GENTLEMEN OF THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES:
By a joint resolution of your honorable bodies approved December 23, 1863, the paying of bounties to veteran volunteers, as now practiced by the War Department, is, to the extent of three hundred dollars in each case, prohibited after this 5th day of the present month. I transmit for your consideration a communication from the Secretary of War, accompanied by one from the Provost-Marshal General to him, both relating to the subject above mentioned. I earnestly recommend that the law be so modified as to allow bounties to be paid as they now are, at least until the ensuing 1st day of February.
I am not without anxiety lest I appear to be importunate in thus recalling your attention to a subject upon which you have so recently acted, and nothing but a deep conviction that the public interest demands it could induce me to incur the hazard of being misunderstood on this point. The Executive approval was given by me to the resolution mentioned, and it is now by a closer attention and a fuller knowledge of facts that I feel constrained to recommend a reconsideration of the subject.
A. LINCOLN. [ [!-- H2 anchor --] ]
TELEGRAM TO GOVERNOR BRAMLETTE.
EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, January 6, 1864. 2 P.M.
GOVERNOR BRAMLETTE, Frankfort, Kentucky:
Yours of yesterday received. Nothing is known here about General Foster's order, of which you complain, beyond the fair presumption that it comes from General Grant, and that it has an object which, if you understood, you would be loath to frustrate. True, these troops are, in strict law, only to be removed by my order; but General Grant's judgment would be the highest incentive to me to make such order. Nor can I understand how doing so is bad faith and dishonor, nor yet how it so exposes Kentucky to ruin. Military men here do not perceive how it exposes Kentucky, and I am sure Grant would not permit it if it so appeared to him.
A. LINCOLN. [ [!-- H2 anchor --] ]