Federal Military Pensions in the United Motes. By W. H.
Classon. (Oxford University Press. 10s. 6d. net.)—Under the auspices of the Carnegie Endowment, Professor Giessen, of Trinity College, North Carolina, has written a candid and highly interesting history of the American pension system. He shows how generous the American people has been to the Federal veterans who saved the Union and made America what she is ; America has paid over a thousand millions sterling to her soldiers and their dependants, and nearly all this money went to survivors of the Civil War. Professor ClE88011 also shows how the pensions system has been used for corrupt political purposes, and how the organized vote of the Grand Army of the Republic, a veterans' association, has been employed to blackmail the rival party caucuses. Mr. Cleveland owed his defeat in 1888 to his action in vetoing many Pension Bills, and his successful adversary, General Harrison, paid the price of victory by appointing es Pensions Commissioner e. Federal veteran named Tanner, " who started out with entire seriousness of purpose to distribute the surplus to the ex-sokliers." The successive Pension Laws, the last of which was passed in 1918, have been more and more lavish, and any man who served for three months in the Federal ranks, his widow or his dependants can receive a pension, whether it is needed or not. Moreover, Congress hes continued to grant special pensions by Bills, which are practically a form of Congressional patronage." In the Sixty-fourth Congress, 1915.17, 5,885 pension grants were made in this way, but President Taft in four years ratified 15,999 spa Pal pensions. For this war Congress has adopted an entirely new plan under which sailors and soldiers are insured against death or disability.
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