Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1892-11-23
The Republicans Bankrupt the Govern
ment
THE PENSION BILLS THE CHIEF
CAUSE.

CAUSE.
Though, at the end of his term,
Cleveland left the sum of 800, 1000, 900
in the treasury, the Republicans have
spent it all and passed pension bills
and incurred obligations which will re-
quire even greatly increased appropria-
tions to meet, so that, as the Washing
ton correspondent of the Baltimore
Sun says, when the committee on APP
preparations gets to work at the begin
ming of the next session of Congress it
will be confronted with the necessity |
of making pension appropriations on a
scale of greater magnitude than ever
before. The extravagant pension leg |
islation of the Reed Congress and the
free handed distribution of pensions
to all applicants, with little regard to
the merits of their claims, by Commits
sioners Tanner and Raum, are bearing
their natural fruit. There is no exag-
geration in the prediction that the next
session of Congress must appropriate
| the enormous sum OF not less than
| 5000, 1000 for pensions alone. The
object of the pension office under the
present administration has avowedly
| been to dispose of pension claims with
the greatest possible rapidity and there
is ample ground for the suspicion that,
in their haste to railroad the cases
through and beat all previous records
at increasing the pension roll, the Off
cials of the bureau have not taken
much care to look into their merits.
At any rate the pension roll is being
increased at the rate of $4,000 names
per month, and, making due allowance
for deaths, it is safe to say there will
be million names on the roll before
the beginning of Mr.. Cleveland's adj
ministration and the list will still be
growing. The appropriations for pen
sions at the last session reached the I'M
sprecedented sum of $147, 100000, and
yet, large as that amount is, it is now
estimated there will be deficiency of
between $33, 100000 and $35,000,C00 to
be provided for at the next session,
while the regular appropriation for the
next fiscal year will havesto be in the
neighborhood of $1S0,000,0OO. These
enormous appropriations will make it
impossible for the most economically
disposed Congress to keep down the
total appropriations of the session to a
| figure within the estimated total rev.
enues without seriously crippling the
administration of the government.
These appropriations will have to be
made by a democratic Congress, but
the country will fully understand that
the present situation is the direct re-
suit of the action of the republican
Congress in imposing enormous obliga-
lions upon the treasury, while at the
same time the tariff was raised so as to
decrease imports. and thereby lessen
the revenue While the pension ap-
preparation bill was under discussion
last year number of Representatives
advocated the imposition of an income
tax heavy enough to meet the pension
expenditures, and it is probable this
plan will be again advocated at the
next session. 1t is argued that if the
money for pensions was raised by di-
rect tax people would then appreciate
the weight of the pension burden, and
would demand revision or the pen
sion laws and q wedding out from the
pension rolls of the thousands of names
fraudulently or improperly there at
the present time.