Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 41, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 October 1908 — Bryan a Foe to Pensioners. [ARTICLE]

Bryan a Foe to Pensioners.

In 1892 Wm. J. Bryan made a speech in congress bitterly attacking the veterans of the war, and deploring the nation’s pension expenses. These opinions were expressed by him before he learned the wisdom of more indefinite speech. They were delivered in Congress, and published in the Omaha World-Her-ald the next morning. At that time he was editorially and politically connected with that paper. “The next session of congress,” he said in this speech, “will have to wrestle with one deficiency of $36,000,000. This is on account of pensions. The appropriation for next year must be not less than $150,000,000. It is therefore easy aiitbmetlc to perceive that the appropriation that congress must make aggregates not less than $186,000,000. “This tremendous sum, which would in itself be enough to run a reasonable government, is held up and despoiled of. It is not an honest debt, and a large part of it is not a debt at ail, because it was never earned by any act of patriotism or heroic service. The government is held up and despoiled of a large portion of this, and it seems helpless to defend itself. One cannot help being curious to know how many more years it will take to exhaust the generation which ftels itself injtfiwd by the war.” Apparently no distinctions were made for the speech reads that he regarded the whole debt as dishonorable. To the Bryan or that time the wearer of blue of *6l is a hold-up man and a despoiler.