Claims, may amount to $25,000,000. This indicates either that the actual sufferers or those nearer to them in time and blood than the present claimants underestimated their losses or that there has been a great development in the manner of their presentation.

Nothwithstanding persistent efforts to secure payment from the Government and the importunity of those interested, no appropriation has ever been made for that purpose except a little more than $1,300,000, which was placed in the general deficiency bill in the very last hours of the session of Congress on March 3, 1891.

In the long list of beneficiaries who are provided for in the bill now before me on account of these claims 152 represent the owners of ships and their cargoes and 186 those who lost as insurers of such vessels or cargoes.

These insurers by the terms of their policies undertook and agreed "to bear and take upon themselves all risks and perils of the sea, menof-war, fire, enemies, rovers, thieves, jettison, letters of mart and counter mart, surprisals, takings at sea, arrests, restraints, and detainments of all kings, princes, or people of what nation, condition, or quality whatsoever."

The premiums received on these policies were large, and the losses were precisely those within the contemplation of the insurers. It is well known that the business of insurance is entered upon with the expectation that the premiums received will pay all losses and yield a profit to the insurance in addition; and yet, without any showing that the business did not result in a profit to these insurance claimants, it is proposed that the Government shall indemnify them against the precise risks they undertook, notwithstanding the fact that the money appropriated is not to be paid except "by way of gratuity-payments as of grace and not of right.”

The appropriations to indemnify against insurance losses rest upon weaker grounds, it seems to me, than those of owners; but in the light of all the facts and circumstances surrounding these spoliation claims, as they are called, none of them, in my opinion, should be paid by the Government.

Another item in this bill which seems to me especially objectionable is an appropriation in favor of Charles P. Chouteau, survivor, etc., of $174,445.75, in full satisfaction of all claims arising out of the construc tion of the ironclad steam battery Etlah.

The contract for the construction of this battery was made by the Government with Charles W. McCord during the war, and he was to be paid therefor the sum of $386,000. He was paid this sum and $210,991 for extras, and in May, 1866, gave his receipt in full. The assignee of McCord in bankruptcy assigned to Chouteau and his associates in 1868 all claims of McCord against the United States for the precise extras for which he had receipted in full two years before. Chouteau brought

suit in the Court of Claims for such extras and was defeated. I can not gather from the facts I have been able to collect concerning this appropriation that it is justified on any ground.

In 1890 my immediate predecessor vetoed a bill allowing the matter to be examined again by the Court of Claims.*

If the additional payment proposed in this bill was made, the cost of the battery in question would be almost double that of the contract price. I have determined to submit this incomplete presentation of my objections to this bill at once in order that the Congress may act thereon without embarrassment or the interruption of plans for an early adjournment. GROVER CLEVELAND.

To the House of Representatives:

EXECUTIVE MANSION, June 10, 1896.

I herewith return without my approval House bill No. 225, entitled "An act to provide for the lease of Fort Omaha Military Reservation to the State of Nebraska."

This bill authorizes and directs the Secretary of War, when Fort Crook, near the city of Omaha, is ready for occupancy, to lease for a nominal rent to the State of Nebraska the possession of Fort Omaha Military Reservation, containing about 80 acres, with all the buildings, appurtenances, and improvements thereof. It is declared that the lease shall be conditional upon the use of said reservation by the State of Nebraska as a place of rendezvous and school of instruction for the National Guard of said State; that the State of Nebraska shall while it is in possession of said reservation keep the buildings and improvements thereon in as good condition and repair as at the date it shall enter into possession thereof, and that at any time when, in the judgment of the Secretary of War, the interests of the United States shall require such action he shall take possession of said military reservation for the use of the Government, together with all the buildings, appurtenances, and improvements thereon.

On the 23d day of July, 1888, an act was passed authorizing the Secretary of War to purchase suitable grounds, of not less than 640 acres in extent, to be situate within 10 miles of the city of Omaha, and to construct the necessary buildings thereon for a ten-company military post, to be known as Fort Omaha, and a necessary sum, not exceeding $200,000, was appropriated to enable the Secretary of War to carry out the provisions of said act.

The said act also authorized the Secretary of War, when the purchase of the new site should be effected, to sell the military reservation know as Fort Omaha and such of the buildings and improvements thereon 2a could not be economically removed to the new site, and to cause the said reservation, for the purposes of said sale, to be platted in blocks, streets,

and alleys, if in his judgment it would inure to the benefit of the Govern ment in making a sale of such site.

The new site provided for by this act has been purchased, a large sum of money has been spent by the Government in preparing it for use, and I understand it will soon be ready for occupancy. The authority to sell the old site has not been exercised. This may be accounted for by the fact that the Government has not thus far been able to dispense with its use or because the depression in land values at Omaha has rendered it nadvisable.

The authority to sell and to remove any of the buildings from the old reservation to the new site still remains, however, unimpaired. In this condition of affairs it is now proposed to lease this land and these buildings to the State of Nebraska at a nominal rent, allowing the Government to repossess it only "when the interests of the United States shall require such action."

Of course it would be claimed that this language, in view of the statute of 1888, should not be construed as permitting the Government to retake the property for the purpose of selling it, because that is not stipulated in the bill. For that reason it would be plausibly urged that the lease was paramount to the power of sale contained in the law of 1888 and that the omission of any provision that possession might be resumed for the purpose of sale plainly indicated that "the interests of the United States" which allow such resumption contemplate some other and different emergency.

As a practical question, we all know that transactions of this character relating to Government property amount to a permanent alienation, or certainly pave the way for an absolute grant.

I do not think there should be anything done with this valuable property which will in the least embarrass the Government in its sale, and to that extent reimbursing itself for the cost of the new military post, which was plainly contemplated in the law of 1888.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

PROCLAMATIONS.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas the Congress of the United States passed an act, which was approved on the 16th day of July, 1894, entitled "An act to enable the people of Utah to form a constitution and State government and to be admitted into the Union on an equal footing with the original States," which act provided for the election of delegates to a constitutional con

vention to meet at the seat of government of the Territory of Utah on the first Monday in March, 1895, for the purpose of declaring the adoption of the Constitution of the United States by the people of the proposed State and forming a constitution and State government for such State; and

Whereas delegates were accordingly elected, who met, organized, and declared on behalf of the people of said proposed State their adoption of the Constitution of the United States, all as provided in said act; and

Whereas said convention, so organized, did, by ordinance irrevocable without the consent of the United States and the people of said State, as required by said act, provide that perfect toleration of religious sentiment shall be secured and that no inhabitant of said State shall ever be molested in person or property on account of his or her mode of religious worship, but that polygamous or plural marriages are forever prohibited, and did also by said ordinance make the other various stipulations recited in section 3 of said act; and

Whereas said convention thereupon formed a constitution and State government for said proposed State, which constitution, including said ordinance, was duly submitted to the people thereof at an election held on the Tuesday next after the first Monday of November, 1895, as directed by said act; and

Whereas the return of said election has been made and canvassed and the result thereof certified to me, together with a statement of the votes cast and a copy of said constitution and ordinance, all as provided in said act, showing that a majority of the votes lawfully cast at such election was for the ratification and adoption of said constitution and ordinance; and

Whereas the constitution and government of said proposed State are republican in form, said constitution is not repugnant to the Constitution of the United States and the Declaration of Independence, and all the provisions of said act have been complied with in the formation of said constitution and government:

Now, therefore, I, Grover Cleveland, President of the United States of America, in accordance with the act of Congress aforesaid and by authority thereof, announce the result of said election to be as so certified and do hereby declare and proclaim that the terms and conditions prescribed by the Congress of the United States to entitle the State of Utah to admission into the Union have been duly complied with and that the creation of said State and its admission into the Union on an equal footing with the original States is now accomplished.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

[SEAL.]

Done at the city of Washington, this 4th day of January, A. D. 1896, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and twentieth.

By the President:

GROVER CLEVELAND.

RICHARD OLNEY, Secretary of State.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas it is provided by section 13 of the act of Congress of March 3, 1891, entitled "An act to amend Title LX, chapter 3, of the Revised Statutes of the United States, relating to copyrights," that said act "shall only apply to a citizen or subject of a foreign state or nation when such foreign state or nation permits to citizens of the United States of America the benefit of copyright on substantially the same basis as its own citizens, or when such foreign state or nation is a party to an international agreement which provides for reciprocity in the granting of copyright, by the terms of which agreement the United States of America may at its pleasure become a party to such agreement;" and

Whereas it is also provided by said section that "the existence of either of the conditions aforesaid shall be determined by the President of the United States by proclamation made from time to time as the purposes of this act may require;" and

Whereas satisfactory official assurances have been given that in the United States of Mexico the law permits to citizens of the United States of America the benefit of copyright on substantially the same basis as to the citizens of that Republic:

Now, therefore, I, Grover Cleveland, President of the United States of America, do declare and proclaim that the first of the conditions specified in section 13 of the act of March 3, 1891, now exists and is fulfilled in respect to the citizens of the United States of Mexico.

In testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the sea! of the United States to be affixed.

[SEAL.]

Done at the city of Washington, this 27th day of February, 1896, and of the Independence of the United States the one hundred and twentieth.

By the President:

GROVER CLEVELAND.

RICHARD OLNEY, Secretary of State.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF America.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas in a suit between the United States and the State of Texas involving the title to and jurisdiction over all that territory lying between the North and South forks of the Red River and the one hundredth degree of longitude, known and styled as "Greer County, Tex.," the Supreme Court of the United States has decided that the title to and jurisdiction over said territory is vested in the United States; and

Whereas the Choctaw Nation claims that the title to these lands passed