Cyclopædia of Political Science, Political Economy, and the
Political History of the United States UNITED STATES PENSION
LAWS AND THE PENSION LAWS OF OTHER COUNTRIES. A pension is
defined by Webster to be an annual allowance of a sum of money
to a person by the government in consideration of past services.
In theory at least a pension is an arbitrary payment of money by
the money-giving power in a country—in this country, congress;
in another, the crown or parliament—for what it considers
services. A secondary definition, historically the primary one,
in Webster, shows us the aspect in which a pension used to be
regarded: "An allowance or annual payment considered in the
light of a bribe." The more modern idea is to consider it in the
light of a payment on an insurance policy. We will briefly
consider how these different ideas about a thing called by the
same name arose. —After a man or set of men have done any signal
service to their country, it has in every country and in every
age been thought only right a