The gold leaf. [volume] (Henderson, N.C.) 1881-1911, 1893-12-14

ports we're sS4 900, 900, of which Great
Britain took $53 100000 In bread
stuffs, cotton and minor products like
proportions sent to the same destination
are shown.
MONTHLY CROP REPORTS.
The work of the statistical division of
the Department Of Agriculture deals with
all that relates to the economies ofiarn-
ing.
The main purpose of its monthly re-
ports is to keep the farmers informed as
fully as possible of all matters having
any influence upon the worlds markets
in which their products find sale. Its
publicatio relate especially to the com
mercial side of farming.
1t is therefore OF profound Importance
and vital concern to the farmers of the
United States, who represent nearly one
half of our population, and also of direct
interest to the whole country. that the
work of this division be efficiently per-
formed, and that the information it has
gathered be promptly diifused.
1t is q matter for cOngratulation to
know that the Secretary will not spare
any effort to make this part of his work
thoroughly useful.
In the year 1889 the Congress appro-
priated 81 900, to be taken from the
patent office funds, for the purpose OF
collecting and distributing rare and i'm
proved varieties of seeds and for prose-
cutting agricultural Investigations and
procuring agricultural statistics. From
this small beginning the seed division OF
the Department of Agriculture has grown
4 1l
extravagant proportions.
During the last fiscal year the cost of
seeds purchased was $50, 54S,61. The
remainder of an appropriation of $135,-
900 was expended in putting them up
and distributing them. 1t surely never
could have entered the minds of those
who first sanctioned appropriations OF
public money for the purchase OF new
and improved varieties of seeds for gra-
tuitOus distribution that from this would
grow large appropriations for the pur-
chase and distribution by members OF
Congress of ordinary seeds, bulbs and
cuttings which are common in all the
States and Territories and everywhere
easily obtained at low prices.
In each State and territory an agri-
cultural experiment station has been
established. These stations, by their
very character and name, are the proper
agencies to experiment with and test
new varieties of seeds, and vet this in
discrimination and wasteful distribution
by legislation and legislators continues,
answering no purpose unless it be to re-
| mind constituents that their represent
tatives are willing to remember them
with gratuities at public cost.
Under the sanction of existing leglsla-
ton there was sent out from the Agrl-
cultural Department during the fiscal
year enough of cabbage seed to plant
10000 acres of land, a sufficient guam
tity of beans to plant 1000 acres, beet
seed enough to plant 2 900 acres, sweet
corn enough to plant $500 acres, sufii-
cient cucumber seed to cover 9 1925 acres
with vines, and enough muskmelon and
watermelon seeds to plant 1878 acres.
The total quantity of flower and vegc-
table seeds thus distributed was con-
tanned in more than nine million
packages, and they were sufficient, If
planted, to cover 80, 500 acres of land.
In view of these facts this enormous
expenditure without legitimate returns
| OF benefit ought to be abolished. Antic-
ipating a consumatiOn SO lmanifestly in
the interest of good administration,
more than 100000 has been stricken
from the estimate made to cover this OBJ
ject for the year ending June 30, 1873,
and the Secretary recommends that the
remaining $4,000 of the estimate be
confined strictly to the purchase OF new
and improved varieties of seeds, and
that these be distributed through expert
ment stations.
Thus the seed will be tested, and after
che test has been completed by the ex-
pertinent station the propagation of
the useful varieties and the rejection of
the valueless may safely be left to the
common sense of the people.
BENEFITS OF CIvI.-sERvICE LAW.
The continued intelligent execution OF
the civil-service law and the increasing
approval by the people of its operation
are most gratifying. The recent extern
sion of its limitations and regulations
to the employees at free-delivery post
Offices, which has been honestly and
promptly accomplished by the commits
sion, with the hearty cooperation of the
Postmaster-General, is an immensely
important advance in the usefulness of
the system.
am if possible, more than ever con-
WINGED of the incalcuabe benefits con-
ferred by the civi-service law, not only
in it's effect upon the public service, but
also, what is even more important, in
elcvating the tone of political life gener-
ally.
The course of civil service reform in this
country instructively aud interestingly
illurates how strong a hold a movement
gains upon our people which has Under
lying it a sentiment of Justice and right,
and which at the same time promises
better administration of their govern
ment
The law embodying this reform found
| its way to our statute book more from
fear of the popular sentiment existing
in its favor than from any love for the
reform itself on the part of legislators,
| and it has lived and grown and -four
ished in spite of the covert as well as
open hostility of spOilsmen and nOtwith-
standing the querulous impracticability
of many self-constituted guardians.
Beneath all the vagaries and sublimated
theories which are attracted to it there
underlies this reform q sturdy common
! sense principle not only suited to this
ns.Adane sphere, but whose application
| our people are more and more recognize
ing to be absolutely essential to the most
| successful operation other government,
| If not to its perpetuity.
1tseems to me to be entirely inconsistent
with the character of this reform, as well
as with it's best enforcement, to Oblige
the commission to rely for the clerical
assistance upon clerks detailed from
other departments. There ought not to
be such a condition in any department
that clerks hired to do work there can
be spared to habitually work at an Their
place, and it does not accord with a
sensible view of civil service reform that
persons should beemployed on the theory
that their labor is necessary in one de-
partment when in point of fact their ser
vices are devoted to entirely different
work in another department.
| earnestly urge that the clerks neces-
| sary to carry on the work of the com
mission be regularly put upon its roster,
and that the system of obiging the COM
missioners to rely upon the services of
clerks belonging to other departments
be discontinued. This ought not to in
crease the expense to the government,
while if WOuld cert ainly he more cOnSiS-