The National tribune., 1899-03-16

accounts Tor tnlS excess rs lOllOWS.
For payment of pensions. .............. 5,aOC
| For the postal service, t" meet i'll
creased d. inaudS of commerce. l6, ,5Sl
For river ana h irbor improvements. 3,40l. lbs
For constructing rev shipS........ G,0S0, S5s
For beginning the work of the 18th
cel.SilS., 49, .....---..-. lSbUN
7 he Paris EXpuSit inn. ................ 2l000O
For new pubic buildings. 5000,C00
For pa nicpt of Judgements against the
Government undt / the Bowman act
and for he French spoliatlons....... 3,iCO.I6S
Total. ....... Observation-Disclosures 2S1 5l6
This reduces the item Of pension ex-
pcnditures nearly 100000 from that
given in bis first estimate last week, and
shows that the total increase over those
Of Clevelanrl's Administration was but
81 ,937, 500 a year.
This concrete statement carries in
itself the severest disappointment to
those who fought through the bitter
political campaign of 1896 with SAN
guire hopes, and it is incidentally a
strong confirmation CT all that has been
alleged against the management of the
Pension Bureau.
The complaint against the manage
ment of the Pension Bureau under
Cleveland WAS twofoid. First, that
tens of thousands of veterans and their
dependent ones were cruelty and most
unjustly deprived of pensions which had
been bitterly earned by hardest service
for the country. Second, that instead
of the laws being interpreted more liber
ally and their relief being extended
more promptly, as was inperatively de-
nanded by the advancing age of the
veterans, the progressive grievousness of
their disabilities and rapid rise of the
mortality rate among them, the reverse
Was the case, and the hardship of OBJ
tanning their rights intensified in
mockcry Of the bitterness of their needs.
Much of the energy of the cam
Taign of 1896 WIS directly due to the
burning dissatisfaction of the veterans
and their friends with the pension
policy of tie Cleveland Administra-
ton. 1t is no exaggeration 10 say that
it Influenced fully 100000 votes.
The pension question was everywhere
an issue, and very nearly a controlling
one in all the States which cast their
votes for Mckinley. The people were
directly asked to approve or disapprove
of that policy, and the friends of Maj.
Mckinley made the most of the situa-
ton by bitterly attacking Cleveland's
pension policy, and promising a radical
amendment if Comrade Mckinley were
elected.
Certainly everybody in the country
supposed, and had every right to sup
Tose, that one of the results of the vic
tory of 1886 would he the radical
reform of the pension policy, the undo
ing of the wrongs which Lochren had
been TIE agent in committing, and the
commencement Of all era Of liberality
and justice toward the veterans. The
people were prepared for an increase Of
nany millions in the pension expendi-
lures. They had voted for it and ex-
pectcd it, for the matter had been
thoroughly discussed before them, and
they understood the rightfulness of such
ali increase. They understood that it
would be but temporary, for the Unjust
ices Of Cleveland would have to be
repaired as tar as they could be to the
veterans who yet survived. They ex-
rected that the men and widows who
had had their pensions unjustly taken
away would have them restored, and
that the hundreds Of thousands of long
waiting applicants would at last have
their claims allowed.
Two years have row passed, and the
total increase of the pension expendi-
lures has been but $1,937,6OO per
annum, while the immense clerical force
Of the Pension Bureau is going through
the same dreary, heart breaking policy
of circumlocution, and employing the
same subterfuges, evasions and shifts to
send the veterans to their graves I'M
pensioned that was inaugurated by VIM.
Lochren at the command of Grover
Cleveland.
How long will the veterans and their