omptroller.
This bill, should it become a law, clearly excuses Mr. McCullah, late
collector, from showing that he used due diligence for the collection
of the tax in question while the lists remained in his hands.

U.S. GRANT.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _February 11, 1873_.

_To the Senate of the United States:_

I return herewith without my approval Senate bill No. 161, entitled
"An act for the relief of those suffering from the destruction of salt
works near Manchester, Ky., pursuant to the order of Major-General
Carlos Buell."

All the objections made by me to the bill for the relief of J. Milton
Best, and also of the East Tennessee University, apply with equal force
to this bill.

According to the official report of Brigadier-General Craft, by whose
immediate command the property in question was destroyed, there was a
large rebel force in the neighborhood, who were using the salt works and
had carried away a considerable quantity of salt, and were preparing to
take more as soon as the necessary transportation could be procured; and
he further states "that the leaders of the rebellion calculated upon
their supply of salt to come from these works," and that in his opinion
their destruction was a military necessity. I understand him to say, in
effect, that the salt works were captured from the rebels; that it was
impracticable to hold them, and that they were demolished so as to be of
no further use to the enemy.

I can not agree that the owners of property destroyed under such
circumstances are entitled to compensation therefor from the United
States. Whatever other view may be taken of the subject, it is
incontrovertible that these salt works were destroyed by the Union Army
while engaged in regular military operations, and that the sole object
of their destruction was to weaken, cripple, or defeat the armies of the
so-called Southern Confederacy.

I am greatly apprehensive that the allowance of this claim could and
would be construed into the recognition of a principle binding the
United States to pay for all property which their military forces
destroyed in the late war for the Union. No liability by the Government
to pay for property destroyed by the Union forces in conducting a battle
or siege has yet been claimed, but the precedent proposed by this bill
leads directly and strongly in that direction, for it is difficult upon
any ground of reason or justice to distinguish between a case of that
kind and th