William Burnham Woods

“ To hold that for one class of travel he should have eight cents per mile, and for the other his actual expenses, is to make the law and not to construe it. When this travel was performed there was not a line on the statute-book of the United States which made any provision whatever, under any circumstances, for allowing officers of the navy, when engaged on the public business, their actual expenses of travel. ”

“ The attempt to justify the decision of the accounting officers of the treasury is based on an alleged practice in conformity therewith, which, it is said, grew up in the Navy Department under the act of 1835. ”