titled to transportation and subsistence to the place in the United States to which returnable, or cash travel allowances in lieu; and had they in fact been so discharged, and had the President under the authority conferred on him by the proviso to section 15 of the act of March 2, 1899, supra, authorized the volunteers then in the islands and about to be discharged to temporarily enlist for the time necessary to replace them by regulars, not in excess of six months, and had they so enlisted-instead of, as in fact occurred, their continuance on in their existing enlistments for not exceeding six months pending their replacement-it would appear they would have been entitled to cash travel allowances on their discharge for close of the war, and again to travel allowances in kind or in cash on their discharge from their temporary enlisted service of not exceeding six months; or, in other words, to cash travel allowances from the Philippines back, additional to the travel allowances in kind and/or in cash they later in fact received on their return from the Philippines and discharge. What the bill, therefor, in effect appears to do is to pay these volunteers entitled to discharge on April 11, 1899, and who continued on for not exceeding six months, the cash travel allowances they presumably would have received had they in fact been discharged on said date, or, in other words, cash travel allowances on such a hypothetical discharge additional to such allowances as in fact received on their later actual discharge."

According to the best information obtainable from the War Department there were approximately 15,000 officers and soldiers of the volunteer service of the United States in the Philippine Islands at the conclusion of peace with the Kingdom of Spain who would become the beneficiaries of this act.

Your committee feels that the Government, having received the benefits of the services rendered by these volunteers, who after April 11, 1899, on which date they were entitled to receive their discharge, continued in combative service until the organized insurrection had been broken and for various periods approaching six months after such date, should not now-nor at any time-avail itself of a technicality to deny to these brave and patriotic officers and the soldiers serving under them the travel pay and allowances which they understood and believed was to be paid them and which, if not a legal obligation, is certainly a moral obligation on the part of the Government to pay. Thirty years and more is entirely too long a time for the Government to withhold a payment of this obligation. Therefore, after careful consideration of all the facts, your committee unanimously recommends that the bill do pass as amended.

The report of the Secretary of War is appended hereto and made a part of this report. WAR DEPARTMENT, Washington, D. C., May 16, 1930.

Hon. JAMES G. STRONG,

Chairman Committee on War Claims,

House of Representatives.

DEAR MR. STRONG: Careful consideration has been given to the bill H. R. 9333, Seventy-first Congress, second session, for the relief of volunteer officers and soldiers in the volunteer service of the United States who served in the Philippine Islands beyond the period of their enlistment, and for other purposes, which you transmitted to the War Department under date of February 24, 1930, with a request for information and the views of the department relative thereto. The law under which officers and soldiers of the Regular Army were paid travel pay and commutation of rations upon discharge in 1899 is contained in sections 1289 and 1290, Revised Statutes, which read as follows:

"SEC. 1289. When an officer is (honorably) discharged from the service (except by way of punishment for an offense), he shall be allowed transportation and subsistence from the place of his discharge to the place of his residence at the time of his appointment, or to the place of his original muster into the service. The Government may furnish the same in kind, but in case it shall not so do, he shall be allowed travel pay and commutation of subsistence, according to his rank, for such time as may be sufficient for him to travel from the place of his discharge to the place of his residence, or original muster into service computed at the rate of one day for every 20 miles.

"SEC. 1290. When a soldier is (honorably) discharged from the service (except by way of punishment for an offense), he shall be allowed transportation and subsistence from the place of his discharge to the place of his enlistment, enrollment, or original muster into the service. The Government may furnish the same in kind, but in case it shall not do so, he shall be allowed travel pay and commutation of subsistence for such time as may be sufficient for him to travel from the

place of discharge to the place of his enlistment, enrollment, or original muster into the service, computed at the rate of one day for every 20 miles."

Under the option given the Government to furnish transportation and subsistence in kind by section 1290 quoted above, the War Department issued in General Order No. 180, dated November 26, 1898, the following:

"By direction of the Secretary of War, enlisted men discharged in Cuba, Porto Rico, Hawaii, the Philippines, or other places outside of the United States, will be provided free transportation to the United States on Government transportsunder direction of the commanding officers in the several localities, and will be subsisted by the Subsistence Department to the port of destination, and will not be entitled to travel pay from port of embarkation to the United States, nor to commutation of rations for the time so subsisted on the transports. Upon arrival in the United States they will be furnished with travel pay by the Pay Department to the places of their enlistment, as in all other cases of soldiers discharged on final statements."

The effect of the bill is to provide that the categories described therein "shall be entitled to receive travel pay and commutation of subsistence from the port of embarkation in the Philippine Islands to the place of previous enlistment in the United States, at the same rate and to the same extent as allowed under section 1290, Revised Statutes of the United States, to officers and soldiers of the Regular Army honorably discharged on expiration of enlistment.' The intended beneficiaries of the bill are some 15,000 volunteer officers and men who while serving pursuant to the act of April 22, 1898 (30 Stat. 361-363), volunteered to remain in the service in the Philippines beyond April 11, 1899, the date they were legally entitled to be discharged, until they could be replaced with other troops.

Irrespective of the merits of this measure, the War Department is of the opinion that the determination and settlement of claims under it pertain more properly to the functions of the General Accounting Office, and therefore suggests that, should the bill be favorably considered, it be amended so as to provide that such claims be settled and adjusted by the Comptroller General and certified to Congress for appropriation. The department further suggests the desirability of fixing a reasonable time limit during which claims may be submitted.

All of the enlisted men covered by the proposed legislation were discharged subsequent to the promulgation of General Orders 180, W. D., 1898, referred to above, which was applicable to Regulars and volunteers alike, and presumably received governmental transportation and subsistence for sea travel and the authorized commutation of travel allowances for land travel. It is also reasonable to assume that their officers received the travel allowances or transportation and subsistence in kind authorized by section 1289, Revised Statutes. Therefore, it is the belief of the War Department that a great portion, if not all, of the personnel intended to be benefited by this bill received the allowances to which they were entitled by the then peritnent laws or to which they would be entitled under the proposed legislation. Although there may be individual cases whose claims for relief merit consideration, the War Department feels that general legislation upn this subject is inadvisable and recommends against the enactment of H. R. 9333.

Due to lack of available data, the War Department is unable to furnish an estimate of the cost of the proposed bill, though the merits of any particular claim thereunder could be ascertained. The returns of April 30, 1899, the first submitted after ratification of the treaty of peace with Spain, show that there were then serving in the Philippines 15,080 officers and enlisted men belonging to volunteer organizations.

It is deemed proper to state that a report has this day been furnished on a similar bill, H. R. 9933, to the chairman Committee on Military Affairs, House of Representatives.

Sincerely yours,

STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES G. STRONG, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF KANSAS, AND CHAIRMAN OF THE COMMITTEE ON WAR CLAIMS

Mr. STRONG. Mr. Chairman, before Mr. Guyer speaks, I would like to say that the Committee on War Claims of which I am chairman has reported this bill unanimously, and asked me to present a request to your committee for a rule.

The CHAIRMAN. Has the Committee on Rules ever given a special rule for a war claim, Mr. Strong?

Mr. STRONG. I do not know; not since I have been chairman of the committee.

The CHAIRMAN. They never did while I was chairman.

Mr. STRONG. Here is the situation, Mr. Chairman. These men were in the Philippines, enlisted for the duration of the war between Spain and the United States. The war between Spain and the United States came to an end. They would thus have been automatically discharged, but Aguinaldo was refusing to accept the terms of the peace settlement and threatening war. He was at the gates of Manila with an army.

General Otis, who was in command of the American forces realized that it would be practically turning Manila over to Aguinaldo's army if the volunteers that were in Manila in the service of the Government were discharged.

So he had his officers line up the men and they asked the men if they would remain until the war was over, or until the Government could get new troops over there.

They also told them that if they would remain they would be entitled to the travel pay.

We have had Army officers before our committee who were there at the time and who said that they told their men who were willing to accept that proposal to take a step across the line, and practically every man in every company did so.

General Otis communicated with the War Department, and asked the War Department to approve the agreement made with the men. The War Department said that all those who would reenlist would be entitled to the travel pay in cash, besides being returned home. The CHAIRMAN. Who said that?

Mr. STRONG. The War Department sent cables over there to that effect. Then when Aguinaldo attacked the waterworks at Manila, they had no time to discharge and reenlist the men, but responded to the order of their officers and went out and attacked Aguinaldo, and the fight was on. They never were actually discharged or reenlisted, although their time of enlistment expired, and they continued in the service under that understanding.

When they were discharged and other troops had been brought over from the United States and asked "Where is our travel pay?" The Army officers said to them, "We have not the authority to pay it; you will have to have an act of Congress," and that is what they have been trying to get for 30 years. I think the good faith of the Government should now be made good.

Mr. PURNELL. What will it cost?

Mr. STRONG. Oh, a matter of three, four, or five million dollars. The CHAIRMAN. As I figured it out, it would cost about seven and a half million.

Mr. STRONG. There were about 10,000 to 15,000 men, some of whom have died, and will have no claims.

The CHAIRMAN. There is a provision in the bill to pay their legal heirs.

Mr. STRONG. Suppose they have not any legal heirs? That happens in a bunch of 10,000 men.

The CHAIRMAN. As I read the report, it provides for 15,000 men and their heirs; is not that correct?

Mr. MICHENER. It will perhaps cost from seven to nine million dollars.

Mr. STRONG. We can not tell about that. I think the best evidence we have is that the number of men will be around 10,000 and cost around $5,000,000.

The CHAIRMAN. The War Department says there are 15,000 men. Mr. GUYER. They did not all stay, and the regiments were not all full.

The CHAIRMAN. The report from the War Department says that there are practically 15,000 men that would come under this bill. Then the bill provides for the men and their legal heirs.

Mr. STRONG. If the companies were all full and the men all stayedand they all leave heirs-it might be that much, but I think that is a violent presumption. Under those circumstances it might reach the amount of $7,000,000 but the Government would have expended many times that amount if the men had not remained.

The CHAIRMAN. That is what I figured it to be, about seven and a half million.

Mr. GUYER. There is no definite amount authorized to be appropriated in the bill.

The CHAIRMAN. The report from the War Department says that "The returns of April 30, 1899, the first submitted after ratification of the treaty of peace with Spain, show that there were then serving in the Philippines 15,080 officers and enlisted men belonging to volunteer organizations."

Mr. STRONG. They did not all stay as I have said.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Guyer, we will be glad to hear you now.

STATEMENT OF HON. U. S. GUYER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF KANSAS

Mr. GUYER. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, I do not want to take up much of your time. Mr. Strong has referred to the situation here at the time of the insurrection in March, 1899, when Aguinaldo was at the gates of Manila making a drive on the waterworks. Some of the town had already been burned, and they would have destroyed it all. I do not blame them for that, because they had some cause; they had been under the yoke of Spain for 400 years, and they were suspicious. even of the United States.

The United States had no troops in adequate numbers, in the Philippine Islands at this time; about the only troops which were there were these volunteers for the war with Spain. They were the only ones that were there.

I want to review the cable correspondence between The Adjutant General at Washington, General Corbin, and General Otis, in command at Manila.

Let me say first, that section 15 of the Army bill provided that any man or officer whose enlistment expired and who reenlisted was entitled to travel pay in cash, as a sort of bounty, if you please, and all the Regular Army men who did reenlist in the Philippine Islands got

that.

Mr. MICHENER. Travel pay from the Philippines?

Mr. GUYER. Yes; they got that as a sort of bounty.

Mr. MICHENER. The only thing here is the question of travel pay from the Philippines and travel pay from the coast.

It is the policy of the War Department to pay travel pay from the coast. We operate a line of transports of our own from the Pacific coast to the Philippines, and we haul these men back and forth, and we discharge them from the Pacific coast in order to avoid having to pay the large amount of travel pay for that long distance of travel. Mr. GUYER. But you should consider the fact that there was no time to send a transport.

The CHAIRMAN. May I read from section 1289 of the Revised Statutes, the section on which your bill is based? That section says:

The Government may furnish the same in kind, but in case it shall not do so, he shall be allowed travel pay and commutation of subsistence.

So it remains with the Government to furnish it in kind, if it so desires.

As I understand it, they always bring them back to the Pacific Coast on a transport.

Mr. GUYER. They did bring them back, after they were discharged. Mr. MICHENER. The distance from Manila bring so great the Army would almost go broke, if the men discharged in the Philippines were allowed travel pay all the way from the Philippines to their homes, which they do not do.

Mr. STRONG. But there was no time to send a transport for those troops.

Mr. GUYER. This came up in an emergency and it was taken up with the officers of these 12 or 15 States. They went to their regiments and companies and asked the men if they would stay.

Mr. MICHENER. I am very familiar with this proposition. I have talked with a captain who told me that he had his soldiers step out, if they were willing to stay, and he said that now every time he goes to a reunion they ask him when they are going to get their travel pay. Mr. GUYER. He promised them that on the authority from Washington.

This is what General Corbin said in his cable correspondence:

The President inquires as follows: "If we are not able to get you sufficient forces to replace volunteers under your command before exchange of ratification of treaty, will you be able to enlist your present volunteer force under this section."

That is section 15, and he replied that it would be possible to do that.

On March 16, 1899, General Otis replied in a cable as follows:

Believed after inquiry majority volunteer organizations willing to reenlist for six months from ratification of treaty, provided that upon original discharge are paid traveling allowances to places of muster in, and that after expiration of second enlistment they are transported to those places by United States.