Congress Votes to Elevate VA to Cabinet Status

Congress gave an election-year salute to the nation’s 28 million veterans Tuesday by voting to make the Veterans Administration the 14th Cabinet department and granting veterans the right to have courts review denial of benefits.

Both measures were approved on voice votes. The measure creating the new Cabinet department now goes to President Reagan, who is expected to sign it before the next celebration of Veterans Day on Nov. 11.

The judicial review plan must be returned to the House for approval. The plan gives veterans, for the first time in 170 years, the right to have federal courts review VA denial of benefits.

The measure abolishes the current Board of Veterans’ Appeals.

Third-Largest Employer

The VA, which now provides medical care, home loan guarantees, life insurance and pensions for veterans of the armed forces and their 51 million dependents and survivors, spends about $30 billion a year. Its 240,000 employees make it the third-largest federal employer, trailing the Defense Department and the U.S. Postal Service.

Only 11 members of the Senate and 17 members of the House opposed earlier versions of the Cabinet legislation in both chambers earlier this year, an indication of the massive power of the veterans’ lobby.

Rep. John Edward Porter (R-Ill.), one of those who voted against Cabinet-level status for the VA, said it would increase spending for veterans’ benefits “at a time when we are bleeding red ink from one budgetary deficit after another.”

He said during debate that many House members agreed privately that the legislation is unwise. “Members are in craven fear of retribution at the polls,” he said.

Sponsors of the bill, however, said that veterans deserve to be heard by a Cabinet officer with direct access to the President.

Sens. John Glenn (D-Ohio) and Alan Cranston (D-Calif.) said that the change is long overdue recognition of the fundamental importance of caring for those who performed military service. Senate Republican Whip Alan K. Simpson of Wyoming disagreed, saying that the elevation of the independent agency to Cabinet status is “an overreaction to a non-problem.”