Omaha daily bee., 1888-05-27

~ $500 N'R> ~
have his committee discharged from the
further consideration of a large number of
petitions and memorials from heirs and legal
representatives of deceased officers, together
with memorials from the Cincinnati society
of Maryland, representing members of the
old Maryland line; of the Cincinnati socie-
| ties of Virginia, Massachusetts and Pennsyl-
vania, and of certain resolutions in behalf
of the claims from the legislature of
the state of New York. Leave was
granted accordingly. Mr.. Fenton, of New
York, introduced a bill which was
favorably reported back from the proper
committee of The house of representatives on
March ), 1853, and placed upon the calendar.
He addressed the house on June IL, 1858;
again on May is, 1Sc0, but nothing practical
came of it. kansas was all the go, and
justice and right. So far, then, the honor
and conscience of the American people have
never recovered from the effects of the
subtle poison administered through the
secret erasure made in the annual estimate
sometime between the PRONUNCIATION of the
report of congress on the 25th of September,
1888, and the proceedings of April ". 1884.
That seems, indeed, to have been a fatal po-
ton. Can we recuperate from itl
S.*
During the forty-ninth congress
several bills were offered and some reports
made on the weighty subject of national re-
| sponsibility for private debts owing by the
government, the which, if they were owing
to the government, the most stringent meth
DDS would have been, If necessary, resorted
to in order to collect. Among the ablest of
these reports was one from the house COM
mittee on claims by Mr.. William Warner. 1t
declares that the action of congress in pass
ing upon private and domestic claims is most
unsatisfactory. 1t estimated that the num-
Der of claims likely to come before that COM
mittee alone prior. to the close of that con-
| gress would reach 800. Some are for very
small, others for large amounts. Not more
than l per cent OF private claims ever pass
congress, whereby is effected a practical de-
NAL of justice to the honest creditors of the
country. Judging from the DISPOSE
ton made or private claims in the past, there
were more of such before that committee
alone than at the present rate of procedure
would be disposed of IN the next fifty years.
That is a humiliating statement for a coun-
try provided with ample means for honest
payment, and which, in times past, pleaded
its poverty as the only reason for not pune
tually paying its debts.
The average claimant, says the report,
comes and goes and dies, leaving his claim
against the United States to his children, for,
if the claimant does not belong to the favored
few, an ordinary lifetime is far too short to
get Il claim, however just, through congress.
The report regrets that this republic of
ours should refuse to- open its
courts to any of its citizens having
just demands against the govern
ment. Other great nations far exceed the
United States in the dispensation of justice
to citizens, and the fact is judiclally estab-
lished that of nearly all governments the
United States holds itself least amenable to
the laws. Russia and Spain approximate us
the closest, whilst the great empire of the
German states sets all mankind a noble ex-
ample of national and public justice.
In England the subject of the sovereign is
| provided with redress under what is called
the petition of right and his case is tried
like a suit between one subject and another.
The respectable governments OF Europe
never shirk from a full and fair investigation
of claims aUaiuSt them and submit tn n do
cision adverse to the government when
rendered by their courts. We alone stand
back from so righteous and noble a policy.
Why! Most probably because our long train
of delinquencies has accumulated a mass of
claims that %tcrrlties, and so the mass gets
bigger and bigger with every passing year.
why not brace up our moral energies and re-
solve upon some expedient by which the con-
slant cries of justice and truth might be
properly stopped!
If the present court of claims is choked
with business, as is also the case with the
supreme court, an additional court of claims
should be instituted without delay. The or
ganization of the present court furnishes an
example to be initiated.
In referring cases OF claims from con-
gress and its committees the so-called
"Bowman act' of March 3, 1888, should be
extended, in principle, to all claims. 1t
should be that all claims preliminarily APP
proved by a committee of either house might
be open to investigation and report by the
court of claims. The questionably legitimate
and very wholesale enactments of limitation
which past fears excited, ought no longer to
control sensible and Just legislation. Such
an act of limitation was passed anu approved
March y, 1863, when every available dollar
had tC be appropriated for the purposes of
the war then fragrant. 1t barred most just
and honest claims which, but for it, would
undoubtedly have been determined long
before now. Limitation acts are arbi-
trary and one-sided at the best, and
ought not To he continued IN narration pnn
hour beyond the pressure of urgent state
necessity. Even the narrow circumstances
OF the earlier years of the republic did not
justify or approve such acts when no longer
pressingly needed. Thus on the 9th of Jan
uary, 1907, Il committee of the house OF rep
resentatives resolved: That all just and
equitable claims growing out of the revolu-
tionary war, which are now barred by any
law of the United States, ought to be pro-
yided for by law. Later on, viz, January
IA, 1928, a committee reported its opinion
THAT it would be as dishonest in the gov
eminent of the United States to shield itself
against the payment of a just debt under the
statute of limitations, as 1t would for an
individual to do SO. A claim of long
standing, if provably Just, ought
to be paid irrespective of statutes of lilnita-
ton" Still later, viz, February 81, 1880, a
committee argued deliberately against not
only the injustice but the essential unconsti-
tutionality OF limitation acJs, and on January
10, 1882, it was said, THAT when a claim is
clearly proved TO have been'originally Just,
and never TO have been adjusted or dis
charged, the moral obligation still exists, and
the debtor cannot coEscientiously avail him
self of the protection OF an act of limita-
ton" In the consideration of the claim of
Colonel Francis Vigo (recently settled and
paid the committee, though not allowing the
claim, make the declaration February "A,
1885 that they do not insist that the United
States are exonerated by lapse of time
from any obligation 10 admit claims' if
proven sound and just.
These testimon les suffice TO show that acts
OF limitation ought not TO impede the admin
istration of what is in itself just and right,
and that every claim now before either house
of congress is entitled To a fair and impartial
consideration and decision. For the future /
it should be the especial care of the govern
.ment in It's every branch, TO pay as they go,
or, az least, TO disallow claims from acquiring