The resolution
assumes that the Secretary of the Treasury "established a tariff of
duties in the ports of the Mexican Republic." The contributions
collected in this mode were not established by the Secretary of the
Treasury, but by a military order issued by the President through the
War and Navy Departments. For his information the President directed the
Secretary of the Treasury to prepare and report to him a scale of
duties. That report was made, and the President's military order of the
31st of March, 1847, was based upon it. The documents communicated to
Congress with my annual message of December, 1847, show the true
character of that order.
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.
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