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Show THE SERVICE PENSION. ' e The dispatches have recently announced an-nounced that the Senate and Jluuse Conference Committor on the so-called service pension bill, has come to an agreement. We. may reasonably expect, therefore, that the conference agreement agree-ment will bo adopted by both Houses of Congress. It is, therefore, important to note just what tho offoct of this bill will be First of all, it is stated that its addition to tho pension, cost will be something over $2.5,000,000 yearly upon tho passage of this bill. Under jts provisions, all pensioners 66 to 70 years of ago who siirvpd two and a half vears will rocpoivc $JS a month, and if three years or more., $10; those 70 ti 7) vears old who s'crved a year alid a half receive $111. HO a month, two vears men $2,'5, two ami a. half yours $21 and three years or more $25. -Men 7.1 vears old or more who served a vcar and a half will Tcccivo $27 a month and those who served, two years or more ."0.. This hist is the "dollar a day" limit. This will be (he. nearest to a real service pension law that Congress has ever enacted when both Houses agree to it and the President signs it, of which there can bo no doubt. Heretofore, Hereto-fore, those who did practically no service serv-ice in the war have been put on precisely pre-cisely the same basis and rate of pay as those who served long and arduously ardu-ously , at tho front; but this bill -recognizes service as in itself meritorious and pensionable. Jn the consideration of the measure as between tho two Houses, a Sonylc amendment barring persons who have an income of their own exceeding !?2'100 a vcar was strickon out in the conference. confer-ence. An amendment was also adopted in Ihc Senate requiring the Commissioner Commis-sioner of Pensions lo publish in his annual an-nual roport a list by counties of all tlic ueusioners. on the roll with their post-odico post-odico address ajid the amount received. This wns retained by the Conference Committee but with a proviso that it do not tako effect until 30M. Under the lattor provision, undoubtedly, tho Pension roll will . be considerably trimmed, and any names fraudulently thereon will be stricken off, which will fend to make the pension roll a roll of honor, 'as it ought to be... Wc notice in the New Tork Commercial Commer-cial a statement i'n this connection that "it is well known that the rolls arc padded with the' names of thousands who had no legitimate claim. ' If this is known to tho person who wroto those words, it certainly ought to be known to. the pension ollico which has jurisdiction juris-diction over the roll, and which ought to be able to purge the. roll of those fraudulent names. The service which fVio nnliUnil-.v nf thn mil tvill rnndir will be largely in the elimination of names fraudulent' thereon, provided there arc the thousands thereon which our iSTcw York contemporary allirms to be there. The pension commissioners Generally, hi replying to these charges of fraudulent, names on the pension roll, deny all knowledge of such fraudulent names, and aflirm that no fraudulent names are known to bo on the Toll, and that creat vigilance is exercised in keeping the roll pure. However this mav be. and however mnch or little truth there may be in tho, charges such as arc frequently made aboiit fraudulent fraudu-lent names on the pensipn roll, the publication pub-lication of that roll will be of the high-est high-est possible service in detecting and eliminating all frauds that may appear. |