In cities and towns all across America, Memorial Day will be marked with parades down Main Street, patriotic speeches on the town square and little league games in the park.  But for others -- families and surviving comrades in arms -- it is a day of pilgrimage to cemeteries and memorials, for a moment of remembrance.

For some, this pilgrimage takes them to places far away from that town square; to places made infamous through the fury of war, and where now, peace holds its gentle sway.

Our Commonwealth’s sons and daughters have routinely placed themselves in harm’s way – on the beaches, in the jungles and the deserts.  Many didn’t return.  But to those who did, we made a promise, a sacred covenant between nation and soldier – a commitment as old as the Republic itself.  We recapitulate that vow through national holidays and monuments in their honor --- and through lifetime health care and education benefits. 

Currently, that covenant is under attack from the forces of budgetary and bureaucratic efficiency.  To combat these foes, I believe we need a new, comprehensive GI Bill of Rights for the 21^st Century.

In 1944, Congress enacted the original GI Bill of Rights, to honor the Greatest Generation—providing our returning troops with educational benefits, loans to buy a home, and medical assistance. And in each major military conflict since, we have honored the service of our soldiers through an improved GI bill.

A New GI Bill will strengthen benefits for our men and women in uniform today, and provide long overdue benefits for the veterans and military retirees who have already served.

Nationally, more than 30,000 veterans are waiting in line for their first appointment with the VA, and that problem will only get worse with the growing numbers of returning service men and women – and the potentially Draconian recommendations of the VA’s Capital Asset Realignment to Enhance Services (CARES) Commission. 

As veterans and their families know, the CARES Commission is currently studying a proposal to close or realign the West Roxbury, Jamaica Plain, Brockton or Bedford VA centers. Closing or realigning existing services would place tremendous burdens on those who use the VA system.  Asking aging veterans to travel additional distances – in some cases, after already waiting months for an appointment – is flat out wrong.  Relocating services will only add to a patient’s stress and impede recovery.   Instead, we should modernize and renovate the existing facilities.

Earlier this month, I voted against the Republicans' five-year budget because it cut veterans health care by $6 billion -- even as more than 144,000 returning troops from Iraq and Afghanistan have now sought health care with the VA. Instead, I am working with my colleagues to provide an additional $1.8 billion to meet the demand for current services and medical inflation this year, which will work to ensure that the VA is adequately funded to ease the growing waiting periods.

How quickly we fail to learn from the past.  Last summer, the Bush Administration was finally forced to acknowledge that funding for veterans’ health was nearly $3 billion short.

In my view, the only real solution to problem of chronic VA under-funding is to make federal spending for VA services mandatory, just like Medicare.  That’s why I’m a proud cosponsor of HR 515, the Assured Funding for Veterans Health Care Act.  Currently, this legislation is pending before the House Veterans Affairs Committee and has attracted the public support of 138 of my House colleagues.  It’s my hope that this momentum will help to move this legislation forward – and I will do all that I can toward this end.

We must also put an end to the Military Families Tax which unfairly penalizes 60,000 survivors, most of them widows, of those who have died as a result of service-connected injuries. This tax reduces their military survivor benefits by the amount of their VA Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC) benefits – at a $1033 deduction per month.

Those who have sacrificed so much should receive all of their promised benefits. On the battlefield, the military pledges to leave no soldier behind. As a nation, let it be our pledge that when they return home, we leave no veteran behind. Let us honor their service with a New GI Bill of Rights worthy of our grateful nation.

No other group of Americans has stood stronger and braver for our democracy than those who service in the military. We must celebrate, honor, and remember these courageous and faithful men and women by ending these unfair taxes on military families and disabled military retirees, and improving veterans’ health care to keep up with our returning troops.

That is our moral obligation as we honor those who have fallen on this Memorial Day.

Rep William Delahunt represents the Tenth Congressional District in the US Congress.

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