Delaware gazette and state journal. (Wilmington, Del.) 1883-1902, 1901-07-11
The Fight Against Evan..


The Washington correspondent of tho
Baltimore American writes: 1.-THE
annual report of Commissioner OF Pen
sions Evans, when it is made public in
day or two, will probably bring down
upon him renewed assault on his
administration of his Office, for the
report win show that he has not ex-
pended during the fiscal year just
ended all of the sl40, 00o,00 which
Congress appropriated for pensions, but
that he has, on the contrary, turned
back into the treasury nearly FIVE nil-
lions of dollars. He will be charged
with having deliberately deprived hun
dreds Of veterans or theii widows Of
pesions Justly due them. for no other
cause than his hostility to the old
soldier"
This report will also have the effect
of inciting to renewed desperation the
gang OF pension sharks who have been
fighting Commissioner Evans ever since
he assumed control Of the Office, because
he has stood firmly against all their
attempts to loot the TREASURY under the
gdise of providing adequate pensions
tor deserving veterans OF the Civil War.
There can be no possible doubt at
this late day, more than a generation
after the close OF the Civil War, that
every deserving veteran who rendered
service to the country in that great
conflict has been adequately rewarded
10 the way of pension. And yet the
pension sharks who make a living
under the guise of patriotic work have
been bounding Commissioners Evans
most vindictivly because he has insisted
upon enforcing the pension laws fairly
and honestly, instead OF letting down
the bars to every kind OF raid that the
thieyish Ingenuity of the pension
sharks might conceive.
Recent events have created renewed
interest in the course that President
Mckinley is likely to pursue in this
interesting controversy. 1t has been
established that during the last ma
tional campaign members of the Re-
publican National Committee promised,
In return for support of members of
the Grand Army Of the Republic, who
threatened to revolt, that Commits
sioner Evans should hs removed from
Office and man acceptable to the pen
sion sharks appointed in his place.
but President Mckinley was afraid to
remove Commissioners Evans, and so the
scheme of promoting him to a higher
and more lucrative Office was broached,
Commissioner Evans, however, de.
clined the suggested official prefer
ment, and the pension sharks were
baked again.
1t lie now announced that the vacancy
caused by the resignation of Comp
troller of the Currency Dawes will be
rendered Commissioner Evans, in the
hope that he will ACCEPT it. and thus
enable the President to pay off the
debt of the Republican National Com
mittee to the Grand Army of the Re-
public by appointing friend of the
pension sharks to the bead of the Pen
sion Bureau. 1t may be that COM
missioner Evans Will once more refuse,
from a sense of duty, to accept official
preferment, and thus the greedy pension
sharks mag be disappointed once more.
1t is shame that an honest and
competent public official should be put
in the position of being obliged, from
sense of public duty, to decline offers
OF Uell-merited official promotion, but
this il exactly the position in which
Commissioners Evans is placed. Presi
dent Mckinley does not dare remove
him, and the public interests demand
that he shall not resign, even to a soept
a higher and more remunerative Office.
III the President could be depended
upon to select some man like Evans fol
the Office, instead of an emissary of the
clamorous pension sharks, Commits.
sioner Evans would be free to ACCEPT
the official preierment to which he 1:
entitled by reason of his ability and his
conscientious regard for the obligations
of public office. But as it is, he rcust
make personal sacrifice, in order that
the administration may not sacrifice the
public interests and degrade the public
service in the payment of politica
debts.