The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1889-01-03


had been disabled or not. There no pretense
that any considerable class of deserving claimants
suffered hardship on account of this limitation,
that relief by private bill was not ready to flow
forth to exceptional cases.
The consequence was what might have been
forcseen The Nation has offered a bonus of 81 900
cash, besides future payments, for every new PEN
sion claim that could be proved The gang of
claim agents in Washington were busy urging ex-
soldiers everywhere to solicit Government aid, and
assuring them of our unusual facilities" What
wonder. considering the infrmities of human ma
ture, that the invitation to step up and take
thousand dollars apiece, with annuity, out of
the Treasury, "on mere ex-parte affidavit"
should be accepted in the large spirit in which
it was offered; that men in comfortable circum-
stances, who had been ashamed to ask for So
month, should find the offer of thousand dollars
in lump to be quite different natter and that
men in comfortable health should become con-
scious al at of hitherto unsupported disorders,
traceable through subtle lines of oausation TO
longer shorter military service? OF course, as
everybody Except Senator Blair might have
known, and as everybody now does know, there
were frauds innumerable, And the Senator from
New Hampshire, whose guileless hands had been
employed to pull the lanyard to explode this mine
uIAuSI only feinarki rs uc saw
the rogues running away with the gold, that he
had no idea that it was loaded to that extent.
We have had Gen. Hawley's testimony that the
pressure for this great robbery did not proceed
from the soldiers. 1t was eoncocted and carried
through by the dens of pension thieves in Wash
ington, and their confederates in Congress and in
various parts of the country But the same cannot
be said of the like schemes that have followed this.
One of the most ptiHble results of the Arrears of
Pensions Act was the decentralization of the
soldiers; not merely the decentralization indicated
by such facts were told to the Senate through
Mr.. Beck by the officers of the various Soldiers
Homes-that the payments under this act emptied
their institutions for weeks thereafter, the pen
sioners drifting back little by little suffering the
miserable consequences of a long debauch. To a
painful extent the ex-soldiers throughout the Ma
ton were intoxicated by these copious drafts from
the Treasury, and began to and threaten, like
drunken men demanding more drink. Their Or
CARNATIONS for mutual aid and good-fellowship
were turLed into political machines, not for the
promotion of public ends, but for the one purpose
of public plumber for the personal profit of the
members. Candidates for Office were pledged 10
the support of new projects of robbery, under the
threat of being opposed by s. the soldier vote"
The next scheme for distributing the surplus"
bill for the promotion of thrihlessness and the
punishment of private virtue which provides that
any ex-soldier who by industry and thrift shall
have taken good of himself and his family and
laid up something for rainy day. shall be exelud-
ed from the privileges of that act and that spend
Thrills and deadbeats and sharpers with wit
enough to put their property under other names,
shall have the of the Treasury. And the two
Houses of Congress were builed into passing this
bill-the Dependent Pension Bill" called
under the open and mpudent threat, that if they
refused to pass it they would presently be COM
PEELED to pass something great deal worse.
The man who wrote the above was drunk
with his own venom. His hatred of the
veterans is so intense that it silences all
/ scruples as to misstatements Of well-known
facts. The sober, plain truth is that every
dollar which was paid out to the veterans
under the arrears of pensions was as lawfully
owed to Them to say the least, as were the
billions ofdollars which were paid to the bond
holders. The soldiers had given more value
received for the money than the bondholders.
The money was due them under as clear and
binding contract as that under which the
bondhoIders received their money Under
every consideration of honor and justice the
Nation was bound to pay them what it did,
and it is equally bound to pay them
more. The pension thieves in Wash
ington VI. C.. pension attorneys-did just
as honorable service for their clients as
the brokers who collected the interest for the
bonds for their patrons, or the attorneys who
secured payment for mules bought, or sup
plies furnished. The service rendered by
the pension attorney was, if any thing, much
higher and more honorable. He assisted
poor deserving men, who had few friends
and who had sacrificed much for the country
to secure their rights. Everybody was will
ing to help the bondholder or the contractor
few were willing to help the soldier. TIT
moneyed mans attorney was praised for do
ing his duty. The soldiers friend is de
nounced.
The Free Trade animus Of the writer
clearly exposed in the concluding para
graphs:
Can we afford tolaugh at the enormity of scheme
Of public plumber such as these? Is there anythin
less hopeful in the plotfor stealing s. coo coo
year than there in the plot for stealing $500
O00OO0 10 years before? Is there leading pol
tician the North, of either party that dares ope
his mouth against these shameless -eonspiiacie
against the Nation in the late Presidential can
paign? Did not both the parties bid against eae
other, in promises of public money for the soldie
vote, to buy the Presidency by largesses to thi
c praetorian guard?
There is not room here to say the tenth part {
the plain words that need to be said on this sui
ject and that no one seems ready to say. 1t look
highly probable that the next Congress and tn
next Executive will unite in some measure unprt
cedently ruinous and infamous; that the part
/ whose boast has been that it would maintain th
n American worllingman in his superiority to til
r European worlzingman viii deliberately impos
upon American industry the identical burden {
= war taxation, to be borne through generations
e come, under which the industry of the older ma
1t tions is bowed into the dust; so that it shall b
said of u.s. as with such bitter truth it has been sal
g of them, that " the workman goes TO his labor ca
It rying soldier strapped upon his back"