Grover Cleveland: “Legislation establishing limitations against the right of the Government to sue is an innovation not entirely consistent…”

To the Senate:I transmit herewith, in response to the resolution of the Senate of February 24, 1897, a report from the Secretary of State, in relation to the claim of M. A. Cheek against the Siamese Government, with accompanying papers.

A radical departure from our national policy relating to immigration is here presented.

I have not thought it compatible with the public interest that the correspondence referred to in the resolution should be communicated pending the public and exhaustive investigation about to be instituted.

The time is quite within recent memory when the same thing was said of immigrants who, with their descendants, are now numbered among our best citizens.