Daily independent. [volume] (Elko, Nev.) 188?-1915, 1893-04-25
PURGE THE PENSION ROLLS,

attention in an article on 1.-THE Roll OF
Honor" to the fact that there were
numberless frauds on the pension
rolls, and manfully took the ground
that these should be eliminated and
the pension list be made again what
it was at frat, and what the patriotic
people Of America intended it should
be-a Roll Of Honor. That article
was repu blished with favorable conf
ments in many of the leading news
papers in this country, and the agita-
ton thus started has gone on
increasing. May it lead to the speedy
purging of the pension list.
The most drastic measures could
not be severe enough for that purpose.
In this purifying process every
comrade can be enlisted who has given
honorable service in his country's
hour of need. And it is as much
patriotic duty. II you know of per-
son receiving pension in your town
who is not honorably entitled to it by
service in the field, send the name to
the new Pension Commissioners for
investigation.
Or if you fear the wrath OF the no
service wearers of the bronze button
who might drive you out of the G.. A.
r. Post because you will not connive
at fraud. send the names and adj
dresses to the editor of the Gazette,
at the Office Of this paper, and we will
see to it that proper investigation is
made.
No American can afford to neglect
this important matter. With a pen
sion roll greater than the number Of
mon in the field at the close of the
war Of the rebellion-and most of
those lie in honored graves-and with
an expenditure over S160,O0O,O00 a
year for that one item, it behooves
those interested in the real veterans,
and the tried and true veterans them
selves, to be up and doing.
There will be some startling revela-
tions in the next two or three years,
we are convinced. We have some
evidence already which will be pre-
pared for the new Commissioner of
Pensions. II fraud. cannot be proven,
then the pension will still be psid.
If fraud can be proven it cannot be
too quickly proven, and the pension
should cease.
Every dollar paid in fraud is wicked
ly stolen, not alone from the patient
taxpayers, but from the deserving
veterans. Strike, comrades, while
the iron is hot, and if it should scar
some bogus claimants 80 as to leave a
mark by which they may be known
OF all men, there will be no cause for
regret.
In this connection we wish to call
attention to the frantic efforts made
by one George Il. Lemon, in his claim
agents organ, to. befog and mislead
the people and the comrades who sup
port his paper and have made him
rich, by publishing huge cartoons Of
one-legged and otherwise MANNED
veterans, and claiming that when
honest mon and honorable editors
olamor for the wedding out of frauds
they are injuring these manned heroes.
Lemon knows better than that. There
never was worse or more yicious
misrepresentation made by him and
the claim agents ring. The gist OF
what we have all along claimed ia
given above. We have added moth
ing to and taken nothing away from
our demands, and readers CT the Ga
zette will bear us out in what we say.
We ask only this: Let the pension
list be overhauled. If a name is sent
in as that Of person believed to be a
bOoua or ,lnuorthv rac;p;ant LOT H.