Cox, 8 Fed. (2d) 669). However, this exception does not apply to the auditor for the Philippine Islands, for he does not pay such officers. The language in H. R. 10940 that the settlements of the auditor (page 6, line 8) of the Philippine Islands drops the words "upon the executive branches of the Government," and provides that they shall be "final and conclusive." except when an appeal is taken as elsewhere provided in the bill. It will be seen, therefore, that the purpose of the change is to continue the practice which has obtained in the United States since the ordinance of 1778, with respect to the comptrollers and auditors of the Treasury, now the Comptroller General : of the United States, and which it was believed obtained with respect to the auditor for the Philippine Islands under the same language of the corresponding statutes. The bill makes no change in theory as to the independence of the auditor from judicial control, but clarifies the existing statutes so as to overcome the recent decisions of the Supreme Court of the Philippine Islands, asserting a jurisdiction to control the auditor by extraordinary writs, a jurisdiction which has never theretofore existed either as to the accounting officers of the United States Treasury or as to the auditor for the Philippine Islands, and a continuation of which-as pointed out by the Supreme Court of the United States in the Guthrie case, supra-will subject the treasury of the Philippine Islands to "the undefined and undefinable discretion of the courts" and place it under "an absence of all rule." The CHAIRMAN. That closes the hearings and the committee will now go into executive session. (Whereupon, at 11.50 o'clock a. m., the committee proceeded to the consideration of executive business, and at the conclusion thereof, adjourned to meet at the call of the chairman.) |