I know of no mode of providing for the public wants which would entail sacrifices so great as a fresh issue of Treasury notes, and I trust that you will concur in the propriety of absolutely forbidding any increase of those now in circulation.
Officers have been appointed and dispatched to the trans-Mississippi States and the necessary measures taken for the execution of the laws enacted to obviate delays in administering the Treasury and other Executive Departments in those States, but sufficient time has not elapsed to ascertain the results.
In relation to the most important of all subjects at the present time, the efficiency of our armies in the field, it is gratifying to assure you that the discipline and instruction of the troops have kept pace with the improvement in material and equipment. We have reason to congratulate ourselves on the results of the legislation on this subject, and on the increased administrative energy in the different bureaus of the War Department, and may not unreasonably indulge anticipations of commensurate success in the ensuing campaign.
The organization of reserves is in progress, and it is hoped they will be valuable in affording local protection without requiring details and detachments from active force.
Among the recommendations contained in the report of the Secretary of War, your attention is specially invited to those in which legislation is suggested on the following subjects — viz.:
The tenure of office of the general officers in the Provisional Army, and a proper discrimination in the compensation of the different grades.
The provision required in aid of invalid officers who have resigned in consequence of wounds or sickness contracted while in service.
The amendment of the law which deprives officers in the field of the privilege of purchasing rations, and thus adds to their embarrassment, instead of conferring the benefit intended.
The organization of the general staff of the Army, in relation to which a special message will shortly be addressed to you, containing the reasons which compel me to withhold my approval of a bill passed by your predecessors at too late a period of the session to allow time for returning it for their reconsideration.
