Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 21, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 June 1893 — THE PENSION DECISION. [ARTICLE]

THE PENSION DECISION.

Inasmuch as the recent pension deois. ion by Secretary Smith has attracted such general attention it becomes desirable tha 1 its exact character be understood. Following is the official syllabus of the same carefully prepared and issued by the de’ t partment: 1. The basis of pensions under secs--4C92 and 4693, R. S., is disability by reason of wound, injury or disease contracted while in the seivice and in line of duty. 2. The basis of pension under sec. 2, act June 27,1890, is incapacity, due to any permanent mental or physical disability not the result of vicious habits, to snoh a degree as renders olaimantuDabletoearn a support bj manual labor. 3. Disabilities incurred while in the service and in the line of duty, and incapacity for earning a support befalling a claimant for pension after his service had ceased, are placed by the pension laws on an entirely different footing. 4. Disability inourred during service and in line of duty is pensionable without regard to capacity to earn a support, and is rated under the provisions of the Revised Statutes without reference to this condition.

5. Disability resulting from causes other than of servioe origin are pensionable only under the provisions of the second section of the act of June 27, 1890, when incapacity to labor joins with incap city to earn a support, and the grades of rating thereunder are dependent upon these two eonditions. 6. When by order No. 164 of the commissioner of pensions, Oct. 15, 1890, it was declared that the disabilities under the act of June 27, 1890, should be rated as if of service origin, the very principle which governed ratings under said act was displaced, and a rule applicable to a different law was substituted. 7. Neither the secretary'of the interior nor the commissioner of.pensions can. by order or by practice, supercede an act of congress. The power of the department, so far as its orders and practice ure concerned, is limited to an execution of the law; it ceases when an effort is made to supercede the law. The case in which the decision was made arose under the law of June 27, 1890, which applies to persons!"unable to earn a support” because incapacitated for 'manual labor." The object of the law was to provide for honorably discharged soldiess who had become helpless from causes arising since the close of the war, and it virtually excludes those who received their injuries during the war because th6se were provided for previous legislation. If, therefore, deafness of a pen ioner arose from wound, injury, or disease contracted while in service, this decision has no bearing in the case. It is merely to the effect of the law itself that when the injury was received out of service there must be an incapacity to earn a suDport to br ng the claimant within the puiview of tne law. And this not only asto deafness but also as to any other disability resulting from injury recetved out of service. The law itself, is clear enough as to this point, and the decision was rendered necessary on account of the improper rulings made on it under the preceding administration. The Republican press in this district are making great eff .rts to foment discord among applicants for nlace. That is all the interest they have it; it.