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The attitude of many a veteran, parked on his cushion, was: "I'll wait until things shake down." By the time things "shake down" he may find he has been shaken out. But these were matters for personal reflection and decision. The nation had tried to do its best.
"During His Life." The U.S. had come to accept payment to veterans as inevitable—like death and taxes. As long ago as 1636 the Pilgrim Fathers at Plymouth decided: "If any man shalbee sent forth as a souldier and shall return maimed, hee shalbee majntained competently by the Collonie during his life." The U.S. had been maintaining its old soldiers ever since, although not always competently.
The 4,000,000 who came home from World War I found plenty of promises but a country unprepared either to reabsorb or support them. Veterans legislation was a hodgepodge and the Veterans Bureau was a scandal until President Harding made a halfhearted attempt to clean it up; then the bureau became more concerned with economy—those were the days of Coolidge and Hoover—than philanthropy. Veterans plunged into race riots. The jobless sold apples, and in 1932 marched on Washington. The Government drove them out with cavalry and tanks while the nation watched in shame.
This time the U.S. was ready for its homecoming soldiers, on a scale which men were just beginning to appreciate.
Congress had provided the legislation (the "G.I. Bill of Rights"), and Harry Truman had provided the man. It was one of the President's best appointments: General Omar N. Bradley, the "Doughboys' General." He had not wanted the job; he had wanted to rest and shoot quail. But he walked into the old grey Veterans Administration Building in Washington, said modestly, "My name's Bradley," and sat down.
52-20 & Everything. The legislation to take care of the veterans included more than just the G.I. Bill of Rights. Some of it went back to 1789. It provided: medical care for all; education for those who wanted it ($500 a year for four years towards tuition, $65-90-a-month subsistence); $65-90 a month for those who wanted to train on the job; help in finding jobs through 6,443 local boards; legal aid through the Department of Justice in getting old jobs back; loans up to $4,000 to build homes, start businesses; $20-a-week for 52 weeks for those out of jobs (the "52-20 Club"); Old Soldiers' Homes; and pensions.
Between 1919 and 1929, pensions to World War I veterans and their survivors increased by 866%. Veterans of the Spanish-American War, the Boxer Rebellion, the Philippine Insurrection, World Wars I & II can collect as high as $250 a month. A veteran disabled in peacetime (while still a member of the armed forces) can collect as high as $187.50 a month. Long after discharge, a veteran totally disabled by such civilian misadventures as falling downstairs or getting hit by a truck can collect as high as $60 a month.
Death pensions are being paid to widows, children, dependent parents (whether death occurred as the result of service or not) in rates ranging from $18 to $100 a month.