Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1893-03-08
Simpson on Pensions.

hOA OOAACAO OAlnh obJ OJuCA OboOO
In the Union, and from district that
has 20, 900 old soldiers within its bord-
ers, had hoped to have more time to
discuss this question, as it is one of vi
tai interest, not only TO the people of
the whole Union, but particularly of
interest to the people of my district.
II am opposed to these amendments.
L am particularly opposed to the
amendment turning oyer the Pension
Bureau to the War Department; and
am surprised that a democratic COM
mittee should recommend measure of
this kind. The democratic party has
stood as launch opponentof all forms
of Capitalization. This is centraliza.
ton beyond which do not believe the
republican party would like to go. 1t is
centraliZing this government into the
most dangerous Department of any De-
partment in the goyernment-the War
Department. 1t is to create and make
a necessity for the continuance of the
army.
Now, gentlemen will readily under
stand, particularly gentlemen from the
South, in this country this pension
question today has grown out of the
fact that we have been believing in this
country for years in a spirit of warfare.
Every man as old as l am will we'll re
member that the North, in the discus
sion of this slavery question, exhaust
ed every argument. They proposed to
fight the battle out on the lines of argu-
ment and reason. When the South dis
covered that they were beaten in the
arena of debate, they resorted TO the
argument of force to set up a govern
ment, government in which should be
perpetuated system of slavery, a sys-
tenn that proposed to take from 1905, 900
people the product Of their own labor.
How they failed is a matter of history.
Our southern friends must remem-
Der that this pension system that they
complain of is the outgrowth of their
appeal to the arbitration of the sword,
they must remember that the generous
North offered everything within the
range Of honor in order to avert blood
shed; for thirty years they exhausted
Cancellation and compromise, they tri-
ed eyerv expedient, they relinquished
every right, the North offered to meet
in convention her sister states to ar
range terms of peaceable separation ev
en-, but all these generous terms were
refused by the South, nothing would do
but an appeal to the God of War, and
today we are reaping the results, which
are crop of evils that are greater than
the evils we attempted to cure, and
are the legitimate fruit that always
grows out of such parent plant and
follows, as natural consequence, the
transgression of the laws of right and
justice.
I'VE admit that 1T is hard lesson,
but let us learn to bear it manfully and
i'll the future profit by the experience
of the past, and, if possible, avoid a
repetition of these grieyous errors and
thereby prevent a recurrence of these
evils in the future.
Mr.. Chairman, if these evils of the
pension system were the only ones it
would not be so hard, but that is only
| legislation that came in with the war
period. The excuse for levylng tribute
upon trade was one of the eXpedients
of war. Though that people have been
robbed for q years, untold millions
have been flowing from the hands of
productive labor into the pockets of
! trusts and combines, the legitimate off
| spring of our tariff legislation that was
hoiSted upon us as an eXcuSelfor meet
ing the large expenditures growing out
of fine civil war.
Then another twin evil, our bonded
indebtedness that has come to be ma
tIOnal curse, has cost, according to the
statement OF the gentleman from Penn
sylvania, republican in good stand
ing, nearly S2,500,00O.00O IN interest
alone, to say nothing of the principal.
and yet that debt hangs over us and
bids fair to drag the nation down to
national bankruptcy.
These evils alone have propably mad
the effect to draw from productive la
Dor more wealth In q years since the
close of the war than slavery had done
for handred years, and has had the
effect Of impoveFishing not less than 60
per cent of the surviving veterans of
the war, who fought to defend the ma
ton against the destrOyers, has had the
effect TO leave them in condition 20
require national aid through our pen
sion system as a preventative to keep
them out of the poor house,
Now, to my mind, the way to cure
his evil is to strike at the root of the
disease. First teach our children bV
necessary, that &c is 2 very cowardly
way to settle dispute; stop worship
ing military heroes, stop building mill
tary forts and arsenals; stop building
ironclads, naVies and all these things
that make war possibiei for these
things are part of the war system and
may all be resolved into prepare
tons for war, and when you have made
preparations fGy anything you general
ly get it sooner or later, and yet men
who are crying out against the burdens
of pensions, have in this congress vot-
ed large sums OF money to create all
the instruments and agencies, all the
adjuncts and accessories, all its furni-
ture and equipage, all it's forts, armies,
navies, military, displays-that keeps
alive in the minds Of men this barba
rone plan Of settling dispute.
And these same gentlemen that COM
plain of this heavy burden of taxatIon.
brought all about by this pension sys-
| tenn, come forward with the plan to