Most of what I want to report corresponds to news from the Fall Meetings held at the National Headquarters in Indianapolis from
Monday to Thursday of last week. I would be remiss, however, if I did not give you some feedback from the 85th National Convention
held in St. Louis on August 23-28.
A year ago several long standing Foreign Relations related resolutions were inexplicably defeated rather than being renewed.
In St. Louis this was corrected when the Convention passed our "Free Trade Area of the Americas" resolution as amended. The
amendment was the removal of two clauses relating to scholarships and people to people programs such as student exchanges. These
were made into a separate resolution. Both of these resolutions then were presented to the Convention and were accepted.
At our Department Convention in June, Royce read a letter from the chairman of the Americanism Commission explaining why the
National High School Oratorical contest could not include non-resident non-citizens as participants. As you surely remember, the
language, tone, and content of that letter was highly insulting and even xenophobic. Well, a resolution repeating our desired
changes was sent to the Convention, but once again, it had no success.
Now let’s talk about the Fall Meetings... First of all, let me comment that today at this meeting you are getting The Word
sooner than any time in the past 30 years. That is, since I’ve been on the DEC, we have not had a meeting of the DEC just 5 days after
the NEC held its meeting.
Commander John Breiden has been in office just 6 weeks but has already been to Washington to testify before Congress and to visit
the troops at the Bethsesda and Walter Reed hospitals. He reports that moral is high and that attitudes are wonderful. After
visiting these hospitals, Commander Breiden says that “No service member should ever doubt that The American Legion is supporting
them.”
Related to this, the good news is that this Congress is beginning to listen to the veterans organizations and, as one newspaper
has written, “The Legion is leading the charge.” Because of this, Commander John is certain that we will continue to win on the
Concurrent Receipt issue. Simply by changing the terminology to call this the
“Disabled Veteran Tax” we began to win-over
individual Congressmen and to make important advances.
When the Administration asked for an endorsement from us for the $87 Billion supplemental budget item relating to Iraq, we said,
“No. The Legion can not do that while the Administration says it can not find the additional $1.8 B we say the VA needs for a
number of issues, including what is needed to eliminate the Disabled Veterans Tax.”
Commander John says we have this clout in Congress because we habe been consisten and because we represent almost 3 million
veterans. Not surprisingly, he went from there to pitching what he calls Membership Momentum.
Last Wednesday was the 55% target date; at that time the National Organization was 100,800 members ahead of 2002. Good for them !
Parenthetically I have to say it pains me to say “Good for them” rather than “Good for us”. However, even including our PUFLs, we
were at only
31% on the 55% target date.
Commander John is recommending that we go at membership recruiting and retention in a new way. He says, each Post should have not
one but two membership teams. One should plan for and execute a 60 day campaign to contact non-renewing members between November
11 and January 11. By the end of that campaign, they should achieve 100% retention. At that point, their job is finished. Next,
the Post’s “B” Team goes to work planning and then executing a 60 day campaign to attract new members. Exactly when that
happens may depend upon the nature of the community – for example, Mexico City might go after new members between Mothers Day
and the 4th of July, while in Acapulco the dates might be during February and March while snowbirds are in residence.
Returning to the theme that "No service member should ever doubt that The American Legion is supporting them", Commander Breiden
said that he and Auxiliary President Catherine Morris will be in the field with the troops at Thanksgiving and overt the
Christmas-New Year holiday period.
Related to this, he recommended that individual Legionnaires as well as Posts go to the National web site to send electronic
greeting cards to relatives on active duty .. .. .. or to “any service member”.
After talking about other subjects such as the Child Welfare Foundations’s 50th Anniversary, plans for Dedication Day – that is,
the day the WW-II Memorial will be inaugurated in May of 2004, and the Citizen’s Flag Alliance, Commander Breiden closed his
comments to the NEC with a simple declarative sentence. We who heard him speak at the Winter DEC may appreciate that it carries
a lot of “personal baggage” for John, but even if you don’t know about that, it should serve as our watchword. With the full
strength of all his convictions and pride in The American Legion he proudly proclaimed, “I believe we make a difference.”
Reports from the var ious Commissions re-enforced much of what Commander Breiden had commented upon.
The good news from the Magazine Commission was that advertising was $400,000 over budget and there was a $3 Million surplus
overall. I consider this good news because as long as the Magazine is making money it is doubtful that we shall have any increase
in annual dues.
The Finance Commission reported a $1,080,000 surplus for this year and projects a surplus of $660,000 for next year.
During the past year the Children and Youth Commission expended $260,000 to benefit 662 children under the Temporary Financial
Assistance Program. An additional $339,000 was given to 13 non-profit organizations for research and programs benefiting children.
The VA&R Commission is active promoting the Legion publication entitled, “A System Worth Saving” which was written earlier this
year as a white paper for Congress. They are also studying how to modify the Resolution process so that we can keep regional
concerns about specific VA facilities from overwhelming or contradicting the priorities we set for our VA relations on a national
level.
We were also told that the Commission has set-up a Strike Force to make visits to BA hospitals to ascertain just how we can best
help them, especially with respect to the VAVS – the VA Volunteer Service program in which non-VA personnel assist at VA Outpatient
Clinics, State Homes, national cemeteries, and especially in the Home Health Programs.
You have heard me describe the Legion as the VA’s “loyal opposition”. From time to time we have sued the VA or assisted those who
wanted to do so. Most recently we have been active on behalf of the complainant in
Huston v. Principi. This case deals with the
VA’s non-compliance with the Veterans Claims Assistance Act of 2000 (which the Legion helped develop). In passing this
legislation, Congress made it very clear that when the VA received a claim, it had a legal duty to notify veterans what specific
information or evidence would be required and who had to provide it – the VA or the veteran.
The VA has responded by using beneral boiler-plate type letters that are not personalized, non-informative letters which often
contain incorrect or misleading information presented in incomprehensible bureaucratic jargon.
The plaintiff we supported recently won. Now the VA must revise its letters to make them clearly understandable and case specific.
This will eventually help both the VA and veterans because claims presented will be better prepared. This will result in fewer
rejections and appeals so that overall there will be better service to the veterans.
National Judge Advocate Phillip Onderdonk, Jr. gave his report on his activities as Corporate Counsel. Among the cases he mentioned
is one in which the defendants named include himself, the national adjutant, and all commanders and members of the NEC during
the years 1996 to 2001. This case is interesting because it has been dismissed in three federal courts and is now in the appeals
process, but none of us has been served. The case involves a man who got cross-wise with his Post. Instead of taking his case
to his Department, he went to National. Onderdonk told him the National Organization could not and would not become involved in
his case. Rather than taking his case to Department level, this fellow decided to sue us for damages.
In a similar manner, the attorney for an individual terminated by a Post from her position as a bar employee wants to sue us all
at National. He was held off though because Onderdonk sent him several citations of cases where the Department and National were
released from the cases because they exercised no day to day control of local Post operations. Then Phil informed the attorney
that based upon these precedents, he would feel quite justified in filing a countersuit for harassment should the NEC be included
in the suit.
Besides receiving reports from Commissions and Committees of the Legion, we were privileged to hear MGen. Patrick Brady, the
Medal of Honor recipient who heads up the Citizens Flag Alliance. He says that it is still possible to win the Amendment issue
in this Congress, but if we should fail, it is even probable that we succeed in the next Congress. To do this, we must get every
Senator on record and then hold their collective feet to the fire to make them respect what they have said before having to vote.
General Brady’s remarks were extended to include other areas of concern to him and many of us. He feels that the Judiciary has
ursurped powers of the States to the extent that we now face a danger from an unelected irresponsible “elite”. If left to do their
worst, humanism & athiesm will undermine Americanism without any need for the democratic process. Their job is simply to say what
the law is, not what they would like it to be or what they would have written if they had been sitting in Congress in 1787.
As an example, he talked about the separation of Church and State. No such thought exists in the Declaration of Independence or in
the Constitution as amended. Neither was it present in the Founders thoughts. They, the Founders of our country identified God as
the source of our rights as opposed to an earthly ruler who could give privileges today and retract them tomorrow. President
Madison said, “We must individually govern ourselves according to the 10 Commandments”. According to the Founders, religious
principles were to be the foundation of our laws. To highlight this, General Brady told us that the day after passing the First
Amendment, Congress hired a Chaplain and declared a day of fasting and prayer. As an aside, he then commented, “I guess we’d
better find out where Governor Arnold stands .. .. .. he could probably terminate the opposition.”
Returning to serious comments, we were reminded that Jefferson himself feared the power of the Judicial Branch. He called federal
courts the “Germ of Desolution”. Because of these fears, Article III, Section 2 of the Constitution was drafted to allow Congress
the power to pass laws which could not be subject to judicial review. General Brady finished his comments by calling us to support
the
“Trinity of Patriotism: Flag, Pledge, and Constitution”.
As always, I have with me all the reports presented to the NEC in case anyone wants to see an issue in greater detail.
Respectfully submitted,
John E Hayes, N.E.C.
