A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents. Volume 8, part 3: Grover Cleveland, First Term

Grover Cleveland

March 4, 1885, to March 4, 1889

Grover Cleveland

Grover Cleveland was born in Caldwell, Essex County, N.J., March 18, 1837. On the paternal side he is of English origin. Moses Cleveland emigrated from Ipswich, County of Suffolk, England, in 1635, and settled at Woburn, Mass., where he died in 1701. His descendant William Cleveland was a silversmith and watchmaker at Norwich, Conn. Richard Falley Cleveland, son of the latter named, was graduated at Yale in 1824, was ordained to the Presbyterian ministry in 1829, and in the same year married Ann Neal, daughter of a Baltimore merchant of Irish birth. These two were the parents of Grover Cleveland. The Presbyterian parsonage at Caldwell, where he was born, was first occupied by the Rev. Stephen Grover, in whose honor he was named; but the first name was early dropped, and he has been since known as Grover Cleveland. When he was 4 years old his father accepted a call to Fayetteville, near Syracuse, N.Y., where the son had common and academic schooling, and afterwards was a clerk in a country store. The removal of the family to Clinton, Oneida County, gave him additional educational advantages in the academy there. In his seventeenth year he became a clerk and an assistant teacher in the New York Institution for the Blind, in New York City, in which his elder brother, William, a Presbyterian clergyman, was then a teacher. In 1855 he left Holland Patent, in Oneida County, where his mother at that time resided, to go to the West in search of employment. On his way he stopped at Black Rock, now a part of Buffalo, and called on his uncle, Lewis F. Allen, who induced him to remain and aid him in the compilation of a volume of the American Herd Book, receiving for six weeks' service $60. He afterwards, and while studying law, assisted in the preparation of several other volumes of this work, and the preface to the fifth volume (1861) acknowledges his services. In August, 1855, he secured a place as clerk and copyist for the law firm of Rogers, Bowen & Rogers, in Buffalo, began to read Blackstone, and in the autumn of that year was receiving $4 per week for his work. He was admitted to the bar in 1859, but for three years longer remained with the firm that first employed him, acting as managing clerk at a salary of $600, a part of which he devoted to the support of his widowed mother, who died in 1882. Was appointed assistant district attorney of Erie County January 1, 1863, and held the office for three years. At this time the Civil War was raging. Two of his brothers were in the Army, and his mother and sisters were largely dependent upon him for support. Unable himself to enlist, he borrowed money and sent a substitute to the war, and it was not till long after the war that he was able to repay the loan. In 1865, at the age of 28, he was the Democratic candidate for district attorney, but was defeated by the Republican candidate, his intimate friend, Lyman K. Bass. He then became the law partner of Isaac V. Vanderpool, and in 1869 became a member of the firm of Lanning, Cleveland & Folsom. He continued a successful practice till 1870, when he was elected sheriff of Erie County. At the expiration of his three years' term he formed a law partnership with his personal friend and political antagonist, Lyman K. Bass, the firm being Bass, Cleveland & Bissell, and, after the forced retirement, from failing health, of Mr. Bass, Cleveland & Bissell. In 1881 he was nominated the Democratic candidate for mayor of Buffalo, and was elected by a majority of 3,530, the largest ever given to a candidate in that city. In the same election the Republican State ticket was carried in Buffalo by an average majority of over 1,600. He entered upon the office January 1, 1882, and soon became known as the "Veto Mayor," using that prerogative fearlessly in checking unwise, illegal, and extravagant expenditures. By his vetoes he saved the city nearly $1,000,000 in the first half year of his administration. He opposed giving $500 of the taxpayers' money to the Firemen's Benevolent Society on the ground that such appropriation was not permissible under the terms of the State constitution and the charter of the city. He vetoed a resolution diverting $500 from the Fourth of July appropriations to the observance of Decoration Day for the same reason, and immediately subscribed one-tenth of the sum wanted for the purpose. His administration of the office won tributes to his integrity and ability from the press and the people irrespective of party. On the second day of the Democratic State convention at Syracuse, September 22, 1882, on the third ballot, was nominated for governor in opposition to the Republican candidate, Charles J. Folger, then Secretary of the United States Treasury. He had the united support of his own party, while the Republicans were not united on his opponent, and at the election in November he received a plurality over Mr. Folger of 192,854. His State administration was only an expansion of the fundamental principles that controlled his official action while mayor of Buffalo. In a letter written to his brother on the day of his election he announced a policy he intended to adopt, and afterwards carried out, "that is, to make the matter a business engagement between the people of the State and myself, in which the obligation on my side is to perform the duties assigned me with an eye single to the interest of my employers." The Democratic national convention met at Chicago July 8, 1884. On July 11 he was nominated as their candidate for President. The Republicans made James G. Blaine their candidate, while Benjamin F. Butler, of Massachusetts, was the Labor and Greenback candidate, and John P. St. John, of Kansas, was the Prohibition candidate. At the election, November 4, Mr. Cleveland received 219 and Mr. Blaine 182 electoral votes. He was unanimously renominated for the Presidency by the national Democratic convention in St. Louis on June 6, 1888. At the election in November he received 168 electoral votes, while 233 were cast for Benjamin Harrison, the Republican candidate. Of the popular vote, however, he received 5,540,329, and Mr. Harrison received 5,439,853. At the close of his Administration, March 4, 1889, he retired to New York City, where he reentered upon the practice of his profession. It soon became evident, however, that he would be prominently urged as a candidate for renomination in 1892. At the national Democratic convention which met in Chicago June 21, 1892, he received more than two-thirds of the votes on the first ballot. At the election in November he received 277 of the electoral votes, while Mr. Harrison received 145 and Mr. James B. Weaver, the candidate of the People's Party, 22. Of the popular vote Mr. Cleveland received 5,553,142, Mr. Harrison 5,186,931, and Mr. Weaver 1,030,128. He retired from office March 4, 1897, and removed to Princeton, N.J., where he has since resided. He is the first of our Presidents who served a second term without being elected as his own successor. President Cleveland was married in the White House on June 2, 1886, to Miss Frances Folsom, daughter of his deceased friend and partner, Oscar Folsom, of the Buffalo bar. Mrs. Cleveland was the youngest (except the wife of Mr. Madison) of the many mistresses of the White House, having been born in Buffalo, N.Y., in 1864. She is the first wife of a President married in the White House, and the first to give birth to a child there, their second daughter (Esther) having been born in the Executive Mansion in 1893.

INAUGURAL ADDRESS.

FELLOW-CITIZENS: In the presence of this vast assemblage of my countrymen I am about to supplement and seal by the oath which I shall take the manifestation of the will of a great and free people. In the exercise of their power and right of self-government they have committed to one of their fellow-citizens a supreme and sacred trust, and he here consecrates himself to their service.

This impressive ceremony adds little to the solemn sense of responsibility with which I contemplate the duty I owe to all the people of the land. Nothing can relieve me from anxiety lest by any act of mine their interests may suffer, and nothing is needed to strengthen my resolution to engage every faculty and effort in the promotion of their welfare.

Amid the din of party strife the people's choice was made, but its attendant circumstances have demonstrated anew the strength and safety of a government by the people. In each succeeding year it more clearly appears that our democratic principle needs no apology, and that in its fearless and faithful application is to be found the surest guaranty of good government.

But the best results in the operation of a government wherein every citizen has a share largely depend upon a proper limitation of purely partisan zeal and effort and a correct appreciation of the time when the heat of the partisan should be merged in the patriotism of the citizen.

To-day the executive branch of the Government is transferred to new keeping. But this is still the Government of all the people, and it should be none the less an object of their affectionate solicitude. At this hour the animosities of political strife, the bitterness of partisan defeat, and the exultation of partisan triumph should be supplanted by an ungrudging acquiescence in the popular will and a sober, conscientious concern for the general weal. Moreover, if from this hour we cheerfully and honestly abandon all sectional prejudice and distrust, and determine, with manly confidence in one another, to work out harmoniously the achievements of our national destiny, we shall deserve to realize all the benefits which our happy form of government can bestow.

On this auspicious occasion we may well renew the pledge of our devotion to the Constitution, which, launched by the founders of the Republic and consecrated by their prayers and patriotic devotion, has for almost a century borne the hopes and the aspirations of a great people through prosperity and peace and through the shock of foreign conflicts and the perils of domestic strife and vicissitudes.

By the Father of his Country our Constitution was commended for adoption as "the result of a spirit of amity and mutual concession." In that same spirit it should be administered, in order to promote the lasting welfare of the country and to secure the full measure of its priceless benefits to us and to those who will succeed to the blessings of our national life. The large variety of diverse and competing interests subject to Federal control, persistently seeking the recognition of their claims, need give us no fear that "the greatest good to the greatest number" will fail to be accomplished if in the halls of national legislation that spirit of amity and mutual concession shall prevail in which the Constitution had its birth. If this involves the surrender or postponement of private interests and the abandonment of local advantages, compensation will be found in the assurance that the common interest is subserved and the general welfare advanced.

In the discharge of my official duty I shall endeavor to be guided by a just and unstrained construction of the Constitution, a careful observance of the distinction between the powers granted to the Federal Government and those reserved to the States or to the people, and by a cautious appreciation of those functions which by the Constitution and laws have been especially assigned to the executive branch of the Government.

But he who takes the oath to-day to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States only assumes the solemn obligation which every patriotic citizen—on the farm, in the workshop, in the busy marts of trade, and everywhere—should share with him. The Constitution which prescribes his oath, my countrymen, is yours; the Government you have chosen him to administer for a time is yours; the suffrage which executes the will of freemen is yours; the laws and the entire scheme of our civil rule, from the town meeting to the State capitals and the national capital, is yours. Your every voter, as surely as your Chief Magistrate, under the same high sanction, though in a different sphere, exercises a public trust. Nor is this all. Every citizen owes to the country a vigilant watch and close scrutiny of its public servants and a fair and reasonable estimate of their fidelity and usefulness. Thus is the people's will impressed upon the whole framework of our civil polity—municipal, State, and Federal; and this is the price of our liberty and the inspiration of our faith in the Republic.

It is the duty of those serving the people in public place to closely limit public expenditures to the actual needs of the Government economically administered, because this bounds the right of the Government to exact tribute from the earnings of labor or the property of the citizen, and because public extravagance begets extravagance among the people. We should never be ashamed of the simplicity and prudential economies which are best suited to the operation of a republican form of government and most compatible with the mission of the American people. Those who are selected for a limited time to manage public affairs are still of the people, and may do much by their example to encourage, consistently with the dignity of their official functions, that plain way of life which among their fellow-citizens aids integrity and promotes thrift and prosperity.

The genius of our institutions, the needs of our people in their home life, and the attention which is demanded for the settlement and development of the resources of our vast territory dictate the scrupulous avoidance of any departure from that foreign policy commended by the history, the traditions, and the prosperity of our Republic. It is the policy of independence, favored by our position and defended by our known love of justice and by our power. It is the policy of peace suitable to our interests. It is the policy of neutrality, rejecting any share in foreign broils and ambitions upon other continents and repelling their intrusion here. It is the policy of Monroe and of Washington and Jefferson—"Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations; entangling alliance with none."

A due regard for the interests and prosperity of all the people demands that our finances shall be established upon such a sound and sensible basis as shall secure the safety and confidence of business interests and make the wage of labor sure and steady, and that our system of revenue shall be so adjusted as to relieve the people of unnecessary taxation, having a due regard to the interests of capital invested and workingmen employed in American industries, and preventing the accumulation of a surplus in the Treasury to tempt extravagance and waste.

Care for the property of the nation and for the needs of future settlers requires that the public domain should be protected from purloining schemes and unlawful occupation.

The conscience of the people demands that the Indians within our boundaries shall be fairly and honestly treated as wards of the Government and their education and civilization promoted with a view to their ultimate citizenship, and that polygamy in the Territories, destructive of the family relation and offensive to the moral sense of the civilized world, shall be repressed.

The laws should be rigidly enforced which prohibit the immigration of a servile class to compete with American labor, with no intention of acquiring citizenship, and bringing with them and retaining habits and customs repugnant to our civilization.

The people demand reform in the administration of the Government and the application of business principles to public affairs. As a means to this end, civil-service reform should be in good faith enforced. Our citizens have the right to protection from the incompetency of public employees who hold their places solely as the reward of partisan service, and from the corrupting influence of those who promise and the vicious methods of those who expect such rewards; and those who worthily seek public employment have the right to insist that merit and competency shall be recognized instead of party subserviency or the surrender of honest political belief.

In the administration of a government pledged to do equal and exact justice to all men there should be no pretext for anxiety touching the protection of the freedmen in their rights or their security in the enjoyment of their privileges under the Constitution and its amendments. All discussion as to their fitness for the place accorded to them as American citizens is idle and unprofitable except as it suggests the necessity for their improvement. The fact that they are citizens entitles them to all the rights due to that relation and charges them with all its duties, obligations, and responsibilities.

These topics and the constant and ever-varying wants of an active and enterprising population may well receive the attention and the patriotic endeavor of all who make and execute the Federal law. Our duties are practical and call for industrious application, an intelligent perception of the claims of public office, and, above all, a firm determination, by united action, to secure to all the people of the land the full benefits of the best form of government ever vouchsafed to man. And let us not trust to human effort alone, but humbly acknowledging the power and goodness of Almighty God, who presides over the destiny of nations, and who has at all times been revealed in our country's history, let us invoke His aid and His blessing upon our labors.

MARCH 4, 1885.

SPECIAL MESSAGES.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, March 13, 1885.

To the Senate of the United States:

For the purpose of their reexamination I withdraw certain treaties and conventions now pending in the Senate which were communicated to that body by my predecessor in office, and I therefore request the return to me of the commercial convention between the United States and the Dominican Republic which was transmitted to the Senate December 9, 1884; of the commercial treaty between the United States and Spain which was transmitted to the Senate December 10, 1884, together with the supplementary articles thereto of March 2, 1885; and of the treaty between the United States and Nicaragua for the construction of an interoceanic canal which was transmitted to the Senate December 10, 1884.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

EXECUTIVE MANSION, Washington, April 2, 1885.

To the Senate of the United States:

For the purpose of its reconsideration I withdraw the additional article, now pending in the Senate, signed on the 23d of June last, to the treaty of friendship, commerce, and navigation which was concluded between the United States and the Argentine Confederation July 27, 1853, and communicated to the Senate by my predecessor in office 27th of January, 1885.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

PROCLAMATIONS.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas it is alleged that certain individuals, associations of persons, and corporations are in the unauthorized possession of portions of the territory known as the Oklahoma lands, within the Indian Territory, which are designated, described, and recognized by the treaties and laws of the United States and by the executive authority thereof as Indian lands; and

Whereas it is further alleged that certain other persons or associations within the territory and jurisdiction of the United States have begun and set on foot preparations for an organized and forcible entry and settlement upon the aforesaid lands and are now threatening such entry and occupation; and

Whereas the laws of the United States provide for the removal of all persons residing or being found upon such Indian lands and territory without permission expressly and legally obtained of the Interior Department:

Now, therefore, for the purpose of protecting the public interests, as well as the interests of the Indian nations and tribes, and to the end that no person or persons may be induced to enter upon said territory, where they will not be allowed to remain without the permission of the authority aforesaid, I, Grover Cleveland, President of the United States, do hereby warn and admonish all and every person or persons now in the occupation of such lands, and all such person or persons as are intending, preparing, or threatening to enter and settle upon the same, that they will neither be permitted to enter upon said territory nor, if already there, to remain thereon, and that in case a due regard for and voluntary obedience to the laws and treaties of the United States and if this admonition and warning be not sufficient to effect the purposes and intentions of the Government as herein declared, the military power of the United States will be invoked to abate all such unauthorized possession, to prevent such threatened entry and occupation, and to remove all such intruders from the said Indian lands.

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 13th day of March, 1885, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and ninth.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

By the President:
T.F. BAYARD,
Secretary of State.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas satisfactory evidence has been received by me that upon vessels of the United States arriving at the island of Trinidad, British West Indies, no duty is imposed by the ton as tonnage tax or as light money, and that no other equivalent tax on vessels of the United States is imposed at said island by the British Government; and Whereas by the provisions of section 14 of an act approved June 26, 1884, "to remove certain burdens on the American merchant marine and encourage the American foreign carrying trade, and for other purposes," the President of the United States is authorized to suspend the collection in ports of the United States from vessels arriving from any port in the island of Trinidad of so much of the duty at the rate of 3 cents per ton as may be in excess of the tonnage and light-house dues, or other equivalent of tax or taxes, imposed on American vessels by the government of the foreign country in which such port is situated:

Now, therefore, I, Grover Cleveland, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the act and section hereinbefore mentioned, do hereby declare and proclaim that on and after this 7th day of April, 1885, the collection of said tonnage duty of 3 cents per ton shall be suspended as regards all vessels arriving in any port of the United States from a port in the island of Trinidad, British West Indies.

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 7th day of April, 1885, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and ninth.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

By the President:
T.F. BAYARD,
Secretary of State.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas, by an Executive order bearing date the 27th day of February, 1885, it was ordered that "all that tract of country in the Territory of Dakota known as the Old Winnebago Reservation and the Sioux or Crow Creek Reservation, and lying on the east bank of the Missouri River, set apart and reserved by Executive order dated January 11, 1875, and which is not covered by the Executive order dated August 9, 1879, restoring certain of the lands reserved by the order of January 11, 1875, except the following-described tracts: Townships No. 108 north, range 71 west; 108 north, range 72 west; fractional township 108 north, range 73 west; the west half of section 4, sections 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, and 33 of township 107 north, range 70 west; fractional townships 107 north, range 71 west; 107 north, range 72 west; 107 north, range 73 west; the west half of township 106 north, range 70 west; and fractional township 106 north, range 71 west; and except also all tracts within the limits of the aforesaid Old Winnebago Reservation and the Sioux or Crow Creek Reservation which are outside of the limits of the above-described tracts, and which may have heretofore been allotted to the Indians residing upon said reservation, or which may have heretofore been selected or occupied by the said Indians under and in accordance with the provisions of article 6 of the treaty with the Sioux Indians of April 29, 1868, be, and the same is hereby, restored to the public domain;" and

Whereas upon the claim being made that said order is illegal and in violation of the plighted faith and obligations of the United States contained in sundry treaties heretofore entered into with the Indian tribes or bands occupants of said reservation, and that the further execution of said order will not only occasion much distress and suffering to peaceable Indians, but retard the work of their civilization and engender amongst them a distrust of the National Government, I have determined, after a careful examination of the several treaties, acts of Congress, and other official data bearing on the subject, aided and assisted therein by the advice and opinion of the Attorney-General of the United States duly rendered in that behalf, that the lands so proposed to be restored to the public domain by said Executive order of February 27, 1885, are included as existing Indian reservations on the east bank of the Missouri River by the terms of the second article of the treaty with the Sioux Indians concluded April 29, 1868, and that consequently, being treaty reservations, the Executive was without lawful power to restore them to the public domain by said Executive order, which is therefore deemed and considered to be wholly inoperative and void; and

Whereas the laws of the United States provide for the removal of all persons residing or being found upon Indian lands and territory without permission expressly and legally obtained of the Interior Department:

Now, therefore, in order to maintain inviolate the solemn pledges and plighted faith of the Government as given in the treaties in question, and for the purpose of properly protecting the interests of the Indian tribes as well as of the United States in the premises, and to the end that no person or persons may be induced to enter upon said lands, where they will not be allowed to remain without the permission of the authority aforesaid, I, Grover Cleveland, President of the United States, do hereby declare and proclaim the said Executive order of February 27, 1885, to be in contravention of the treaty obligations of the United States with the Sioux tribe of Indians, and therefore to be inoperative and of no effect; and I further declare that the lands intended to be embraced therein are existing Indian reservations, and as such available for Indian purposes alone and subject to the Indian-intercourse acts of the United States. I do further warn and admonish all and every person or persons now in the occupation of said lands under color of said Executive order, and all such person or persons as are intending or preparing to enter and settle upon the same thereunder, that they will neither be permitted to remain or enter upon said lands, and such persons as are already there are hereby required to vacate and remove therefrom with their effects within sixty days from the date hereof; and in case a due regard for and voluntary obedience to the laws and treaties of the United States and this admonition and warning be not sufficient to effect the purpose and intentions as herein declared, all the power of the Government will be employed to carry into proper execution the treaties and laws of the United States herein referred to.

In testimony thereof I hereunto set my hand and cause the seal of the United States to be affixed.

[SEAL.]

Done at the city of Washington, this 17th day of April, 1885, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and ninth.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

By the President:
T.F. BAYARD,
Secretary of State.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas certain portions of the Cheyenne and Arapahoe Indian Reservation, in the Indian Territory, are occupied by persons other than Indians, who claim the right to keep and graze cattle thereon by agreement made with the Indians for whose special possession and occupancy the said lands have been reserved by the Government of the United States, or under other pretexts and licenses; and

Whereas all such agreements and licenses are deemed void and of no effect, and the persons so occupying said lands with cattle are considered unlawfully upon the domain of the United States so reserved as aforesaid; and

Whereas the claims of such persons under said leases and licenses and their unauthorized presence upon such reservation have caused complaint and discontent on the part of the Indians located thereon, and are likely to cause serious outbreaks and disturbances:

Now, therefore, I, Grover Cleveland, President of the United States, do hereby order and direct that all persons other than Indians who are now upon any part of said reservation for the purpose of grazing cattle thereon, and their servants and agents, and all other unauthorized persons now upon said reservation, do, within forty days from the date of this proclamation, depart and entirely remove therefrom with their cattle, horses, and other property.

In witness 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 on this 23d day of July, 1885, and the year of the Independence of the United States the one hundred and tenth.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

By the President:
T.F. BAYARD,
Secretary of State.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

The President of the United States has just received the sad tidings of the death of that illustrious citizen and ex-President of the United States, General Ulysses S. Grant, at Mount McGregor, in the State of New York, to which place he had lately been removed in the endeavor to prolong his life.

In making this announcement to the people of the United States the President is impressed with the magnitude of the public loss of a great military leader, who was in the hour of victory magnanimous, amid disaster serene and self-sustained; who in every station, whether as a soldier or as a Chief Magistrate, twice called to power by his fellow-countrymen, trod unswervingly the pathway of duty, undeterred by doubts, single-minded and straightforward.

The entire country has witnessed with deep emotion his prolonged and patient struggle with painful disease, and has watched by his couch of suffering with tearful sympathy.

The destined end has come at last, and his spirit has returned to the Creator who sent it forth.

The great heart of the nation that followed him when living with love and pride bows now in sorrow above him dead, tenderly mindful of his virtues, his great patriotic services, and of the loss occasioned by his death.

In testimony of respect to the memory of General Grant, it is ordered that the Executive Mansion and the several Departments at Washington be draped in mourning for a period of thirty days and that all public business shall on the day of the funeral be suspended; and the Secretaries of War and of the Navy will cause orders to be issued for appropriate military and naval honors to be rendered on that day.

In witness 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 23d day of July, 1885, and of the Independence of the United States the one hundred and tenth.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

By the President:
T.F. BAYARD,
Secretary of State.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas public policy demands that the public domain shall be reserved for the occupancy of actual settlers in good faith, and that our people who seek homes upon such domain shall in no wise be prevented by any wrongful interference from the safe and free entry thereon to which they may be entitled; and

Whereas, to secure and maintain this beneficent policy, a statute was passed by the Congress of the United States on the 25th day of February, in the year 1885, which declared to be unlawful all inclosures of any public lands in any State or Territory to any of which land included within said inclosure the person, party, association, or corporation making or controlling such inclosure had no claim or color of title made or acquired in good faith, or an asserted right thereto by or under claim made in good faith with a view to entry thereof at the proper land office; and which statute also prohibited any person, by force, threats, intimidation, or by any fencing or inclosure or other unlawful means, from preventing or obstructing any person from peaceably entering upon or establishing a settlement or residence on any tract of public land subject to settlement or entry under the public-land laws of the United States, and from preventing or obstructing free passage and transit over or through the public lands; and

Whereas it is by the fifth section of said act provided as follows:

That the President is hereby authorized to take such means as shall be necessary to remove and destroy any unlawful inclosure of any of said lands, and to employ civil or military force as may be necessary for that purpose.

And whereas it has been brought to my knowledge that unlawful inclosures, and such as are prohibited by the terms of the aforesaid statute, exist upon the public domain, and that actual legal settlement thereon is prevented and obstructed by such inclosures and by force, threats, and intimidation:

Now, therefore, I, Grover Cleveland, President of the United States, do hereby order and direct that any and every unlawful inclosure of the public lands maintained by any person, association, or corporation be immediately removed; and I do hereby forbid any person, association, or corporation from preventing or obstructing by means of such inclosures, or by force, threats, or intimidation, any person entitled thereto from peaceably entering upon and establishing a settlement or residence on any part of such public land which is subject to entry and settlement under the laws of the United States.

And I command and require each and every officer of the United States upon whom the duty is legally devolved to cause this order to be obeyed and all the provisions of the act of Congress herein mentioned to be faithfully enforced.

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 7th day of August, 1885, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and tenth.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

By the President:
T.F. BAYARD,
Secretary of State.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas satisfactory evidence has been received by me that upon vessels of the United States arriving at the port of Boca del Toro, United States of Colombia, no duty is imposed by the ton as tonnage tax or as light money, and that no other equivalent tax on vessels of the United States is imposed at said port by the Colombian Government; and

Whereas by the provisions of section 14 of an act approved June 26, 1884, "to remove certain burdens on the American merchant marine and encourage the American foreign carrying trade, and for other purposes," the President of the United States is authorized to suspend the collection in ports of the United States from vessels arriving from any port in "Central America down to and including Aspinwall and Panama" of so much of the duty at the rate of 3 cents per ton as may be in excess of the tonnage and light-house dues, or other equivalent tax or taxes, imposed on American vessels by the government of the foreign country in which such port is situated:

Now, therefore, I, Grover Cleveland, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the act and section hereinbefore mentioned, do hereby declare and proclaim that on and after this 9th day of September, 1885, the collection of said tonnage duty of 3 cents per ton shall be suspended as regards all vessels arriving in any port of the United States from the port of Boca del Toro, United States of Colombia.

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 9th day of September, 1885, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and tenth.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

By the President:
T.F. BAYARD,
Secretary of State.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

The American people have always abundant cause to be thankful to Almighty God, whose watchful care and guiding hand have been manifested in every stage of their national life, guarding and protecting them in time of peril and safely leading them in the hour of darkness and of danger.

It is fitting and proper that a nation thus favored should on one day in every year, for that purpose especially appointed, publicly acknowledge the goodness of God and return thanks to Him for all His gracious gifts.

Therefore, I, Grover Cleveland, President of the United States of America, do hereby designate and set apart Thursday, the 26th day of November instant, as a day of public thanksgiving and prayer, and do invoke the observance of the same by all the people of the land.

On that day let all secular business be suspended, and let the people assemble in their usual places of worship and with prayer and songs of praise devoutly testify their gratitude to the Giver of Every Good and Perfect Gift for all that He has done for us in the year that has passed; for our preservation as a united nation and for our deliverance from the shock and danger of political convulsion; for the blessings of peace and for our safety and quiet while wars and rumors of wars have agitated and afflicted other nations of the earth; for our security against the scourge of pestilence, which in other lands has claimed its dead by thousands and filled the streets with mourners; for plenteous crops which reward the labor of the husbandman and increase our nation's wealth, and for the contentment throughout our borders which follows in the train of prosperity and abundance.

And let there also be on the day thus set apart a reunion of families, sanctified and chastened by tender memories and associations; and let the social intercourse of friends, with pleasant reminiscence, renew the ties of affection and strengthen the bonds of kindly feeling.

And let us by no means forget while we give thanks and enjoy the comforts which have crowned our lives that truly grateful hearts are inclined to deeds of charity, and that a kind and thoughtful remembrance of the poor will double the pleasures of our condition and render our praise and thanksgiving more acceptable in the sight of the Lord.

[SEAL.]

Done at the city of Washington, this 2d day of November, 1885, and of the Independence of the United States the one hundred and tenth.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

By the President:
T.F. BAYARD,
Secretary of State.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

A PROCLAMATION.

Whereas it is represented to me by the governor of the Territory of Washington that domestic violence exists within the said Territory, and that by reason of unlawful obstructions and combinations and the assemblage of evil-disposed persons it has become impracticable to enforce by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings the laws of the United States at Seattle and at other points and places within said Territory, whereby life and property are there threatened and endangered; and

Whereas the legislature of said Territory can not be convened, and in the judgment of the President an emergency has arisen and a case is now presented which justifies and requires, under the Constitution and laws of the United States, the employment of military force to suppress domestic violence and enforce the faithful execution of the laws of the United States if the command and warning of this proclamation be disobeyed or disregarded:

Now, therefore, I, Grover Cleveland, President of the United States of America, do hereby command and warn all insurgents and all persons who have assembled at any point within the said Territory of Washington for the unlawful purposes aforesaid to desist therefrom and to disperse and retire peaceably to their respective abodes on or before 12 o'clock meridian on the 8th day of November instant.

And I do admonish all good citizens of the United States and all persons within the limits and jurisdiction thereof against aiding, abetting, countenancing, or taking any part in such unlawful acts or assemblages.

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

[SEAL.]

Done at the city of Washington, this 7th day of November, A.D. 1885, and of the Independence of the United States the one hundred and tenth.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

By the President:
T.F. BAYARD,
Secretary of State.