The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1884-11-06
CRUELTY OF DELAY.

| ale gives twice who gives quickly.''-Old Addge
! Can any subsequent payment compensate for
Withholding the present payment of a pension?
Certainly not.
The disabled and suffering soldier wants his
pension-money nop-not five years hence, or
even next year.
| He wants it now to buy food and medicine
| for himself which he has to have now. If he
/ did not need these things until next year he
could afford to wait until then for his money.
But he has daily necessities that will not he
denied. Every day has wants that must be
| supplied that day, or great suffering results.
To assume, as the Pension Bureau seems TO,
| that delay of a few years in granting pen
sion is a small matter, since the pensioner
finally gets all he is entitled to, is frightful
| error
The pensioner is not like any other creditor
Of the Government. 1t works but little hard
ship to the man who furnishes the Nation with
iron or coal or building stone or mules to wait
few years for his money,-which, in fact, he
never uoeS,-peCauSe III The emu NC 10 ceitaih
to get all he is entitled to. A dollar is dollar
TO him, whether he receives it this year or
waits until next for it. Being a capitalist if
necessary, he can borrow money.
But with the pensioner q dollar this year
may be, and probably is, worth more than $1C0
next year. No amount of money next year
will buy the food and medicines he should
have to-day.
What tragical picture is presented by the
disabled soldier struggling hopelessly amid the
miseres of Want and Privation against the
daily nearing advances of the grim Destroyer!
His once magnificent manly strength has been
shattered by the bullets of the enemy, or the
strains of the march or prison pen. Unable to
worb-unable to procure for himself and family
the actual necessaries of life-still less is he
able to buy those medicines and comforts which
his condition imperatively demands. The
anxiety as to the source of daily bread for him
self and dependent ones cannot help greatly
| aggrevating his bodily Affections. The lack of
proper food. shelter medicine and medical
attendance must greatly aid the ravages of dis
ease. He turns to the Government whom he
has given so much and asks its assistance in
his hour Of need, just as it asked his assistance
in its hour of need He gave his at the asking
he left everything, gave up everything that he
enjoyed or valued,-and hurried to the field,
fearful that he would be too late to render it
service.
Is it not natural that he should expect SINH
lar promptness on the part of the Government,
in repaying some of the debt it owes him?
Can there be anything more inefably sorrow
full than the spectacle of this worn-out veteran
waiting until hope deferred, dies the bitter
death of despair? Conceive of how he and his
family watch the arrival of every mail for days
that add up into weeks, and weeks that gather
into months and years even! Imagine how
their hopes rise with every new "examina-
ton " and every call for additional evidence"
that now all is done that need be, and the re-
lief is at last at hand! Meanwhile Want and
Wretchedness press him and them more sorely
every day. Every day his strength becomes
less-his wants moro pressing. Every day in
exorable death pushes little nearer his siege
| of the Citadel of Life. Every day it becomes
more likely that the grave will close over the
veteran before the relief that is justly his due
reaches him.. Imagine all this undergone amid
the cruelest pain and want that is sharper than
serpent's tooth
Can anything be more distressing?
What intensely aggravates the horrors of
The people of the United States have given
money enough to relieve every deserving SOL
der in the country. Nearly hundred mill
lion dollars appropriated for this purpose lies
idly in the vaults OF the Treasury, and has lain
there, while those who should have had it are
| dying off by thousands every month. If more
were needed the generous people stand ready
! to give more. They do not want distress to
come upon any man who stood by the country
| in its hour of trouble.
With money in abundance to pay claims,
and with every facility afforded to examine
and settle them, there is no earthly reason why
any soldier should be kept out of his rights
| three months after he files his application and
| furnishes reasonable evidence. The terrible
delays of years. with the consequent protracted
misery to the men whom the Nation desires to
| treat justly, are an awful Indictment Of the
cumbersomeness and inefficiency of the Bu-
reau's methods. and Of the incompetency and
bad faith of the man who is responsible for
methods-Col. w. w. Dudley,-the man who
was given the Office under q solemn promise
from him that he would do precisely what he
has utterly failed to do.