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ST. LOUIS, Aug. 28, 2003-- Georgia Congressman Jim Marshall drew enthusiastic cheers and applause from thousands of American Legionnaires today as he addressed delegates to the 85th National Convention here on his fight to end the "disabled veterans tax." "There has long been a fiction that military retirees receive benefits from the government for their disability," Marshall said. "But most don't. To add insult to injury, as a veteran's disability increases, so does the penalty imposed by our government." "Retired military veterans who incurred service connected injuries are the only people in America who have to fund their own disability benefits, and that's wrong," American Legion National Commander Ronald F. Conley said. "The American Legion will pull out every stop to end this travesty. No veteran who served his or her country with honor should be forced to pay for their own disability." H.R. 303, introduced by Rep. Michael Bilirakis of Florida, would authorize the government to implement full payment of both retirement pay and disability compensation to half a million disabled military retirees. This bipartisan legislation has more than 300 cosponsors from both sides of the aisle and similar legislation has already passed the Senate. Under current law, retired veterans with a service-connected disability and twenty years of honorable service are not permitted to receive both disability compensation and military retired pay for their years of military service from the Department of Veterans Affairs. "It's time for Congress to put up or shut up," said Marshall. "This legislation has been introduced each Congress for the last sixteen years. That's sixteen years too many. I call on America's Representatives to demonstrate their support for veterans and sign the discharge petition and end the Disabled Veterans Tax." A discharge petition is a special House rule allowing for a majority of the House, 218 Representatives, to force a vote on an issue that is being bottled up in committee or by the leadership. It is the same extraordinary procedure used to force passage of campaign finance reform legislation in the last Congress. Founded in 1919 in Paris by World War I veterans, the 2.8 million-member American Legion is the nation's largest wartime veterans organization |
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Congressman
Marshall draws cheers from American Legion in fight