The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1909-08-05
PUBLIC JOBS
REDISTR|BUTED
Washington 0ffice-Holders Are
Now Being Switched
About.
By Ernest G.. Walker.
Mail Special to the Advertiser


When the popular excitement over tariff
revision has abated and the country
has time to think of other events that
proceed from Washington, it will occur
more prominently that there has been
an important change in the personnel
of place holders. Hardly day gone
by but what one or more appointments
are made. Many are appointments
which need not go to the Senate for
confirmation. Consequently they at
tract less attention.
Thus far the typewriter slips from
the White House, which are distributed
about the Capital every afternoon when
the President sends IL nominations for
confirmation, have been chiefly the pro-
motions of officers in the Army and
the Navy. These have been numerous.
The commissioned list of the military
services Of the government now COM
prises many thousands of men. Retire
ments for age come so rapidly that
there are vacancies for promotions by
the score every few days. As seniority
prevails in most of those nominations,
the President part in making them is
chiefly of routine character. He has
been making few other nominations
to the Senate, occasionally a customs
collector, or receiver or register for
a land office. But there has been little
change indeed in the big places and
with half hundred exceptions, per
haps, the same Republicans are serving
under the Taft administration who
served under the Roosevelt administra-
tion.
It is different among the smaller
places, those that pay salaries ranging
from $1,000 up to $4,000. There has been
a considerable moving of men out of
such places and the substitution of men
of the President IS own selection. Post
master General Hitchcock and Secretary
Nagel of Commerce and Labor, who
are the President s leading political ad-
visers, have been cognizant of most Of
those changes, which have by no means
been confined to their two departments.
Those two cabinet officers keep the
roster Of those who aided in the Taft
campaign, both before and after the
Chicago convention. They keep the
President acquainted with the facts
about such workers and no week goes
by without some of those workers be-
ing taken care of.
by no means been as rich as in previous
administrations, but they constitute
recognition. There has been no descent
of Office seekers upon Washington this
year, such as that of the faithful legion
who toiled under the late Chairman
Hanna, or even of those who came to
became President in his own right dur
ing March, 1905. Most of the Office
seekers of the Taft administration have
remained at home and pleaded their
cause from afar. Many Southern Re-
| pubicans have come ON to Washington,
but they have ascertained that it is
| not very easy to obtain access to Post
| master General Hitchcock, who, as for
mer chairman of the National Commit
| tee, has had their matters in charge.
| They also find that Mr.. Hitchcock gives
them careful and methodical consider
alton, whether they come to Washing
| ton or not, and therefore have decided
| that it is wiser to wait
But in quiet and unobtrusive ways,
the Taft men of 1908 are being taken
/ care of to the extent of the admins
tration s ability. There has been no
unseemly haste about it and will be
/ none. The President wants the changes
/ political, such as all his predecessors
have deemed wise, made in that fashion
He has demonstrated again and again
that he wants to look out for those
who were his friends, although not to
the extent of ignoring Republicans who
favored other candidates. His course
in that regard has won him an unusual
amount of support in both branches OF
Congress. There has been no such bit
terness among the allies and their many
lieutenants, as there was among the
Reed men during the first two years
of the Mckinley administrations, or a;
there was among the Mckinley and
Hanna men during the first years OF
the Roosevelt administrations.
Postmaster General Hitchcock is tax
ing care of a few Republicans in the
Postotfice Department. He has done
this without removing any of his -four
assistants and, as fa< as can be Judged
without impairing the efficiency of the
postal service. This is in marked
contrast with the conditions twelve
years ago, when the Postoffice Depart
ment was made the dumping GROUND
for multitude of politicians and wher
laws and regulations were ignored tc
make places and even sinecures fol-
the faithful. The census office viii
help out, as it has several hundred
supervisors to name, each Of whom
will receive salary of $500 and per
quisites which bring the total compen
sation up to an average of about $4,000
But these welcome places have not
been turned over to the spoiIsmen and
care is being exercised to select Taft