Veterans Administration

Military service inevitably involves some sort of sacrifice on the part of those who serve. In addition to risking loss of life or suffering a debilitating injury, military personnel typically have to devote several years of their lives to military service, time that could have been spent pursuing an education, a career, or starting a family. The realization of these sacrifices has prompted the U.S. government to offer benefits to those who have served, varying in type and substance since the end of the Revolutionary War. These benefits, which have included mustering out pay, medical care, insurance, and education benefits, are intended as both a reward for service and as compensation for time lost from civilian life. As the wars of the 20th century demanded that increased numbers of civilians be conscripted for service, the government began to offer a more comprehensive set of benefits. Several different agencies were charged with the task of administering these benefits until the creation of the Veterans Administration (VA) in 1930. Since its inception, the VA has evolved into a vast organization dedicated to administering the multitude of benefits on offer to the nation's veterans. It has aided the millions of returning soldiers in the transition back to civilian life and offered invaluable help in lessening the burden of service.

The principle that all citizens have a special obligation to care for their veterans has existed in America from the beginning of the country's history: indeed, the founders of the Plymouth colony pledged to take care of their disabled soldiers. During the Revolutionary War, the Continental Congress promised soldiers, among other things, mustering out pay and pensions for the disabled. During the first half of the 19th century, benefits were extended to widows of deceased soldiers and their surviving dependents. In addition, individual states offered medical assistance to injured veterans. [Page 867]The devastating nature of the Civil War left the nation with an unprecedented number of veterans. This ultimately led to pressure on Congress, in a year when there was a federal budget surplus (1890), to increase its efforts to assist veterans. The lobbying efforts of the nationwide veterans' organization The Grand Army of the Republic ensured that Civil War veterans received the most generous and widely available pensions the government had yet offered. In addition to offering pensions to almost 1.9 million former Union Army soldiers (Confederate soldiers were denied such privileges until 1958, when only a handful remained alive), the government offered aid to disabled veterans through the National Home for Disabled Soldiers. By 1930, the government administered 10 such homes in addition to more than 50 veterans' hospitals. Veterans of the Indian Wars and the Spanish–American War received similar benefits at the end of the 19th century. But the total wars of the 20th century forced the government to create a more structured and permanent benefits system.

America's entry into World War I led to an unprecedented mobilization of manpower for an overseas conflict. More than 5 million veterans, including some 200,000 with injuries, reentered society after service. In 1917, the government for the first time recognized the need to compensate veterans for time lost from civilian life by offering World War I veterans vocational rehabilitation and insurance, as well as compensation for the disabled. As a further reward for service, the government also authorized the payment of a one-time cash bonus to be paid in 1945. But because of the financial pressures brought on by the Great Depression, veterans descended on Washington in June and July of 1932 demanding early payment of those bonuses in what would be known as the Bonus March.

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