What does the reform propose? A recent party platform (that of the Massachusetts Republican Convention at Worcester, Sept. 21, 1881) has expressed this in very direct and intelligible form: "Maintenance of the constitutional prerogative of the president to make nominations upon his sole responsibility." "The relief and exclusion of the members of the legislative branch from the business of selecting office-holders"" for party purposes."

Which of the two conforms to the constitution? The answer is not difficult. When it comes to a question of means, certain details as to knowledge of candidates claim attention, and chiefly these three: How is the president to know? May not a senator or representative sometimes know? Can the president act through an examining board? All three are important questions, but only the first and third will be discussed at this point, from the fact of their legal and constitutional bearing. The other will be considered under another heading.

It is perfectly obvious that, in order to act intelligently, the president must seek for information of some one. Can he act as he is enjoined by the constitution, and yet accept the reports as to qualifications, etc., which reach him through an examining board?

This question was in due time submitted to the attorneygeneral of the United States (at that time Mr. Akerman), in connection with the provisions of section 1753 of the "Revised Statutes of the United States," which had become law in 1871. Mr. Akerman, on the 31st of August, 1871, rendered an opinion as follows: The "question proposed by the commissioners is this: 6 May the president, under the act by which the board is organized, regulate the exercise of the appointing power now vested in the heads of departments or in the courts of law so as to restrict appointments to a class of persons whose qualifications or fitness shall have been determined by an examination instituted in

1 This section is as follows: "The president is authorized to prescribe such regulations for the admission of persons into the civil service of the United States as may best promote the efficiency thereof, and ascertain the fitness of each candidate in respect to age, health, character, knowledge, and ability for the branch of service into which he seeks to enter; and for this purpose he may employ suitable persons to conduct such inquiries, and may prescribe their duties, and establish regulations for the conduct of persons who may receive appointment in the civil service." 2 I. e., the "Civil-service commission."

dependent of the appointing power?' My opinion is that he may." ." And in this connection he cites the opinion delivered by a previous Attorney-General. (Mr. Legaré, in " Official opinions of the Attorneys-General," v. 4, p. 164.) As expressed, therefore, in the Report of the Civil-Service Commission, the next year, it appears "that both the theory of the constitution and its recognized interpretation, allowed the direct exercise of choice by the appointing power to be limited to a few of the worthier applicants; the less worthy having been first ascertained and eliminated by a just method, authorized by law and fairly exercised under its sanctions." Not only was the principle here recognized embodied in the legislation of 1871, but with no less care in the bill now before congress.

"3

The reform, therefore, not only in its general principle, but as regards this specific feature of examinations, rests on a constitutional basis, as repeatedly affirmed by the government's chief legal advisers.

1"Official opinions of the attorneys-general of the United States," v. 13, p. 524. 2 Dated April 15, 1874.

3 See p. 20 of the "Report of the Civil-Service Commission," April 15, 1874. It should be added that in this report the whole question of constitutionality is examined with much detail. (See p. 19, 20, 23, 61-63.) Also by Mr. Eaton in his letter to the Springfield Republican, dated Oct. 10, 1881, when he says:

"The language of the bill is not appoint a chief examiner,' but 'employ a chief examiner.' Now, from the foundation of the government there has been this distinction that when officials have had business details to attend to- like a committee of congress needing a clerk, for example - they have been allowed to employ' such persons as they may approve, within the limits of an appropriation. So broad is the rule that, from the beginning to this day, when there are more than 42,000 postoffices, every clerk and subordinate in either of them, including the assistant postmasters, have been employed and dismissed by the postmasters at their discretion, without the approval of other officials; such being the fact even in regard to the thousand clerks in the New York offic., and the assistant postmaster there, who may be left in sole charge of that vast office. When the postmaster at Boston or Pittsfield is thus allowed to employ and dismiss, at his pleasure, all those who serve under him, may not five civil-service commissioners be allowed to employ one examiner without violating the constitution?"

4 Section 1754 of the "Revised statutes," also relating to the same point, but stating the preference to be given to honorably discharged soldiers, has also been reaffirmed in an opinion delivered this year by Attorney-General MacVeagh:

"An ex-Union soldier applied for a position in the New York Custom House. He was informed that he must first pass the prescribed civil-service examination before he would be eligible to the appointment he desired. He appealed to the secretary of the treasury, claiming the right of precedence over those who had passed the examination referred to under the act giving preference in appointments to positions in the treasury department to ex-soldiers and sailors of the war of the rebellion. Secretary Windom referred the matter to the attorney-general, with a request for an opinion upon the legal question involved. Attorney-General Mac Veagh replied that the preference conferred by the statute upon an ex-soldier or sailor is over those who, with himself, have passed the civil-service examination. Passing the prescribed examination is an indispensable condition precedent to appointment in the civil service."- Boston Herald, Aug. 21, 1SSI.

CHAPTER III.

- IT IS NOT IMPRACTICABLE.

CLOSELY allied with the point just considered is that suggested by the questions, Is not this an impossible theory? Is the idea a practical one? Is the scheme practicable? There is no better way to answer questions like these than to show what has been done. In this light we are able to answer that the reform is essentially a practicable one. Ten years

ago, indeed, we might point to what had been the experience in Great Britain since 1855. Yet, since it might be urged that two countries differing so widely in social and national characteristics cannot furnish analogies for each other, an American experience was desirable. This, also, we have had. Without going back to the distinguished career of Mr. Bristow, as secretary of the treasury from 1874 to 1876, during which great administrative reforms were accomplished, it will be well to consider in detail those that have followed.

In 1876 a writer in the North American Review said, respecting the reasonable hope that Mr. Schurz might be called to a place in the cabinet in case of Mr. Hayes's election, that "He more than any other man in the country personifies that which they" (i.e., independent voters, including friends of civil-service reform)" wish to see introduced into politics; that he is the spear-head to which they are but a shaft." Mr. Schurz did become a member of President Hayes's cabinet, and retained his seat throughout the presidential term of four years. He was the first to demonstrate, by actual administration, that an entire government department may be conducted on these very principles. What he accomplished might appropriately be described in the very language used in 1869 by Gen. Cox, then at the head of this very same department, in stating his ideal of administration.2" "To

1 North American Review, Oct. 1876, v. 123, p. 467.

2" Annual report of the secretary of the interior, for the year 1869,” p. xxiv.

raise the standard of qualification, make merit, as tested by the duty performed, the sole ground of promotion, and secure to the faithful incumbent the same permanence of employment that is given to officers of the army

and navy; with this exception, that the civil-service

reform measure now advocated does not insist on a permanent tenure of office. The chief features of his service to the country are given in detail in an article in the International Review. We have space to quote from it only the following: "The results of Mr. Schurz's administration are of almost inestimable value to the country." "The country

has been given an opportunity to study a civil-service reformer as an executive officer. It has seen him reaching practical results for the attainment of which his predecessors made no effort. He has left his department in better condition than it was ever in before; he has adopted methods for transacting the public business more perfect than were ever dreamed of by any business man who ever filled the office (p. 393).

Again, if a demonstration of a different kind were needed, we have it in the experience of the two great local sub-offices, the New York Custom House and the New York Post Office. A public service has been done by the issue in pamphlet form of the history of the abuses to be reformed, the ineffectual efforts to abate them, and the successful accomplishment of this result in both offices, under the late collector, Mr. Merritt, and the late postmaster, Mr. James.2

This pamphlet was prepared by request of Mr. Hayes (then president), in view of the fact that "the civil-service rules requiring open competitive examinations for appointments and promotions in the post office, the custom house, the surveyor's office, and the naval office, at the city of New York, have now, I think, been tested long enough to disclose their tendency and to enable an opinion of some value to be formed as to the probable effects of the permanent enforcement of such public tests of merit." To this pamphlet

1 "Schurz's administration of the interior department," by Henry L. Nelson, International Review, April, 1881, v. 10, pp. 380-396.

2"The spoils' system and civil-service reform in the custom-house and post-office at New York," by Dorman B. Eaton. [Publications of the N. Y. Civil-service Reform Association, No. 3.] This valuable document is frequently cited in these pages, under the name of Mr. Eaton's pamphlet."

are appended an abstract of the civil-service rules for the custom house, and specimens of subjects of examinations.

In 1870 Mr. Thomas Murphy was collector of the port of New York, and in the course of the congressional investigation of that office, conducted in the spring of 1872, testified in a somewhat grimly amusing manner as follows:

66

Speaking of an officer who had been in the custom-house over thirty years, Mr. Murphy remarked that he was a great relief to and a great comfort to any collector."

Question. To have a man of such experience and good character?

Answer. To have such a man of experience.

2. Kept there steadily attending to public business? A. Yes, sir.

2. Is he not allowed to enjoy his own opinions in regard to political matters?

A. He is, sir; Mr. Clinch is.

2. And he attends to his duties and does that publicly, and is permitted to remain?

A. Yes, sir.

2.

A.

No matter what may be the ebb or flow of party?
That is so, sir.

2. And the result is that the collector has, as you say, a great comfort in this officer?

A. Yes, sir.

2. Who is permitted to serve the public and yet maintain his personal independence?

A. Yes, sir. He is an exception to the general rule though.

This is the same collector whose idea of the custom house was 66 a machine to be run in the interest of the party." And yet this is a custom house whose business exceeds that of any other in the world, requiring the collection of more than $480,000 every day of the year except Sundays. In 1879 the open competitive examinations went into effect under Collector Merritt, together with the entirely new order of things which an intelligent public sentiment would demand. Some of the facts, as given in Mr. Eaton's pamphlet

1"Testimony in relation to alleged frauds in the New York Custom-House" (1872), v. 3, p. 406.