Читать книгу A Supplement to A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents: William McKinley - William McKinley - Страница 11
MESSAGES.
ОглавлениеEXECUTIVE MANSION, March 15, 1897.
To the Congress of the United States:
Regretting the necessity which has required me to call you together, I feel that your assembling in extraordinary session is indispensable because of the condition in which we find the revenues of the Government. It is conceded that its current expenditures are greater than its receipts, and that such a condition has existed for now more than three years. With unlimited means at our command, we are presenting the remarkable spectacle of increasing our public debt by borrowing money to meet the ordinary outlays incident upon even an economical and prudent administration of the Government. An examination of the subject discloses this fact in every detail and leads inevitably to the conclusion that the condition of the revenue which allows it is unjustifiable and should be corrected.
We find by the reports of the Secretary of the Treasury that the revenues for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1892, from all sources were $425,868,260.22, and the expenditures for all purposes were $415,953,806.56, leaving an excess of receipts over expenditures of $9,914,453.66. During that fiscal year $40,570,467.98 were paid upon the public debt, which had been reduced since March 1, 1889, $259,076,890, and the annual interest charge decreased $11,684,576.60. The receipts of the Government from all sources during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1893, amounted to $461,716,561.94, audits expenditures to $459,374,887.65, showing an excess of receipts over expenditures of $2,341,674.29.
Since that time the receipts of no fiscal year, and with but few exceptions of no month of any fiscal year, have exceeded the expenditures. The receipts of the Government, from all sources, during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1894, were $372,802,498.29, and its expenditures $442,605,758.87, leaving a deficit, the first since the resumption of specie payments, of $69,803,260.58. Notwithstanding there was a decrease of $16,769,128.78 in the ordinary expenses of the Government, as compared with the previous fiscal year, its income was still not sufficient to provide for its daily necessities, and the gold reserve in the Treasury for the redemption of greenbacks was drawn upon to meet them. But this did not suffice, and the Government then resorted to loans to replenish the reserve.
In February, 1894, $50,000,000 in bonds were issued, and in November following a second issue of $50,000,000 was deemed necessary. The sum of $117,171,795 was realized by the sale of these bonds, but the reserve was steadily decreased until, on February 8, 1895, a third sale of $62,315,400 in bonds, for $65,116,244, was announced to Congress.
The receipts of the Government for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1895, were $390,373,203.30 and the expenditures $433,178,426.48, showing a deficit of $42,805,223.18. A further loan of $100,000,000 was negotiated by the Government in February, 1896, the sale netting $111,166,246, and swelling the aggregate of bonds issued within three years to $262,315,400. For the fiscal year ending June 30, 1896, the revenues of the Government from all sources amounted to $409,475,408.78, while its expenditures were $434,678,654.48, or an excess of expenditures over receipts of $25,203,245.70. In other words, the total receipts for the three fiscal years ending June 30, 1896, were insufficient by $137,811,729.46 to meet the total expenditures.
Nor has this condition since improved. For the first half of the present fiscal year, the receipts of the Government, exclusive of postal revenues, were $157,507,603.76, and its expenditures, exclusive of postal service, $195,410,000.22, or an excess of expenditures over receipts of $37,902,396.46. In January of this year, the receipts, exclusive of postal revenues, were $24,316,994.05, and the expenditures, exclusive of postal service, $30,269,389.29, a deficit of $5,952,395.24 for the month. In February of this year, the receipts, exclusive of postal revenues, were $24,400,997.38, and expenditures, exclusive of postal service, $28,796,056.66, a deficit of $4,395,059.28; or a total deficiency of $186,061,580.44 for the three years and eight months ending March 1, 1897. Not only are we without a surplus in the Treasury, but with an increase in the public debt there has been a corresponding increase in the annual interest charge, from $22,893,883.20 in 1892, the lowest of any year since 1862, to $34,387,297.60 in 1896, or an increase of $11,493,414.40.
It may be urged that even if the revenues of the Government had been sufficient to meet all its ordinary expenses during the past three years, the gold reserve would still have been insufficient to meet the demands upon it, and that bonds would necessarily have been issued for its repletion. Be this as it may, it is clearly manifest, without denying or affirming the correctness of such a conclusion, that the debt would have been decreased in at least the amount of the deficiency, and business confidence immeasurably strengthened throughout the country.
Congress should promptly correct the existing condition. Ample revenues must be supplied not only for the ordinary expenses of the Government, but for the prompt payment of liberal pensions and the liquidation of the principal and interest of the public debt. In raising revenue, duties should be so levied upon foreign products as to preserve the home market, so far as possible, to our own producers; to revive and increase manufactures; to relieve and encourage agriculture; to increase our domestic and foreign commerce; to aid and develop mining and building; and to render to labor in every field of useful occupation the liberal wages and adequate rewards to which skill and industry are justly entitled. The necessity of the passage of a tariff law which shall provide ample revenue, need not be further urged. The imperative demand of the hour is the prompt enactment of such a measure, and to this object I earnestly recommend that Congress shall make every endeavor. Before other business is transacted, let us first provide sufficient revenue to faithfully administer the Government without the contracting of further debt, or the continued disturbance of our finances.
WILLIAM McKINLEY.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, April 7, 1897.
To the Senate and House of Representatives:
Information which has recently come to me from the governors of Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana, and from prominent citizens of these States and Tennessee, warrants the conclusion that widespread distress, involving the destruction of a large amount of property and loss of human life, has resulted from the floods which have submerged that section of the country. These are stated, on reliable authority, to be the most destructive floods that have ever devastated the Mississippi Valley, the water being much higher than the highest stage it has reached before. From Marion, Ark., north of Memphis, to Greenville, Miss., a distance of more than 250 miles by river, it is reported there are now at least fifty towns and villages under water, and a territory extending from 100 miles north of Memphis to 200 miles south, and from 5 to 40 miles wide, is submerged. Hundreds of thousands of acres of cultivated soil, with growing crops, are included in the submerged territory. In this section alone there are from 50,000 to 60,000 people whose property has been destroyed and whose business has been suspended. Growing crops have been ruined, thousands of cattle have been drowned, and the inhabitants of certain areas threatened with starvation. As a great majority of the sufferers are small farmers, they have thus been left entirely destitute, and will be unprepared for work even after the floods have subsided.
The entire Mississippi Valley in Arkansas is flooded and communication with many points cut off. In Mississippi a like condition exists. The levees in Louisiana, with a single exception, have held; but the water is rising and the situation there is reported as being extremely critical.
Under such circumstances the citizens of these States look for the co-operation and support of the National Government in relieving the pressing cases of destitution for food, clothing, and shelter, which are beyond the reach of local efforts. The authorities who have communicated with the Executive recognize that their first and most energetic duty is to provide as far as possible the means of caring for their own citizens; but nearly all of them agree in the opinion that after their resources have been exhausted a sum aggregating at least $150,000 and possibly $200,000 will be required for immediate use.
Precedents are not wanting that in such emergencies as this Congress has taken prompt, generous, and intelligent action, involving the expenditure of considerable sums of money, with satisfactory results. In 1874 $590,000 was appropriated, and in 1882 $350,000 was also appropriated for relief in same direction, besides large sums in other years.
The citizens' relief committee of Memphis has taken prompt action, has already cared for from 6,000 to 7,000 refugees from the flooded districts, and they are still arriving in that city in large numbers daily. Supplies and provisions have been sent to the various points in Arkansas and Mississippi by this committee, but the utmost that can be done by these efforts is to partly relieve the most acute cases of suffering. No action has yet been taken for the great majority of the inhabitants living in the interior, whose condition has already been described.
Under these conditions and having exerted themselves to the fullest extent, the local authorities have reluctantly confessed their inability to further cope with this distressing situation unaided by relief from the Government. It has therefore seemed to me that the representatives of the people should be promptly informed of the nature and extent of the suffering and needs of these stricken people, and I have communicated these facts in the hope and belief that the legislative branch of the Government will promptly re-enforce the work of the local authorities in the States named.
WILLIAM McKINLEY.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, Washington, April 14, 1897.
To the Senate and House of Representatives:
I transmit herewith for the consideration of the respective Houses of the Congress, a report of the Secretary of State representing the appropriateness of early action in order that the Government of the United States may be enabled to accept the invitation of that of the French Republic to participate in the Universal Exposition to be held at Paris in 1900.
The recommendations of this report have my most cordial approval, and I urge upon the Congress such timely provision for this great international enterprise as will fittingly respond to the widely testified wish and expectation of our inventors and producers that they may have adequate opportunity again, as in the past, to fortify the important positions that have won in the world's competitive fields of discovery and industry. Nor are the traditional friendships of the United States and France and the mutual advantages to accrue from their enlarged commercial intercourse less important factors than the individual interests to be fostered by renewed participation in a great French exposition, especially when it is remembered that the present display is projected with a degree of completeness and on a scale of magnificence beyond any of the European exhibitions that have marked the close of the century.
It is proper that I should emphasize the need of early action, for if the present session pass without suitable provision being made, the postponement of the matter for nearly a year longer could not but operate greatly to the disadvantage of the United States, in view of the elaborate preparations already making by other governments, and of the danger that further delay may result in an inadequate allotment of space to this country as well as an incomplete organization of the American exhibit.
WILLIAM McKINLEY.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, Washington, May 3, 1897.
To the Congress of the United States:
I transmit a report from the Secretary of State reciting the circumstances attending the lynching at Hahnville, La., on the night of August 8, 1896, of three Italian subjects, named Salvatore Arena, Giuseppe Venturelia, and Lorenzo Salardino, and I recommend the appropriation by Congress, without admitting the liability of the Government of the United States in the premises, of the sum of $6,000, to be paid by the Secretary of State to the Government of Italy, and to be distributed by that government in such manner as it may deem proper among the heirs of the three Italian subjects above named.
WILLIAM McKINLEY.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, Washington, May 13, 1897.
To the Senate of the United States:
I transmit herewith, in response to the Senate resolution of April 22, 1897, addressed to the Secretary of State, a report from that officer relative to diplomatic and consular reports on postal savings banks systems in foreign countries.
WILLIAM McKINLEY.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, May 17, 1897.
To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States:
Official information from our consuls in Cuba establishes the fact that a large number of American citizens in the island are in a state of destitution, suffering for want of food and medicines. This applies particularly to the rural districts of the central and eastern parts.
The agricultural classes have been forced from their farms into the nearest towns, where they are without work or money. The local authorities of the several towns, however kindly disposed, are unable to relieve the needs of their own people, and are altogether powerless to help our citizens.
The latest report of Consul-General Lee estimates six to eight hundred Americans are without means of support. I have assured him that provision would be made at once to relieve them. To that end I recommend that Congress make an appropriation of not less than $50,000, to be immediately available for use, under the direction of the Secretary of State.
It is desirable that a part of the sum which may be appropriated by Congress should, in the discretion of the Secretary of State, also be used for the transportation of American citizens who, desiring to return to the United States, are without means to do so.
WILLIAM McKINLEY.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, July 1, 1897.
To the Congress of the United States:
On the 15th ultimo all the buildings of the immigration station at Ellis Island, New York, excepting the heating plant and lighting apparatus, were destroyed by fire.
I transmit herewith a letter from the Secretary of the Treasury, which states the fact and explains the need of rebuilding.
In order that there may be no delay in this important work, I recommend that an appropriation be made at once of $600,000, the sum estimated by the Secretary of the Treasury as required for this purpose.
WILLIAM McKINLEY.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, Washington, July 23, 1897.
To the Senate of the United States:
I transmit herewith a report from the Acting Secretary of State, with an accompanying paper, in response to the resolution of the Senate of July 12, 1897, requesting the Secretary of State to send to the diplomatic representatives of the United States abroad a circular letter, similar to the one sent by Secretary Elaine on May 20, 1881, instructing them to obtain from the several foreign governments to which they are accredited as full information as possible (including copy of laws relating thereto) as to the nature and practical workings (including expenses, receipts, and rates) of the postal telegraphs, telephones, and postal savings banks of such countries as have adopted the same.
WILLIAM McKINLEY.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, July 24, 1897.
To the Congress of the United States:
In my message convening the Congress in extraordinary session I called attention to a single subject—that of providing revenue adequate to meet the reasonable and proper expenses of the Government. I believed that to be the most pressing subject for settlement then. A bill to provide the necessary revenues for the Government has already passed the House of Representatives and the Senate and awaits executive action.
Another question of very great importance is that of the establishment of our currency and banking system on a better basis, which I commented upon in my inaugural address in the following words:
Our financial system needs some revision; our money is all good now, but its value must not further be threatened. It should all be put upon an enduring basis, not subject to easy attack, nor its stability to doubt or dispute. The several forms of our paper money offer, in my judgment, a constant embarrassment to the Government and imperil a safe balance in the Treasury.
Nothing was settled more clearly at the late national election than the determination upon the part of the people to keep their currency stable in value and equal to that of the most advanced nations of the world.
The soundness of our currency is nowhere questioned. No loss can occur to its holders. It is the system which should be simplified and strengthened, keeping our money just as good as it is now with less expense to the Government and the people.
The sentiment of the country is strongly in favor of early action by Congress in this direction, to revise our currency laws and remove them from partisan contention. A notable assembly of business men with delegates from twenty-nine States and Territories was held at Indianapolis in January of this year. The financial situation commanded their earnest attention, and after a two days' session the convention recommended to Congress the appointment of a monetary commission.
I recommend this report to the consideration of Congress. The authors of the report recommend a commission "to make a thorough investigation of the monetary affairs and needs of this country in all relations and aspects, and to make proper suggestions as to any evils found to exist and the remedies therefor."
This subject should receive the attention of Congress at its special session. It ought not to be postponed until the regular session.
I therefore urgently recommend that a special commission be created, non-partisan in its character, to be composed of well-informed citizens of different parties who will command the confidence of Congress and the country because of their special fitness for the work, whose duty it shall be to make recommendations of whatever changes in our present banking and currency laws may be found necessary and expedient, and to report their conclusions on or before the 1st day of November next, in order that the same may be transmitted by me to Congress for its consideration at its first regular session.
It is to be hoped that the report thus made will be so comprehensive and sound as to receive the support of all parties and the favorable action of Congress. At all events, such a report cannot fail to be of value to the executive branch of the Government, as well as to those charged with public legislation, and to greatly assist in the establishment of an improved system of finance.
WILLIAM McKINLEY.
