Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1888-03-14
LARGEss TO THE LEGIoNs.

In the United States Senate, last
week, Senator Vest, of Missouri, took
occasion to "talk out in meetin', )" on
the subjet of pensions, in a way that
must have been satisfactory to every
one in the hearing of his voice who was
not blinded by partizan zeal or who was
not candidate for Office and dependent
on the soldier vote. The question under
discussion was the arrearages of PEN
sion bill. Following are the most inter-
esting extracts from the speech:
1--WE hear this talk that we have not
done enough for the soldiers. We have
spent since the close of the war $751;
100000 in pensions. a sum unparalleled
in the history of the whole world. We
passed laws that preferred them TO ap
pointments for Office above theirfellOw-
citizens. and to-day we are told that we
owe them debt of eternal gratitude
because they did not seize with mailed
hand the government of this country
and convert it TO their own purposes"
1.-THE great military and political or
ganiZatiOn. the Grand Army of the Re-
public, throws its iron glove into the
debates of congress and sends to us
bills through its accredited senators;
and when the president of the United
States honestly and bravely discharged
his executive duty and vetoed an enact
ment which he considered improper. he
was threatened by the officers of this
organization with personal insult If he
dared to make his presence known in
the city where it held its last meeting"
In this city are corps of men en-
gagged in inventing legislation to take
more money out of the federal treasury.
Here is the report of the commissioner
of pensions showing that in 1879, when
we passed the aTrears-Of- pension act,
there were some $50 applications for
invalid pensions. We passed the act,
and in 1850 the applications jumped to
ll0,B73. The war had closed in 1865;
fifteen years had elapsed. Where were
these $4,000 and more invalids who were
entitled to pensions from this govern
ment through all those fifteen years?
They did not know that they needed
the money. They did not know that
they had been disabled, but the claim
agents invented a law, and when con-
gIess put limitation upon the time for
applying, the number of applicants
jumped in one single year, by the record,
from 10000 to 10000, and the amount
of disbursements from $3O,OO0,OOO to
S57 900, OOO."
1.-The pension rolls show that out of
2, 300 900 men enrolled in the federal
army 200 were disabled by disease or
by shot and shell. Nearly 80 per cent.
of all the men enrolled in the federal
army according to the pension reports
are now applicants for pensions, or
have been. Such mortality and such
military execution have never been
known in the history of tn whole world.
The cOntederateS were not properly
equipped. We deprecated the quality
of our powder; our soldieres were half
clothed and half-armed and half-fed;
yet according to this report, making
due allowance for the effect of climate
and disease, every confederate soldier
disabled three of his adversaries."
"There has been no such destruction
in military annals since the children of
Israel marched through the wilderness
and destroyed whole nations in single
day. Talk of craftsmanship Why.
sir, we have read in the Arabian Nights,
of that Persian prince to whom a gent
gave an arrow which went to its mark
across whole continents, through noun
tains, over rivers, despising space i'm its
flight. The arrow in the Arabian Nights
was nothing to the bullet of the con-
federate soldier. 1t must have hit two
it was not aimed. 1t produced strange
and subtle diseases, which lie dormant
for twenty-five years in the system. and
then suddenly break forth under the
effect OF some new pension law"