The National tribune., 1900-03-08

Orders No 6. Headquarters First Separate
| Division. Army of the Cumberland. March
IL. 1865
One of the charges was that Lieut.-Col.
Corbin got off his horse. and hid behind a
tree.
Capt. Clarence W Baker. mentioned by
Gen. Morgan. WAS breyet.ed a MAJOR. was
mustered out with his regiment. and did not
enter the Regular Army.
THE INI0UIrY OF THE CoDIFICATION
COMMISSIONS.
Eyer since the war The veterans and their
friends have boon struggling perjisjcn.iy
ami encrg2iicaily to build up Il body of
pension laws that would do exact justice
| to the gallant men who savcGttiio Nations
life at frighiful expense to themselves.
There has been an amount Of thought,
labor and high intelligence dcvo.cd to the
framing and passage of those laws which
is past describing. In all these years the
pension system has been Il matter Of deep
est thought TO all sorts AMI conditions of
mon in every part of the country. The
matter has b2en discussed i'll Posts, Re
unions, and social gatherings Of veterans
and their friends, the higher orgaHiza-
tions Of the Grand Army OF the Republic
have had committees compojci of the
abIest mon in The country, who nave given
the subject anxious thought, politicians
and statcsmcn-from tho lowest official 10
Presidents of the United Statcs-havc
discussed the subject. ii has been mad Q
the matter for Statc papers. Every news
Paper in the United tatcs has from time to
time cditorialized on the question voIu-
minously. II may be said that 10 every
IiIe and provision in the pension laws
th"r" has been giVcn an amount Of study
hardly devoted toGay other legislation upon
the statute books. Indeed. we know of
none other that has boon as carefully
studied for rs long Il time by as many able
men, rs the pension laws
Now Mr.. Evans. by his Commission TO
Revise and Codify the Pension Laws.
proposes to sweep all the product of this
| tremendous amount of labor aside, and
substitute for it a new set Of laws, prepared
by a squad of clerks under his direction
The proposition is simply iniquitous.
He and his friends claim that it is to be a
Commission, composed of "dstin-
guished and able lawyers, two Of whom
shall be members of the Grand Army of the
Republic" Against this may be set the
plain provisions OF the bill. which say tiat
the Commissions duty snail Ec, under the
direction of the Secretary OF the interior,
10 revise and codify the pension laws Of
the United States" They shall further
report their labor5 to the Secretary Of thc
Interior, at the earliest practicable day,
TO be by him laid before Congress. They
shall also make such other reports during
the progress Of thcir work, as they shall
see fit, to be laid before Congress, at his
discretion"
Can anybody mistake this? No matter
who may be appointed TO and accept q
position on the Commission, he will at once
be reduced to the status of a mere clerk of
the Interior Department; he can do nothing
except at the direction of the Secretary of
the Interior" No matter what he may
think of the laws in general, he must not
touch anything but what he is directed,
and he must shape that according to the
Secretary's ideas, or else lose his job and
the accompanying salary. Inasmuch as
the Secretary said frankly in his testimony
before the Senate Pension Committee that
lie knew nothing of the pension business,
but left everything to the Commissioner,
this means the absolute control and direc-
ton of Henry Clay Evans.
Does anybody know Of any really able
and prominent lawyer, any comradc of
distinguished standing in the Grand Army
Of the Republic, who would accept an ap-
pointment under these conditions? We
certainly do not.
Therefore, this means and can only mean
giving Henry Clay Evans full power TO
manglc ana pervert the pension laws abso-
lutely as lie secs fit.
1t must lie remembered all the time that
there is absolutely no need Of this Com
mission. Nobody but Henry Clay Evans
has ever seen any obscurity or ambiguity
in the pension laws. To everybody else
they have seemed as clear and plain as
clear, plain, English words, used in their
everyday sense, could make them And
in all this controversy, neither Henry Clay
Evans nor any Of his friends is OH record
with an amendment which offers to make
any part Of the laws clearer or more cx-
plicit than it now is.
We repeat, the whole business is an
inquitous trick 10 put the pension veterans
and their widows more completely at the
mercy Of the Commissioner than they now
are.
EVERY time Il man makes AN improve
ment in guns-big or small there is n
; loud proclamation that now war is TO he