Page:U.S. Department of the Interior Annual Report 1873.djvu/85

Rh the widow was entitled to the aforesaid original pension; and also increased the pension to the minor children provided for by the act of July 14, 1862, by granting $2 per month for each of them, where there was more than one.

The act of July 27, 1868, provided for the increase of the pension of the widows by adding also $2 per month on account of each of the children by a former wife of the person on account of whose service and death she was entitled to the original pension.

In the act of February 14, 1871, provision is made for pension at the same rate that,is prescribed for the surviving officers and enlisted and drafted men of the war of 1812, to their widows who were married before the treaty of peace which terminated said war.

The addition to the expenditure in payment of pensions by reason of increase of rates, the including of so large a proportion of the pensioners among those entitled to the higher rates, and the extension of the benefits of the pension laws to so many classes of pensioners, have been so great as to warrant consideration in connection with any proposition for further increase.

There has been a decided increase in the general business of the office, resulting from the changes in legislation which required the re-adjustment of so large a. number of claims, and the careful review of all the certificates of the recent biennial examination. This imposed unusual labor upon the clerical force, and necessitates unavoidable delays in the transaction of routine business. Greater satisfaction could be given the public if Congress would be pleased to make a small addition to the clerical force; but if reasonable time can be granted Without working injustice to claimants, the present force will soon be adequate to the demands made upon the office.

I have ordered the preparation of a grand alphabetical roll of pensioners, which shall comprise, in a record relative to each pension which has been granted, the following features.: Name of soldier; name and residence of the pensioner; number of pension certificate; act under which it was granted; commencement and termination of the pension; such changes as may have been made in it; and, so far as practicable. the disability, or cause of death, on account of which it was granted, The incomplete character of the roll, as heretofore kept, has been for years clearly manifest, and it is believed that the method adopted as above stated, after careful consideration, will secure a concise, correct, and available statement of every pension awarded by the Government.

The attention of Congress was invited in my last report to the necessity of a complete codification of the pension laws. Congress was pleased to act upon the suggestion then offered, and the office is now operating under the codified laws, approved March 3, 1873. The objects sought by this legislation have been in the main accomplished, and the confused mass of laws has been made uniform and consistent. The large and increasing number of instances in which claims for increase of invalid pensions having been once adjudicated, are immediately, or before a reasonable time has elapsed, renewed, and new adjustment urged, is a source of embarrassment to the office, and the question presents itself whether it might not be well to prescribe by law a definite period of time during which, after any adjudication of an invalid-pension claim, acquiesced in by the claimant, the rate of pension should remain as fixed in that adjudication.

Attention has been heretofore invited to the insecure condition of the Seaton House. I now respectfully refer to what I stated in my report