Date:    12/17/97  10:09 AM

Subject: s7-26-97 / Home Depot
     
     
     
I'm writing to give you my input on HR 944 and HR 945 which I just heard 
about.  Rep Paul Gillmor's asinine idea is obviously to further his own 
social agenda.  Two of the main reasons his idea is so stupid is because it 
will create a logistical nightmare and because it does a disservice to our 
associates.
     
At Home Depot, rather than our board or some management committee making 
all the decisions on where we give, the company matches the charitable 
donations our 118,000 associates choose to make.  This way, monies are 
going straight to the organizations of the communities where our people 
want them to go.
     
To have our shareholders vote on this would be to overrule the good sense 
and values of our associates.  And who's supposed to handle the logistics 
for this?  Will we have to present a case for each charity?  Discuss each 
one?  Have a separate proxy and count all the votes for the two people in 
Vermont who got their $25 donations to the local YMCA matched?
     
The way I understand it, these bills are the biggest waste of company 
resources.  Gillmor should keep his values to himself and stop 
grandstanding and wasting our shareholders money.
     
--James Grant, Mgr-Investor Relations