The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1882-11-09
An Iowa Editor RefuteS an Infa-
nous SANDER.
USTICE LONG DELAYED.
How a Republic Should Pay
it's Great Debt.
From The Iord State Rcgisier.J

| grab and steal that takes hundred millions of
dollars out of the national Treasury" Yes there
is one that We know of. This paper endorses
| it, and considers it as noble an act as Congress
| ever passed, and as noble deed of plain and
| bounden duty as nation ever performed.
First, it simply made its bounty to the volun-
| teer soldiers of the army that saved the Ma
| TONS life equal to all alike. Second, it comes
| to such of its soldiers as were broken
down in its service, in their older age and
need, and from its bounteous treasury saves
them from lives of actual suffering and deaths of
beggary and burials as paupers. No doubt
somc and even very much, of the vast sum
goes through fraud to unworthy purposes. But
what great sum Of Governmental money is ever
expended without loss and fraud? Put it at
its worst and admit even that half of it goes
to dishonest claimants,--which is q greater
ratio than any one clains,-and who will say
that the honest halfof it in going to crippled or
| destitute soldiers and their starving families
is not accomplishing great and noble work
that is worth more to the Nation, and to the
grateful satisfaction of its people, than it all
costs? Grant that there are many swindles
perpetrated in its name and on its fund, as no
doubt there are. Grant that many men share
in its bounty who do not deserve and who
never earned it. Grant that every neighbOr-
hood knows of such abuse of it. Grant that it
is an enormous sum, and that no other Govern
ment on the face of the earth has ever dealt so
bountifully with its soldiery as this act deals
with the soldiers of the army of 1861. Grant
all this, and as much more, by way of Objec-
ton, as may be justly or unjustly added. And
still the fact remains that the good it has done,
the suffering it has relieved, outweghs all the
wrongs and OutWeighs all the objections. For
there is no neighbOrhoOd in the North where
this grateful almonry of preserved Republic
has not gone to help some Union soldier, or his
family, out of q condition of present want and
threatened starvation. There can be no per-
son, with intelligence enough to criticize
the pension at all, who does not know of
some one deserving soldier in his own &C
quaintance, to whom it has come like mamma
from Heaven. We venture to say that there
is no neighborhood in the North, from which
dozen men went out to the war. which has
not had, to the knowledge of all its people, q
case of suffering relieved by this act. 1t went,
like an angel of mercy to the hut of a soldier
in MGGregor, in his utter blindness and beg
gary, and Lifted from the edge of starvation
himself and children, and put him in a little
home of his own, with some money left over to
feed him in his remaining days of helplessness
and blindness Who in Clayton county, or in
Iowa, will say that the help it gives to that
man in his blindness and helplessness, caused
by the war, did not outweigh all the frauds
perpetrated in its name in Iowa? A year ago
q printer in the Register office, with an invalid
wife and five little children, was dying of con-
sumption, enRendcred by his service in the
army. Charity had been feeding this proud
soldier all that he had eaten for some time, and
all that his helpless family had eaten, and he
he was leaving them all to beggary and want,
and perhaps to the aims house. A week before
he died this pension came, and put in his pal
sying hand enough to buy home to put his
family in, and enough to enable the mother to
keep her little children from hunger and out of
the pOor-house. What man in all the Nation,
whether he staid at home during the war and
made money, while this soldier wrecked his
life and lost his health or whether he has
grown to mans estate since, and has prOspered
in the Republic that these soldiers helped to
save, would begrudge all that he will pay to
this fund if only this one soldier and his family
had been benefited by it?
There are thousands of eases like this one
in help Of the blind soldier at McGregor, and
like this other, in help OF dying soldier at
Des MOines-hundreds of them in Iowa, and |
many thousands of them in the country at large !
There is not a county in the whole North and |
scarcely neighborhood, which has not had its |
case of a suffering, needy soldier relieved by |
this pension of a strong and wealthy Govern |
ment coming in between him and his family |
and utter want or the poor-house. Who wants |
the men who made up the Union army to die |
in want, or their families to have the aims of /
Government only through the poor-house? On |
whom has the burden OF this pension money |
fallen so heavily that in his health and strength,
he feels it at all much less suffers by reason of |
it7
These men went to the help of the Republic .
when it was in dire peril and when all the |
in it was in extreme jeopardy.
They said, we leave our homes and our fami-
lies, and our comfortable living, to imperil
our lives and perhaps lose them for you and
we ask only SI3 month-nOt half as much
rs any of us could earn at home. We do this
freely, because we love the Republic, and are
willing if need be to die for it. We are young
strong and healthy. We ask but little while
you have so little. We offer all that we have
and all that we are,-and if we shall save the
Republic, even if we die, or become crippes
Dr lifelong invalids and helpless incurables
we know the strong arm of the Government
md the wealthy people under it, will not
see us suffer, or our families starve. This
was the unwritten agreement in time of war
between the Republic and its sons that the
Republic is now in time of peace trying to re-
leem. And beautifully as it is doing it, the
burden Of it is not felt by it nor by any of its
people. 1t is not money given away that it
gives to these soldiers. They earned it all in
me war; and simply did not claim it while
hey We're strong and the Government was
weak. Now that they are weak and in need,
md the Government is strong, it is simply
paying to them the money that they earned
Wenty years ago. 1t can we'll afford to pay il
md the interest. For they see the great pros
,erity that it has had, and all the great for
uncs and good livings that all its people have
made since, all are due to the valor and devo-
ion of these soldiers who saved it in the war.
It is but small tithe-this great pension, at
is greatest-that this Nation and its people are
,aying to these soldiers or their families now.
{ is merely interest, and but Il beggarIy in
crest, on what they earned at cost of health or
ife twenty years ago.