I think, when the application of Mr. Worden for an increase in his allowances was twice declined for any cause during the year covering his present demand, that if he made personal expenditures for clerk hire, and especially if he did so without the encouragement of the Department, they were made at his own risk.  It appears, too, that the amount of his claim is larger than can be justified in any event.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

The time allowed the Executive by the Constitution for the examination of bills presented to him by Congress for his action expired in the case of the bill herewith returned on Saturday, May 19.  The Senate adjourned or took a recess on Thursday afternoon, May 17, until to-day, the 21st of May.

On the day of said recess or adjournment the above message, disapproving said bill and accompanying its return to the Senate, where it originated, was drawn, and on May 18 was engrossed and signed.  On Saturday, the 19th of May, the Senate not being in session, the message and the bill were tendered to the Secretary of the Senate, who declined to receive them, and thereupon they were on the same day tendered to the President of the Senate, who also declined to receive the same, both of these officials claiming that the return of said bill and the delivery of said message could only properly be made to the Senate when in actual session.

They are therefore transmitted as soon as the Senate reconvenes after its recess, with this explanation.

GROVER CLEVELAND.

[May 22 the Senate proceeded, as the Constitution prescribes, to reconsider the said bill returned by the President of the United States with his objections, pending which it was ordered that the said bill and message be referred to the Committee on Privileges and Elections.  No action was taken.]

EXECUTIVE MANSION, May 19, 1888.

To the House of Representatives: 

I return without approval House bill No. 88, entitled “An act granting a pension to Sally A. Randall.”

Antipas Taber enlisted in the War of 1812 and was discharged in the year 1814.  There is no claim made that he received any injury in the Army or that his death, which happened long after his discharge, was in the slightest degree related to his military service.  It does not appear that he ever made any application for a pension or was ever upon the pension rolls.  He died at Trinidad, in the island of Cuba, April 11, 1831, leaving as his widow the beneficiary mentioned in this bill.  About twenty-two years after his death, and in February, 1853, she married Albert Randall, and twenty years thereafter, in October, 1873, Randall died, leaving her again a widow.

It is alleged in the report of the committee in the House to which this bill was referred that Mrs. Randall is a worthy woman, 75 years of age, in needy circumstances, with health much impaired, and that the petition for her relief was signed by prominent citizens of Norwich, Conn., where she now resides.