The Waterbury Democrat., 1944-12-15

c. ARTHUR DUBOIS.
 Commission Chairman
 while in the actual oIScharge of such duties" There is no requirement. that death follow injury or exposure within any specified period of time. Under the proposed bill, in order for a death to be Service-connected, il must be a direct result of bodily injuries effected directly and inde- endently of all other causes through external, violent and accidental means" Now those words are the familiar words of art employed in the standard policy of accident ir- surance. They have been construed so often that We are not required to guess about their meaning. The next requirement. of this proposed bill is that if service-connected the death must occur within six months of accident"
 Wording Of Bill
 "Under the proposed bill, if a po- liceman or fireman were suffering from heart condition or similar disease or disorder, and sustained a severe injury in the course of dis charging his duty by being struck or otherwise, and died it would be difficult if not impossible, in view of the interpretation by the Con. necticut Supreme Court of the lang uage employed in the proposed bill, to prove, to use the language of the bill, that he died "as a direct result of bodily injuries effected directly and independently of all other causes through external, violent and acidental means; and the burden of proof would be upon those repre- senting the deceased. Such language requires that the injury be the sole, promixate cause of death. There fore in this case, the widow of the deceased policeman or fireman would, under the proposed bill, re- ceive, instead of one-fourth pay for life, only the equivalent provided by the Federal Social Scurity Act for those within its operation, which is to say, nothing if the widow had no children under eighteen years of age until she attained age 65, if she lived that long, when she would be- gin to receive $26.08 per month.
 Also under the proposed bill, if a policeman or fireman Sustains, as has happened in the past, a trau- matte amputation of, or other in- juries to leg or arm, inflicted by the falling of some portion of a structure, and if, despite competent surgical attention, gangrene and i1- lection set in, so that he dies from the effect of his injury more than six months after he sustained it, his widow and dependents would not get the Service-connectd death ben- efitS at all, but they too would re- ceive only what would be payable under the Federal Social Security Act, if it were applicable to the de- cased. It is thus seen that the effect of this proposed bill, whether in- tended or not, is to penalize a man in direct proportion to the period of suffering that proceeds death when that period is in excess of six months"
 Breach of contract"
 To revise the present pension qualifications now in effect under the present bill, would he normally breach of contract" the spokes- man pointed out to the commission, on the basis that these same fea- lures have been the means of at- tracting the high-type personnel now in the departments all of whom by-paSsed more lucrative means of employment, because of these pension considerations con- tained in the current bill.
 Referring to workman's compen- sation features of the proposed bill MT. Fitzgerald.
 He also opposed the provision in the proposed bill which requires that any payments made under the workmen'S compensation act or the widows pension act be deduct ed from what the beneficiary would receive under this act. This would mean that the beneficiary would receive nothing under the city pen- sion act for the first six years and for the next six years might receive nothing from either that act or the compensation act.
 He proposed as 8 substitute a provision that no payments be al- lowed so long as payments are being made under the workmen's compensation act. Payments un- der the workmen's compensation act or widows pension act, he said, are not dependent upon contribu-