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motion may especially invite them. The same considerations make it impossible for me to receive those who merely desire to pay their respects except on the days and during the hours especially designated for that purpose.

I earnestly request Senators and Representatives to aid me in securing for them uninterrupted interviews by declining to introduce their constituents and friends when visiting the Executive Mansion during the hours designated for their reception. Applicants for office will only prejudice their prospects by repeated importunity and by remaining in Washington to await results. GROVER CLEVELAND.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, May 26, 1893.

It is hereby ordered, That the several Executive Departments and the Government Printing Office be closed on Tuesday, the 30th instant, to enable the employees to participate in the decoration of the graves of the soldiers and sailors who fell in the defense of the Union during the War of the Rebellion. GROVER CLEVELAND.

AMENDMENTS OF CIVIL-SERVICE RULES.

Special Departmental Rule No. 1 is hereby amended as follows: Include among the places excepted from examination therein the following: 6. In the Department of Agriculture:

In the office of the Secretary: The assistant chiefs of the following divisions: Of economic ornithology and mammalogy, of pomology, of microscopy, of vegetable pathology, of records and editing, and one property clerk.

In the Weather Bureau: The assistant chief of the Bureau, the three professors of meteorology of highest grade, executive officer, superintendent of telegraph lines, and one property clerk.

In the United States Commission of Fish and Fisheries the following: Scientific or professional experts to be temporarily employed in investigations authorized by Congress, but not to include any persons regularly employed in that Commission nor any person whose duties are not scientific or professional and who are not experts in the particular line of scientific inquiry in which they are to be employed.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, June 6, 1893.

The foregoing amendments are hereby approved.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

AMENDMENTS OF CIVIL-SERVICE RULES.

Postal Rule No. 2 is hereby amended as follows:

Strike out all of section 1 except the last paragraph, relating to noncompetitive examinations, and insert in lieu thereof the following:

1. To test the fitness for admission to the classified postal service one or more examinations shall be provided, as the Commission may determine, which shall not

include more than the following subjects: Orthography, copying, penmanship, arithmetic (fundamental rules, fractions, and percentage), elements of the geography of the United States, local delivery, reading addresses, physical tests: Provided, That when special examinations are needed to test fitness for any place requiring special or technical knowledge or skill the examination shall include, in addition to the special subjects required, such of the subjects of the regular examination as the Commission may determine.

Strike out section 2 and insert in lieu thereof the following:

No person shall be examined for the position of letter carrier if under 21 or over 40 years of age, and no person shall be examined for any other position in the classified postal service if under 18 years of age.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, June 6, 1893.

The foregoing amendments are hereby approved.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

EXECUTIVE MANSION,

Washington, June 16, 1893.

In accordance with section 16 of the act of Congress approved April 25, 1890, and entitled "An act to provide for celebrating the four hundredth anniversary of the discovery of America by Christopher Columbus by holding an international exhibition of arts, industries, manufactures, and the product of the soil, mine, and sea in the city of Chicago, in the State of Illinois," the designations of the following-named persons as members of the board of control and management of the Government exhibit at the World's Columbian Exhibition are hereby approved:

W. W. Rockhill, chief clerk of the Department of State, to represent that Department, vice William E. Curtis.

Lieutenant-Commander E. D. Taussig, United States Navy, to represent the Navy Department, vice Captain R. W. Meade, United States Navy.

Frank W. Clark, chemist, United States Geological Survey, to represent the Department of the Interior, vice Horace A. Taylor.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

SPECIAL SESSION MESSAGE.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, August 8, 1893.

To the Congress of the United States:

The existence of an alarming and extraordinary business situation, involving the welfare and prosperity of all our people, has constrained me to call together in extra session the people's representatives in Congress, to the end that through a wise and patriotic exercise of the legislative duty, with which they solely are charged, present evils may be mitigated and dangers threatening the future may be averted.

Our unfortunate financial plight is not the result of untoward events nor of conditions related to our natural resources, nor is it traceable to any of the afflictions which frequently check national growth and prosperity. With plenteous crops, with abundant promise of remunerative production and manufacture, with unusual invitation to safe investment, and with satisfactory assurance to business enterprise, suddenly financial distrust and fear have sprung up on every side. Numerous moneyed institutions have suspended because abundant assets were not immediately available to meet the demands of frightened depositors. Surviving corporations and individuals are content to keep in hand the money they are usually anxious to loan, and those engaged in legitimate business are surprised to find that the securities they offer for loans, though heretofore satisfactory, are no longer accepted. Values supposed to be fixed are fast becoming conjectural, and loss and failure have invaded every branch of business.

I believe these things are principally chargeable to Congressional legislation touching the purchase and coinage of silver by the General Government.

This legislation is embodied in a statute passed on the 14th day of July, 1890, which was the culmination of much agitation on the subject involved, and which may be considered a truce, after a long struggle, between the advocates of free silver coinage and those intending to be more conservative.

Undoubtedly the monthly purchases by the Government of 4,500,000 ounces of silver, enforced under that statute, were regarded by those interested in silver production as a certain guaranty of its increase in price. The result, however, has been entirely different, for immediately following a spasmodic and slight rise the price of silver began to fall after the passage of the act, and has since reached the lowest point ever known. This disappointing result has led to renewed and persistent effort in the direction of free silver coinage.

Meanwhile not only are the evil effects of the operation of the present law constantly accumulating, but the result to which its execution must inevitably lead is becoming palpable to all who give the least heed to financial subjects.

This law provides that in payment for the 4,500,000 ounces of silver bullion which the Secretary of the Treasury is commanded to purchase monthly there shall be issued Treasury notes redeemable on demand in gold or silver coin, at the discretion of the Secretary of the Treasury, and that said notes may be reissued. It is, however, declared in the act to be "the established policy of the United States to maintain the two metals on a parity with each other upon the present legal ratio or such ratio as may be provided by law." This declaration so controls the action of the Secretary of the Treasury as to prevent his exercising the discretion nominally vested in him if by such action the parity between gold

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LANDING TROOPS ON THE CUBAN SHORE

General Shafter's army of 17,000 men were disembarked on the 22d, 23d and 24th days of June, 1898. The main landing place was Daiquiri, but Kent's division landed at Siboney, as shown in the illustration. Two soldiers perished when a boat capsized. Considering the squally weather and the weight of the accoutrements carried by each man it is a wonder that more did not drown. At Daiquiri some of the boats were run up on the beach, so that the troops might wade ashore, while others ran up to a ramshackle old wharf, to which the men jumped when the boat rose on a wave.

The need of a merchant marine was made apparent by the events of the war. The Government paid steamship owners two and three times their commercial freight rates for the use of vessels as transports and supply ships. (Great Britain pays 10 per cent. more than the commercial rates.) Never- theless, before turning over their vessels to the Government the owners carefully removed the accessories of a passenger steamer - beds, linen, towels, etc., converting the ships into mere tramp steamers. When the coast of Cuba had been reached and the troops disembarked, the captains of these vessels would take fright at the least sound of firing and run twenty miles out to sea, bearing rations and supplies in their holds, while the troops on the firing line went without their hardtack, bacon and coffee.

The men called the transports prisons, and the landing was like a pleasureseeking excursion. They sang in chorus to the rhythm of the oars, waded ashore with howls of triumph, stripped and hung their uniforms to dry before the fire, then plunged naked into the surf, still shouting and dancing. At night the searchlights of the fleet made the picturesque scene light as day. The article, "Spanish-American War," in the Encyclopedic Index, recites the history of the struggle briefly. President McKinley's war time messages form the official history.

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