Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1900-03-10
THE EVENING STAR SATURDAY, MARCH TO- 10000 PAGES
PRIVATE PENSION Bill
Representative Loud Protests Against the
Practice.
The Country Owes to the Soldier What
He Lost in His Service to
the Flag.

yesterday afternoon against the practice of
passing private pension bills. He said:
My remarks shall not be directed par
ticularly to this case, because one case,
Mr.. Chairman, would have very little eff
feet upon the country; but 1t Is the settled
policy. so it seems, that where case gets
into the committee on invalid pensions
asking for an increase above the amount
provided by law, that the committee either
grants the full request or compromises
somewhere along the line
Now, first, the committee have reported
cases here giving remarked women a pen
sion of $12 month, where If they had not
remarked they would have only been en-
tilted to IS. The law prohibits granting
pension committee, and ask the House of
Representatives., why We should take up
cases that are presented to them and al
low pension in excess of the law. If the
proper that remarked widows should re-
ceive a pension of s12 month, then why
not enact such legislation and relieve Con-
gress from the pressure of these individual
cases."
Mr.. sulloway-"Mr Speaker, can I ask
the gentleman a question:"
Mr.. Loud-"Certainly.
Mr.. Sulloway-"Would you favor such
legislation?'
Mr.. Loud-'I would not, and the gentle
man need not have asked the question.
but, IL ulQ favor IL WOulO 90 all In my
power to pass such legislation. If the
committee on invalid pensions believe that
such legislation should be enacted, then
it becomes their duty to come out into the
open, in the broad light of day, and pre-
sent unanimous report. as they delight
to roll their tongues around every case that
comes from that committee. A unanimous
report, Mr.. Chairman. means casual in
Vestigat1on by one member of that COM
mittee. Why, this committee, or it's men,
bers. can report here six or eight or ten
cases a day. The pension office spends
weeks and months in investigation to report
against these cases and yet a member of
Congress can dispose of six eight, or an
unlimited number of them in one day.
Disability Not Result of Service.
Mr.. Loud continued
Now, you take these reports from the
beginning to the end and, as a rule, where
you give the applicant a pension of $24,
$50 or s36 a month it is clearly apparent
that the applicants disability is not the
result of his service. Clearly, 1 say. in
granting 80 per cent of your cases, where
the man today is disabled, 1t is clearly ap-
parent from the reports that his disability
has no connection with his service what
ever. Now, let me say to you again, If
man becomes blind, if man becomes par
alyzed, or if any disease shall overtake
him in 1889 or 1900. and you think he
ought to have a pension of s24 $36 a
month because he may have served in the
army LOT ninety OF one nunQreQ Gays or
six months a year, then why not be
fair and come out and say to the country
that We believe and will enact into iegis-
lation such measure as will give every
man who was in the army $24 $36 a
month, if he, perchance, is disabled to-
day.
Il know very well, Mr.. Chairman, that
my words are falling upon deaf ears. They
have fallen upon deaf ears before. There
are motives that push this pension legisla-
ton through here which 1t Is unnecessary to
discuss. Some members, perhaps, may be-
lieve that it will secure their election in
the next contest. No man can believe that
John Smith or Tom Jones today, because
he IS totally disabled, and not the result
of his service, should have a pension be-
yond sl2 a month. If he does, then he
ceive it.
Now, what condition is confronting this
country today? We have just gone through
another little trouble. Thirty thousand ap-
plicants are now before the pension Office. |
and, If am creditaby informed, the widow
of every officer who died in this late war is
now an applicant and in some cases which |
have passed the other legislative body they |
ask for and in many cases receive so, |
SIS, so. $25 and $50 a month more than |
the law gives them. How they are scaled |
cannot tell. One widow of an officer, a
captain, gets $40 month. What the spe-
cial incentive, what the special influence
may be- God alone. perhaps, knows. An
other woman who has lost her husband in |
the service, captain, who 1 will put in |
the ordinary class, gets along and receives
a pension which the law gives her.
The Brake Removed.
Now the brake that has been placed on
pension legislation ever since the close of
the civil war Is removed. Our southern
brethren are criminally implicated now in
the pension roll. The late war saw soldiers
on the right side from all parts of the
country. and 1 witnessed here few mo-
ments ago the spectacle of every democrat
1 believe. except one voting to increase the
pension of a widow from $12 which l think
the committee reported, to $3.50. Perhaps
the widow was entitled under the law to
IS; as to that 1 will not say; she was not
entitled under the law to more than IS.
Undeserving of Consideration.
81 will say, without fear of successful
contradiction outside of this House-but
will not guarantee that members on the
floor of the House will publicly, although I
do undertake to say it without fear of con-
tradiction outside of the House or in the
corridors-that 90 per cent of the pension |
cases reported here for our action never
should receive the favorable consideration
of any legislative body. These cases have |
exhausted all of the means which the law
provides for their consideration in the first |
instance, and as the last resort are brought |
before us to set aside the law and give |
them a respectful hearing.
They have been reported against time and |
time again. The pension department of the |
government, with all of the means at it's
disposal, with all of the liberality that the
law allows, has Investigated the cases and
reported against them time and time again
and yet we asked to believe that a rep
resentative on the floor of the House can
by glancing at these papers for half hour |
or less present a question here which we |
are called upon to accept as logical and |
proper, which the department has taken |
years to determine the other way. Some |
people say 1t is unpopular to take this POSI-
ton. Gentlemen, it never is unpopular to |
pursue the course of right. There are liv- |
ing today more than 1000 900 veterans of |
the civil war-perhaps two millions and a |
quarter; do not know. There are about a |
million of them and their widows on the
pension roll. We had, l think 200 600 or |
100000 volunteers in the late unpleasant |
ness with Spain.'
Mr.. Talbert-"Two hundred and seventy
eight thousand
Mr.. Loud-'Two hundred and SEVENTH
eight thousand the gentleman SAYS When
the youngest man the floor Of this |
House shall have passed away and his de- |
scendants have followed him, Congress un-
less 1t takes new turn, will be legislatin9
upon these pension cases. 1t may be sur
prising to think that We yet legislatin9
upon cases arising out Of the revolutionary