Note 83 — Chapter XVI

Ex-President Benjamin Harrison, in his book "This Country of Ours," p. 138, thus describes the course which a bill takes after it has passed both houses: "When a bill has passed both houses of Congress and has been signed by the president of the senate and the speaker of the house, it is taken, by the clerk of the committee on enrolled bills, to the Executive Mansion, where the date of its delivery is stamped upon it. The practice is then to send the bill to the head of the department to which its subject matter belongs—to the war department, if to army matters; to the interior, if to pensions, or public lands, or Indian affairs, etc.—for the examination of the secretary, and for a report from him as to any objections that may occur to him. As to the frame of the bill, and as to any constitutional questions involved, the attorney-general is often consulted, though the bill does not relate to his department. The President then takes up the bill, with the report from the department, and examines it, and if he approves writes thereon "Approved," giving the date, and signs his name. The bill, now become a law, is then sent to the state department to be filed and published in the statutes at large."