The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-01-20
CONSULAR REFORM
H0OT POINTS OUT DEFECTS OF
 PRESENT SYSTEM.
Says the Trouble Lies in Appointing Amfable old Gentlemen to
 Nice Jobs at the. Na-
 tf0n's Expense.

[
 | Washington, Jan. 19.-Secretary Root while appearing before the House Alp. | propriations Committee in relation tc l the expenses of the State Department | spoke frankly concerning the short. comings of American consular service | The statements of Mir. Root, whict
 have just been made public. show thal | in response to questions by Represent | ative Livingston, the Secretary said: l There are a great many consulates | that have been in that condition and | there are some that are still in thai | condition, and the fact arises from several causes. One cause is that con | sulates are used and regarded here as | not places in which active and sum. cient work Is to be done, but are usee
 as places in which to shelve estimapfe and elderly gentlemen whose friends l find it necessary to take care or them ] in some way" uaughter)
 l Now. | have got old enough to bf able to say that sort of thing without anvbodv being offended. do not think I that when a man has lived out the ac- tivity of his life and passed beyond his ambition and his energy, and his desire to make a career for himself dc not think that then is time to start him out in a new place where he l has got to learn new business and push the commerce of the country"
 The following statements were made
 by MT. Root in reply to questions or members of the committee:
 Mr. Brundidge--I quite agree with you, Mir. Secretary, as to that, but on whom rests the blame for that condi- tion2
 Secretary Root--'It rests on long, standing custom, whereby the execu- | tive is expected to appoint to impor- tant consulates important men from the different States"
 MT. Craft But you have system of examfnatfon?.
 "Yes, so far as the young fellows go. You can put the screws on them and make them come up for examina- tion, but when an eminent citizen Mir. Livingston-"An eminent ex- senator or member of congress-" Secretary Root, (continuing)-"Yes es When an eminent citizen comes around you cannot examine him in geography and arithmetic. He resents 1t ana
 there is the dickens to pay all along. OIaughter.) It Is the custom that
 has grown up--just like this deficiency custom. When you step into change
 custom, you cannot change 1t by
 piecemeal; you have to jar something
 
 now pending. When 1t was introduced it contained series of provisions un- der which the consulates were to be graded. The original appointments made were to be only to the lower grades and the upper grades were to be filled by promotion, so that we would catch fellows young, while they still had some motive power left in them. These provisions have been stricken out and the bill reported with
 out them.
 "still, the bill makes a great ad- vance over the present system. It graduates the consulates and provides for the abolition of fees, and 1t pro- vides against the employment of any clerks, except those of the very low
 est grades who are not American cit izens; provides against what I think
 is a very great abuse, namely, the fact that a great number of American consulates are run by clerks of the country in which they are situated. It also does various other things. l
 don't know whether 1t will pass sor not"
 MT. Livingston-That is now in, the Senate?
 Secretary Root--Yes, in the Senate. It has been unfavorably reported.
 The approaching end of the active work of the reciprocity bureau was sounded in Mir. Roots statements about the expense for its maintenance. The salaries of clerks in the bureau are carried on the emergency roll of the State Department and the Secretary said the bureau was regarded as an unforeseen and unexpected emergency established by MT. Kassan number of years ago.
 Representative Littauer asked Mir. Root If the Bureau would be permanent and the Secretary of State provoked a laugh with the following reply: '"Fhe indications arc that 1t will not be, The making of g system of reciprocity