Transcripts For CSPAN3 Honoring U.S. Veterans Since The Revolutionary War 20240713

History tv all weekend, every weekend, on cspan3. From the American Revolutionary institute, a discussion examining the experiences of u. S. Veterans since the revolutionary war era. Veterans Affairs Secretary Robert Wilkie delivers the opening remarks. Secretary wilkie good evening. And welcome to the headquarters of the American Revolution institute of the society of the cincinnati. Am president general of the society, a position first occupied by george washington. He held the post from our founding in 1783 until his passing on december 14 1799. Today is november 11, 2019 which marks the 100th anniversary of veterans day in america. Originally known as armistice , and renamed in 1954, this is a day when we recognize the service of all u. S. Military veterans. We are delighted to mark this important day with a special event designed to salute americas veterans. I am especially pleased that our guests this evening include a fellow north carolinian who is the nations secretary of Veterans Affairs, the honorary Robert Wilkie. The society of the cincinnati was our countrys first veterans group, so it is particularly fitting the secretary will be providing remarks. You will hear more about that in a moment. We are gathered tonight to listen to a distinguished panel of noted historians who will be discussing the experience of American Veterans since the revolutionary generation more than 240 years ago. I also want to encourage you to return to Anderson House and visit us again and look at our very special museum exhibition, americas first veterans. Thes behind me and behind fireplace. You may not go in there now. The exhibit opened last week and will go until the spring of 2020. Now, im going to ask Mark Williams, chairman of the board of overseers of the American Revolution institute of the society of the cincinnati, to provide a very brief summary of andwe are and what we do then to introduce our distinguished secretary. Mark . [applause] Mark Williams thank you. The American Revolution was the worlds single most important achievement for selfgovernance in the past 1000 years. 1783, towards the end of the war, the continental officers formed an organization with two primary purposes. First, they wished to perpetuate the remembrance of the American Revolution and the ideals for which they fought. Second, they wanted to perpetuate the mutual friendships formed in the crucible of war. Of note, our organizations charter goes on to state the spirit of friendship extends to provide care for ones fellow combatants and the families. The first such expression in our history. Considering a name for this organization, the officers were inspired by a famous roman voluntarilywice gave up his near absolute dictatorial authority to return to being a mere, ordinary farmer. Hence, the revolutionary war officers deemed an appropriate name for their organization to be the society of the cincinnati. Military ceding authority back to civilians may seem obvious today, but in 1783 was nothing short of extraordinary. Nothing in happened like that before. There are numerous examples of the military remaining in control after successful revolutions. Mao,der napoleon, lenin, castro, and others. Membership in the society is limited to a few thousand men because eligibility requirements consist of being the eldest male descendent of a continental officer with only a Single Person being able to represent that officer. We will come back to that. For the first 200 years of the societys existence, most of our focus was on the fraternal purpose. Frankly, that is because there was not much need to focus on the Mission Purpose as our nations founding was more rally celebrated throughout america than today. For example, schoolchildren routinely memorized the declaration of independence and the constitution. They learned of the sacrifice made by ordinary folks to secure our independence, to establish our republic, to create our national identity, and to commit the new nation to ideals of liberty, equality, natural rights, civil rights, and responsible citizenship. Unfortunately, a couple of generations ago, this sort of education started to become tarnished. Cincinnati leaders recognized they would have to start focusing more on the remembrance of that vast event, as our forebears called it, and its associated ideals. Furthermore, they recognized their limited resources of only 3500 domestic members would not be enough to accomplish their enormous it vitally important goals. As a result, the society created the American Revolution institute of the society of the cincinnati. All, eligibility is open to who share our patriotic passion. As theificent revolutionary war achievements were, like any human endeavor, the results of the war and the civilian government that followed were not perfect. Notably, it failed to resolve suffrage, ands particularly poignant for tonights discussion, it did not address veterans question rights veterans rights. Press would fall into the trap presentism,them the intellectual fallacy of judging the past by current standards, we must recognize the revolution created an evolutionary process. That is the beauty of our heritage. While it did take us a couple of generations to grant revolutionary war veterans a pension, the important fact is we did so. And we were the first nation in the world to do so. If you have not had an opportunity to visit our museum, i strongly encourage you to do so. Tonight, i am delighted to introduce the secretary of Veterans Affairs. Secretary wilkies background and list of accomplishments could take most of the evening. But please allow me to share a few. Perhaps first and foremost, he is the son of an army officer and grew up at fort bragg. He is an attorney and currently a colonel in the air force reserves. More than 20 years of federal service at the national and international level, anluding being in an assistant secretary of defense as well as senior director at the National Security council under condoleezza rice. Prior to that, he had extensive expense serving multiple congressmen. Outside the federal sector, he has been Vice President of Strategic Programs for a multibilliondollar Public Company focusing on largescale engineering and program management. Academically, secretary wilkie holds degrees, an honors degree from wake forest, a jd from loyola, a master law from georgetown, a masters in strategic studies from the army war college. In addition, he has graduated from several military colleges. He has published articles in multiple military journals and has been awarded the highest noncivilian award of the defense department, the Defense Distinguished Public Service medal. Please allow me to introduce you robert leononorable wilkie. [applause] Mark Williams and if i may take a line from casablanca, im glad he is on our side now. Secretary wilkie the pin reads the American Revolution institute. Secretary wilkie thank you all very much. Ending for aderful set Veterans Affairs, this day 41days, when we celebrate million americans who have put on the uniform since the first shots were fired at Lexington Green in april of 1775. It is important for me to echo what was just said because it is an honor for me to be here amongst the keepers of the american flame, those who fight ism, whopresent like thed people indispensable man over my shoulder are men in bedded in their times and struggle as all humans do with how to make the best of what has been given to them. After achurchill said rather mixed academic career that i let the smart children know latin for a fashion and greek for a treat but i hit them hard when they do not know their history. This place drips with history. This society was founded in new york, newburgh, new where one of the seminal events in the history of armies of the west was born when certain officers, including one scoundrel named gates, and i will not talk about him very much, were threatening to overthrow the order that gentleman established. And in the midst of chaos stepped george washington. He walked into the barn and started to speak, but he could out a piece ofd paper and tried to read it, but he could not do that. And he reached for spectacles. Me, gentlemen,e because i have run almost blind and my hair has grown white in the service of my country. The tears began to flow like rivers that night. Was in new later, he york saying goodbye to the hamiltons, the tillmans, henry knox, the founder of this society, the first president of the society, and others who had borne the cause of American Freedom on her shoulders their shoulders. It is those ancestors we honor most tonight. The process of turning the ideas of the American Revolution and the declaration of independence into Something Real requires the most necessary ingredient in any fight soldiers. In those years, this fledgling nation got an early glimpse of the importance of the men and women who stand up to be counted. Paine,ary of 1776, tom who helped inspire the reading of the declaration of independence across the Continental Army by publishing common sense. Things were not going well that winter. Pushed troops have washington out of new york and new jersey into pennsylvania. Who wasmpted payne retreating with the continental First Americanhe crisis essay that december. You know the first line. These are the times that try mens souls. But what followed was a lesserknown appeal to the spirit of americas warriors. The summer soldier and sunshine patriot will shrink from the service of their country, but he ghost dance now deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered. It we have the consolation that the harder the conflict the more glorious the triumph. A few days later, washington crossed the delaware and routed the mercenaries on that christmas day, a brilliant stroke that would infuse the american cause for years to come. America owes everything to those men and women who refuse to be known as the summer soldiers and the sunshine patriots. All through our history as we have spoken of national unity, the real obstacle of moving forward the boundaries of freedom and the only danger to america comes from within. That is not a new thought. Ronald reagan spoke of it often. Thoughtsok at reagans on the American Revolution, they on infused with his thoughts the relationship between two of the great masters of the revolution. When independence was gained to the government was formed, partisanship ripped the bonds of friendship these two men formed first in 1775. Thomas jefferson destroyed john adams in 1800. The night before jeffersons inauguration, adams slipped out of washington in bitter, sorrowful, and brokenhearted. , theyen both retired began through letters to speak again. As reagan reminded us in 1986, they wrote on every imaginable subject. Gardening, horseback riding. Jefferson even talk about sneezing as a cure for hiccups. But other subjects were there. The loss of loved ones. The mystery of grief and sorrow. The importance of religion in the young country. And of course, the final hopes of two old men, two great patriarchs of the country to help to found and loved so deeply. It carries me back, jefferson said, to the times when the set with difficulties and dangers we were fellow laborers in the same cause, struggling for what is most valuable to man, his right to selfgovernment. Laboring always at the same oar with some wave ahead threatening to overwhelm us. And yet, passing harmless by, we rode through the storm with heart in hand. That was there last gift to us. A lesson in brotherhood and tolerance for each other, and insight that would make america strong and great as a nation. When both died on the same day 1826, 50urs on july 4, years after the declaration was signed, america had what many considered to be a divine sign. I mentioned earlier 41 million americans have one this nations uniform since the first volunteers took after the british on Lexington Green. Some of our greatest heroes are those two insisted on wearing even when being told they were not wanted or needed. One of them was a scratch farmer from eastern tennessee by way of North Carolina who would become the greatest hero of the First World War by capturing 132 german prisoners with just a small group of men. He was one of Many Americans called upon to do extraordinary things. Slight, buta small, farmerl bespectacled from jackson county, missouri, who had never commanded anything but a plow. But he lied and cheated to get into the Field Artillery because he could not bear the thought of his friends and neighbors going to war without him being there to help them. He commanded the battery of the 120 night Field Artillery called the dizzy dees. He said they were the hardest Drinking Group in kansas city. He was a baptist leading people with names like maloney, driscoll, and ofarrell. He wrote his future wife, i do not know what will happen when the first explosions hit and the clouds of gas come. On the day two horses were shot out from under him, one private look at him trying to recover, through the bottle thick glasses, he said, harry truman dont scare with eight da wo rth a damn. The infantry from harlem was there, known as the Harlem Health fighters hell fighters. They were not allowed to enter the parade. When they reached europe, they were assigned to the french army because so Many American units would not fight with them. In the two years they were in western europe, the Harlem Hellfighters suffered more casualties, 1500, earned more decorations, and spent more time on the western front than any unit in the American Army. And when they returned, the people of new york righted a wrong. Fifthead the parade up avenue when the American Army came home. Back to alvin york, that ordinary man called upon to do extraordinary things. York became a voice not only for veterans before his nation. Nation. Or his as the guns of your slowly started to approach the shores of the United States again, some questioned why the United States should again become tangled in the problems of your. Didnt we just fight the war to end all wars . But york would echo Thomas Paines remarks from the revolution and explain precisely why america had to fight. He said liberty, freedom, and democracy are so precious that you do not fight to win them once and then stop. Liberty and freedom and democracy are prizes awarded only to those people who fight to win them and then keep fighting eternally to hold them. When i am asked what animates our work at the v. A. , i say it is the stories of the men and women who sacrifice everything for us. It was not always so. Presently can set the tone for us during the civil war by challenging us to care for those who have borne the battle. Just a few blocks from here, president lincoln would get on a horse unaccompanied and follow ambulances up to hospitals located just north of the white house. He would reach into the ambulances and Start Talking to the soldiers, asking how they were, what was going on, what could he do for them . But the veterans of world war i many years later did not experience what mr. Lincoln hoped when he issued his proclamation in the second and noneuro, that we hope for peace and pray for it, but in order to ensure, we not only have to honor the soldiers who bore the battle, we have to care for their families. Inew short blocks from here the early 1930s, veterans of world war i marched on this town and were met with tanks. Franklin roosevelt was watching. He sent his wife into the midst to tell those troops that everything would be all right and that change was coming. A young veteran who had served with york on the western front told the washington post, the army sent tanks, and Franklin Roosevelt sent eleanor. A few years later after world war ii was over, that great veteran of the first war came to the white house. And he understood the mistakes made between the two great wars. Of thethe predecessors Veterans Administration, he called upon his favorite missourian, general omar bradley, to take control of the v. A. In two years, he administered 2. 7 million scholarships to college for americas veterans. He built 52 hospitals in two years and he pledged america would never turn its back in the 20th century on those who had borne the battle. But once again, we fell down. As mentioned, i am the son of a combat soldier. My father was grievously wounded in the invasion of cambodia. He was a big man for his day. 62, 240. In those days, it was a big fellow. He was so badly wounded that he spent a year in the Army Hospital before he returned home to us, weighing half of what he did when he left. Only through the good graces of general abrams was he allowed three years to recover and return to the division that our new york served in alvin york , thed in world war i Allamerican Division, the most decorated combat unit in the armed forces of the United States. My father was a senior officer in that division and was not allowed to wear his uniform off post. That was not cambridge, massachusetts, that was not california. That was fayetteville, North Carolina, the heart of Richard Nixon country. There were no parades. Was notulture said it right to defend soldiers. My father reeled from the crisis. Company of the daughter of bob hope as i dedicated our new cemetery in los angeles. I recounted to her a story i remember experiencing with my mother. Mr. Filled donahue was on television. He was running up and down the aisles with the microphone in his hand. Bob hope was his guest. He spent about the first 20 trying to the show get bob hope to say that the soldiers of vietnam are somehow different from the soldiers bob hope interchanged in korea and the pacific, that somehow they were broken. Bob hope finally had enough. He said the soldiers i saw were the same soldiers that i thought , the same soldiers i saw in australia, and the same ge. Diers i saw after the bul all remember after that was my mother yelling from the other room, god bless you, bob hope today, we are finally people who praise the contributions of our warriors and know in our hearts that their services all we have to defend our way of life. And while we can never thank them enough, we must continue to take historic steps to make sure we fight for those who fought for us. We have finally integrated the v. A. With americas Broader Health care network. We are giving veterans the choice so that finally, if we cant provide them with a need, they need, we give them the opportunity to go into the private sector. For people like my father, after 30 years of serving, of being wounded and jumping out of , they no longer have to carry around an 800page record of their service in peacetime in wartime. We have done to other things i believe are absolutely essential. We have talked about history here. Im going to make reference to one of the more obscure successors to general washington, a fellow by the name of benjamin harrison. Benjamin harrison is known for one thing. He served in between two nonsuccessive terms of grover cleveland. And that was his contribution. But served as a Major General during the civil war. And he has seen death on an unimaginable scale. And he was troubled. He was troubled by the reports that continued to come in from the War Department that hundreds, almost thousands, of officers and men in the Frontier Army were taking their lives with her own hands. That was the first cataloging a suicide by the United States government. Veterans take their lives each and every morning. 60 are not in our v. A. This is not a crisis just of those who have worn the uniform. The leading cause of death for americas youth is not what it was when i was a teenager, car accidents, it is suicide. The new York City Police department is now overrun with policemen veteran ending their lives tragically. What we have promised this time is that we are going to take veterans, because most americans understand at some level what veterans experience, what their fellow americans go through, when they put that uniform on and when they take that uniform off. We are going to finally have our First National conversation about Mental Health, homelessness, and addiction. It is long past time that a problem we identified in the 1890s be addressed by the people of this nation, and we are going to do that. [applause] secretary wilkie and to give you some historic perspective, most of the veterans who take their lives are from my fathers generation. Lyndon johnson left washington, d. C. , 50 years ago in january. That is how long their problems have been building. And it is long past time that we address them. So, i want to leave you with a stories thatries, are important to me and i believe are important to those i have served with and those i have watched growing up. The first is from the greatest of airborne warriors, matthew bunker ridgeway. General ridgway led the Allamerican Division ii victory in north africa. Withal Eisenhower Task him preparing the Airborne Assault on hitlers force. He was in command of the screaming eagles and red devils. The night before dday, he could not sleep. He was sot of his cot restless. He was worried. He reached for the Old Testament and turned to the battle of , up to that time, the most ferocious battle in the history of the hebrew people. He looked to gods promise, i will not fail thee nor forsake thee. Ronald reagan awarded general ridgway president ial medal of freedom. He said he heroes, and they are needed. Great men step forward when courage seems in short supply. That is what we are about, not failing or for seeking ghost who step forward when courage seems in short supply. Of 1776the warriors stepped forward to create a new dawn of the west. Finally, we turn to the man whose greatest hero was the man we see above us, that was dwight eisenhower. When president eisenhower was inaugurated, he was told he had inherited a president ial ya cht. He thought it was an indulgence unworthy of a democracy and ordered it scrapped. But there was one officer in washington whose orders general eisenhower could not countermand, mamie eisenhower. , but wheno, keep it you take it out, only take it out with soldiers. Five months after eisenhower was inaugurated, you know the kabuki dance about to take place. The president pulls up to appear navy yard. The secret service immediately deployed to separate the. Resident from his troops and is only a fivestar general of the army could do, eisenhower , get behind me, i know these men he walked on the deck and there were 40 korean war soldiers. Most were missing limbs. The others were horribly disfigured. Eisenhower ordered those who could to stand at attention. And those who could do it, did it. He said you have a standing , you never put your uniform away. You live to remind your fellow citizens why they sleep soundly at night. That is what we are about. To never fail or for sake the ordinary men and women called upon to do these extraordinary gs, who step forward when courage seems in short supply and whose existence reminds us that the cost of freedom is so high. Is why the work of this society is so important, to provide us with a link to the earliest times in the founding of this republic when a few people took on the mightiest empire the world had ever seen, an empire launching an76 of Expeditionary Force over 3000 miles of ocean with 30,000 troops. And they did it, and they persevered, and they set the world on fire just as tom paine predicted they would. , as part of your inheritance here, to keep the flame of their memories alive because if we dont, it will not be a foreign power that gets its foot in the ohio or scales the rockies. Who have brought to end this great experiment that is really the last, best hope of man. I thank you for this high honor. I thank you for being here on veterans day and for remembering those 41 million who have taken up arms since those farmers stood at Lexington Green and fought back the greatest force on the planet. Thank you all and god bless you. [applause] the secretary is a hard act to follow, but we will do our best. I am jack warren. This weekend, our society opened an exhibition. If you have not been in, please do. Not during the program. Called americas first veterans. It traces the experience of the revolutionary war veterans from the end of the revolutionary war when the very60s last veterans of the American Revolution died, all of them over 100 years old by that time. The exhibition includes some remarkable treasures. That is one of the reasons you need to come back and see it or see it when the program is done this evening. It includes the original 1792 biography of deborah sampson, one of the first recognized women combat veterans in American History. She disguised herself as a man, easier in the day when all you had to do was draw your hair up in a ponytail when men wore ponytails as well, wore a continental uniform and was wounded in battle near tarrytown, new york. She took two musket balls in her. F i her thigh deborah did not want to be discovered. She dug one of those musket balls out of her leg by herself. She carried the other in her leg until the day she died in 1827. It was there when she gave birth to three children after the war. She was granted a disability pension in 1792 under the law establishing those pensions when the new federal government was established. Her life story told in its First Edition is a great treasure. Another great treasure in the room is the badge of military merit. You have all heard of the badge of military merit even if you do not know it. It is a purple silk cloth about the size of a half dollar. It is the First American military decoration bestowed upon enlisted men for conspicuous service. George washington established it in 1782. It was revived in 1932. We refer to it as the purple heart. There are only two surviving purple hearts in the world today. Dont miss it. Those are not the great treasure. If you could see into the room, you would see the face of a very old man. That is the real icon of this exhibition. It is a painting by john nagle. Nagle was a distinguished philadelphia portrait painter of the Second Quarter of the 19th century. And he painted this painting and called it a pensioner of the revolution. It portrays an elderly veteran encountered on a cold night in december of 1829 on the streets of philadelphia. The man was living in a makeshift shelter. This sounds familiar, doesnt it . Nagle was on his way to a friends house for dinner, but he stopped and approached the man and engaged him in conversation, which was difficult because the man spoke rather poor english. He was an immigrant from germany. Learned his name was joseph winter and he had come to america before the revolution, had settled in eastern pennsylvania in the town of bethlehem where he was a weaver, and he had joined the American Forces and served in the Continental Army during the revolutionary war. After the war, he married and had children. But by 1829, his children were dead, his wife was dead. Requires digital dexterity. It requires good eyesight. Those have faded. By 1829, he could do no more work. He lived in the streets of philadelphia, a homeless veteran. Far as we can as tell, is the oldest portrayal of a homeless veteran in American History, perhaps in the history of the world. We have all seen that image, but we see it in photographs today. A painting is a reminder that the problems of veterans are not new. They are not easily solved. The challenges they face are challenges they faced in the generation of the revolution. The challenges they face today and that we, as a civilized people, must deal with. All of these challenges symptomatic of the revolutionary generation survive in different ways today. Tonight, we are joined by a distinguished panel of historians who have worked on the expense of American Veterans to discuss these experiences, explore how their experiences were peculiar to the circumstances of their generation but also perhaps to establish some common themes. They have been waiting very patiently off to the side. Let me introduce them to you. s assistantw jordan professor of history at sam houston state university. [applause] a cultural historian of the civil war and its aftermath and the author of marching home Union Veterans and their unending civil war. He is the coeditor of the war went on reconsidering the lives of civil war veterans. Stephen ortiz is associate professor of history at binghamton university. [applause] he is the author of beyond the bonus march and g. I. Bill. He is also the editor of veterans policies, veterans politics new perspective on veterans in the modern United States. Finally, miranda summers lowe is a curator in the division of political and military history at the smithsonian. [applause] Research Includes the National Guard and reserve history, womens military history, and the g. I. Bill. She has served in the army National Guard since 2002, including deployments to iraq and the horn of africa. You are our veteran of the evening. Thank you. [applause] veterans of the revolutionary war faced withenges associated demobilization and reintegration into civilian life. Century ways 21st of describing it. Many faced challenges associated with disability, financial need, financial distress, poverty, and homelessness. Only after the passage of several decades did our nation fully honor, celebrate, and memorialize the service of revolutionary war veterans. Theirumption is experience are patterns repeated to varying degrees in the aftermath of Major Military actions of the 19th and 20th century. That is what i hope we can talk about tonight. Before we dive in, perhaps each of you would tell us a little bit about your own work on veterans and what you see as toortant about this theme understand American History more broadly. I begin with professor jordan. Jordan my book is a social history of the men who won the civil war but could not bear what followed. Previous scholarship argues Union Veterans returned home and slippedil war into hibernation for at least 15. Ears after the conflict the implications of that scholarship were enormous. Bill yank was n somehow complicit in the bargain. Hat achieved reconciliation ist my scholarship has done a different approach and to suggest a myriad of ways the war continued to and annex the lives of veterans for the rest of their lives. Not only did they stagger through physical and emotional scars, but they also returned home to a northern civilian society that had reached no consensus about the meaning of the war, their participation in such unprecedented violence, the meaning of emancipation. Billy yank comes home to a society that wants to remember a of he did not fight, a war northern civilians was not the war he fought. He finds himself adrift needing urgently to explain and contextualize his own experiences. I think the lesson and larger implications are really important. Ultimately, he could perhaps get over what he had seen and experienced at antietam or shiloh. When he could not get over was the way in which northerners wanted to swiftly embrace reconciliation, the way they wanted to move so quickly be on the war, the way they wanted to frame this. Wanted to maintain authority over those experiences. Hisanted to maintain position as custodian of the wartime experience. That was an ongoing battle for. Ecognition and acknowledgment thank you for having me here. Im delighted to be here on this wonderful day. My research and writing about the role of veterans and their organization, like this organization, although i tend to focus on 20thcentury organizations such as the veterans of foreign wars and the American Legion. The American Legion celebrating their centennial. I focus on the way those organizations and veterans within them have played an active role in american political life. A previous book has dealt with the ways that beyond the bonus about,he secretary spoke they have been very active participants in the creation of the way americans handle veterans policies and benefits. That is a misconception americans have always been unbelievably generous with veterans benefits. They have been somehow unanimously supported. What seems to have been the case for a very long time now is that veterans and their organizations intenseight and wage political battles to get the benefits they think they deserve. And that is the focus of my research. Miranda thank you for having me here this evening. It is a great honor. My research into veterans started when i was serving as in afghanistan were historian for the army. I thought this will be simple, it is an operational story. I was charged with writing the mobilization sections getting into the guard and reserve. There how in this era were not clearcut lines of being at war and at home, that our Service Members were routinely serving three tours of duty. Now, we are getting up to 5, 6, 7. As much as i would have liked to keep it all within the military history perspective, i really did have to look at what was happening between the mobilizations which pulled me into looking at the veteran experience, particularly how people were framing it in the modern era coming back into their service, whether active duty or reservist. That research guided me back many generations before to look at different iterations of veterans programs and benefits and reintegration and how those programs had evolved for the current servicemember. If you are looking at Current Events right now, a lot of the topics we will talk about tonight are very timely. These are patterns that start as early as the American Revolution. Begin would like to i would like to begin because it seems important to understand the experience of veterans of the revolution. Veterans at the time of demobilization . Professor jordan, you have tipped your hand a little bit. From surprised to learn the briefer remarks she made how similar that experience was to from the brief remarks you may have similar that experience was. Most modern americans would think the victors of the menlutionary war would be who could expect to get free lunch for the rest of their lives, that they would be heroes from the instant they went home. In the case of the revolutionary, that was definitely not the case. The army was discontented because it had not been properly paid. Who werehe men discharged in the summer of 1783 were given debt certificates by the Continental Army which were not worth very much in which they sold immediately for pennies on the dollar. That was how they managed to get the money they needed to get home or to buy basic clothing for civilian life. And that was it. When they reached home, the communities which had been divided by war, particularly in large parts of the country, in parts of new york and the south where loyalist and have been common, communities were anxious to put the war behind them really quickly. For this reason, not only have they suffered financially at the end of the war and the promises made to them had not been fulfilled, but they did not find themselves as welcome as we would like to think they were. The same experience for Union Veterans. Jack very similar experience dr. Jordan very similar experience. 1. 5 million men will call themselves Union Veterans after the civil war. It is an enormous scale. The physical process of demobilization is remarkably efficient. Demobilizedwill be a few months after appomattox. All of that expertly choreographed by the quartermaster general. No one anticipates the social problems that will accompany demobilization. Wartime voluntary aid societies, Christian Commission which had done marvelous work during the war, both would shatter their headquarters in the following can 65. 1865. Veterans were left to navigate their way home by themselves. There is this notion that there is a great fear of a Standing Army and we want you to quickly cede authority or distinction as you return home. That is very palpable in many of the speeches delivered at ceremonies welcoming Veterans Home and demanding quickly they get on with the work of their lives. There is not yet that link to understand how the experience of war will continue to manifest. Stephen for will rule on veterans, i dont think there was ever since the u. S. Was not prepared to reintegrate them into society. Look at the civil war pension systems and civil war veterans process. During the war, they had set up a clear bureaucratic approach to integrating veterans in terms of health care, vocational training, employment services. But they were scattered amongst a bunch of different federal agencies. Public health service, vocational services, the army does quite a bit of this. Warrior at Risk Insurance bureau. We are speaking in washington now. We know how that scattering of bureaucratic goals cannot lead to the results necessary. Despite the fact that world war i veterans were the targets of legislation to ease the transition, it overwhelmed what the government expected. This will lead to the creation of the Veterans Bureau that will consolidate all of these approaches. The is not something government is quick to address. Is quick to address this is the American Legion and the officials of the American Legion who pressure congress. The veterans of foreign wars and the American Legion will set up a very important part of washington which they will set them up right after world war i. They become part of the congressional world of testimony and of Button Holding congressional members to push for the type of changes necessary to reintegrate world war i veterans into american life. It is definitely a struggle, nopite the fact, again, country was as prepared to do with that struggle as the u. S. 1918, int was circa that time period. Is not an easy answer, what demobilization is like in the global war on terror. We have the advantage of having 18 years to work on it and i have tried a lot of different approaches, which i think is one of the first thing you see in ,hese periods in this periods roughly the same number of gulf iraq warans as veterans, at the same time. You try different methodologies for how to do this. The other thing i would bring up is that it is possible to demobilize, where in an emergency we can have a Service Member from combat into their living room and 24 hours. That can happen. Even where previously it would have taken how long to even get you back from europe to the states, plus the demobilization. So you will see this pattern where we spend anywhere from four days to two weeks, may be upwards of a month, to send someone back home. And there have been a few different complications of that. Especially if we knew these wars would have lasted that long, we would have done demobilization differently. Early reports coming out of these demobilizations around 2004 were showing about 40 of demobilizing were already medically unfit for the next deployment. But the mindset was, we wont need them for the next deployment, that is ok, we can push them off active duty or back to their units and they will have time to recover. You see that time factor in just , but you can also see how there was a better infrastructure for this generation of veterans, these strong lobbyist groups with a stronger v. A. , and so many living veterans from other conflicts who didnt want to see the same thing happen again. If i could share an experience from my deployment to iraq, when we got back, a whole unit, we landed in new jersey, snow on the ground, and there was a group of Vietnam Veterans there waiting for us and they made us breakfast. We had a chaplain come up and he was like, you are going to spend about two weeks demobilizing. I will tell you why. It took two days for me to get home and i looked down one day and my mothers home and i realized the dirt under my fingernails was from vietnam. So you are going to be a little bored, but we are going to get you back on the right time zone, see a doctor, see a dentist before we send you home. That was during the era where you were spending about two weeks demobilizing. At this point for a lot of individuals it is two or three days and that is usually at the persons request, because at this point is it is so common to go out, and those services are available, they can walk into the v. A. , they dont necessarily have to do that when they are coming back from that deployment. We havent mentioned the very successful demobilization of world war ii veterans. Was, the g. I. Sons bill paved the ground in 1944 for the readjustment into american life, and that demobilization process. It is not a coincidence that the g. I. Bill had more or less American Legion authorship. Basically, the American Legion writes the g. I. Bill, because that is the generation of world war i veterans that were intent of at have the same level system being overwhelmed, of whether it beent, from unemployment to the Great Depression, you name it, they were intent not to have that replicated with the world war ii generation. The year before they write the g. I. Bill, the open their doors to world war ii veterans and then start pushing for a g. I. Bill. So that crossgenerational beingns attention ends up a really important part of the veterans story of readjustment over time, nor of not readjustment when it comes to Vietnam Veterans not feeling adequately prepared for coming home. So these cross generation things are very powerful, and what is handed off from one cohort to the next matters a great deal. There is an enormous difference between the four wars the three of us represent and the modern conflict, and that is, our wars ended clearly. They had closure. Korean war veterans, we can test that. I would lump korea in with vietnam, it was much more ragged. Whatever the flaws of the way in which the government handled the resolution of the revolutionary war civil war or world war i or world war ii, we know that they came to an end. Closures a moment of and group identity, which i veterans ofking for these almost interminable conflicts. It would be very difficult, those of us who teach history, when did the conflicts in afghanistan begin and end . We expect you to give us for some to her and appomattox. And that has to affect the way veterans are perceived, and their own experience. They do not represent a single coterie in the way those of earlier wars do. Is that fair . Ms. Lowe americans really like the idea of a citizen soldier, picking up and serving your country. We also love the idea of the military profession. We are trained, regulated, and especially the all volunteer force, military is stretched thin. We hold these ideals in very high stature and they dont necessarily always get along with each other. Doing your twoyear stint is not the same as doing 20 years, getting a pension, and with these wars going on so long, we are moving more into that where we have so many people, where they are veterans still in uniform and serving in some fashion. It pulls at that idea of whether they are still serving their country. We are entering some disability,ry here, financial need, distress and poverty, the origin of pensions of various kinds. In the englishspeaking world they go back to elizabethan laws, essentially that is their root, that when disabled soldiers were sent home from the battlefields of england or europe and they were in the english army, if they had been disabled, crippled in the war, if they had lost a limb, the government made a commitment to support them. But it looks at least to a historian like a commitment to keep them off the local poor roles and not impose them on the local port relief system. And that is the great grandfather of all military pension symptom pension systems. Abouten into the debate revolutionary war pensions in the early 19th century, when revolutionary war veterans were in their 50s and 60s and this debate was heating up, it is mostly a debate about relieving oferty, and not so much one providing veterans with compensation, just compensation duty faithfully rendered. There is a big change in america in the 1820s over that issue. It is the first big pension debate in American History that produces the pension act of 18 32, the first General Service pension. But even thereafter, there is a residual sense that this is not something earned, but something given. Im wondering how, as that died, for Union Veterans of the civil war, when they begin drawing sense of is there a popular resentment, misunderstanding . Union veteransn were keen students of history and understood the resistance they would face in fighting for a pension. Dalzell, private of the 1 16 of ohio, wrote one of the early biographies of john gray, the last surviving revolutionary war pensioner, so they connected their experiences to those early debates over revolutionary war pensions. They understood it just what they would face. And in the space of their veterans organization, the grand they begin republic, to articulate a strikingly modern notion. They began to make the revolution the argument around their ga are campfires that pensions were debt of anditude that took honor, they would sue for a definition of who was entitled to a pension. Initially there were pensions for folks who were missing arms and legs as a result of battle, a pension of eight dollars a month end officers up to 30 a month. Thedue to the activism of ga are over time, over the late 19th century, you get pension ar overtion ga time, the late 19th century, you get pension legislation, the 1890 pension legislation that you get a disability pension for anyone discharged. And you get the pension act that would provide basically an oldage retirement pension. First toare the articulate this notion that there is a special relationship between the federal government and veterans, and they do that in the space of the gar, and the gar itself, when those pensions is doingquate, the gar a lot of the work of poverty , fraternity, charity and loyalty where there are three hallmarks. They are paying for costly medical procedures, the government refuses to pay. There burying soldiers and poppers grades, they are heating soldiers homes for the winter. So once you get this pension labyrinth, it is still maybe not enough. The world war i era legislation looked at what brian suggest what brian suggested and said, we want none of that because it has been expensive,credibly and what we will do is give pensions to serviceconnected disability, absolutely, vocational training, we will help them with unemployment services, get them reintegrated, but we are not doing a pension. Eriods what they will ultimately do is pass what is known as adjusted compensation, known colloquially as the bonus, which then leads to the bonus march. Buddy pension was seen as completely young the pale of a progressive era, cost and efficiency minded bureaucrats were interested in doing in the early 20th century. However, something did change a and pensions were seen not just as poverty relief come about as oldage poverty relief. And 1945, and19 there is the Social Security act of 1935, and that changes the conversation of pensions, because oldage pensions that were seen as only for veterans now become part of american life, with federal involvement in oldage pensions. That changes the nature of the conversation going forward. So the g. I. Bill doesnt deal with old age pensions, Social Security is there, it does deal with forwardlooking things like education and home loans and Small Business loans and veterans preference and all these things to help veterans reintegrate, but not pensions. I was hoping you would bring up the words deal the words new deal, because looking at the original g. I. Bill it makes a lot of sense in the context of a new deal program where government is expanding rapidly, getting into a lot of new areas of american life, whether it is transportation or oldage care and even medical care. When you move into the allvolunteer force, there were conversations early on where a weref famous economists like, what if we could make military service marketbased . A young Milton Friedman was there, and they wanted bonuses and they were, we need to make this entirely marketbased. But the idea that you would have enlistment bonuses and Retention Bonuses and, should combat arise, you would get a combat bonus, but not as much on the social service side of things. Well,dea i did not work so bonuses were never responses enough to what was happening, both in the life and health of the department of defense as an organization and also what was up what was happening in the civilian economy. So anyway, we dont do the combat bonus anymore. In other ways, we really do, because it is really expanded, we get paid much better and get a lot of these other services in the military that you didnt use to, whether it is family care appeared but you also have to look at how other countries have structured this. I was talking to a canadian officer and we were looking through their military costs and i was, that is a lot cheaper, because you dont pay for college and dont pay for health care because anyone gets that. Structured things differently in america and those Services Become military expenses, Like Health Care for military families or tuition assistance, and to an extent some of these bonuses as well, but we dont do the same, spend two years in, you get a victory bonus. I think a lot of people would be satisfied by that idea, but hasnt been the way that we have done it. The veteransdan Service Organizations have can professor ortiz the veterans Service Organizations have continued that level of care in their local immunities. When you talk about pensions really being poverty relief, it was away for Veterans Services organizations to operate, first get charitable lay but also connections to employment and connections to Small Business ownership and these other ways that are in effect poverty relief, all these things are, but often conducted more through the organizations and locally than they are as a federal pension. Secretary wilkie talked and we gave him a hearty round of applause when he talked about an Energetic Initiative to do with veteran homelessness. I invited everybody to look at this portrait during my opening of aks, at this portrait revolutionary war veteran who was homeless on the streets of philadelphia. Aure tonight home shift makeshift homeless shelter on the street in philadelphia, one might assume they are a homeless veteran. We meet them on the streets. They have a cardboard sign, and whether they are authentic veterans are not, they are claiming the status of veterans because they feel that a veteran our, on what . On our generosity . On our gratitude . This seems to be an unresolved question, during our entire history we have been struggling with it. , thehing i learned so far more time passes, the more these things stay the same. We have many of the same issues today that we had in 1820. Is that fair . Do you feel we have made dramatic progress . Professor jordan in infrastructure issues, we have made progress. Civil war veterans did not have the Veterans Administration to return to. They only had a nation pension bureau. So in infrastructure we have come a long way in dealing with veterans issues. What we havent done so good of a job in doing is realizing the deeper, more intellectual issues about the meaning of service, and what that entails. Veterans, should they continue to have authority over the history of their war . What is that look like . What does acknowledgment and recognition look like . Those are questions that are much more difficult for us to answer. National,d no meaningful conversation nationally about rituals every integration. For civil war veterans, it was finding a space to share their war stories, honestly and urgently, finding respectful mixence where they could and contextualize their experiences. That is so much more important to veterans, or as important as infrastructure issues, and that is the piece that has been difficult for us to get at as a nation. Professor ortiz it is difficult, and part of the the Veterans Affairs is very keen to say that, if men and women go into combat and come back, we have the tools to reintegrate them into civilian life, and quite simply, that is not always the case. But that he thousand of rehabilitation but that he ethos ofhat rehabilitation has been a difficult one. Whopercentage of veterans lead normal, Productive Lives is very high. So when we focus on the homeless , that is not a normative. Xperience sendve said that when we men and women into conflict, we the the professional skill, national will to make that right. Thethe professional skill, national will, have not always been commensurate to that challenge. , and i problem persists dont know if there is a good answer. Collective endeavors, starting in the oftnam era with vets centers many1970 nine, communitybased approaches to these challenges appear to be the best way to go. We also have annan ormiston for structures of hospitals and what so to to zach soto balance out those economic imperatives as been difficult. There is an attempt to put more into communitybased efforts, but again, the national whalen professional skill has not always been there and able to deal with these challenges. What ie at least from have seen, we have a tendency to focus on the end of the road, whether homelessness or suicide and what i have seen really improve over the last decade is the willingness to address a problem before it. Its that point so, looking at factors like who needs consistent Mental Health care, who is a disabled veteran who can still work but needs help with that, who was underemployed, who looks like they have a nice life, they are not homeless yet but it is a thoseday struggle, programs are gaining a lot of momentum. I think that will be the future, where this is going, but it is harder to get people passionate about programs like that. And i think that within a lot of these veterans communities, they are getting more understanding, but over time there has been an issue, are we the ones who give service, are we the pillars of the community who run the fourth of july parade, or are we the ones that need the charity . And looking within organizations and perhaps the communities to see who does need that care early on. Mr. Warren let me reach a happier place, but just as complicated, which is how we come to celebrate, honor, or in your thinking, take control of and thery, of war service of soldiers who hold that close to themselves, in the early decades, certainly, after their service. We see it in the work we did on this exhibition, looking at the earliest published memoirs of ordinary soldiers of the revolution, which i think are some of the earliest published memoirs of enlisted men probably republished in the world, in which they talk about their experience. And they all say at some point, im going to tell you about something, i know you think you know the story of the American Revolutionary war, but you dont. If you werent there, you cant really grasp it, i can only give you in these few pages a pale approximation of what this experience was like. End then they try to convey the harrowing experience of war, and you can see at this point in 1820s and 30s, they have a strong proprietary sense about that story. It is their story. But by the 1830s and 1840s as they grow older, at least society seems to have a greater inclination to remember fondly, to memorialize their service, monuments, andst that is a pattern replicated over and over again, and it takes decades for a society to reach that place. Is that fair . By 1913, thedan 50th anniversary of gettysburg, 1938, you get reunions at gettysburg, veterans ready to simmering beneath the surface were lingering sectional animosities, and many of the most grievously wounded and injured veterans had already passed away many would die within a decade of appomattox. Veterans of the union believed they were to be the custodians of their history. They felt a greater urgency to about to record, to talk their experiences. Example,ve you one 24yearold daniel eldridge, who fought with a New Hampshire regiment, brought home a souvenir from a battle, a piece of lead wedged in his arm. The first thing he does when he gets home in 1865 is to begin what hea memoir, believes at first will consume no more than a dozen pages, but he urgently begins to write, to understand and conceptualize his experience, his injury. Memoir,y work on that by 1867, brought it to more than 600 pages, including hundreds of battle maps. He is writing through his pain with every new word sending uprents of pain traveling that limb as that rebel lead is pressing his tenure in his tendons. Republic meeting halls became museums, reliquaries of artifacts, battlefield relics. Veterans would collect regimental histories, they would hold reunions simply to swap war stories, they published in newspapers in every major city, not just to engage in the work of charity, but to engage in this active recording what they had done, for themselves and for posterity. That is a tough one because world war i veterans were pretty active right after the war in the commemorations, building of statues, building of stadiums, all kinds of different monuments to the world war i cause, and even the creation of the American Legion as a monument to Wartime Service is an active memory production. So they are active early on. The world war ii generation takes some time. I would point to one difference between the world war i and world war ii generations. The meaning of the war for the world war ii generation was what worldubt, but war i meant was very much questionable for those who came back from france. What was it exactly they were fighting for . How should it become, rise should it become a member aided how should it be commemorated . How should fighting in the trenches be remembered, as victimhood, sacrifice, valor . Veterans and their organizations worked very hard to put their stamp on what the meeting on what the meaning was for them, right away i think, whereas you hear stories from the world war ii generation, they all came back, went to school and they all had kids. That was their active commemoration, to forget about it, to leave the Great Depression and world war ii behind and get on with a productive, successful life. Generation was different, not to mention at all the way this was addressed in terms of literature, so lost generation novelists and poets immediately start working on what the were experience was like, trying to understand and shape the memory of that war. So they are two very different qualitative experiences based on the types of conflicts, the generations involved, and the to school and start having kids that the world war ii generation had, thanks to the g. I. Bill. I dont have a lot terrore global war on memorials, the first are starting to come up, but i cant give a little about my daily commute. Those of you who have lived in washington, you see most of those buildings were built in the 1950s and 1960s, and if you would have walked through that area at the end of world war ii, you would see the capital, Natural History museum, a bunch of government buildings, and part of that plan is that we were going to have a Great War Museum on the mall. This gets set up after world war i, we are going to have this great place to show our technology, tell the story of andmilitary servicemembers, that gets interrupted by world war ii, instead of including taking some of the equipment back so it can be used again. By the time it is time to build this again, it is the vietnam era at the appetite for National War Museum on the mall is not there. And it takes great forms now in the smithsonian and others, but what is interesting is that up until that point, the National Mall was not an area for war memorials. Then you get the vietnam memorial, and that sparks the Korean War Memorial in the world war ii memorial. There are a couple of things that are interesting about that. We have these great memorials and monuments on the mall, but dont necessarily have the information and understanding. There are wonderful military museums across the services, excellent military histories in those museums, but we dont have the same place where you go and learn. On the other hand, these monuments are very much veteran theyn, getting them are and they take different forms, vietnam being one of the most famous, a place of healing. By the time the world war ii generation came around and the energy for that memorial is built up, it is monumental and a place of reflection. So we have the National Mall being this beautiful place where there is discussion about war, but very much crafted by the people who served in those wars. And is all of you should probably know, there is still a hotly contested plan for some kind of world war i memorial. Is noen people say, there world war i memorial, i always is yes, in washington there not a National Memorial on the mall. There is a memorial to washingtonians who died in the war, but not a federal one. But there is in kansas city, and inrated in 1921, indianapolis, a rich, rich imorial space for world war that was created immediately after. These were built in the 1920s. So the world war i memorialization is diffuse, and it is not in washington. It is everywhere, but nowhere, essentially. And quite beautiful in europe, the American Battlefield Monument Commission overseen by general pershing, the three primary world war i memorials in france, which is quite staggering. Thank the i want to three of you for being with us tonight. [applause] and give the audience an opportunity to ask questions. You can cover anything from 1775 to present. We might be here a long time. Is this working . Professors up there and somebody who served. Thank you for serving. To the professors, what do your students think of the military and what your colleagues think of the military . And after the answer, what can you do to change that . Brian teachesz at an institution that has a large veteran population, and is better poised to answer the question. Suny binghamton is a place that was very much antiwar in the 1970s, very strongly antiwar. I have heard many stories from Vietnam Veterans who went to school there and had a horrible time. So the institution has a reputation as being inhospitable to military history. I think that has changed profoundly since 9 11. Of 55, a lot,ards of binghamton alum that were in the towers when they came down, and i think that changed the understanding of what war and subsequent military service mean to binghamton students in particular. We also have a large jewishamerican population, many of whom either plan to server will serve in Israeli Defense forces, so their understanding of military service is informed by that perspective. Usedd to be atypical left, lefteral, antiwar campus has changed. Some not particularly interested in military history, but my esteemed colleague Diane Sommerville just won to book prize on the American Civil War and the suffering of people in the civil war, and colleague howard brown teaches and writes about the french revolution and talks about violence and war. Academiatoryline of or antimilitary, i remember when i started doing the topics of veterans, gettering peculiar stares from people, why would you do that . But that has changed dramatically. Is, whatowup question should we do to change that . That change is underway as we speak. Professor ortiz professor jordan i would echo steve, sam houston state has a veterans population, at graduation we give stoles to veteran students to identify them as veterans. There is a veterans graduation ceremony. We do a lot to support our veterans. My colleagues as well support our graduateory, program in history, so we are doing a lot of positive things that sam houston state. In academia as a whole, im now coeditor and a book series with the university of massachusetts press, which brings together work from across academic disciplines on veterans issues, so there is a real sense that is becoming aes discipline and the changes underway. Thank you for coming. Dr. Warren,is for about the American Revolution. You mentioned the government wrote ious to the continental soldiers and then the soldiers sold them. My question is about afterwards, when speculators who bought and hamilton wanted them to be honored as contracts, and madison and his supporters wanted the government to help these veterans who sold them for pennies on the dollar. How was the tension resolved . Mr. Warren it was resolved in favor of the speculators. When the Continental Army everyone wasmost paid with continental debt certificates. And almost all those men were penniless, so had a most no theme but to negotiate immediately with someone who would pay them in cash, so almost all those debt certificates wound up in the , and withinculators the soldiers would be referred to as their original holders. When the hamilton funding system establish the Economic System of the new federal government being debated in congress in 1789, 1790, 1791, a recurring theme is , dont we need to do justice to the original holders, to soldiers . But in some cases, civilians for whom similar debt certificates were issued when their cattle or produce were taken from them. There was a practical problem. Washington considered this, discussed it with his cabinet, that there was almost no credible records at that point of how those debt certificates had been issued. Most had been issued in great recordsnd a lot of the were held at the state level if they existed at all. Thosetually tracking down original holders would have been extremely difficult. Been a serious advocate of veterans rights in congress in the 1780s and said, if we do not pay off people who have invested in what are, in fact, very questionable securities of the United States, if we dont pay them off, we will destroy the credit of the United States. Not an easy argument for hamilton to make. He felt he was paid by the dispossessing of ordinary soldiers of their pay, but he couldnt see any other way to establish the credit of the United States. Makingwas done, im not any excuse, it was done on the back of soldiers who had secured american independence. And they wound up fighting for the remainder of their lives, and the debate about doing justice to the original holders fueled the pension debates of the eight team 20s and leading up to the pension law of 1832, the first universal Service Pension law, it was that, look, we didnt pay these people properly when they were young men. At least those who have survived and now in their 60s and 70s, certainly we can pay them now, when the government has plenty of money. Of the u. S. Income was four times the national budget. Can you imagine such a thing, only needing to spend one fourth of the money the government takes in, and revenue . Wast that moment the u. S. Extraordinarily flush, and so did this when at the time it was regarded as a remarkable thing, but only for that small number of men who survived. As many as 250,000 americans served in arms during the revolutionary war, which pales beside those of later wars, but so did our population, that was in a normas percentage of american men. Liveding like 35,000 men to claim pensions under the law of 1832, and those were the only ones to whom that kind of justice was ever done, and even then belatedly. Good evening. I have been a naval officer for 10 years, but spent 15 years collecting oral interviews of world war ii veterans. Ive noticed an interesting paradox as i have talked to both my peers in service and those who served 70 years ago, and that is that there is a cohort we are familiar with, who were traumatized and suffered with the horrors of things they witnessed, but also a cohort on the opposite end of the spectrum, who suffer with anguish because they were unable to serve in a sphere of the war that directly impacted victory, or what we conceive of as victory. Throughout history, have we treated combat veterans differently from noncombat veterans . And now with an all volunteer force, do we continued to draw that distinction, and is that the healthy answer for those volunteering to serve . As far as the distinction between combat and noncombat veterans, some of that comes down to the work that was done. There was a discussion over whether Industrial Workers would have access to the g. I. Bill and it was decided no. But that was one of those moments where there were military officers there supervising it and their daily conditions were about the same as the war workers, and one group got the benefits and one group didnt. Also haveo it now, i met some of these individuals who feel somehow their service didnt justify access to the benefits. I see this a lot particularly with female veterans, where their concept of what they were allowed to do in their service, they feel doesnt equate to what somebody who had a more combatfocused profession did. So even when they are struggling, they are not going to the v. A. Are veterans organizations to ask for help. I have encountered this issue quite a bit, particularly in the 20s after the American Legion was founded. The American Legion was specific, you had to be a member of the military in world war i, but not necessarily a soldier in combat in france. Half the vfw members were called what were called stayathome soldiers. So there was intraveteran conflict over how to advocate for policies that were expensive, when you knew that two and a half of the 4. 5 million had not seen combat. Larger why there was a federal effort to address serviceconnected disabilities and really focus on that, and not on larger veterans policies. So yes, it can be a rather is a real who veteran and who is a true veteran can be contested. I have not found the same level of anguish that you have for those who were not on the front lines, or what they deem to be frontline service. Tohink there is a way conceptualize military service of any sort, recognizing that you are part of a large machinery where all is necessary, and i would argue that there are fewer people actually in combat compared to the number of people in positions, that it is awfully hard to tell these other 90 of the people, your service doesnt matter. I have not personally found that level of anguish. The that might be is success of american propaganda during world war ii, we are all doing our part no matter how small or seemingly insignificant, that has alleviated some of that. But those differences amongst veterans were real, and had a real impact on the g. I. Bill for Vietnam Veterans, because they tried to think of a g. I. Bill that would just prioritize the Vietnam Combat soldiers and waites, and everyone said, a minute, we have military personnel stationed all around the globe, how are we going to give them more than the guys serving in west germany . In order to pay for it for all veterans of the vietnam war era, the better the relative benefits were far less significant than the benefits for world war ii veterans. But this debate over who is really serving, those were pronounced even in the vietnam era. We see thisrdan manifested over the debate over whether there should be a specific class of pensioners after the civil war. The grand army of the republic, the great pension lobby, many posts will Petition Congress to specific pow, prisoner of war pension, because they believe they are somehow less of a veteran than a combat veteran. Folks who x pows, survived in places like andersonville, are making appeals for pensions on what they call mental aberration or exposure, and it is more difficult to document but it is interesting to see these notorious pension lobbyists actually coming out and opposing that specific legislation, which i think is an index of the situation for civil war soldiers. Tangential to the other gentleman who just asked a question, my father and his brothers served in combat in world war ii. Towent in the early 1970s an all volunteer army, in which i served as a noncombatant. We have had a volunteer army since the early 1970s. We havent declared war, i believe, since 1941, and we have relatively interminable to some, dubious reasons. Do you think these things have affected the perception of the military and the military career amongst the majority of people now, who do not have a relative or a friend in uniform . Ms. Lowe if anything, when they do surveys of which Government Agencies americans like, the military always comes up as most trusted, most professional. And a lot of how that happened is through. Rofessionalism although we havent had a declared war, people have felt protected by the military, and military personnel in general are getting good training, good education. They come back to their communities with some form of citizenship that is recognized and valued by their communities. Right now we are seeing a bit of a pedestal effect on military service, as far as problems to have, i think we will take that d,er our veterans being ignore but that can cause a bridge of misunderstanding where we dont always think of a servicemember being one of us in our community, they are somehow other and set apart. G. I. Billortiz the of 1944 is one of the most important pieces of legislation to impact 20thcentury United States. The creation of the all volunteer force is one of the most impactful things in the history of this country, in ways it has redefined citizenship, redefined what the countrys commitment to service and war can mean. In the early years, you mentioned how high of esteemed the military is held, that is from the nadir of the 1970s when the all volunteer force pulled those numbers up high over time. But for all of us it is something to think about very , to be fighting in wars done by all volunteers in so even the house of representatives does not declare war, the people dont to claire historian,find as a i will continue to go back to 1973 moment as something that was a tectonic shift in American Public life, american cultural life, and that we will continue to bear that wait for some time. Mr. Warren that is the last word. [applause] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2019] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] i think we have some refreshments. This is American History tv on cspan3, where each weekend we feature 48 hours of programs exploring our nations past. The house will come to order. For 40 years, cspan has burned providing a merit has been providing america unfiltered coverage of congress, the white house, the supreme court, and Public Policy event from washington dc end around the country, so you can make up your own mind. Created by cable in 1979, cspan is brought to you by your cable or satellite provider. Cspan, your unfiltered view of government. December 20, 19 89, the u. S. Army launched operation just cause, the invasion of panama. A 1990ama deception is three Academy Awardwinning independent documentary, which takes a critical look at the invasion and the media coverage. Here is a preview. One year ago, the people of panama lived in fear, under the thumb of a dictator. Today democracy is restored, panama is free. [applause] noriega, i dont know how americans can be so stupid. How can you be so stupid . The performance of the mainstream news media in the coverage of panama has been just about total collaboration with the administration. Not a critical perspective, not a second thought. Our regret is that we were not able to use the media pool more effectively. You would think, from the video clips, that this whole thing was just a mardi gras, that the people in panama were just jumping up and down with glee. They went after Daniel Norrie exclusionriega to the of the people in the streets. The truth of the matter is we dont know how many panamanians we have killed. They were another example of destroying a country to save it. The United States has exercised a might makes right document among smaller countries of the third world, to invade these countries, get what we want, and leave the people there to kind of rot. Stage invasion sets the for the wars of the 21st century. You look at any document in international law, any of numerous treaties, this invasion was illegal. It is not debatable. The goals of the United States have been to safeguard the lives of americans, to defend democracy in panama. How do you restore that which has never existed . Never been a democracy, since we created panama for our own purposes in 1903 . All we did was go down to restore american control and dominance in panama. There mustve been something we could have done. We could have gone to the world court, the united nations, the organization of american states, but invade a country because of this . Its absolutely ridiculous. The americans didnt want noriega, they wanted to destroy the panamanian army. Learn more about the 1989 panama invasion, this weekend on American History tv. Next on history bookshelf, Susan Cheever talks about her america ining in which she provides a history of Alcohol Consumption in america, beginning with pilgrims, and she explains how there beer supply themay flower mayflower influenced their decision to land at cape cod. We are honored tonight to welcome Susan Cheever, bestselling and highly esteemed and biography as she launches her newest book, drinking in america the drinking in america our secret history. He will tell us the secrets