Persons seeking to obtain the pension provided by this section must be now or hereafter—­

1.  “Suffering from mental or physical disability.”

2.  Such disability must not be “the result of their own vicious habits or gross carelessness.”

3.  Such disability must be such as “incapacitates them for the performance of labor in such a degree as to render them unable to earn a support.”

4.  They must be “dependent upon their daily labor for support.”

5.  Upon proof of these conditions they shall “be placed on the lists of invalid pensioners of the United States, and be entitled to receive for such total inability to procure their subsistence by daily labor $12 per month.”

It is not probable that the words last quoted, “such total inability to procure their subsistence by daily labor,” at all qualify the conditions prescribed in the preceding language of the section.  The “total inability” spoken of must be “such” inability—­that is, the inability already described and constituted by the conditions already detailed in the previous parts of the section.

It thus becomes important to consider the meaning and the scope of these last-mentioned conditions.

The mental and physical disability spoken of has a distinct meaning in the practice of the Pension Bureau and includes every impairment of bodily or mental strength and vigor.  For such disabilities there are now paid 131 different rates of pension, ranging from $1 to $100 per month.

This disability must not be the result of the applicant’s “vicious habits or gross carelessness.”  Practically this provision is not important.  The attempt of the Government to escape the payment of a pension on such a plea would of course in a very large majority of instances, and regardless of the merits of the case, prove a failure.  There would be that strange but nearly universal willingness to help the individual as between him and the public Treasury which goes very far to insure a state of proof in favor of the claimant.

The disability of applicants must be such as to “incapacitate them for the performance of labor in such a degree as to render them unable to earn a support.”

It will be observed that there is no limitation or definition of the incapacitating injury or ailment itself.  It need only be such a degree of disability from any cause as renders the claimant unable to earn a support by labor.  It seems to me that the “support” here mentioned as one which can not be earned is a complete and entire support, with no diminution on account of the least impairment of physical or mental condition.  If it had been intended to embrace only those who by disease or injury were totally unable to labor, it would have been very easy to express that idea, instead of recognizing, as is done, a “degree” of such inability.