The National tribune., 1895-04-25

1 ~
stress, demand in imperative tones thai
there shall be no haggling with the men
who gave the Government what it could
not buy?
For 80 long years now the Pension
Bureau has been considering these claims
after its own leisurely fashion. During
that time fully 100000 men who served
in the Union army have died. How
many hundred thousand of these died de-
frauded of their rights, because of the
delay in settling their claims, we have no
means of knowing. IF an accurate
statement could be made it would appal
the people. 1t would show an amount
of needles8ly-infiicted misery that would
stir the conscience of the country to its
profoundest depths. 1t would be a
revelation such as they never dreamed
possible under our system Of Govern
ment. If all the suffering, the heart
sickness, the bitter need that these brave,
notwithstanding men and their families
endured before death came to end all
could be known, the compassionate peo-
pie would say with indignation that it
would have been better TO pay every
claim ten times over rather than sub
jected any men to that frightful ordeal.
To-day, Mr.. Commissioner, the situa-
ton is vastly more imperative than ever.
Every one of the men who have claims
before the Bureau is now past the meri-
dian of life. He is on the downward
slope that heads directly to the grave
The steps are few and quickly taken that
will place him there. Every year that
he has waited has shortened the time that
he can wait, because it has not only
enormously increased his need Of pen
sion, but it has brought his tomb promi-
nently into the foreground and called
for haste in the adjustment of his earthly
affairs. His arm is steadily growing
weaker, his step more trembling, bis eye
DINNER. Less able now to earn money,
his want of it is still more clamorous, for
he must have food and medicine and
comforts that he could awhile ago have
dispensed with. IF we multiply cases
like this by the hundreds of thousands
of those now waiting adjudication in the
Pension Bureau, we get a mountainous
misery that is painful to contemplate
that the people of the United States do
not for an instant desire to exist. IF we
remember that at least 10000 of these
men will die this year, and still larger
number mex. year, We get an incentive
for activity that should be irresistible.
No man can desire that these men
shall die in poverty and distress The
chillest friend the veterans can have
the most carping critic of their character
and services-will pronounce it inexcus-
able that they should, under any pre-
text, be denied the prompt and generous
given the money-lenders. He
must freely admit that every one of
them is entitled to have his case quickly |
investigated, everything in his favor
given its proper weight, and be allowed |
the full benefit of all laws passed in his
behalf His American citizenship en-
titles him to this, even if bis services to
the country be not considered.
To come back to the question of ethics
with which we started. Every man who |
dies denied his rights is the victim of a |
an inexcusable wrong. In |
every way it is a much more shameful
thing than for the Government to de-
fraud outright any other class of claim
ants. To other claimants delay is
merely an inconvenience. Their entire
means of support are not involved in
their claims, nor does death invalidate |
the debt due them.
But the worldly all of the veterans is
in the pensions due them for
services rendered when the Nation was
in mortal extremity. To not give them
these is to combine inhumanity, ingrati-
tude and dishonesty. The people now
understand this as they never did before. |
They have had demonstrated to them the |
falsity of the charges against veterans as
a class, and the merits, the services, the