The record-union., 1892-11-02
MIR. CLEVELAND AND A DEMO
CRATIC COMMITTEE.

A Democratic committee in the House
condemned Mr.. Cleveland's veto of the
dependent pensions bill as unwarranted,
unjust and untrue.
Mr.. Cleveland had put the soldiers
service in the war on the cold "pay'' basis,
saying they had received Compensation in
pay and bounty such as no other country
gave" The House committee, headed by
c. c. Matson, afterward Democratic NOM
inee for Indiana, sent in a report scoring
the veto message right and left. There
were fifteen signers of the report, and
nine of them were Democrats and had
voted for Mr.. Cleveland. That committee
said:
The Executive seeks to place a construction
upon the bill different from that which was
clearly intended, and which, we believe, is
clearly expressed.
We submit with confidence to the discrimi-
mating Judgment of the House and the coun-
try that but one construction can be given it,
and that is the one adopted by your commit
tee. The words which prescribe the right to a
pension entirely exclude the con-
Struction sought to be given by the President.
Taken altogether, and not so delicately ana
ment is exceeded in an effort to do away with
the plain provisions of the bill. we again sub
nit to the judgment of the House and the
country that those who framed il, alter three
months of careful, deliberate consultation,
have made no mistake in the bill.
This, from a committee of his own
politics, was the severest rap President
ever had. But, as if the committee could
not repress its sense of the injustice Mr..
Cleveland was doing the soldiers, it ad-
ded:
We regard the strained Interpretation put
upon the bill in the message as an excuse,
rather than a reason, for returning il to the
House, and we believe we do no injustice to
the Executive when, considering the whole
message, we say that II It's provisions had
been palmer and that no question could have
been raised as to whether it included only
those unable to labor, he would have yet in
terposed objections.
Here the committee might well have
paused. But it seems as if it was de-
termined to arraign the President, Grover
Cleveland, as playing unfairly in the
whole matter. He had charged in his
message that in the procuring of pensions
there was widespread disregard of truth
and good faith" AS to that, the PEN
sions Committee, nine to six of them
Democrats, replied:
Your committee do not share in the opinion
that There exists widespread disregard of
truth and good faithn in the prosecution of
pension claims. Nor do we believe that the
soldiers of the country are prone to commit
fraud, perjury or subornation of perjury for
that purpose or any other.
Referring to the Mexican war pension
bill, which Mr.. Cleveland signed with
out a murmur, and which gives every
widow of a soldier of that war aged 81.
whether she was his wife at the time of
the war or not, and regardless of the
cause of his death, even if he was killed
in rebellion and in the Confederate
army, the committee, as a parting shot,
had this to say of Mr.. Cleveland:
1t passes the comprehension of this COM
mittee to understand how the President couId
nave overlooked in another bin what are al
legged as faults in this bill. The bill we refer
10 passed the House on the same day this did
and met his unhesitating approval. $
rms committee would rejoice II there could
even now be found some indefinite vagueness
or latent ambiguity in the Mexican pension
law that would enable the President to saw
that these results were not foreseen by him
when he was approving the one and contem-
plating the veto of the other. The bill We
presented to the house was broad, liberal and
patriotic. 1t struck down any disbarment
from the pension list on account of any
service against the flag excepting such per
sons as were laboring under political dis
abilities.
1t was intended 10 reach mainly the sur
vivors of our Civil War who had fought for
the Union, but it embraced within its gener-
Gus terms the survivors of the war of 1912
the Indian wars ana the war with Mexico
all who could show that they were totally un-
able to labor and were dependent upon their
daily labor for support could appeal to its
provisions, and all were to be treated exactly
alike.
II this bill fails to become law, such dis
tinctions are made by the acts of the Execu-
tive in approving one and disapproving the
other that the committee cannot believe il
will be indorsed anywhere by the patriotic
sentiment of this country.