The National tribune., 1901-12-05
LACK CONFIDENCE"
In his report Commissioner Evans
makes this admission:

Claimants lack confidence in the de
cisions of this Bureau, rs determining the
real merits of claims, and it therefore
often happens that rejected cases are re
OPENED and appealed again and again, be
ing abandoned only when claimant and
attorney have both lost all hope of IA
vorable adjudication
They have certainly every reason to
lack confidence, when every community
in the North and West has its numerous
aagrant instances of n violent disregard
of law and justice. No little group of
veterans can gather together anywhere
but what will contain some men who
have been denied what is rightly due
them, by a most unjustifiablc peryersion
of the law. The country rings with the
maladministration of his office by the
Commissioner. Congress is besieged by
men and women who have been unjustly
deprived of what is due them. and nearly
every private pension bill passed is an in
dctmeut of the Commissioner. The Grand
Army of the Republic is strongly opposed
to private pension bills, except in very
exceptional eases. 1t holds that the laws
should be SO interpreted and administered
as TO give every man and woman what
rightfully belongs to him or her. 1t
claims that the laws ms they now stand.
if administered according to their obvious
intent and purpOrt-if administered ac-
cording 10 the clear purpose Of those who
put them on the statute bopks-would 20
far toward removing all proper cause of
complaint. They would give substantially
oil t1t hn mr., Glp hn
to expect.
They are sustained in this view of the
perveIsion of the laws, not only by their
own good common sense of justice, right
and the explicit meaning of plain English
words, but by the multitude of revcrSals,
whenever the Commissioners reflections
can be reached by a competent legal tri-
bunal.
The ignorance of the law and its wilful
violation are constantly demonstrated by
the almost daily reversals by the Commits
sioners official superior-the Secretary Of
the Interior. No other official of the Gov
ernmeut is so constantly and Eumiliatingly
reversed, lectUTed and admoniShed as the
Commissioner of Pensions. Approximate
ly, % per cent. of the reflections which
reach the Secretary on appeal are re-
versed, and the Commissioner instructed
to recede from his action, and allow the
claim. This is a proportion entirely nm
heard of in any other Department of the
Government. Any other officer found
erring in so large proportion Of instances
would be at once dismissed as incompe-
tent for his place.
1t is treble or quadruple the proportion
of reyersals which the superior courts of
the country make of the decisions of the
courts below them.
Unfortunately, only small proportion
of the reflections can reach the Secretary
of the Interior. The Board Of Pension
Appeals, the duty of which is to prepare
cases for the Secretary of the Interiors
is about two years behind
with its work. That is. man who is
rejected today cannot hope to have his
case reach the Secretary's eyes before
two years. The probabilities are that
he will be dead before that time. This is
another advantage for the Commissioner.
He can calculate on his worst victims dy-
ing before his injustice can be legally
passed upon, and the case thus taken out
of court.
No wonder the claimants lack conf
dence."