May 17, 1886. After the charge of desertion was entered upon the company rolls the soldier returned to his command, completed his term of service, and was honorably discharged. This woman afterwards received her pension, but the ruling still remains. This ruling is in disregard of the official action of the Department of War. That Department having honorably discharged the soldier, it is none of the Commissioner's business what military offenses he may have previously committed. It is in disregard of the decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States.

That court, in the case of the United States vs. Kelly, 15 Wallace, page 34, says: "That the honorable discharge of the deserter was a formal final judgment passed by the government upon the entire military record of the soldier, and an authoritative declaration by it that he had left the service in a status of honor." Hence the court says: "Such a soldier does not need any correction of his service by the adjutant-general, because his discharge amounted of itself to the removal of any charge or impediment in the way of his receiving bounty," and this ruling reverses the practice of his predecessors, who were accustomed to obey the above decisions. But the present Commissioner is wiser than the Supreme Court, more powerful than the Secretary of War, and more "liberal" than all his predecessors.

Another "liberal" decision was made in defiance of law and common-sense in the case of Thomas Ferguson, Co. B, 91st Regiment, Ind. Vols. A special act of Congress approved May 6, 1873, directed the Pension Bureau to restore to the pension roll the name of this soldier.

May 23, 1873, Secretary Delano decided: "Pensioners under special acts are entitled to restoration from date of suspension of original pension," and the uniform practice of the office was in accordance with this decision, because the word. "restore" could have no other sense; but in this case the Commissioner restores him from the date of the approval of the act, and still withholds seven years' pension to which the soldier is entitled.

The national cemeteries, the numerous battle-fields of war,

and various unknown resting-places hold remains of dead soldiers whose names are inscribed only on fame's eternal roll. They sleep in unmarked graves, their resting-place unknown to loving friends. In many cases it is impossible to prove the date or cause of the death of the soldier. They were simply reported as missing. Perhaps the last known of them they were going into battle with their comrades, or they were languishing on hospital beds, or they were immured in rebel prisons, or they were lost sight of in the hurried retreat. It was the practice under the Republican administration, and came to be a common law in the Pension Office, that when the presumptions of law as to the death of the soldier were fairly met, the date of death should be fixed at the date of the disappearance as nearly as possible. Thus the common-law rule that absence for seven years without ever being heard of was accepted as prima facie evidence of death, and the last date at which the soldier was seen or heard of was accepted as that from which the widow or dependent mother was entitled to receive her pension; but Democratic "liberality" changes this rule.

In the case of Mary A. Brennan, widow of Connor Brennan, Co. I, 19th Ill., Commissioner Black ordered that her pension should begin seven years after the disappearance of her husband.

In another case, of a dependent mother, whose son was engaged in the battle at Cold Harbor, and at the close of that engagement was missing and has never since been heard of, the Commissioner ordered that the pension should commence on the 4th of June, 1871, seven years from the date of the battle, and only changed this ruling upon a direct order from the Secretary of the Interior.

But at last we do come to a genuine specimen of General Black's "liberality." Section 4714 of the Revised Statutes provides that declarations of pension claimants shall be made before a court of record, etc. Section 4 of the Mexican pension act provides that the pension laws now in force which are not inconsistent or in conflict with this act are hereby made a part of this act so far as they may be made applicable thereto; but, disregarding these plain provisions of law, General Black is

issuing pension certificates under the Mexican service act, without any application whatever from the beneficiary.

Hon. William R. Morrison of Illinois, who was a gallant sol. dier in the Mexican and also in the late war, had a pension certificate issued to him which he refused to accept because he had never made any application for a pension; did not want it, and would not receive it. Captain George A. Boss of Cincinnati, Ohio, also received a certificate of pension under the Mexican pension act without ever making an application for it. The same is true of the widow of Lieutenant William Demmett. How many other cases there are like these, can only be told by the records of the Pension Office.

Were it not that the Commissioner of Pensions is noted for his fairness to political opponents and his comparative freedom from anything like partisanship, one might reasonably conclude that this excessive liberality towards the veterans of the Mexican war was due to the fact that they are largely from the South, and consequently good Democrats.

VETOING PENSION BILLS.

During the first session of the Forty-ninth Congress President Cleveland vetoed more pension bills than had all his predecessors since the organization of the government.

This fact alone stamps the unfriendly character of this administration and of the party it represents. But to break the force of this fact two defenses are alleged: (1) that Mr. Cleveland also signed more pension bills than any one of his predecessors, and (2) that this exercise of his constitutional right shows an independence of judgment, a courage to accept the responsibilities of his office, and a desire to arrest fraudulent and unworthy claims, which should commend him to the approval of honest and independent voters.

These defenses might have some weight but for the fact that these bills were all passed by a Democratic House of Representatives upon the representation of a Democratic Pension Committee. What a set of scoundrels these Democratic Congressmen must have been to consent to these frauds!

Analyzing the bills approved and those vetoed, no one can discern any difference of honesty or merit in the two classes on which to base such insinuations. The reasons given in many cases simply betray ignorance of the respective provinces of Congress and the Pension Bureau. Thus the bill to pension Mavilla Parsons is vetoed because there is "no pretext" that she "is entitled under the general law." And dozens of others are vetoed upon this same ground.

Now this is precisely the reason why Congress should act, if the case is a worthy one. To say an act should not become a law because there is no right under existing law, is to aver that Congress shall create no new pension rights. The President, instead of proposing to limit the Pension Office by the will of Congress, actually proposes to limit Congress by the will of the Pension Office.

Neither will the plea of official duty avail.

The bill to pension Harriet Welch is vetoed notwithstanding the President says: "I believe her case to be a pitiable one, and wish that I could join in her relief, but unfortunately official duty cannot always be well done when directed solely by sympathy and charity."

But this Roman devotion to duty did not prevent him from signing the bills to pension the widows of Generals Hancock, Blair, and Logan, at a sum equal in each case to that required for fourteen such cases as this pitiable one.

John Taylor was pensioned at $12 per month by a special act of Congress. The Pension Office holds that it cannot increase his pension, and refuses to do so because Congress has fixed his rating. He is therefore compelled to go to Congress for further relief, and an act is passed to give him $16 per month. But the President vetoes this bill, holding that the claimant now has a liberal rating for a gun-shot wound through the face and shoulder which affects his sight and hearing, and causes him constant neuralgic pains. But he seems to have no conscientious scruples in signing a bill to increase the pension of General Benj. F. Kelly to $100 per month for gun-shot wounds which do not disqualify him for a high-grade clerkship in the Pension Office.

Joseph Romiser was a member of a Maryland Volunteer Militia Company. In an emergency, the company was called on by the Government, and sent to Cumberland to repel a Confederate attack. This soldier, while in the ranks, was wounded by the accidental discharge of a gun in the hands of a comrade, the ball passing through his head and destroying the sight of one eye and the hearing of one ear.

Congress could and did pension him by special act, but the President vetoed the bill because the man was not mustered into the United States service. But this was too flagrant an abuse of the veto power, even for a servile Democratic House, and the bill was passed over the veto by a vote of 175 to 38. In the Senate it passed unanimously, 50 votes in the affirmative and none in the negative.

Scores of cases of bills approved and bills vetoed might be cited to show the utter inconsistency of the President in considering these cases. It is a fact known to every one familiar with the work of the Committee on Invalid Pensions that the President has repeatedly vetoed the strongest bills and signed the weakest; that he has repeatedly vetoed bills for certain reasons, and approved other bills where the same reasons existed.

It is unquestionably true that the President has little. sympathy for the Union soldier, and would have vetoed many more cases if he had had time, as he plainly declares; and his hostility and utter lack of sympathy with this large class constantly crops out in trivial and sarcastic sentences in his messages. For instance: “No statement is presented of the bounty received by him upon either enlistment." "Probably there were those who found their interest in such an appeal" (to Congress). "The number of instances in which those of our soldiers who rode horses during the war were injured by their saddles indicates that those saddles were dangerous contrivances." "After this brilliant service with a terrific encounter with the measles." "Whatever else may be said of this claimant's achievements during his short military career, it might be considered that he accumulated a great deal of disability." Many more quotations might be made of a similar character