The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1893-10-26
REPUBLICANS HAVE THE BEST
PLACES.
How the Civil Service Laws Were
Evated in Their Behalf.

N@Sh4hs touS OCV- 81 ne dcbllS CUM
missioner of PENSIONS Mr.. Murphy, has
put in force an order which is intended to
prevent employees of the pension office
from asking for promotion. The order
states that applications for promotion
made by employees, or at their instance,
Will not only be absolutely fruit
less, but, if persisted in,
will endanger the position of the Offend
ing employee" This is an old order which
has been long established, but has been
practically ignored for many years IL
was first issued by Carl SchurZ when he
issued as an evidence of the desire Of MIR.
Schurz that nothing but genuine
merit should control in the matter
of promotions. Mr.. Schurz has not
yet passed out of the public mind.
He is well remembered as con-
spicuous example of the soldier of
fortune" in politics, a modern Dugald
Dalgetty, or, in other words, a statesman
for revenue only. This order has long
been a dead letter, if indeed, it was not
always so. The republicans made great
professions of civil service reform, but
wherever the reform would act disad
vantageously, it was applied only to the
democrats.
After the election lsst November, when
1t was known that the republicans would
have to go out of power in so far as the
executive department was concerned the
heads of the various departments imme-
diately began promoting their lOwgrade
republican clerks to the higher grades,
where they would get large salaries. By
March 1, they had thus promoted an i'm
mense number, including men and women
in all the departments. In some cases,
this was done after so-called eXamina-
tions which pretended to test
merits of those examined for pro-
motion, but most of these eXamina
tlons were very loosely conducted, so
that they were in effect a mere preteuse,
and bad record made by any person ex-
aminede was not allowed to stand in tho
way of the promotion provided he was
one of 1.-THE faithful. " The consequence
was that when the democratic admins
tration took hold IN March last, it found
the higher grades well filled with repub-
licans who had been put there as a legacy,
or parting gift. by the Harrison admins
tration. And there they remain, and it
is by no means easy for a democrat, in
some of the departments, to get promo
ton.
Indeed, am informed by a democratic
member of congress from a southern
state, who went to the pension Office to
ask for the promotion of a democratic
clerk who had been kept down because he
was a democrat and whose merits war
ranted his promotion, that a majority of
the promotions that have been made in
that Office since March have been re-
publicans. This looks altogether too
much like the old Indian story of the tur-
key and the buzZard Civil service re-
form so far has meant pretty much all
turkey to the republicans and all buZZard
to the democrats.
A member of congress has shown your
correspondent letters written to him by
clerk in one of the departments on official
business, whose handwriting is almost
illegible. 1t would seem that a good hand
writing is an essential req uisite for per
son who holds position as clerk in one
of the government departments; but this
man has held his position right along for
years because he is on the turkey side
in politics, and for aught l know, he may
have had a promotion since
the people turned (o~ supposed
they turned) the republicans out last No
vember The complaint that is made is
that the democratic administration is
very faithfully observing the spirit as
well as the letter of the civil service law,
while the republicans never have done so,
and the latter have had all the advan-
tage. They started with their people in
office, they have always had
an immense majority n''of 3!thehf . in
office, and they have given them every
advantage in retaining and promoting
them, while the democrats in offlce-or
many of Them at least-haye been sub,
1ected to many unjust requirements, chief
among which has been the requirement.
to do the same work on lOw-grade salaries
for which republicans were getting high
grade salaries, and are still getting them.
For example, there is a clerk in one of
the departments at a salary of 81 200, who
has for several years been doing the work
of a s., 500 clerk. All the clerks in his di-
vision, doing the same class of work as
his, have been getting 81 800, while he has
been kept down to 81 200; yet no COM
plant has ever been made of his eff
cheney, and his work record speaks for
itself. But he is demo-
crat, and. of course, the republi-
cans would not promote him. But
his congressman tells me that he has been
trying to get the democratic head of his
department to promote him, and yet it
cannot be done, although that head officer
makes no complaint of the quality of
work done.
These things-and they are more numer-
Gus and more conspicuous than Is sup
posed by persons at distance-are very
discouraging TO the democratic clerks, and
quite tiresome to the democratic con-
gressmen.
a civil service which is one-sided in It's
operations is necessarily very unsatis-
factory; and this is what is said of the
way the present system is carried on. To
begin with-when it was put into operation
ali the employees who were brought under
its provisions were republicans, who had
been appointed under what is now
called the "Spoils System" They had
been appointed for political rea-
sons, and not because of any special COM
potency for the duties they were TO per-
form. They had undergone no examina-
ton, and they were retained in their po-
sitions without examination. Some of
them were doubtless competent and well
qualified, and some of them undoubtedly
were not; but they all stayed, and they
are all there now, except those who have
died.
Thus the republicans had the start of
the democrats, and they have kept 1t ever
since. No democrat has ever got into the
classified service without examination,
though there are thousands and thousands
of republicans who never stood any ex-
animation at all. A way has been
suggested as a fair one to adopt in the
classified service. That is, to remove
republicans, and replace them with dem
Ocrats until the numbers of the two par
ties are the same. Then let all who are
appointed hereafter be appointed after
competitive examination as at present,
without regard TO politics or congress