Cleveland, Grover, as Twenty-second President

Manuscript document signed ("Grover Cleveland"), 2 pages (13 ¼ x 8 ¼ in.; 336 x 210 mm), "Executive Mansion," Washington, 26 February 1889, to the House of Representatives, being a veto of a bill to increase a pension, joined with green ribbon, docketing on verso; some soiling, formerly folded with tears at folds.

See E.C. Mason, The Veto Power: Its Origin, Development and Function in the Government of the United States (1890), p. 207, no. 432

Manuscript document signed ("Grover Cleveland"), 2 pages (13 ¼ x 8 ¼ in.; 336 x 210 mm), "Executive Mansion," Washington, 26 February 1889, to the House of Representatives, being a veto of a bill to increase a pension, joined with green ribbon, docketing on verso; some soiling, formerly folded with tears at folds.
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Famous example of a presidential veto.

Cleveland himself insisted that, as President, his greatest accomplishment was blocking others' bad ideas, vigorously pursuing a policy against special favors for any economic group. He wrote: "Federal aid in such cases encourages the expectation of paternal care on the part of the Government and weakens the sturdiness of our national character ...." He also vetoed hundreds of private pension bills for American Civil War veterans. When Congress, pressured by the Grand Army of the Republic, passed a bill granting pensions for disabilities not caused by military service, Cleveland vetoed it. He used the veto far more often than any President up to that time.

The present veto is an example of the latter, where the claimant had received a pension for a dog bite received during the Civil War, but was applying for an increase in pension due to increasing disability from a leg strain received three months after his discharge.