The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1904-03-15
Story from Washington That
He Has Done So.
President Looking for Foreign
Berth for the kansan.
AWAY FROM OFFICE.
Has Not Been There for Three
Days.
Rumor Says That lie Will Be
Seen There No More.

Chicago, March 15-A special to the
Inter-Ocean from Washington says:
Commissioner Ware has not been at
the pension office for three days, and
there is a rumor that he will not re-
turn. It is said he opposes the rulings
of former Commissioner Green B.
Raurn.. who was the first to interpret
the pension act of 1890 and made his
interpretations favorable to the PEN
sioner rather than against him.
Commissioner Lochran, in the second
Cleveland administration, revised the
rulings of Commissioner Raum and
compelled the pensioners to comply
with the letter of the law rather than
its spirit and rulings of Lochran have
prevailed ever since, though the old sol-
diers have complained that the Repub-
lican administration is following a
Democratic precedent and not Re-
publican one.
Commissioner Ware has not been
popular with the old soldiers, and is not
popular in washington. He is accused
of being more of a martinez in office
| than any of his predecessors He re
sents the overturning of his rulings by
| the pension board of appeals and Mr.
| Miller, associate secretary of the inter-
| ior He has appealed to Secretary
! Hitchcock and the president to over
rule Miller and the board of appeaiss
| but in vain. His resentment may lead
| him to resign.
It is intimated that the president
hopes for such an outcome. as it may
enable him to remove the cause of fric-
! tion with the pension office without hav-
| ing congress pass service pension laws
| The president told the G. A. R. commit
| tee that he favored their bill for a SER
! vice pension The house is ready to
pass a pension bill, but the senate lead
ers do not want such bill placed be-
fore them with the Endorsements of the
| president and the house.
/ There is apparently only one way to
] I'll. H. SC
resignation of Ware and the appoint
| ment of a pension commissioner who
will return to the liberal rulings of Com
missioner Raum under the Harrison adj
| ministration, or even more liberal
rulings in the cases of veterans who are
| disabled but cannot prove that their
/ disability is due to service in the army
| It is understood the president is look
ing for a foreign berth for Ware that
he may appoint a new commissioner ana
get back to Republican interpretation
I of the pension laws
i washington. March 15.-The Star
saws:
A visit recently made by Eugene F.
Ware, pension commissioner, to the
White House. is declared to have been
connected with serious clash report
ed to have arisen between Mr. Ware
and Melville w. Miller, assistant sec
retary of the interior department
This clash is declared to be the result
of appeals in pension cases. Mr. Mil
Her is the official of the interior depart
ment who has supervision of all pen
sion cases upon which appeals have
been taken. The statement is made
that his views of pension cases have
been so much at variance with those
of the commissioner of pensions that
the latter has become angered and has
/ demanded of Secretary Hitchcock and
President Roosevelt that an investiga-
| ton be made to determine whether he
has acted properly To back up his
| demand he has, it is declared from an
unofficial source, submitted his resig-
nation to the president. on the cond1-
| ton that it is to be acceDted should
| he be not vindicated in the claims that
he makes.
1t is alleged that the two officials Of
the interior department have not at all
: agreed on a line of policy in pension
! | cases. and that their official and per-
sonal relations are anything but salts
factory. Mr.. Ware, who is more or
5 less independent about remaining
the story, that his claims be investi-
gated that he may be either vindicated
! or turned down by persons higher in
! authority than Mr.. Miller.
Secretary Hitchcock has had consid-
cradle business at the White House in
the last week or SO, but it is not known
whether the reported trouble in the
pension establishment is one of the
matters under consideration between
{ himself and the president.
The story is not treated at the
White House in the light of an ac-
curate one. It is said that Mr. ware are
| may have been getting off one of his
= nice little much misunderstood jokes,
+ or he may have concluded to do some
: thing at some later date about re-
! signing.
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