diseases and does not specify any time limit within which the disability must occur, it is apparent that it would presume as service-connected injuries incurred many years following discharge from service.

Former prisoners of war suffering service-connected disablement are entitled to compensation under existing law. The law (38 U.S.C. 354) provides for giving consideration to places, types, and circumstances of service, and section 354(b) provides liberalized criteria in determining service connection for those engaged in combat.

Prisoners of war during World War II were granted $1 per day compensation for failure of the enemy to provide food of quality and quantity provided by the Geneva Convention of 1929 (Public Law 896, 80th Cong., as amended) and $1.50 per day compensation for being forced to perform labor and/or being subjected to inhumane treatment in violation of the Geneva Convention. Prisoners of war during the Korean conflict received similar benefits under Public Law 615, 83d Congress. These payments were not considered duplication of payment and were in addition to any other benefits payable by reason of active service.

It is our view that the fact that a veteran was a prisoner of war does not justify establishing a presumption-and certainly not a conclusive presumption-that any disability he may ever incur is service connected. The enactment of H.R. 1507 would be discriminatory, establishing a separate standard for a special group.

PROPOSALS CONCERNING FREEZE OF SERVICE CONNECTION, RATINGS, AND RATING SCHEDULE

H.R. 5428. Existing law (38 U.S.C. 110) provides that a rating of total disability or permanent total disability, which has been made for compensation, pension, or insurance purposes under laws administered by the Veterans' Administration and which has been continuously in force for 20 or more years shall not be reduced thereafter except upon a showing that such rating was based on fraud. The section also provides that a disability which has been continuously rated at or above a given percentage for 20 or more years for compensation purposes shall not thereafter be rated at less than such percentage except upon a showing that the rating was based on fraud. H.R. 5428 proposes to reduce the 20-year period mentioned in these provisions to 15 years.

Section 110 of title 38 establishes a conclusive presumption of the continuance of any degree of disability, after a disability has been rated at or above that percentage for 20 years. Since the existence of any disability is a question of fact, this presumption is a fiction in those cases where improvement or recovery actually occurs. But the probability of a reduction in ratings that have continued for 20 years is slight. However, if the period involved is shortened, the chances of recovery become greater and the conclusive presumption of the continuance of a given percentage of disability becomes increasingly less factual.

This is particularly true since the principal immediate impact of the bill would be on World War II veterans, a relatively young group. If enacted, it would preserve ratings that have been in effect since 1950 or before. Hence, its greatest immediate impact would be on World War II veterans now on the compensation rolls-whose average age today is about 45. It is apparent that the bill would immediately grant permanent rating protection to a group of men whose disabilities are not as yet stabilized and who may be immeasurably benefited by the advances in medical science in the coming years. The enactment of H.R. 5428 would, of course, constitute a precedent for a further reduction of the period involved. We are unable to concur in this proposal.

H.R. 6133 proposes to reduce to 10 years the 20-year period in 38 U.S.C. 110 providing that disabilities rated at or above a given percentage for that period of time shall not thereafter be reduced. In addition, this bill would make the amended provision effective from June 20, 1932. In doing so, it would apply to literally thousands of wartime and peacetime veterans who meet its criteria but who were removed from the compensation rolls or whose disability compensation was reduced when their disability improved-as long as 30 years ago and who, in fact, have not been entitled to such disability rating since that time. We are unable to think of any justification for such contrary to fact ratings and we strongly recommend that H.R. 6133 not be favorably considered by the committee.

H.R. 210 proposes to provide a retroactive effective date for the 20 year bar on the reduction of ratings, just discussed. This bar (38 U.S.C. 110) was enacted

and became effective on August 19, 1964. It prohibited future reduction of evaluations that had been in effect for 20 years but did not affect any prior reduction actions. H.R. 210 would require the reestablishment of any evaluations that had been in effect for 20 years when they were reduced between July 1, 1959, and August 18, 1964. These reductions were made because the condition had improved, or was no longer disabling, or because a change in rating criteria resulted in the reduction of the disability evaluation. The Veterans' Administration believes that the mere fact that a veteran enjoyed benefits for 20 or more years which were thereafter properly reduced because his condition had improved or was no longer disabling or were discontinued because he had no entitlement to them is not a valid reason for requiring the reinstatement, and continuation of those benefits throughout the balance of his lifetime.

The July 1, 1959, date was presumably selected on an arbitrary basis since its significance is not otherwise apparent. It seems obvious, however, that if H.R. 210 is enacted it will be cited as a precedent for a further retroactive application of the provisions of 38 U.S.C. 110 by those veterans whose disability ratings were reduced at an earlier date after having been rated at or above a given percentage for 20 years.

It is estimated that the retroactive costs of H.R. 210 might approximate $300.000 for the 1959-64 period and that additional costs would accrue at about $100,000 for each year thereafter.

In this same general field, 38 U.S.C. 359 provides that service connection for any disability or death which has been in force for 10 or more years shall not be severed, on or after January 1, 1962, except upon a showing that the original grant was based on fraud or it is clearly shown from military records that the person concerned did not have the requisite service or character of discharge. This provision was enacted by Public Law 86-501, approved June 10, 1960. H.R. 5682 would delete the clause "on or after January 1, 1962," and would require restoration of service connection for any disability or death which was severed between June 10, 1960, and December 31, 1961.

The size of the Veterans' Administration compensation program (nearly 2 million disability cases presently on the rolls) makes it inevitable that, in the application of the numerous provisions of law and regulations to the cases considered, service connection will be erroneously authorized on occasion. Errors in adjudication may arise from misinterpretation or misapplication of the law or facts. In 1954 the Veterans' Administration began a thorough and extensive review of the running awards of disability compensation and pension to find and correct mistakes made during the peak workload period following World War II. Apparently, as a result of severances effected during this review, Public Law 86-501 was ultimately enacted. It barred the severance, on or after January 1, 1962, of service connection for any disability or death which has been in force for 10 years or more, subject to the limited exceptions noted above. In setting January 1, 1962, as the effective date of this provision, the Congress took cognizance of the running award review which, on June 9, 1980, was approximately 83 percent completed and was scheduled for completion by the end of 1961.

Our regulations and procedures provide the utmost protection for claimants. Service connection once established will not be severed unless it is shown to be clearly and unmistakably erroneous. Moreover, service connection will not be severed if there is any reasonable theory upon which it can be maintained. In the running award review, as an added safeguard, all cases in which it was proposed to sever service connection were reviewed by a unit in the Veterans' Administration central office before service connection was actually severed. This special review was provided in addition to the statutory right of appeal available to the veterans concerned.

H.R. 5682 would restore to the rolls veterans who were found, after a careful review of both Veterans' Administration regional offices and central office, to have been originally granted service connection as a result of clear and unmistakable error, which grant could not be maintained on any reasonable theory. In enacting Public Law 86-501, the Congress did not take issue with the desirability of this comprehensive review of running awards. To the contrary, by providing an effective date for this law subsequent to the completion of the review, we feel that the Congress endorsed both its basic purpose and the careful, safeguarded approach which we adopted.

We do not know of any valid reason for reestablishing service connection in these cases in which it has been determined, after a careful and comprehensive review, that they were granted originally through error.

H.R. 231 Section 355 of title 38, United States Code, requires the Administrator to adopt and apply a schedule of ratings of reductions in earning capacity from specific injuries, constructed to provide 10 gradations of disability. H.R. 231 is presumably intended to "freeze" the Veterans' Administration Rating Schedule, 1945, as it appeared on January 1, 1957, and to bar any future amendment of that schedule, unless enacted into law. This would be consistent with bills that have been introduced in the Congress in the last several Congresses. However, the language of H.R. 231 would have a considerably different effect. If enacted, it would rescind the rating schedule including all extensions thereto "as to its instructions, expressed policies, terms, evaluations, and all other data contained therein, effective as of January 1, 1957." The bill's net effect would be to abolish the entire rating schedule leaving nothing for use by the Veterans' Administration in the future adjudication of cases and rendering erroneous literally hundreds of thousands of rating actions that have been taken since 1956 and which involve the policies, terms, evaluations, and other data contained in the schedule.

AUTOMOBILES FOR DISABLED VETERANS

Chapter 39 of title 38, United States Code, currently authorizes a payment of not to exceed $1,600 toward the purchase of an automobile by World War II and Korean conflict veterans who have suffered, as the result of service during such periods, the loss or permanent loss of use of one or both hands or feet or permanent visual impairment to a prescribed degree.

H.R. 7852, which was drafted by and introduced at the request of the Veterans' Administration, proposes to extend such benefits to veterans who suffer the loss or permanent loss of use of one or both feet due to disability incurred or aggravated in line of duty (1) as a direct result of armed conflict or (2) while engaged in extrahazardous service (including such service under conditions simulating war) during the period between January 31, 1955, and the date when individuals are no longer liable for induction into the Armed Forces under the Universal Military Training and Service Act.

For many years it has been the policy of the Government to make certain veterans' benefits programs available only to veterans who served during wartime and, in other cases, to peacetime veterans under more restrictive conditions or at lesser rates. A major change in this established policy with respect to the service-connected benefit programs was made by the Congress in 1956 following an extensive study and recommendations made by the House Select Committee on Survivor Benefits. A new program of dependency and indemnity compensation was authorized by the Servicemen's and Veterans' Survivor Benefits Act, August 1, 1956, for all service-connected deaths occurring on or after January 1, 1957, with a right of application for persons otherwise eligible for the old death compensation benefit. Under this new program for service-connected deaths, no distinction in the rates payable is made between peacetime and wartime service.

Consistent with this change and in the light of present conditions of military service, we have recommended certain additional liberalizations of our benefit programs in behalf of those individuals who have served during the so-called induction period. One such is reflected in H.R. 7852. It proposes to authorize the grant of monetary assistance to those induction period veterans (1) who have suffered severe impairment of mobility, which results from the amputation or loss of use of one or both feet and for whom an automobile can be considered as constituting, in effect, an additional prosthetic appliance; and (2) whose disability or disabilities were the direct result of armed conflict or while engaged in extrahazardous service (including such service under conditions simulating war). Under these more restrictive criteria, we believe it appropriate that special benefit be made available to the induction period group.

Section 2 of H.R. 7852 proposes to extend to the date of enactment the start of any of the three alternative time limitations in 38 U.S.C. 1905 which otherwise would have begun to run prior to that date. Since it is possible that in the case of some induction period veterans to whom the bill would apply all of the time limitations of section 1905 would already have expired, such an extension of those limitations is necessary.

It is estimated that some 115 veterans would become eligible for assistance in acquiring an automobile or other conveyance during the first fiscal year, if the bill is enacted, at an estimated cost of $184,000 for that year. If the induc

tion period is extended to June 30, 1970, and other data remain at current levels, the bill would affect some 15 veterans each succeeding year at a cost of $24,000 annually.

H.R. 217 would also authorize monetary assistance toward the purchase of an automobile or other conveyance for certain induction period veterans. Like H.R. 7852 it would require that the requisite disability have been incurred or aggravated in line of duty as a direct result of armed conflict or while engaged in extrahazardous service during the induction period, but the benefit would be made available to veterans who have suffered the loss or loss of use of one or both hands or permanent visual impairment to a prescribed degree, under such conditions, in addition to one or both feet cases, which the VA proposal would encompass.

It is estimated that H.R. 217 would cost some $304,000 the first year and roughly $40,000 in succeeding years.

H.R. 229 proposes to extend the automobile program to veterans of World War I having the same compensable disabilities as veterans of World War II and the Korean conflict who are now eligible for this assistance.

H.R. 188 proposes to define the term "prosthetic appliance," for the purpose of laws administered by the Veterans' Administration, as including "special hand or foot controls for automobiles which are necessary for the control thereof by any veteran who has suffered the anatomical loss or loss of use of a hand or a foot." Hence, the essential purpose of the bill is to authorize the furnishing of such special controls for automobiles as a function of our hospital and medical care program for veterans.

At the present time, there is no definition given in title 38, United States Code, for the term "prosthetic appliance," although the term is used in certain provsions of the title.

The Chief Medical Director of the Veterans' Administration has advised that special hand-and-foot controls for automobiles do not come within the accepted definition of a "prosthetic appliance" as that term is generally understood in the medical profession and in our department of medicine and surgery. It is his view, in which the Administrator concurs, that it would be inappropriate to provide these appliances to disabled veterans on the theory that they constitute an extension of their medical care and treatment.

Accordingly, we are unable to recommend favorable consideration of H.R. 188 by your committee.

LIBERALIZED DEFINITION OF CHILD

H.R. 204 would extend the period during which certain Veterans' Administration benefits may be paid to a veteran or a widow on account of a child, or to a child alone, while the child is pursuing a course of instruction at an approved educational institution.

Under the current definition of "child" (38 U.S.C. 101(4)), which requires an unmarried status and provides a basic age limitation of 18 years, benefits are continued until the child is 21 if attending school. The bill would amend that definition by substituting 23 years for the present age maximum of 21 years, thus continuing benefits for 2 additional years on account of an unmarried child attending school. The benefits affected include additional compensation for veterans who are 50 percent or more disabled by service-connected disabilities, service-connected death compensation, dependency and indemnity compensation to children alone, and non-service-connected disability or death pension.

It is indicated that the present provision for payment of benefits relating to a child over 18 was based on the feeling that generally children are dependent upon their parents beyond the age of 18 years while attending school. Further, it appeared only just that where the veteran is deceased, the Government should provide benefits for the period in the child's life when, if the father were living, he might be expected to contribute to the child's support.

There seems a general recognition that over the years the need for advanced education and training has increased. Moreover, Bureau of the Census figures reflect that the median age of persons enrolled in the fourth year of college as of April 1, 1960, was 22.7 years.

It is estimated that the bill would cost a maximum of approximately $6.8 million the first year.

DEPENDENCY AND INDEMNITY COMPENSATION AND DEATH COMPENSATION PROPOSALS

H.R. 1169 would increase the monthly rates of death compensation payable to eligible widows, children, and parents of veterans who died from service-connected causes prior to January 1, 1957.

The Servicemen's and Veterans' Survivor Benefits Act established a new and modernized program of dependency and indemnity compensation for eligible survivors of veterans dying from service-connected causes on or after January 1, 1957, thus superseding the old death compensation program. Survivors of veterans who died before January 1, 1957, who are entitled to death compensation may elect to receive dependency and indemnity compensation or continue to receive death compensation. The authority to continue on the death compensation rolls was undoubtedly provided to preclude a reduction of monetary benefits which could have resulted in some instances if dependency and indemnity compensation was made the exclusive program.

An election to receive dependency and indemnity compensation once validly made is irrevocable. It appears from the election provision that the law contemplated death compensation would become a declining program. We doubt that it was expected that death compensation would thereafter be increased or extended.

The Veterans' Administration sees no justification for enhancing the advantage of the protected group of death compensation beneficiaries, and feels that enactment of H.R. 1169 would be a distinct departure from the original concept of the dependency and indemnity compensation program.

It is estimated that the bill would benefit approximately 171,700 wartime cases and 7.200 peacetime cases a total of 178,900 cases the first year, at an additional cost for that year of approximately $23,649,000. It is believed that the additional cost will decrease for the next 4 years to approximately $16,500,000 in the fifth year.

H.R. 233 would repeal the present method of computing income for parents for dependency and indemnity compensation purposes under 38 U.S.C. 415(g) (1) and would substitute standards which are applicable to the death compensation program.

There appears some uncertainty as to the scope of the bill as drafted. Presumably it is intended to be a liberalizing measure; but it is susceptible to an interpretation which while providing new income exclusions for dependency and indemnity compensation purposes would eliminate several of the exclusions presently provided by 38 U.S.C. 415(g) (1).

H.R. 3177 proposes to increase dependency and indemnity compensation in certain cases. It would authorize payment of dependency and indemnity compensation to a widow with children in an amount equal to any greater amount of death pension which would be payable to the children had the veteran's death occurred under circumstances authorizing payment of pension and if the widow were not entitled thereto.

Under the provisions of chapter 13, title 38, United States Code, the widow of a veteran whose death resulted from service-connected causes usually is not paid an increased rate of dependency and indemnity compensation on account of the veteran's children. However, the rate of death pension payable to an eligible widow of a veteran whose death was non-service-connected is increased for each child. The difference in payment standards in the two programs has, in the past, resulted in situations wherein a widow with children of a veteran whose death was service-connected has received a lesser monetary benefit than a widow with the same number of children whose veteran husband died of a non-serviceconnected cause.

Equal payments have been effectuated in some such cases (under 38 U.S.C. 412(b), as added by section 1(a) of Public Law 87-268, effective October 1, 1961). Where the income of a widow is in excess of $3,000, or her corpus of estate would be considered a bar to benefits in a non-service-connected case, however, no amount is payable to her under the current section 412(b). Dependency and indemnity compensation is payable to the widow in such a case only in the lesser amount determined under the standard rate provisions relating to that death benefit.

H.R. 3177 would amend 38 United States Code 412(b) to expand the existing authority for payment of dependency and indemnity compensation to a widow with children measured according to pension rates. In cases of inapplicability of the current section 412 (b) because of excessive income or due to corpus of estate, the measure would afford a new basis for payment of a greater amount