180-6 



THE GARDEN MAGAZINE 



January, 1915 



M 



THE- TALK- OF-THE - OFFICE 



PENSIONS AGAIN 



THERE has been much talk about 

 Prussian militarism: let us look at a 

 few facts in this field drawn from the 

 report of the Commission of Pensions, U. S. 

 A., for the year ending June 30, 1914. 



There was paid out during this time for 

 pensions alone $172,417,546.26. This item, 

 combined with our expenditure for the army 

 and navy, gives the American Republic a 

 military budget of $466,380,266. The Ger- 

 man Empire, the greatest military power, 

 spent in 1913 $491,775,800 for similar pur- 

 poses. In other words, the United States 

 spends nearly as much as Germany. Our 

 federal budget, exclusive of the postal service 

 — which need not be counted, since these ex- 

 penditures are reimbursed by postal revenues — 

 amounted in 1913 to $748,703,574. That is, the 

 United States spends much more than half its 

 income on its army and navy, past and 

 present. 



$27,532 of our pension disbursements, for the 

 year ending June 30, 19 14, was paid for ser- 

 vices rendered in the War of 1812, fought and 

 ended 102 years ago. 



$1,060,530 was paid for services rendered in 

 the war with Mexico which ended in 184"/, or 76 

 years ago, and during the last year 85 new pen- 

 sions were allowed for services in this old 

 war. 



i $163,377,542 was paid for services rendered 

 in the Civil War, which ended nearly fifty years 

 ago, and 17,857 new pensions were granted for 

 services in that war. 



When it comes to the Spanish- American 

 War the figures are more moderate; only 

 about three and a half millions were paid out; 

 but the organization to secure pensions for 

 this war is only getting started, though there 

 are even now on the pension rolls more in- 

 dividuals than ever saw service at the front 

 in that war. 



As a part of the showing, it is also well to 

 mention the fact that thousands of private 

 pension bills pass the House and Senate 

 — so many that the clerk no longer has 

 time to read the names of the people 

 benefited, they are simply passed in "bunches." 

 Many bills are passed, also, to secure "honor- 



able discharge" papers for people who couldn't 

 get them at the time of the Civil War, now 

 about fifty years back. There were in the 

 Civil War about 125,000 deserters; Congress 

 has passed blanket laws giving most of these 

 "honorable discharge" papers which auto- 

 matically carry pensions. Cases of desertion 

 and dishonorable behavior too atrocious to be 

 covered by these general laws are taken care 

 of in special bills. Grover Cleveland studied 

 and vetoed hundreds of private pension bills 

 of deserters, of frauds who never enlisted, and 

 of claimants who had "pulls" with Congress 

 but no right to pay from a generous posterity. 

 His administration was the only one so far 

 to face the facts about pensions, and his own 

 Congress gave him practically no help. Two 

 or three conscientious pension commissioners, 

 notably Henry Clay Evans in 1901, have 

 called attention to the fraudulent character 

 of the pension rolls, without making any im- 

 pression on Congress. 



The Government also supports, and very 

 properly, 12 old soldiers' homes at a cost 

 (last year) of $1,335,000, where 23,051 old 

 soldiers are kindly cared for, in addition to 

 receiving their pensions; but if you will read 

 the Congressional Record you will be surprised 

 to see that most of the speeches referring to 

 pensions speak bitterly of the "illiberal" 

 treatment of the old soldier. 



Sensible and even kind-hearted Americans 

 often ask: How can such things be? How 

 is it that all the people of the United States 

 are taxed to pay over $540,000 every week 

 day, including holidays, for services rendered 

 in wars 102, 67, and 50 years ago? 



The answer is known, of course, to every 

 one — and therein is the scandal of it all: 

 there is no Congress nor party which is willing 

 to face the unfavorable voting influence of 

 the organizations banded together to get this 

 great pension fund, and as the years go by 

 the pension graft grows by new laws increasing 

 pensions and bringing thousands of new 

 pensioners on the rolls. 



Four years ago the World's Work published 

 a series of articles exposing some of the worst 

 of the pension practices, but the publishers 

 cannot flatter themselves on the results. 

 Within a year the Democratic House passed 



a new bill which would have added $75,000,000 

 a year to the expenditures, but owing to the 

 influence of the Republican Senate the bill 

 only added about $25,000,000, and put on the 

 rolls many thousands who had not been 

 eligible up to that time. 



The World's Work will try again carefully 

 to put before its readers information of im- 

 portance on the subject, in the earnest hope 

 that the people who pay this huge tax may 

 bestir themselves to regulate the unmoral 

 and wasteful pension legislation without 

 depriving the soldiers who were actually 

 disabled from disease or wounds, or their 

 legitimate dependents, of payments to which 

 they are entitled. 



Also in February the World's Work will 

 discuss at some length, marshalling new facts, 



"calmness, commonsense, and the 

 national defence" 



Have we any 42 centimetre guns? 



How many submarines have we got? 



Have we motor transports like the Ger- 

 mans? 



Is our artillery as effective as the French? 



The February number of the World's Work 

 will explain just what we have and just what 

 we have not. It will go further. It will 

 explain exactly what kind of an army we 

 should have to meet the attacks of any 

 possible foe. It will do the same for the 

 navy. 



The number will be a manual of national 

 defence explaining: 



What We Want an Army and Navy For. 



What Kind of an Army and Navy We Need 

 for These Purposes. 



What Kind of an Army and Navy We 

 Have Now. 



Looking at it all calmly the facts irrefutably 

 demand that we stop wasting money and 

 adjust our military and naval establishments 

 to our needs, which happily for us is not an 

 expensive process and does not necessitate 

 any militarism. The facts call for common- 

 sense, calmness, and economy. 



