Democratic Sentinel, Volume 5, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 July 1881 — The Pension Office. [ARTICLE]

The Pension Office.

On turning over his office to his successor, CoL Dudley, Mr. Bentley, Commissioner of Pensions, made the following statements as to the condition in which he would leave the office, and as to the future of the pension service : “ The number of new pensions granted during the year will be about 25,000, exclusive of the War of ) 812 pensions. This is an increase of more thaw 6 per cent over the number granted last year. A portion of this increase is accounted for by the fact that we have handled a very large number of new claims during the year, many of which were for gunshot wounds, or for some disease of which there was a record. This element will enter more largely into the work of next year, and continue to increase the number of annual settlements until the claims that are pending but not yet reached for adjustment have been fixed. After that the work will again fall back into its usual course. The settlements next year ought to reach from 45.000 to 50,000. First, there are probably from 5,000 to 7,000 cases on the files ready, or nearly so, for the issue of certificates. Second, there will be an increase of the examining force, including that relieved from the work upon the new records, equal to nearly 50 per cent. Third, there will be a large increase in the number of special agents, which, under t ie law as modified last winter, ought considerably to increase the number of claims that will be settled. These advantages, together with the character of the claims before referred to, ought to nearly if not quite double the number of allowances. We have exhausted the pension appropriation this year, $50,802,806.68, and ‘have been compelled to carry over into July nearly all the May and June settlements. I think they will require for the first payments about 450,000,000. This, added to the expected increase in the settlement next year, will bring the amount for next year up to nearly or quite 490,000,000, so there will be required for the pensions next year an appropriation of $40,000,000 in addition to the $50,000,000 already appropriated. New claims continue to come in very rapidly. There have been filed this year upward of 8Q ( Q00 MW eMne*'*