The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1903-05-14
Should Be Supported by Rank and File.

EDITOR NATIONAL TRIBUNE: Whether
you need bother to send me a $40 prize
or not. Just send me your valued paper.
ana 1t will be all right. / took it awhile
some years ago, but either I was indiffer
ent IN reading it like many others not
partial to long articles, or else The Ma
tional Tribune was not then the soldiers
organ that it now is. think the paper
never had the patronage and never filled
the measure of usefulness that it nov has
and fills. You know best about that.
however. But as soldiers paper. rea
soning ably enough to dissipate plutocra-
tic tendencies and lingering war preju-
dlces, especially against pensioning the
rank and fle-it is the kind of paper. it
seems to me, that the rank and file should
support while they live. They should sup
port 1t as a matter of principle, policy,
and sef-preservation. Some sage has
said "self-preservation is the first law of
nature" We see this exemplified even
in the animal kingdom.
The strenuous statesman of old who
said Eternal vigilance is the price of
liberty" might well say, If living to-day,
Eternal vigilance is the price Of liberty
for blacks and whites. and also the price
OF liberal pensions in a rotatiye Govern
ment such as ours"
As standing Vigilance Committee. The
National Tribune is rendering good sery-
ice, being on the alert for living enemies
and dying friends, striving to put the
former to shame, while encourag ing in
the latter, Fraternity, Charity and 10y
atty, even until the roll is called up
yonder."
Observing the force and application of
the truisms quoted, and the present en-
virOnment of the old soldier who will
deny that these once-popular defenders
of States now united; these ever obnox-
ious defenders. either Willingly or I'M
Willingly of freedom for slaves; these
pensioned and consequently envied de-
tenders of flag no longer a misnomer;
these decrepit and generally impoverished
old soldiers, who will deny that they now
themselves need to be defended more than
ever before since the close of the war?
Surely no one can who stops to consider
that the ''old soldiers" are rapidly losing
through death the political power their
numerical strength once gave them.
III, as we are told. they are now dying
at the rate of a whole regiment a week
(much to the qualification of those who
failed to shoot them. and those who think
pension money worse than wasted on the
rank and file), then The National Tribune,
the soldiers National advocate, is GER
tainly filling great measure of usefulness
as vigilant defender of the defenders of
Gods best Government on earth, and who,
in the vicissitudes of politics, certainly
need such defence.
Therefore. allow me to give The Ma
tional Tribune a merited soldiers salute,
feeling that l only express the wish of the
boys in blue when l say may its patriot
ism. its fidelity. its influence and its
profits never grow less. And may our
saved and loved Government feel when
we sco,d it (as I often think we too fire.
quently do) that our Gliding is only in
harmony with Biblical admonition. IF
you spare the rod you spoil the child
sometimes.
So, while eternal vigilance may be the
price of liberty and pensions, you are at
liberty to quote me as saying that while
none are infallible, Republics are not all
ungrateful; nor can it ever be successfully
charged against this saved and blessed
Republic by either plebeian or plutocrat.
1t can't be done in face of $140,O00.000
annually expended on the poor pensioners
and twice or three times that amount
spent directly or Indirectly on the rich
of this country. No, no; Republics are
not all ungrateful.-I. J. JAMIsoN, Co. E,
2O9th and Co. c, 18th Pa, New Column
bus, Pa.