Democratic Sentinel, Volume 11, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 August 1887 — SOME STUBBORN FACTS. [ARTICLE]

SOME STUBBORN FACTS.

Pension Bills that Received the Approval of President Cleveland. Double the Number Signed During the Present Term than Under Any Previous Administration. [Washington special to Chicago News, Republican.J The Pension Bureau has prepared statistics relating to the number of pension bills signed by President Grant and his successors in office that will prove interesting to Grand Army men and others. From this statement it appears that during Grant’s first administration 321 special acts were approved, and during his second 254. President Hayes approved 303 special acts, and President Arthur 26. In the first two years of President Cleveland’s administration he approved 826, or 275 per cent, more than during Grant’s first term, 420 per cent, more than during Grant’s second term, and nearly double the number, or 100 per cent, more than in Grant’s two terms. President Cleveland has approved 183 per cent, more than Hayes, and over 17 per cent, more than Garfield and Arthur combined. As a still further manifestation of the attitude of the present Democratic administration toward the Union soldiers, the payrolls of the pension office alone, a bureau more closely connected with the soldiers of the country than any other, show that out of 1,531 employes 831, or 54 cent., are either sailors’or soldiers’ widows, sons, or daughters, while only 700 are civilians, most of whom occupy the minor positions, as messengers, watchmen, etc. Three hundred and seventy soldiers, or their kindred, occupy the higher positions, paying $1,200 and upward, against 292 civilians, a difference in favor of the soldiers of nearly 27 per c)bnt. GEN. BLACK’S APPOINTMENTS. In reference to the appointments made by Commissioner Black it appears by the same statement that out of 416 appointments made from March 17, 1885, to June 30, 1887, 230 were soldiers or soldiers’ kindred, and 186 were civilians, a net difference in favor of the soldier of 44, or nearly 24 per cent. Fifteen out of the eighteen United States pension agents receiving a salary of per annum each are among the number of ex-Union soldiers appointed, and one is the widow of brave Gen. Mulligan, who.se fame is associated with the battle of Lexington, Mo. The only two who hold over from previous administrations are distinguished ex-Union soldiers who have been severely wounded. Gen. Black has appointed twenty-nine ex-Union soldiers in excess of the total number dropped from the roll by death, discharge, resignation, or otherwise, and this, with 150 employes less than on the rolls during the last fiscal year of the previous administration, would make a net difference in their favor of 179, which, upon the basis of the total number upon the pay-rolls the last fiscal year, would leave at present almost 12 per cent, more soldiers, sailors, or their widows and kindred, than were ever upon its pay-roll in the history of the office. A Philadelphia paper tells the republican organs that are abusing the President that “they ought to know, for it is plain to everybody else, that they are telling everybody they w ould rather have some other Democratic candidate to fight than Cleveland.” If the fear of Cleveland’s renomination felt by Republicans is to be measured by their abuse of him, they must already be appalled by the certainty of it. A Philadelphia paper thinks that a great many of Mr. Blaine’s Fenian friends are likely to resent his failure to twist the tail of the Br tish lion. On getting within range of that noble animal the magnetic statesman seems to have suddenly felt, with Bottom in the play, that “there is not a more fearful wild fowl than your lion living.”