I've been aware for a long time that our nation does a piss-poor job of taking care of its veterans. My dad was a 20-year veteran of the Navy who served in WWII and Korea, and who had all sorts of difficulties trying to get his disability benefits. I'll spare you the details, but suffice it to say the government didn't do right by him in a number of ways. I'm sure many of you can tell similar stories. And of course we're all aware of the numerous ways the Bush administration and the Pentagon have failed to do right by the troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, both while they're on active duty and after they return.
But I read an op-ed today in the Washington Post that opened my eyes to an ongoing injustice being done to our troops that I had never been aware of. And it's one that is likely to be a serious, and wholly unnecessary, impediment to returning troops getting the veterans' benefits they deserve.
The good news is there's something we can do about it. Follow me below the fold for details.
In today's
WaPo, there is an opinion column by James McKay, a WWII veteran and attorney. (I encourage you to read the entire commentary, which is well worth it, but I will only excerpt a few paragraphs here under Fair Use rules.) Mr. McKay discusses the fact that veterans are
not allowed to hire a lawyer to assist them with veterans' benefits claims.
What? Why wouldn't a veteran be able to hire a lawyer?
For one very simple, and outrageous, reason:
During the Civil War, a statute was enacted imposing a $5 limit on the fees paid to lawyers or agents assisting veterans applying for pensions, reenlistment bounty or other military allowances. Two years later, the cap was raised to $10 -- and remained at that level for 124 years. [snip]
In 1985, the Supreme Court upheld the limit, rejecting the contention that it effectively deprived veterans of their Fifth Amendment right to due process or their First Amendment right to petition for the redress of grievances. And in 1988, while Congress eliminated that $10 ceiling and created a Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims, it also said that a veteran could hire a lawyer only after completing a complex administrative process that culminates at the Board of Veterans' Appeals (BVA). By that time, however, a case has been lost, often because the veteran did not present the correct claim, or properly present available evidence -- technicalities that could hurt the case on appeal even after a lawyer is involved.
Mr. McKay explores some of the reasons the SCOTUS and Congress upheld the effective ban on hiring a lawyer--the benefits process used to be much simpler, and there were fears that unscrupulous attorneys would overcharge veterans and actually cause delays in them receiving their benefits. But as he says, "Whatever the merits of excluding lawyers in the past, the reasons no longer exist." Denying veterans the ability to hire an attorney puts them at a distinct, sometimes fatal, disadvantage when applying for benefits, in a process that is now quite complex. And more fundamentally, it denies them a right that every other American has.
But as things stand now, unless an attorney is willing to represent a veteran pro bono (as Mr. McKay has done for many of them), the veteran has to wrestle with the technicalities of filing claims, contesting awards, etc., without any legal assistance. And the results can be devastating, because the smallest error can be grounds for denying a claim.
Mr. McKay shares a couple of examples. The first is that of Dana Myers, a Marine who received an honorable medical discharge in 1957. Almost fifty years later, he's still trying to get his benefits:
[In 1958], he was denied disability payments. In April 1959, he sent a letter to the regional Veterans' Affairs office taking issue with that ruling. But later the Board of Veterans' Appeals said that Myers didn't use the precise words that are required for what is known as a "notice of disagreement" (or NOD). Without that, the board rejected his appeal.
Mr. McKay took Mr. Myers on as a pro bono client in 1998--the first time he'd ever had a lawyer. The Veterans Administration is fighting to deny Mr. Myers his disability benefits, and an appeal is pending.
And what about veterans like Terry Ledford, who "developed schizophrenia while serving in the Air Force?"
He lived on 100 percent disability benefits from his medical discharge in 1976 until 1981, when his benefit level was suddenly reduced under provisions of new rules in a VA circular. A non-lawyer veterans' service organization representative was assigned to help Ledford. But it took 17 years for the case to make its way through VA administrative processes and court hearings. And in the end, a federal court threw out the claim because Ledford failed at the outset of his case to challenge the legality of the circular -- a strategy a lawyer might have pursued but not an untrained vet, let alone one suffering psychiatric problems.
Giving veterans the right to consult an attorney about their benefits claims is something that's long overdue. This kind of treatment is patently unfair to any veteran; but when you think of all the veterans we have returning with PTSD, it becomes both a travesty and a tragedy in the making.
So here's a chance for the dKos community to do something very specific, and important, to support our troops. Let's ask, say, Kerry, McCain, Murtha, and Graham to sponsor a bill, and then let's all contact our respective Senators and Congresscritters and urge them to support it. What do you say? Please add your comments and suggestions in comments below.
Oh, and if you'd like to drop a line to Mr. McKay and thank him for his service to his fellow veterans, and for publicizing this problem, you can reach him at JMcKay -at- cov.com.