The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1889-03-28
fHE NATIONAL TRIBuNE WAsINGToN g. THURSDAY @
APPOINTMENT OF CoRP'L TANNER.

APPOINTMENT OF ooRP'L TANNER.
President Harrison has gratifed the ar
dent desire of the comrades as mass by the
appointment of GOrpI James Tanner as
Commissioner of Pensions
The expression of this desire was simply
overwhelming. There were about 20 COM
petitors for the position, all good soldiers,
many of them terribly wounded; all of
them men of much more than ordinary
ability. Among them were ex-Governors
Of States, Representatives in Congress, Off
GERS who had held high commands, etc. All
of them were strongly Endorsed by their
comrades, fellow-citizens and acquaintance
among public men. Any one of them would
have made an excellent Commissioner of
Pensions, and the best testimony of this was
that those who knew them best were their
most earnest advocates
But the urgency for Comrade Tanner was
not confined to any one locality or State. 1t
was natural The whole mass of the ex-
soldiers and their friends from Maine to
California were for him. Even the strongest
adherents of the other candidates were en-
Enthusiastically in favor of him if their own
man could not be appointed. BE was the
first choice of the great majority of the COM
rades, and the second choice of the minority.
Corp1 Tanner merited this splendid in
dorsement of his comrades. He has well
earned it. No man in the Nation stands
quite so close to the hearts of all the old,
genuine fighting men as he. He is typical
volunteer, a representative private soldier,
an illustration of the frightful sacrifices
these men made to save the country.
He was one of the 100000 young men
who left their homes and employment at
the call of President Lincoln for volunteers
for three years. He entered regiment
which went directly to the front, and he
was constantly with its colors, in all its
marches and battles, until he received q
frightful mutilation at the second battle of
Bull Run.
Since the war the dearest efforts of his
head and hand have been for the benefit of
his comrades. Whatever else he may have
been engaged in, no day has passed without
his doing something of value for them. The
list merely of what he has accomplished
would stretch out through columns of this
paper.
Nature, through her gift of eloquence, put
it in his power to accomplish more than
would be possible to men equally jealous but
less gifted
He has no superior as an orator in the Ma
ton. Very few, if any, men equal him in
reaching the heart of d popular assembly,
and fashioGing the minds of his hearers to
his will. When speaking of or to old SOL
diers he is particularly effective, for he has
then the true eloquence of the heart, He
feels and thinks as they feel and think, and
speaks as they would speak were their lips
touched as his are, with the magic fire of
genius.
The veterans rejoioe because they have
now, for the first time, a representative pri-
Yate soldier at the head of the Pension
Bureau man whom they recognize as one
of themselves; who has stood shoulder to
shoulder and musket in hand with them in
defense of the Nation; who has shared with
them the trials and sufferings they endured !;
who sympathizes with them to the Utmost
recesses of his heart, and who has the ability
and the force of character to represent them
in all things.
In selecting Comrade Tanner for his Com
missioner of Pensions Comrade Ben Harri-
son has earned the sincere gratitude of every
man who wore the blue, without distinction
of party. Democratic, Prohibition and Labor
! RefOrmers are as enthusiastic over it as Re-
publican veterans. There are no party dis
tinctions in their appreciation of loyalty,
courage, good soldiership and good comrade-
ship.