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When a man in the service has Class A dependents for whom he is making an allotment and in addition has Class B dependents for whom he wants an allowance he must make an additional allotment of $5. Class B dependents receive allowances as follows: One parent, $10; two, $20; each grandchild, brother or sister, or additional parent, $5, provided the total family allowance for Classes A and B dependents for one person does not exceed $50 per month.

As there are no compulsory allotments for a woman in the service, her dependents are always Class B dependents. For Class B dependents where there are no Class A dependents men and women alike in the service must allot, if they want allowances for their Class B dependents, $15 per month. In the case of a woman, the family allowances for a husband and children are the same as in the case of a man for a wife and children except that dependency must be proven to exist, as in the case of Class B dependents.

Class B allowances are subject to two conditions: (1) The person receiving the allowance must need it and be dependent in whole or in part for support upon the person making the allotment. They need not be wholly dependent. They may have earnings of their own or also other sources of support. (2) The total of the allotment and the allowance paid to the dependents must not exceed the amount of the habitual contribution from the man to the dependents in all cases where dependency existed prior to enlistment or prior to October 6, 1917. Otherwise the government allowance will be proportionately reduced.

The bureau, in its regulations made under the authority of the Secretary of the Treasury, has sought to interpret this provision of the law in a broad and sympathetic way. The regulation which defines dependency says:

For the purposes of the War Risk Insurance Act, a person is dependent in whole or in part, upon another, when he is compelled to rely, and the relations between the parties are such that he has a right to rely in whole or in part on the other for his support.

Also, if a Class B dependent, for whom a family allowance is claimed, becomes dependent in whole or in part on the enlisted man, subsequent to both enlistment and October 6, 1917, the limitation as to habitual contributions is regarded as not applicable, and the family allowance is paid without regard to it.

Family allowances are payable for one month after a man is discharged from the service, but are not provided for more than one year after the termination of the war.

The conditions of dependency and habitual contribution make investigation necessary to prevent fraud, and adjustment to the changing conditions affecting dependents, such as births and deaths in the family, children reaching the age of eighteen, or contracting marriage before that age, and economic conditions affecting the family income, of the greatest complexity and difficulty in maintaining the necessary records in the War Risk Bureau in order that awards may be made promptly and allowances paid accurately each month as they become due. Severe penalties are provided for intentional fraud. Anyone knowingly making a false statement of a material fact in connection with claims under the act is guilty of perjury and will be punished by a fine up to $5,000, or by imprisonment up to two years, or both. A beneficiary, whose right to payments under the act ceases, and who fraudulently accepts such payments thereafter, will be punished by a fine up to $2,000, or by imprisonment up to one year, or both.

II. Compensation fob Death ok Disability.

The application of the principles of mutuality and insurance to the risk of death or disability resulting from personal injury suffered or disease contracted in the line of duty, and not due to wilful misconduct on the part of the injured person, is not new. It has been successfully tried out on a large scale through the admirable workings of the national and state workmen's compensation laws now operative for the civilian employes of the federal government and for the industrial workers of thirty-six states of the American Union. These laws have largely displaced or superceded the old employers' liability remedies for industrial accidents. They have proven themselves to be increasingly satisfactory to employers and employes alike. They operate also to place on each industry the cost of the financial burden of its unavoidable industrial accidents as far as that burden can be translated into dollars and cents. They operate to distribute among the consumers of the goods produced the cost of industrial accidents incurred in their production to the extent of providing for the payment of a sum proportionate to the loss of earning power and a fair recompense for the suffering that an industrial accident causes the individual workman and his family. They also operate to encourage industry to adopt and develop every possible safety device for the elimination of preventable accidents.

The analogy of this industrial experience with compensation remedies to the problem of caring for the hazards of war is plain. In the case of our military and naval forces the industry is an "extra hazardous" one, the payments for compensation must be liberal and the cost will be heavy.. The government of the United States is the employer and the nation or the people of the United States are the consumers or those for whom the operations of war are carried on. The government therefore should bear the whole cost of compensation for death or disability for officers as well as for enlisted men, and for members of the nurse corps (female), and distribute the burden through taxation. It does not require any contribution from the beneficiaries as it does in the case of allotments of pay upon which family allowances are based or in the case of premiums covering the peace rates for insurance. The soldier or sailor does his part when he risks his life and bears the unavoidable personal suffering from injury or disease incurred in the service of his country. Compensation is a payment in addition to regular pay, family allowances and insurance benefits, and serves to equalize the burdens and risks of military service which inevitably are unequally distributed between those called upon to serve in front line trenches as compared with those serving in no less necessary operations behind the lines.