New-York tribune., 1873-12-25
MORE CIVIL SERVICE REFORM.

1
MORE CIVIL SERVICE REFORM
| What boon is Civil Service Reform, to be
sure! Decried, abused and fouted, kicked
and cuffed and turned out of doors by the
people who have it in charge, it continues 70
turn up at the queerest possible times and In
the most unexpected places. Two or three
times its warmest friends have given it up
and nut on Grape in its memory, but as often
it returns to life. hundred, yes a
thousand times it has been smothered with
pillows like the Princes i'll the Tower,
and its inventors aid disseminators have
| listened to what they supposed was its
latest wall and last gurgle, but as often
| the President has appeared on the White
House steps lifting the baby afoit and i'm
ploring the American Congress TO do some
thing for it, 1t is lively child. 1t has been
strangled, asphyxiated, drowned, kept under
water for days and under brandy and water
! for weeks, spurned by Morton, jeered at by
Butler, and kicked by Carpenter. Dir. George
W. Curtis has abandoned it, and Mr.. Eaton
and Mr.. Shellabarger are trying to nurse 1t.
And it still lives.
| Our special cause for rejoicing at this mo-
ment is that the new rules OF the Civil Ser
vice are to be applied at once to the whole
continent. There is dismay in the Post-Ofhces /;
CONSERVATION reigns in the Custom houses.
| Collectors are i'm a shiver and Marshais III a
sweat. 1t is announced that the Civil Service
| Commission is about to issue an order requir-
| ing an examination Of everybody who holds
| an Office, and that Examiners are to
be sent out so to speak, broadcast upon
the country. Happy thought for the Com
mission! Diabolical suggestion to the Post
master and Collector! The spectacle pre-
sented by these Examiners scattering abroad
from Washington in all directions, with their
examination schemes in their hands, will be at
once exhilaratng and encouraging. Fancy
the wild Examiner rushing into the nearest
post office, collarng the delivery clerk, and
compelling him to stand and name the prin-
cipal lake ports OF seizing the unsusDiciOus
and perhaps illiterate pOstman, demanding
that he define subtraction; or rushing into a
custom house and summOning all hands to-
gether to divide. Could anything be more
| excitingg Or tend more to establish confidence
in the Governments
| This proposition is one of those brilliant
suggestions which occur to great minds about
once in two hundred and seven years. 1t
reeks with wisdom. For when you come to
look this matter over carefully there 3 nothing
else for this Commission to be doing. The
gentlemen composing it have been more or
less occupied for several years in making rules
for the regulatiOniof the Civil Service. Presi-
| dent Grant has taken great interest in their
performances, and in several of his messages
has called attention to the fact that the Re-
form was in their hands, and that they were
getting along quite comfortably, only they
] needed more legislation of some sort. 1t has
bappened unfortunately that whenever an office
has fallen vacant during President Grants ad-
ministration Some personal friend or relative
| has been going by who wanted 1t, and the
| President. to whom these things belong, of
course has in his usual generous, large-hearted
wav called him in and given him the office.
This has interfered in q degree-a very slight
degree of course-with the operations OF the
Civil Service Commission; but there is this to
be said, that in every case where the President
has made such appointments, he has distinctly
stated that it was an exception to tho rules OF
the service. 1t has happened in consequence
of these condolences that nobody has been
appointed to any important position under the
rules. 1t is the great triumph OF tho CommS-
3 on that it compelled Marshal Sharpe to an
swer some of the most interesting and ab-
struse conundrums ever flung in the face Of
an American citizen, though his appointment
was entirely certain whether he answered them
or not.
| And now, all the offices having been filled
under one class or another of exceptions To
| the rules and there being no vacancies tG
occupy the time of the Board. what wiser
discreeter, or more patriotic thing could the,
| do than shoulder their Algebras and Gram
mars and make an attack along tho whole
linei 1t will answer the purposes tear W
the emotions of the present lot OF clerks o>
| the roots. and make vacancies for new io'
| to fill. For the Examiners. not having done
\ much in tho way of filling mp the service
with candidates bearing their certificates, WI
take hold of the people now holding oiioe
| with an energy and earnestness that VIII
make tho hair Of tho average Department
| clerk stand ON end. When the Examiner
unsling. their Algebras and go for the Depart
ments. it means simply scaips. Tho blood
curdliDg inquiries they Will put TO these clarlkS