If when the City of Mexico was captured the commander of our forces had found in the Mexican treasury public money which the enemy had provided to support his army, can it be doubted that he possessed the right to seize and appropriate it for the use of our own Army?  If the money captured from the enemy could have been thus lawfully seized and appropriated, it would have been by virtue of the laws of war, recognized by all civilized nations; and by the same authority the sources of revenue and of supply of the enemy may be cut off from him, whereby he may be weakened and crippled in his means of continuing or waging the war.  If the commanders of our forces, while acting under the orders of the President, in the heart of the enemy’s country and surrounded by a hostile population, possess none of these essential and indispensable powers of war, but must halt the Army at every step of its progress and wait for an act of Congress to be passed to authorize them to do that which every other nation has the right to do by virtue of the laws of nations, then, indeed, is the Government of the United States in a condition of imbecility and weakness, which must in all future time render it impossible to prosecute a foreign war in an enemy’s country successfully or to vindicate the national rights and the national honor by war.

The contributions levied were collected in the enemy’s country, and were ordered to be “applied” in the enemy’s country “toward defraying the expenses of the war,” and the appropriations made by Congress for that purpose were thus relieved, and considerable balances remained undrawn from the Treasury.  The amount of contributions remaining unexpended at the close of the war, as far as the accounts of collecting and disbursing officers have been settled, have been paid into the Treasury in pursuance of an order for that purpose, except the sum “applied toward the payment of the first installment due under the treaty with Mexico,” as stated in my last annual message, for which an appropriation had been made by Congress.  The accounts of some of these officers, as stated in the report of the Secretary of War accompanying that message, will require legislation before they can be finally settled.

In the late war with Mexico it is confidently believed that the levy of contributions and the seizure of the sources of public revenue upon which the enemy relied to enable him to continue the war essentially contributed to hasten peace.  By those means the Government and people of Mexico were made to feel the pressure of the war and to realize that if it were protracted its burdens and inconveniences must be borne by themselves.  Notwithstanding the great success of our arms, it may well be doubted whether an honorable peace would yet have been obtained but for the very contributions which were exacted.

JAMES K. POLK.

WASHINGTON, January 4, 1849.

To the Senate of the United States: