_January 26, 1830_.
_To the Senate and House of Representatives_:
I find it necessary to recommend to Congress a revision of the laws
relating to the direct and contingent expenses of our intercourse with
foreign nations, and particularly of the act of May 1, 1810, entitled
"An act fixing the compensation of public ministers and of consuls
residing on the coast of Barbary, and for other purposes."
A letter from the Fifth Auditor of the Treasury to the Secretary of
State, herewith transmitted, which notices the difficulties incident to
the settlement of the accounts of certain diplomatic agents of the
United States, serves to show the necessity of this revision. This
branch of the Government is incessantly called upon to sanction
allowances which not unfrequently appear to have just and equitable
foundations in usage, but which are believed to be incompatible with the
provisions of the act of 1810. The letter from the Fifth Auditor
contains a description of several claims of this character which are
submitted to Congress as the only tribunal competent to afford the
relief to which the parties consider themselves entitled.
Among the most prominent questions of this description are the
following:
_I. Claims for outfits by ministers and charges d'affaires duly
appointed by the President and Senate_.
The act of 1790, regulating the expenditures for foreign intercourse,
provided "that, exclusive of an outfit, which shall in no case exceed
one year's full salary to the minister plenipotentiary or chargé
d'affaires to whom the same may be allowed, the President shall not
allow to any minister plenipotentiary a greater sum than at the rate of
$9,000 per annum as a compensation for all his personal services and
other expenses, nor a greater sum for the same than $4,500 per annum to
a chargé d'affaires." By this provision the maximum of allowance only
was fixed, leaving the question as to any outfit, either in whole or in
part, to the discretion of the President, to be decided according to
circumstances. Under it a variety of cases occurred, in which outfits
having been given to diplomatic agents on their first appointment,
afterwards, upon their being transferred to other courts or sent upon
special and distinct missions, full or half outfits were again allowed.
This act, it will be perceived, although it fixes the maximum of outfit,
is altogether silent as to the circumstances under which outfits might
be allowed; indeed, the authority to allow them at all is not expressly
conveyed, but only incidentally adverted to in limiting the amount. This
limitation continued to be the only restriction upon the Executive until
1810, the act of 1790 having been kept in force till that period by five
successive reenactments, in which it is either referred to by means of
its title or its terms are repeated verbatim. In 1810 an act passed
wherein the phraseology which had been in use for twenty years is
departed from. Fixing the same limits precisely to the _amount_ of
salaries and outfits to ministers and chargés as had been six times
fixed since 1790, it differs from preceding acts by formally conveying
an authority to allow an outfit to "a minister plenipotentiary or chargé
d'affaires _on going from the United States to any foreign country_;"
and, in addition to this specification of the circumstances under which
the outfit may be allowed, it contains one of the conditions which shall
be requisite to entitle a chargé or secretary to the compensation
therein provided.
Upon a view of all the circumstances connected with the subject I can
not permit myself to doubt that it was with reference to the practice of
multiplying outfits to the same person and in the intention of
prohibiting it in future that this act was passed.
It being, however, frequently deemed advantageous to transfer ministers
already abroad from one court to another, or to employ those who were
resident at a particular court upon special occasions elsewhere, it
seems to have been considered that it was not the intention of Congress
to restrain the Executive from so doing. It was further contended that
the President being left free to select for ministers citizens, whether
at home or abroad, a right on the part of such ministers to the usual
emoluments followed as a matter of course. This view was sustained by
the opinion of the law officer of the Government, and the act of 1810
was construed to leave the whole subject of salary and outfit where it
found it under the law of 1790; that is to say, completely at the
discretion of the President, without any other restriction than the
maximum already fixed by that law. This discretion has from time to time
been exercised by successive Presidents; but whilst I can not but
consider the restriction in this respect imposed by the act of 1810 as
inexpedient, I can not feel myself justified in adopting a construction
which defeats the only operation of which this part of it seems
susceptible; at least, not unless Congress, after having the subject
distinctly brought to their consideration, should virtually give their
assent to that construction. Whatever may be thought of the propriety of
giving an outfit to secretaries of legation or others who may be
considered as only temporarily charged with, the affairs intrusted to
them, I am impressed with the justice of such an allowance in the case
of a citizen who happens to be abroad when first appointed, and that of
a minister already in place, when the public interest requires his
transfer, and, from the breaking up of his establishment and other
circumstances connected with the change, he incurs expenses to which he
would not otherwise have been subjected.
_II. Claims for outfits and salaries by chargés d'affaires and
secretaries of legation who have not been appointed by the President by
and with the advice and consent of the Senate_.