Veto Message

To the House of Representatives:

I return without approval House bill No. 9034, entitled "An act granting a pension to Lydia A. Heiny."

The husband of this beneficiary served in an Indiana regiment from August, 1861, to March, 1864, when he reenlisted as a veteran volunteer and served as a private and teamster to July 20, 1865, when he was discharged.

There is no record of any disability, and he never applied for a pension. On the 12th day of December, 1880, in leaving a barber shop at the place where he resided, he fell downstairs and died the next day from the injuries thus received.

His widow filed an application for a pension in the year 1885, alleging that her husband contracted indigestion, bronchitis, nervous debility, and throat disease in the Army, which were the cause of his death.

The claim was rejected upon the ground that the death of the soldier was not due to an injury connected with his military service.

While there has been considerable evidence presented tending to show that the deceased had a throat difficulty which might have resulted from army exposure, the allegation or the presumption that it caused his fatal fall, it seems to me, is entirely unwarranted.

GROVER CLEVELAND