The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1897-10-14
THE REAL QUESTION.

Government has always treated its
creditors, of all kinds, and the way it
should treat them. 1t is the only hon.
orable way 1t is the way every honest
man manages his private affairs. lie
takes every pains to find out what he
actually owes each man, and then he
sets about providing means Of payment.
That is the way the Government
treated its bondholders, its contractors
and other creditors at the close Of the
war. The aggregate amount of obliga-
tons that it had to meet was appalling.
The public debt on the 1st day of July,
1866, with millions of claims yet I'M
settled, reached the astounding figure
of S2,773,236,173.69. This was nearly
one-fourth the total assessed valuation
of all the property in the country &C
cording to the census of 1860, only six
years before. In the meanwhile billions
of property had been destroyed by four
years of terrible war. One-third of the
country had been desolated, and could
bear no portion of the burden of the war
debt, which had to be carried alone by
the remaining two-thirds Relative to
the resources Of the country, it was as
large as a debt of s10,000,000,000 to
So, 100000, would be to the country
to-day. The interest amounted to s143,-
701, $50 a year, or nearly halfmillion
dollars for every working day, Yet
the people then did not ask "What is
the size of the debit" but GLOW can
we devise means to pay these men off in
the shortest possible time, and relieve
the country of their claims ?" They
were SO gratifed by the signal victory
in the long struggle for National ex-
istence that they were willing to pay
any price for it. Since all their fears
were ended, and the Nation saved, the
future looked very bright to them.
To-day the people are eagerly DESTROYS
of paying every man who bore his share
faithfully in the great struggle all that
the laws intend he should have. They
do not want any higgling, any chatter
ing, any technical defeat of his rights
They cannot bear the thought Of any
deserving old soldier being defrauded of
what is due him by sharp practice in the
Pension Bureau. Everything goes to
prove this They fully approved the
passage of every pension law now on
the statute books. Every one of these
laws was discussed to the fullest extent
before it became law. The public was
completely informed as to its scope and
purposes, and they intended that the
veterans and their dependent ones should
have every dollar that liberal inter-
probation of those laws would give him.
No Representative or Senator was ever
criticized or condemned for voting for
too liberal pensions. No candidate ever
lost vote because Of his generous views
on pension expenditures. No party has
ever even suggested the repeal of any
of the pension laws, or the reduction of
pension expenditures. No National
Convention, and no State Convention,
held north of Mason 81 Dixon's line,
but what has declared unequivocally in
favor Of full pensions to every deserv-
ing veteran.
On the other hand, the efforts of
Cleveland and his subordinates to de-
prive veterans Of their hard-earned rights
reused a storm Of Indignation from one
end of the country TO the other, helped
most Of all to blight their political
careers, and strand them permanently,
without a friend anywhere.
All these being undeniable facts, why
should not the work Of pension allow
ances be pushed forward with the utmost
rapldltl antil @, tsfed?
Undoubtedly In.s - wAal 10
want, and they will not be salts. al
it is done. The people do not care for
the amount Of the pension expenditures.
That is a comparatively unimportant
abstraction. But they do care very
much for the concrete examples of the
Nations ingratitude which are fonpd in