require the Register to make any changes in statements as to the past events?-A. No, sir; I do not think he had.

Q. He had a right to prescribe rules as to modes of statement for the future under his general power as Secretary ?-A. I suppose, that would come under his general power; he could make him make statements subsequently.

Q. The Register being the official bookkeeper, all his statements had to conform to the truth as his books showed, I suppose, under the law, all the time.-A. Yes, sir; but that would be no objection to making a change in the statement, for it would still accord with the books; it would depend upon what series of books you took.

Q. The $6,293,827.79 of which you have spoken as contained in Statement No. 2, does not appear upon your books?-A. The items composing it do not appear as part of the public debt on our books.

Q. In what form, for example, does this d 3,274,051.69 in 1871 appear?-A. That does not appear in any one single item; it is the dif ferences between the loan account as shown by receipts and expenditures and the public debt-statement. For instance, a portion of it would be charged to one loan and a portion of it to another, making a series of differences.

Q. What are those differences?-A. The difference between the issues and redemptions and the receipts and expenditures on account of the different loans.

Q. But in 1871 you were making up your statement from receipts and expenditures.-A. Yes, sir. I did not put that item in that column in the Statement No. 2. I put it in a separate column by itself, as not being on our books.

Q. And you mean to say that this $3,274,051.69 was a series of differences that had appeared in former years prior to 1871?-A. Yes, sir. It is a balance, if you may so call it, of the differences; so I understand.

Q. Have you furnished this committee, or can you furnish us, a statement showing in detail what this item of $3,274,051.69 is composed of?— A. No, sir; I cannot.

Q. Why not, if it is on the books?-A. It appears on our books because the totals agree, but I cannot tell you what it is made up of.

Q. Could you, without much trouble, furnish us with the items making up that $3,274,051.69?-A. I could not. I presume Major Power could I think he has it made up.

Q. Why cannot you?-A. Because I would require to go over the same ground Major Power has gone over, which has taken him some year or two. He has been analyzing the different loans from one year to another and has made up the amount to show what composed it.

Q. Then you do not know whether this is a true statement or not ?— A. As far as those notes go, I do not.

Q. You believed that it was true because it was furnished you from the Secretary's office?-A. I have no belief on the subject. I was ordered to put it in, and I so put it in.

Q. Did you put in under the year 1861 $2,019,776.10 upon the same order, without any knowledge of its truth?—A. Yes, sir; without knowing whether it was true or not. It is merely a question whether that amount shall be classified as public debt or not; but I had nothing to do with it. It does not take a dollar out of the Treasury or put one in. It is merely whether you shall say the government owes that much more or not; but I had nothing to do with that; I only had to do as I was ordered.

Q. But the sums making it up are either true or false, and I did not

know but that your books would show upon what data it was inserted? -A. They could not show that, because it is through a series of years. Q. But suppose a million of dollars is issued?-A. That can be shown. Q. And the government receives only $900,000, making $100,000 difference; ought not that to appear somewhere?-A. Yes, sir; that would show.

Q. And it is items like this that make up this sum, is it not?—A. No, sir; it is the difference between the loan accounts as shown by the receipts and expenditures and the public-debt statement from 1833 to 1871.

Q. What do you understand by that?-A. I understand that it is the difference between the statement as made up in 1869 and that in 1871, and it is made up of a series of changes; for instance, the Texan indemnity debt was included as a loan or disallowed as a loan; and another thing was included, bounty-land tax was included or disallowed, &c.; the difference of classification making a portion of the difference, also a difference between the issues and redemptions and the receipts and expenditures.

Q. But those items of which you speak are so much larger than the aggregate of this that it is not likely that any of them entered into these differences?-A. I do not know. Those items would be large one year and the next year they would neutralize themselves. In 1864, for instance, there are $75,000,000 difference, and the next year there is only one million and it is the other way, so that $75,000,000 had all been used up and one million more in the next year.

By Mr. ALLISON:

Q. So that the difference between the two years was seventy-six million, as made up from different data?-A. Yes, sir; one year balances the other, and leaves a little bit on the other side.

Q. How long have the accounts of receipts and expenditures been kept in the Register's office ?-A. Always; from the beginning of the government.

Q. And always an account of issues and redemptions, those being two separate accounts?-A. I cannot say that the issues and redemptions have been kept there separate. I do not know how that is. I know that all the issues and all the redemptions have not been kept there.

Q. I find, for example, in 1862 a difference of $9,000,000 between the two statements, one being made up from the books of issues and redemptions and the other being made up from receipts and expenditures. Now, if in 1862 the Register had been directed by the Secretary of the Treasury to make up the public-debt statement from the set of books known as receipts and expenditures account instead of the books known as issues and redemptions account, would not the statement then have appeared as it appears in the report of 1871 by the Finance Report?-A. It would exactly, with the exception of probably a little difference in classification. If he had so classified it as it was classified in the 1871 report, it would appear exactly so; but of course different persons classify statements differently.

Q. Senator Beck inquired if there was any law authorizing the Register to go back and make up statements for prior years differently from the published statements. Having all the data there for both statements, what possible objection in your mind can there be to making up the debt statement from receipts and expenditures running back to the period of 1835?—A. I think it is always allowable to correct an error

if it is known to be an error; and if a person supposes things to be erroneous, I think it is allowable to have them corrected.

Q. And although the Register of the Treasury thought it unwise or perhaps inexpedient to go back to those different years, he did not object to it, because in going back there would be an erroneous statement made?-A. No, sir. My understanding was that he objected to it on account of its inexpediency.

Q. In answer to Senator Beck you spoke of the separate items alluded to in Statement No. 2 as "added to receipts," and you said that you took those items and inserted them because you were directed so to do?A. Yes, sir.

Q. Do you know who made up those items?—A. I presume it was Mr. Ross A. Fish.

Q. I understood you to say that Mr. Power knew something about them?-A. He has subsequently analyzed them in order to find out what they consisted of. I think Mr. Power can explain the whole reason of them.

Q. It would take a long time to analyze them?-A. Yes, sir.

Q. You have not done so?-A. I have not, but I understand Mr. Power has taken the necessary time.

By the CHAIRMAN:

Q. I understood you to say that the items amounting to between six and seven million dollars in Statement No. 2 were not on your books in the public-debt statement in any form?-A. Not so classified as public debt.

Q. I understood Senator Allison to ask you whether if your office had made up any statement of the public debt it would have been the same as you put it in 1871 under the direction of the Secretary, and I understood you to say it would?-A. If it was made up from the receipts and expenditures; that is, barring the difference of classification.

Q. If this $6,293,827.79 was not upon your books, but was upon the statement in the Secretary's office, could you have made the same statement as was made by the Secretary?—A. I could not make it without adding those in.

Q. But they are not on your books in the debt statement.-A. They do not appear upon the books in gross, and they only can be arrived at by an analysis of our books, which Major Power has made.

Q. Do I understand that you could or could not have made the exact same statement in your office as that one sent from the Secretary's office, and which appears in your report of 1871 ?-A. It is from our office. That analysis was made by Major Power as chief clerk of our office, and it does belong to the Register's office.

Q. I am not asking about the analysis, but about the debt statement as it appears. Let me make myself plain: I have understood you to state to the committee more than once that these items do not appear upon your books in any public-debt statement?-A. We have no public debt statement on our books. We do not make a statement on our books of the public debt. We merely state the debt from year to year, but we do not make any continuous statement of the public debt on our books. Q. When you made up the statement in 1870 and sent it to Congress, that the debt was in round numbers $2,480,000,000, was not that from your books?-A. We take the public debt of the year preceding; we then take an account of all the receipts on account of the different loans, amounting to a sum total of so much, which we add to that; we then take all the disbursements for the redemption of the public debt, which we deduct from it, and then state the public debt as the difference be

tween the public debt of the preceding year plus the receipts and minus the redemptions. We make the calculation of that, and put that on the statement; but it does not appear on the books. That is a clerical calculation made from the books.

By Mr. ALLISON:

Q. Made in the human brain?-A. Yes, sir.

By the CHAIRMAN:

Q. The statement you furnish us from the books as Statement No. 2 tells us that the public debt in 1870 was $2,480,672,427.81. Did you not take that from the books?-A. Yes, sir.

Q. I understood you to say a moment ago that the public-debt statement, as a statement, was not upon your books.-A. That is, the tabulated statement is not upon our books. We have to assume the public debt in 1859, for instance, to be so much, and then we have to add on and deduct, year by year, in order to arrive at what it should be at the expiration of that time.

Q. Now, do I understand that the public debt as stated to us is from the books or not?-A. It is a synopsis of the books, with the exception of those notes, a, b, c, and d, on Statement No. 2.

Q. With the exception of the $6,293,827.79 not on your books as public debt-A. Yes, sir.

Q. Will you state briefly the difference between making a statement from receipts and expenditures and one from issues and redemptions?— A. The difference between them is that one is a statement of a loan issued but not negotiated, and the other of a loan which has not only been issued but has been negotiated.

Q. In making a public-debt statement from receipts and expenditures do you take into consideration the moneys received and paid for all expenditures of the government?-A. No, sir; only those on account of the loans and bonds.

Q. How many months are there between the end of your fiscal year and the time you make your statement to Congress as to the public debt-A. We generally make our statement to Congress of the public debt in the Finance Report, which is sent in at the assembling of Congress; that is, five months after the close of the fiscal year.

Q. You have from the end of the fiscal year to the assembling of Congress, five months, to make up the statement and see that it is correct?-A. Yes, sir; and also to close up our year. The fiscal year does not practically close for a month or two.

Q. You stated to Senator Allison that Mr. Saville, chief clerk of the department, told a clerk in your office that he must make the debt statement accord with the statement from the Secretary's office?-A. The head of the division it was.

Q. And the man who did the work went up into the Secretary's office and got the figures there, and made your statement up from that?-A. I cannot say positively that he did that. All I can say is that his figures corresponded with the figures of the public-debt statement to a cent, after adding interest and deducting the cash in the Treasury.

Q. You have your statement and the Secretary's for the years you named, 1869 and 1870, which you were afterwards directed to change; are they not as the Register reported them to Congress exactly as the monthly-debt statements were?-A. No, sir; they are not; they are as the public-debt statements state the debt after adding interest and deducting the cash on hand.

Q. Then I understand that the Secretary's statement of 1870 and yours

of 1870, when compared with the monthly-debt statements, do not agree?— A. I do not know about the Secretary's; ours does not agree with them because the wrong series of figures was taken. There is the amount outstanding [pointing to the column], and instead of taking that the clerk took another column, showing the net amount due.

Q. Will you look and see if they are not exactly the same?-A. They agree in part, but do not agree with the amount outstanding.

Q. Then they do agree with the statement made in your office after adding the interest and deducting the cash in the Treasury?-A. Yes, sir; and that was where the mistake occurred.

By Mr. ALLISON :

Q. Did not the clerk who made up the statement for those two years state the amount of the debt from the monthly statements ?—A. I can say that the the amount which he did put down entirely harmonized with the monthly public-debt statements plus the interest and minus the cash in the Treasury for those two years.

By the CHAIRMAN:

Q. You stated that if you put $100 at the column of discrepancies for each year, and added them all up it would make so many hundreds difference as you put down. Suppose one year there was an increase and another a decrease, and it kept even that way all through, would it come out even or not?-A. It would.

Q. Now, tell me whether there are not increases and decreases from 1833 down, sometimes larger and sometimes smaller?—A. Yes, sir; there are.

Q. Then it would not be counted over and over every time that it was put down? For instance, the $665.95 which appears in 1833 disappears in 1835, and leaves a credit of $313,776.00. Is not that so?—A. Yes, sir.

Q. Then the $665.95 would not be counted as you illustrated to Mr. Allison, because it had disappeared and there was a credit on the other side; and if you added the credit would it not come out in the end the same?-A. I do not think it would.

Q. If that was so on the increase side, how would it be on the decrease side? It would work the same way, would it not?-A. If there was exactly the same amount of decrease and increase, and exactly the same number of years, it would amount to the same thing; but where you have discordant amounts which change, it will not give any correct amount, because each year's statement is a balance.

Q. There are increases and decreases from 1833 up to 1870, are there not? A. Yes, sir.

Q. Are there erasures or alterations upon any of the books of the Register's office to your knowledge?-A. There are none except to correct a clerical error, to my knowledge.

Q. Are there many of those?-A. No, sir; not a great many. Of course they will occur. For instance, a clerk charges an amount to a wrong appropriation; he finds out subsequently that he has so charged it, and he has to erase it from the appropriation that he has charged it to, and charge it to the correct one.

Q. How long is that generally done after the entry is made?-A. It is generally not discovered until the close of the quarter, when in comparing with the other books he finds that he does not agree with the other offices, in comparison with the Secretary's office and the Comptroller's office, and then they examine their books to see who has made the error, and when found it is corrected on whosesoever book it is.