BONUS MARCH II:
A New Beginning
Making All Memorial and Veteran's Days
More Meaningful

If You Serve You Deserve

During the sweltering summer of 1932, sixty-six years ago, a group of courageous young veterans and their financially strapped families organized and led the first 'Million Man' March on Washington. (Click here for Bonus Army I links)

Of the million men hoped by the March's organizers would attend, barely 20,000 managed to scrape together Depression-era bus and train fare... many arrived by horse and mule-drawn plywood shanties.

But, despite the overwhelming odds frustrating their journey at every whistle-stop along the way... the ragged, thin and penniless 20,000 veterans of World War I who survived the cross-country political obstacle course -- not dissimilar to the cratered trenches of battle-scarred Europe they courageously survived -- arrived in Washington that hopeless summer of 1932 to charter a new and innovative course for America's warriors. No Nation had before disappointed its victorious defenders by saying no to a life-saving request.

Representing every color, every religion, every political orientation, the 20,000 beaten, harassed and ridiculed veterans of the 'Bonus Army' earned for all succeeding generations of American soldiers a congressional law establishing the G.I. Bill of Rights... with special thanks to the leadership of the American Legion who authored and hand-carried this eternally grateful document through the Halls of Congress toward passage.

Today, in the Year of Our Lord Nineteen Hundred and Ninety Eight, new young warriors and veterans of wars past are defensively preparing for new peacekeeping/making missions abroad.

But if young Americans must lose their lives as their fathers/mothers, grandfathers/mothers and great-grandfathers/mothers did before them... we must demand those who survive, living for the comrades they left behind, are enabled and granted the fullest possible opportunity to compete on a equal playing field with their former classmates and age-peers who, protected by our Constitution, decided against performing military service.

Historically, what have American war veterans always come home to? Disease, depression, social denial and rejection. Must those who may be called upon to fight Gulf War II or other peacemaking missions confront another 'syndrome'... like Agent Orange and Gulf War I Syndrome? Will future young American warriors be permitted to restore their physically and mentally handicapped lives? Will our young patriots be granted -- by their President and Congress -- the necessary tools and accommodations they need to compete with their age-peers... non-veterans who's months and years spent out of the military gained for them countless corporate contacts and skills our veterans will, as history has proven, need decades to acquire in order to compete equally with people of their own age... and younger?

If we examine the life of the average, young American who made a patriotic, life-risk decision to serve his/her country, we find this:

After leaving the military, for the rest of that veteran's life, he or she is forced to climb a burdensome mountain competing with former classmates who didn't serve. Few veterans succeed in rising to an equal level of their age-peers. Hundreds of veterans commit suicide from depression and rejection. Thousands more drown themselves in substance abuse or engage in self-defeating anger and bitterness.

Memorial Day is May 31st.
Congressional Visit Day is June 1st.
All vets going to Washington DC this year should pre-schedule visits to their State Delegation offices to discuss the needs of veterans and the need to ensure sufficient defense manpower over the next generation.

Don't Leave Town Before Sundown!
Stay an extra day. Meet with your state's House and Senate staff.

Deprived vets need help. Help can come only from the few who found success. Successful veterans who remain true to their Constitutional oath endeavoring to improve the lives of all veterans support the goal of A Million Veteran March...

A New BONUS ARMY Is Needed
Our Memorial Day Legacy
Must Evoke More Than Tears

American veterans must unite to demand recognition and compensation for the years they invested sacrificing their youth to protect the lives and livelihoods of those who have benefitted from our service.

For most who served compensation for years lost have never been fully restored. The 'implied contract' they agreed upon enlistment or conscription bore no fruit for them. Hundreds of Vietnam War era men and women are homeless. Many suffer from psychological impairment... sometimes unable to distinguish friend from foe.

The next 'Million Man' march on Washington should be the Veteran's Million Man March:
BONUS ARMY II

Breach Of Implied Contract

Young Americans who volunteered or accepted conscription into military service should and must be compensated for loss of income and loss of competitive development. Every American who served in uniform did so with the belief their Contract With America would never deny them compensation if they survived their military/combat commitment.

WHAT DO WE NEED. WHAT DO WE WANT...