BVA members and their families may be familiar with the new motto of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), the language changed slightly but still based on Abraham Lincoln’s original admonition “to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow, and his orphan.” You may have noticed also that although VA became a cabinet-level department of the federal government 35 years ago in 1988, adopting the name “Department of Veterans Affairs,” some in Congress, the media, and even some among the Veterans Service Organizations still insist on referring to VA as the Veterans Administration. 

Even lesser known perhaps are the conditions under which the old Veterans Administration was created almost exactly 93 years ago on July 21, 1930, a date marking the signing of Executive Order 5398 by President Herbert Hoover that consolidated the Veterans Bureau, the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, and the Pension Bureau into one independent agency that would care for veterans. The name Veterans Administration was selected for that new agency, a name that remained for the next 58 years. 

President Hoover’s order changed how both the federal government and the public perceived veterans’ compensation and other benefits. For additional information from VA about this historical milestone commemorated this month, click here.