The Ottawa free trader., 1884-03-08
THE MEXICAN VETERANS.

Suint 20 millions Ol taNeS' anu Hioie tiidi
twO-thirds of the names 10 he added To th'
pension list will be those OF men who tough
10 destroy the Union. OF the 10000 mel
, who went to the war in Mexico oO,OOO were
from the South, and of that 30,OOO every
one who was alive and well fought in the
; Rebel army against the Federal Govern
ment Ii is the only way at present that
! tens of thousands of the eX-Confederate'
could get into the Public Treasury through
the medium of a pension, and this accounts
for the fact that there were but four Demo
cratic votes cast against the bill, As Mr.
Browne, of Indiana, said: "The bill was
brought in because the Rebel sodiery
could be- put on no other pension roll, -
Chicago Trtb"ae
When one of those big cosmopolitan
journals like the Chicago 7ribHde goes into
the lying business or makes an exhibition
of its spleen, it does it with wholesale reck-
lessness and elm that makes us small fry
of the bucolc press fairly Shver 1t would
be curious exercise for one fond of such
puzzles 10 take the above paragraph TO
pieces and figure out just how many lies
and how many ounces of spleen (apothe-
|
cary's weight can be crammed into 50
small IA compass No doubt the product
would be astounding. To begin with :
There is the lie that lit is estimated that
The estimate of the pension bureau-not
friendly to the measure-was stated during
the debate on the bill toa be % millions
| Lie No. ,: "Of the 10000 men who went
TO the war in Mexico 10000 We're from the
South" Illinois sent to Mexico 5000 men,
Indiana 5000, Iowa 5000, Wisconsin 1000
Ohio 1000, Pennsylvania eight or ten regi-
ments, New York as many more, and each
New England state had IA regiment or two,
making at least 10000 of the 10000 from
the north and the exact figures we have no
doubt would make the proportion of the
north still greater.
But iii is the only way 1t present that
tens of thousands of the eN-confederates
could get into the public treasury" How
many tens of thousands" of the 10000 in
III W Ii witt lIbIil lilt Spulli W htNlNo ubfS
the 7rtbune imagine are still alive? OF the
100 who went from Ottawa, Il cOu 4 made a
year ago showed l3 TO be still living AT the
same rate-making no account of the
greater casualties at the south than at the
north per- capita during the rebellion, there
cannot now be over 1000 Mexican veterans
in all the southern states. And these are
the Trf6uHes tens Of thousands"
But they served in the rebel army. Very
likely most of them did, but if we recollect
Alright, the first act Of the "martyred Lin
coln,' after the surrender of Gen Lee, was
TO draw up an amnesty proclamation, which |
President johnson afterwards issued, grant |
ing full pardon to. all private soldiers who
took part against the Union during the re.
bellion, on condition of laying down their
arms and returning to obedience to the
constitution and laws of the Union; and to |
make il more binding like amnesty, in |
Guiding officers as we'll as prvates with
few specified eXceptions) was embodied in
a formal act of congress. If the offense of
having served in the rebel army is pardon
ed and wiped out, where is the ground for |
puaishing the Mexican veterans who served !
in the rebel army for an offense that is am.
nestled, pardoned, condoned-by excluding
their names from the pension rolls upon
which those of their comrades of the north |
are borne
The simple point, of the case are, that Of
the 10000 men who enlisted for the Mex
lean war probably not over 5000 survive,
who, with widows of others who have died |
may make up a pension list of 10000.
These, Il, the usual rate of IS per month,
would make up the fearful sum of $500
600 year! All Of them, whose average
age must he some 65 years, must thus live
over % years longer to make the expense
of the bill cost this government $4,000
0O0 spread over space of n quarter of
century.
The surviving soldiers of the revolution
We're pensioned within b years after the
close of that war, and the surviving soldiers |
of the war of 1912 We're pensioned "a years
after the close of the war Ii is now 36
years since the close of the Mexican war,
and the claim of its surviving veterans for
pension is IA, least as good as that of the
soldiers of the previous wars, who fought
mostly on their own dunghills for the pro
lection of their own property and homes,
while the Mexican veterans fought for the
gene,m good alone. They responded
10 the call of their country from patriotic
motives purely, Drawing climate which at
the time was believed To he fraught with
pestilence and death, and an enemy known
to be rs merciless as he was supposed to be-
brave and skilled in the arts of warfare
And the war was no less brilliant in its |
conduct than important in its results II
gave our country prestige and standing in
the eyes of the world as firstclass fight
Ing nation which il never before had en-.
loved, and il did more Ia enrich our coun.