ich that company should bear if the
title of Mr. McGarrahan is established.

The United States provided a proper tribunal for the trial of claims
founded upon Mexican grants. This claim was there tried, and if fraud
affected the judgment it is not, I think, chargeable to the Government;
the contest was chiefly between rival claimants. In this state of the
case it would seem that if the United States consents to open the
litigation and to wipe out all judicial findings and decrees a less
exacting measure of damages than that proposed in the bill should be
agreed on.

It is not my purpose, as I have intimated, to express the opinion that
Mr. McGarrahan is entitled to no relief. It seems to me, however, clear
that he is not entitled to the relief given by this bill, and that it
does not adequately protect the interests of the United States.

BENJ. HARRISON.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, _August 3, 1892_.

_To the Senate_:

I return herewith without my approval the bill (S. 1111) entitled "An
act to amend the act of Congress approved March 3, 1887, entitled 'An
act to provide for the bringing of suits against the Government of the
United States.'"

If I may judge from the very limited discussion of this measure in
Congress, the sweeping effects of it upon the administration of the
public lands could hardly have been fully realized. From the beginning
of the Government the administration of the public lands and the issuing
of patents under the land laws have been an Executive function.

The jurisdiction of the courts as to contesting claims for patents has
awaited the action of the General Land Office. Land offices have been
established and maintained in all the districts where public lands were
found, located with reference to the convenience of the settlers, and
the proceedings have been informal and inexpensive. It is true that at
times, by an administration of the Land Office unfriendly toward the
settlers, unnecessary delays involving much hardship have intervened in
the issuing of patents, but such is not the case now. The work of the
Land Office within the last three years has been so efficient and so
friendly to the _bona fide_ settler that the large accumulation of cases
there has been swept away, and the office, as I am informed by the
Secretary of the Interior, is now engaged upon current business.

It seems to me that a transfer in whole or in part of this business to
the courts, some of whose dockets are al