Veto Message

To the House of Representatives:

I return without approval House bill No. 8807, entitled "An act granting a pension to Harriet E. Cooper."

The husband of this beneficiary served as a major in an Illinois regiment from September 3, 1862, to April 1, 1863, when his resignation was accepted, it having been tendered on account of business affairs.

He was pensioned for rheumatism from April, 1863, and died October 3, 1883.

It is admitted on all hands that Major Cooper drank a good deal, but the committee allege that they can not arrive at the conclusion that death was attributable to that cause.

There is some medical testimony tending to show that death was caused from rheumatism, but one physician gives it as his opinion that death resulted from rheumatism and chronic alcoholism.

The physician who last attended the soldier testifies that the cause of death was chronic alcoholism. This should be the most reliable of all the medical testimony, and taken in connection with the conceded intemperate habits of the deceased and the fact that the brain was involved, it satisfies me that the rejection of the widow's claim by the Pension Bureau on the ground that the cause of death was mainly intemperance was correct.

GROVER CLEVELAND