Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-04-22
AMAN WITHAMEMORY
AMI Smith, Superintendent of the
Senate Document Room,
HAS NO FEAR OF LOSING HIS JOB,
Because in His Fifteen Years Official Ex-
perience He Has Never
FORGOTTEN A FACE, NAME Or NUMBER
rsrpCrAL TELEGRAM TO THE p1spArcu

w ASHlNGTON, april Z-W aShlngtoI
is city of curious characters. There are
more unique people in the public service
here than there are gathered together in one
place IN any other part of this great coun,
try. The department clerk obtains his ap
pointment to place through the influence Of
some political friend or by the slow and
devious route of civil service examination.
Ii his place is a desirable one, he holds il
just as long as his patron remains in favor
with THE powers that be- The great army
OF department employees go on in the routine
of their dull days work until the exigencies
of the public service require change in the
offices in which they are employed. Then
they go out to make room for others more in
favor with the administration.
A man must be exceptionally bright or
exceptionally dull to remain in the public
service for any great length of time. Very
often a man is found who is so especially
well adapted to certain work that his su-
periors hesitate to remove MIN, for fear that
the public service will suffer seriously with
out him. If on the othor hand, man is
SO dull that he is content to 60 on year after
year doing the same routine work, and If
his work is of so unimportant a character,
and the salary attached to it is so trivial as
to make the place one of few attractions, he
may remain undisturbe for an almost in
definite period. That there are such places
in the public service-places of little at
tractlveness and inadequate pay--is proved
bv the fact that the civil service commits
sion have frequently to offer vacancy to
Is or 20 of those who have passed the regu-
lar examination and are fully qualified to
perform its duties before they can find any
one willing to accept the appointment
A MATTER OF PARTY.
In the service of Congress the conditions
are entirely different. The civil service
rules which are supposed to control appoint
ments to public Office In the departments do
not govern here. Congress regulates the
appointment of its own employes-that is,
the two houses of Congress elect officers and
these officers appoint their subordinates ac-
cording to their own desires, theoretically,
but in reality according to the wishes of the
members of the House or Senate belonging
to the party then in the majority. 1t would
be much easier matter for Republican
to hold an important clerkship in one of
the departments under a Democratic ad-
ministration than for a Republican or
Democrat either to hold the smallest posi-
tion in the gift of the officers of the House
when those officers are of a different politi-
cal persuasion.
There are exceptions to this rule in the
government of the Senate, for that body
affects dignity which will not permit it to
squabble over the distribution of small po-
litieal favors- Some of the doorkeepers of
the Senate chamber are Democrats, itst as
certain of the Senate committees have Dem
r,-GA A1.1s,- Tl,,N = L. r
the Senate, the Sergeant at Arms, and all
other officers of significance are of the politi-
cal belief of the party in power A man
therefore who remains in the employ of the
Senate or House in a position of any i'm
portance under both Democratic and Re
publican rule must be man of significant
ability. One of the few men under this
classification is the Superintendent of the
Senate document room, A 1zi Smith. No
change of party will ever affect him. His
tenure of Office is secure. Only death or his
own desire will ever divorce him from the
Senate document room. Every man in pub
lie life during the last 15 years can under
stand why. Mr.. Edmunds, the venerable
Senator from Vermont, or his colleague,
Mr.. Morrill, the President, who spent six
years in the Senate, or the Vice President,
Mr.. Morton, could tell why Amzi Smith is
invaluable in the position which he now
holds ard which he has held for 15 years.
THE MAN WITH A MEMORY.
Among public men and others with whom
he has been brought in contact, Amzi Smith
is known and identified as "the man with a
memory" In his capacity as superintend-
ent of the document room, Mr.. Smith pre-
sides over the destinies of the thousands of
bills, resolutions, reports and other docu-
ments which pass through the two Houses
of Congress, go to the public printer, and,
returning, are stored away in the Capitol
for the use of committees, individual Sena-
tors and others interested in their fate A
little doorway just opposite the entrance to
the diplomatic gallery to the Senate leads
to the document room. It is in fact a Sc
ries of rooms over which Mr. Smith pre-
sides. On their shelves are piled thousands
of printed documents all unbound, the ma
iority of them being bills introduced in
either the House or the Senate. At each
stage in the passage of a measure a new
print is had, and copies of each Of these
prints are kept in the document room that
the exact phraseology of a law at any par
ticular period of its incubation may be
learned easily by reference. As these doc
uments are received they are indexed by
number, title and subject, so that from time
to time copies may be had quickly when
called for.
Here is where the peculiar, the remark
able characteristic of Mr.. Smith is seen. He
is a walking index of the documents slowed
away on the shelves of the document room,
and few who have not followed the proceed
ings of Congress through session will ap-
preciate without great effort the significance
of this statement. Think of the Is, 900 bills
and resolutions that were introduced at the
first session of the last Congress, and add to
4harn the fhnueaudS of expoufivn documents
miscellaneous documents, reports and other
papers pertaining to legislation which pass
through the printers hands; remember that
the documents called for are tn documents
not only of this Congress but of last Con-
gress and the Congress before and The Con-
gress before that.
HE NEVER FoRGETs.
Think, too, of the necessary doubling
caused by the introduction of like bills in
two or more successive Congresses, with the
consequent puzzle growing out of the
change of number. Think of all this and
begin to appreciate in some degree what it
is to be able upon receiving a request for ga
bill for the relief of VIM. c. Jones intfo-
duced some years ago" to state, without
reference of any kind, that the bill was in
troduced in the forty-eighth Congress, first
session, and that its number is (say) 972. 1
do not mean to say that Mr., Smith is lnfal-
Iible, that he remembers every one of the
documents in his possession, or that he does
not at rare intervals make mistakes; but his
accuracy is something remarkable.
An instance of it: Not long ago there
walked into the document room an elderly
gentleman who desired copy of bill for
the relief of Erskine Allen. That was the
only title bv which he knew the bill, the
only means of its Identification that be had.