Believing that this bill is a dangerous violation of the spirit and meaning of the Constitution, I am compelled to return it to the House in which it originated without my approval.  The qualified negative with which the Constitution invests the President is a trust that involves a duty which he can not decline to perform.  With a firm and conscientious purpose to do what I can to preserve unimpaired the constitutional powers and equal independence, not merely of the Executive, but of every branch of the Government, which will be imperiled by the adoption of the principle of this bill, I desire earnestly to urge upon the House of Representatives a return to the wise and wholesome usage of the earlier days of the Republic, which excluded from appropriation bills all irrelevant legislation.  By this course you will inaugurate an important reform in the method of Congressional legislation; your action will be in harmony with the fundamental principles of the Constitution and the patriotic sentiment of nationality which is their firm support, and you will restore to the country that feeling of confidence and security and the repose which are so essential to the prosperity of all of our fellow-citizens.

RUTHERFORD B. HAYES.

To the House of Representatives: 

After a careful consideration of the bill entitled “An act to prohibit military interference at elections,” I return it to the House of Representatives, in which it originated, with the following objections to its approval: 

In the communication sent to the House of Representatives on the 29th of last month, returning to the House without my approval the bill entitled “An act making appropriations for the support of the Army for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1880, and for other purposes,” I endeavored to show, by quotations from the statutes of the United States now in force and by a brief statement of facts in regard to recent elections in the several States, that no additional legislation was necessary to prevent interference with the elections by the military or naval forces of the United States.  The fact was presented in that communication that at the time of the passage of the act of June 18, 1878, in relation to the employment of the Army as a posse comitatus or otherwise, it was maintained by its friends that it would establish a vital and fundamental principle which would secure, to the people protection against a standing army.  The fact was also referred to that since the passage of this act Congressional, State, and municipal elections have been held throughout the Union, and that in no instance has complaint been made of the presence of United States soldiers at the polls.

Holding, as I do, the opinion that any military interference whatever at the polls is contrary to the spirit of our institutions and would tend to destroy the freedom of elections, and sincerely desiring to concur with Congress in all of its measures, it is with very great regret that I am forced to the conclusion that the bill before me is not only unnecessary to prevent such interference, but is a dangerous departure from long-settled and important constitutional principles.