EXECUTIVE MANSION, _Washington, February 26, 1887_.
_To the House of Representatives_:
I herewith return without approval House bill No. 6976, entitled "An act
to erect a public building at Portsmouth, Ohio."
It is represented in support of this bill that Portsmouth by its last
census had a population of 11,321, and that, it contains at present
not less than 15,000 inhabitants; that it is a place of considerable
manufacturing and commercial importance, and that there is no public
building for the transaction of the business of the General Government
nearer than Columbus or Cincinnati, both about 100 miles distant.
It is further stated in a communication from the promoter of this bill
that--
There is not a Federal public building in the State of Ohio east of the
line drawn on the accompanying map from Cleveland through Columbus to
Cincinnati; and when wealth and population and the needs of the public
service are considered, the distribution of public buildings in the
State is an unfair one.
Here is disclosed a theory of expenditure for public buildings which I
can hardly think should be adopted. If an application for the erection
of such a building is to be determined by the distance between its
proposed location and another public building, or upon the allegation
that a certain division of a State is without a Government building,
or that the distribution of these buildings in a particular State
is unfair, we shall rapidly be led to an entire disregard of the
considerations of necessity and public need which it seems to me should
alone justify the expenditure of public funds for such a purpose.
The care and protection which the Government owes to the people do
not embrace the grant of public buildings to decorate thriving and
prosperous cities and villages, nor should such buildings be erected
upon any principle of fair distribution among localities.
The Government is not an almoner of gifts among the people, but an
instrumentality by which the people's affairs should be conducted upon
business principles, regulated by the public needs.
Applying these principles to the case embraced in the bill under
consideration, we find that at Portsmouth there is a post-office and
an internal revenue collector's office for which the Government should
provide.
It is represented that the quarters now furnished for these offices
are inadequate and that more spacious rooms are desirable. In the
post-office there are six employees, and the collector of internal
revenue has five assistants. The annual rent paid for both these offices
is $600.
Upon these facts the proposition is to expend $60,000 for a building to
accommodate these offices, entailing after its completion quite a large
sum annually for its care and superintendence.
Though the sum of $60,000 is the limit fixed for the cost of this
building, if it should be completed for this sum it would be an
exception to the rule in such cases; and if it is absolutely impossible
to do the public business in the quarters now occupied by these offices,
which does not appear to be claimed, there can be no difficulty in
securing in this enterprising city adequate accommodations at a rent not
largely in excess of that at present paid.
Upon the whole it does not appear, as a business proposition, that the
building proposed should be undertaken.