XXIV
THE PENSION OFFICE
The Pension building is situated on Judiciary Square, near G Street. It is the largest department building in Washington, being 400 feet from east to west and 200 from north to south, and 75 feet high.
The walls surround an interior courtyard, two galleries extend around this court, and from these galleries access is attained to the rooms on the second and third stories. The building cost half a million dollars; it is of mixed architecture, not beautiful in appearance, but the best lighted, heated, and ventilated department building in the city. It is sometimes called “the Meigs (name of architect) Barn,” because its outline is not unlike a Pennsylvania red barn.
When the architect had finished escorting General Sheridan through the building, just after its completion, the former inquired enthusiastically, “Well, Sheridan, how do you like it?”
“I find only one fault,” said the General, solemnly; “it is fireproof.”
At the close of the year 1900 there were on the rolls 993,529 pensioners. During 1901 there were added 44,225 new ones, and 3,567 were restored to the rolls, making in all 1,041,321. This number is 4,000 in excess of that of any other year.
There remain on the rolls the names of four widows and five daughters of Revolutionary soldiers. In the last report of the Commissioner of Pensions but one soldier of the war of 1812 survived. He was at that time (September 10, 1901) 101 years of age. Of the Mexican War, the names of 1,086 soldiers and 3,479 widows are still on the rolls; of the Indian wars (1832–1842), 7,568 survivors and 8,109 widows. The war with Spain left a legacy of 2,643 invalids, 1,176 widows, and 650 nurses, drawing pensions. Besides these there is the great army of Civil War pensioners.
If the government would, at least twice each year, publish in each county the names of persons receiving pensions, the amount paid, and the alleged cause of disability, it would bring the blush of shame to the face of many a liar who now draws a handsome sum from his government. The money is largely paid into the United States Treasury not by the rich of our country, but by the laboring class of men and women.
Patriotism which requires a life-long stipend is of doubtful color.