The Failure Of The Bonus Army

In the summer of 1932, at the height of the Great Depression, 45,000 marchers - made up of about 17,000 World War I veterans, their families, and supporters, marched on Washington to ask the government for an early cash payment of their promised certificates. They believed if Congress understood their economical situation, then authorization of immediate payment would occur. However, as we would learn, that was not simply the case and this assembly of marchers, better known as “The Bonus Army”, our very own veterans were brutally driven away by our Army. According to an online timeline, “the incident marked one of the greatest periods of unrest our nation’s capital had ever known.” … an event, that in my opinion, could have been avoided or not so violent.
The decision to pay the veterans was a decision that could have been supported by Hoover, even before Roosevelt was elected. This could have occurred before the gassings, the shootings, the burning down of their shacks, or the many lives lost to a hurricane that caught many veterans working in jobs that were made available in lieu of getting their needs met. A decision that could have supplied relief to many for what was lost for the sacrifice of defending our country in war, became the reason that our veterans were now trying to recover from much