Conference of Officers in Charge of Government Hospitals Serving Veterans of the World War

by Unknown

HON. CHARLES H. BURKE: I happen to be, as some of you may know, at the head of the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

In listening to the discussion this morning by Mr. Madden and by General Dawes, I have had brought to my notice that there are some things in connection with hospitalization that compare in some respects with some of the things I have to come in contact with in connection with the administration of the affairs of the Indians.

Mr. Madden referred to the politicians and the harm they may do by criticism and comment and so forth. I don’t think he meant when he said politicians, the men who may participate in politics. I think he had in mind these demagogues and agitators and sources of propaganda that are doing more harm in the Government service,—I know it is true of the Indian Bureau,—than anything else or everything else all put together; and I think something of that applies to the hospitalization question. Agitators, I call them. Some of them are perhaps interested in the Indians and in their purposes, supersensitive, possibly. Others have selfish motives that they desire to serve; others are just ordinary trouble makers.

So, in the Indian Service, one of the things that we are handicapped by is this aggregation that I have just described, that are criticizing and finding fault with practically everything that is being done. One of the things that they contend for more than anything else is that the Federal Government, in supervising and administering the affairs of the Indians should, before they put into operation any policy for their uplift and their advancement, have the consent of the Indians. What an absurd proposition! When you contemplate sending your boy to some educational institution, are you going to permit him to dictate and say to you what you shall do, or, when he selects a certain institution and tries it for a few weeks, say that he does not like it and is going to try some other institution? How far would a father get with a son if he permitted him to dictate and dominate the situation?

So it seems to me that this question of hospitalization and caring for the ex-service man is very largely a medical question and it ought to be administered with a view to what will be most productive in rehabilitating and restoring these men to full health; and so it occurred to me that before this meeting adjourns, and because possibly the impression may have been given this morning that the principal question was one of economy, that we should, just for a moment, consider this other question of what can be done and what should be done for the best interests of these ex-service men. It will require regulations; it will require legislation.

If you have not been repaid in the other sessions of this Conference until this forenoon, I think every one of you who has come from some distance will feel that he has been fully compensated in listening to the discussion by General Dawes and Mr. Madden with reference to what the Government, under our present Chief Executive, is endeavoring to accomplish in the matter of administering Government. And so we have this hospitalization proposition and all of the Departments having to deal with that subject. We have this Federal Board of Hospitalization made up of representatives or the heads of these different departments.

Now what I want to ask you gentlemen, and I am talking to you now as experts, as men who are in the field in charge of hospitals, in a position to see this Question from every angle,—what can you do now that will help the situation. This is what I want to bring to your attention: that is, that each and every one of you, through your proper officers, communicate freely and from time to time what you believe ought to be done to strengthen and improve this service; and then, these suggestions coming from every part of the country and all of those different institutions and services will be concentrated and ultimately have consideration by the Federal Board of Hospitalization, and a regulation will be prepared where needed and necessary legislation will be suggested to Congress in the interest of better caring for and administering these different hospitals throughout the United States.

My opinion, gentlemen, is this: that when a man goes into a hospital he is presumed to be ill and should be governed by such regulations and by such control as will best enable him to recover from his disability at the earliest practicable time; and if he ought to have considerable money and if he ought to be permitted to go his way, let him go; but if, on the contrary, he should be required to live within certain reasonable discipline as to his personal conduct, if he should be limited in the amount of money that he should have to spend as he desires he should be limited by you, who are expert and who have no possible thing in mind except the welfare of these men.

Now don’t get the impression that you can get all the legislation that you think perhaps you ought to have. I am not going to speak of the Congress as constituted now, because a person in the administrative side of the Government and in a bureau is not supposed to talk about the Congress and so I am not going to say anything about the present Congress; but up to about six years ago and for a period of many years, I happen to know that there were men in Congress that don’t measure up to what my friend, Mr. Madden, said a member of Congress ought to be. There used to be members of Congress who kept their ears very close to the ground listening constantly for any criticism, for any comment on any part of the Government service, perhaps through a magazine or newspaper; and they rose on the floor in their might to denounce some policy or administrative action on the part of the Government simply because they lacked the courage of their convictions.

Mr. Madden does not come within that class of members of Congress. He is a man who has always been known to have the courage of his convictions. Perhaps the entire body is now made up of that type of members, but such was not the case up to 1915.