by John Marshall Harlan

“ When the government desires, in suits against a delinquent officer accountable for public money, to use the final adjustment of his accounts as evidence, the certificate of the officer should show, not, necessarily, in the very words of the statute, but plainly, and not by mere inference, that the transcript offered is from the books and proceedings of the department ”

“ The government, by a statutory rule which the courts must enforce, denies to defendants in such suits the benefit of the recognized principles which, at common law, govern the proof of essential facts in issue, and it should not be permitted to claim an exemption from the fair and legitimate operation of that rule. ”

“ Upon their examination by the latter officer it becomes his duty to certify the balance arising thereon to the Secretary of the Navy. Id., sect. 273. The statute also provides that 'the auditors charged with the examination of the accounts of the departments of war and of the navy shall keep all accounts of the receipts and expenditures of the public money in regard to those departments, and of all debts due to the United States or moneys advanced relative to those departments ”