Finally, without further specification of detail, it may be said that
the act which in its title purports to make provision for a diverse and
greatly extended civil service unhappily appropriates an amount not more
than 65 per cent of its ordinary demands.
The legislative department establishes and defines the service, and
devolves upon the Executive Departments the obligation of submitting
annually the needful estimates of expenses of such service. Congress
properly exacts implicit obedience to the requirements of the law
in the administration of the public service and rigid accountability
in the expenditures therefor. It is submitted that a corresponding
responsibility and obligation rest upon it to make the adequate
appropriations to render possible such administration and tolerable such
exaction. Anything short of an ample provision for a specified service
is necessarily fraught with disaster to the public interests and is a
positive injustice to those charged with its execution.
To appropriate and to execute are corresponding obligations and duties,
and the adequacy of the former is the necessary measure of the
efficiency of the execution.
In this eighth month of the present session of Congress--nearly one
month of the fiscal year to which this appropriation applies having
passed--I do not feel warranted in vetoing an absolutely necessary
appropriation bill; but in signing it I deem it a duty to show where
the responsibility belongs for whatever embarrassments may arise in
the execution of the trust confided to me.
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