New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1878-08-10
CIVIL SERVICE REFORM.
GAIL HAMILToN's PAPERS.

Fnglish Civil Service reform seems TO have licensed
!. Instead of diminishing patronage, the English
reform seems to have organized it on broad
bnsiness principles, and established it
sonnd and stable basis. In doing this,
however. it has not the less accomplished a
Reform. Patronage is no longer irresponsible and
all-powerful 1t is recognized and systematized.
patronage secures to the political leaders their per
sonal acquaintance, known and trusted assistants,
aenendants followers. Examination defends the
aepartments against the influx of ignorance and in
competency. Party leaders may still, as Burke main
tanned they should always be able to do, reward
their followers with office but examination for
bids the Civil Service to suffer from too great
nartiaty OF too little power of resistance in the
marty leader Patronage is the basis of appoint
ment; fitness is the test Of admission.
This may or may not be tho height of effective
ness but this is what the Civil Service of England
~ That ideal Civil Service portrayed by Mr..
Eaton and located in the British Isles may be
found in the Happy Valley of Rasselas, but
NOT between. the North Sea and the Allan
te Ocean, That ideal Civil Service. free
from human passion, preference, and preju-
dice. purged from human weakness, Invested
ef partisan selshness and dictation" open equally
70 the duke and the washerwoman. taken out of
low politics aud given to high merit" resulting in
apeople cOnfding and proud, in civil administra-
zion worthy of a great nation is not the Civil Ser
vice which has just jumped Wellesley into promo
ton over twenty stronger heads, which causes
even its Premier rap the knuckles when the
people think he has been too autocratic in the dis
posa of patronage, and which beseged the house OF
Sir Garnet WOlseley as it was announced
that he was to be Governor Of Cyprus, with such
pressure for Office that force had to be used to dispose
of the applicants. The English went to work reso-
ntoly to improve their Civil Service and they have
improved il into one worthy of a great nation; but
this people cOnfding and PROUD" still growl and
gumble over their Civil Service as every
English. born people does, for God hath made
them so"-grumble over their expenses, and growl
over the patronage. and break GadstOne's win
doys. and throw mud at his wife going home from
church, and bawl down BeaeOnsfed to-day, and
cheer him to the heavens tomorrow, and adore the
aristocras whom they pelt and cherish the patron
age they denouuce. and do all those inconsistent
things which the great strong, brave bullet-headed
and lon-hearted Nation has been doing for genera
Gons.and which made Jefferson say, "Afterallifyou
could strip the British Government of its corrup-
lions it would be the best Government ever devised
by man, and which give even more point to Ham
ilton's reply, If you should strip the British
Government Of what you call its cOruptiOns it
would not survive day|
The English argument falls absolutely to pieces
crumbles and puverizes and vOlatilizes and dis
sppears before one calm and careful glance The
fatal defect of the English Civil Service was the
ineompetency of its servants. That has never been
the fatal defect of ours. Not single person. l
venture to assert was ever appointed to an Ameri-
can clcrksh1p who could not write, or who
eould not count twenty. The American citizen IS
intelligent. We have no serfs nor peasants. An
American citizen who cannot read and write
and cipher is a phenomenon. 1t is not lack
of intelligence that our TefOrmers themselves
allege 1t is lack of virtue. Mr.. Eaton makes
flip OF two in general way against " O Ounce
aud common politician" but all his Civil Ser
vice thunder is discharged at corruption" and
"demagogues and "peculatiOn," and against
such competitive examination hath no power.
Look at his Indictment: "Wben unImpeached Of
Tenders sat in the Cabinet, when Salary-grab
bills could pass Congress, when great officers were
drawn into Credit Moblier frauds, when Whiskey
Ring peculation aud Custom House corruption flour
ished in so many places when fearful abuses under
the very shadow of the Capitol, hardly
halted at the steps of the White House.
to be sure most of these things never happened but
granting them all, not one measure of Mr.. EatOns
reform is brought to bear their prevention. The
English applicant could not count ten and the Eng
Hsb reformer instituted system by which the per-
fee. The American Civil Service officer IS
charged with peculation and corruption, and the
remedy proposed is to put in the one that
can couut the highest. The difference between
the condition of the problem in England aud
In the United States Is so great ana Mf'
Eaton is so utterly incapable of perceivIng those
conditions that he actually brings forward in proof
Of the desrabIeness of Reform among us. that COM
petitiye examination has not only brought superior
class of persons into the English Civil Service but
"has also given an impetus powerful to the cause
of general education throughout the United King
dom that, within the last three years, system OF
general public instruction has been for the hrst
time inanmrated. with provisions for securing
compulsory attendance upon the schoolsI" Here
has our own country been in craze about public
instruction ever since ii was country and before
il was nation. Free education has been its pet and
pride time out of mind. Its free schools OF all
grades, from the c up to the higher mathematics
and the dead languages, have been open to all, and
TO considerable extent, forced upon all. Educa-
ton has indeed been provided in such degree that
we begin to question its wisdom to wonder whether
we have not mistaken its direction, and diminished
individual energy in diminishing individual respon-
sibilty But the unquestionable result has been to
give us an intelligent pOpulation-a pOpu-
lation so intelligent that its intelligence up to GER
tain degree is always taken for granted And Dir.
Eaton leaving this entirely out of view, wants us
TO adopt. as an advance aud reform. test which
was found necessary against ignorance by a nation
which never had any system Of public instruction at
all until within three years; until the adoption OF
the test gave an impulse to public instruction.
Where. should like TO know, are we TO look for
proof of the advantage of our boosted free educa-
ton IT, with our costly common schools we
must erect the same costly bulwark against the
incoming tide of ignorance that England employs
which has had no common schools at all