The authority under which military contributions were exacted and collected from the enemy and applied to the support of our Army during the war with Mexico was stated in the several messages referred to.  In the first of these messages I informed Congress that—­

On the 31st of March last I caused an order to be issued to our military and naval commanders to levy and collect a military contribution upon all vessels and merchandise which might enter any of the ports of Mexico in our military occupation, and to apply such contributions toward defraying the expenses of the war.  By virtue of the right of conquest and the laws of war, the conqueror, consulting his own safety or convenience, may either exclude foreign commerce altogether from all such ports or permit it upon such terms and conditions as he may prescribe.  Before the principal ports of Mexico were blockaded by our Navy the revenue derived from import duties under the laws of Mexico was paid into the Mexican treasury.  After these ports had fallen into our military possession the blockade was raised and commerce with them permitted upon prescribed terms and conditions.  They were opened to the trade of all nations upon the payment of duties more moderate in their amount than those which had been previously levied by Mexico, and the revenue, which was formerly paid into the Mexican treasury, was directed to be collected by our military and naval officers and applied to the use of our Army and Navy.  Care was taken that the officers, soldiers, and sailors of our Army and Navy should be exempted from the operations of the order, and, as the merchandise imported upon which the order operated must be consumed by Mexican citizens, the contributions exacted were in effect the seizure of the public revenues of Mexico and the application of them to our own use.  In directing this measure the object was to compel the enemy to contribute as far as practicable toward the expenses of the war.

It was also stated in that message that—­

  Measures have recently been adopted by which the internal as well as the
  external revenues of Mexico in all places in our military occupation
  will be seized and appropriated to the use of our Army and Navy.

The policy of levying upon the enemy contributions in every form consistently with the laws of nations, which it may be practicable for our military commanders to adopt, should, in my judgment, be rigidly enforced, and orders to this effect have accordingly been given.  By such a policy, at the same time that our own Treasury will be relieved from a heavy drain, the Mexican people will be made to feel the burdens of the war, and, consulting their own interests, may be induced the more readily to requite their rulers to accede to a just peace.

In the same message I informed Congress that the amount of the “loan” which would be required for the further prosecution of the war might be “reduced