The Daily Missoulian. [volume] (Missoula, Mont.) 1904-1961, 1913-03-07

ohu tHose WIN make tnem unuer INT
direct or indirect choice of the PEG.
pie.
How nearly this ideal has beer
reached is revealed by the fact thai
the patronage of the president has
fallen lower and lower by the extern
sion of civil service until today he has
but 10000 positions, great and small
to fill. n all but about a thousand
of them "a be filled only with the
advice and consent of the senate" OF
the thousand concerning which he does
not need to go to the senate for con-
c~urrence, only a few are worth any
thing to the man who distributes
patronage, and a majority of them are
unskilled labor jobs that do not al
ways change with changing admins
trations.
The bulk of the officers directly ap-
pointed by the president are the post
masters above the fourth class. When
we realize that of the 1000 important
appointments he can make, 5000 are
postmasters, it will be seen that his
main patronage left amounts to only
a beggardly 2,00G good jobs for the
whole United States. And many times
presidents have wished they could get
rid of them. 1t is a work involving
great strain to hear and decide the
dozens of claims for each office that
arise in the curse of the presidential
travels on the treadmill of patronage.
The president who called it a tread
mill" probably measured his metaphor
with great care, for they all admit
that it is hard work and no progress.
They assert that patronage no longer
makes or unmakes presidents, and
that the public official in every walk
of life is beginning to realize that
three enemies are made to every
friend won in the dispensation Of Of
fees.
What a riot of patronage, what a.
saturnalia of c~ontending ambitions
n political rivalries there would be
in the United States if the policy "to
the victor belong the spoils' were to
be in force today! -Four hundred
thousand positions. important and
petty. to fill. Four million persons
aspiring to fill them and each feeling
that he has peculiar abilities, peculiar
political claims for appointment, and
peculiar reasons for being recog-
nized.
There Were only about $4,000 posi-
lions of every kind and description in
the entire federal service when An
drew Jackson was president, and yet
with that comparatively small number
Washington was overrun with victors
who thought they were entitled to a
e1,n w. 10 %lo ~~~s1, vVlz,a a~u 4 mn
600 voters in the country then, as
compared with 1000, 900 this year. If
there We're tragedies without number
then as disappointed office-seeker
after disappointed office seeker ex-
hausted the patience of the govern
ment officials, the finances of their
pocketbooks, the credit of their board
and the hopes of
their lives. what would be the result
when the number of voters is multi
piled by fourteen n the accessibility
of Washington by a%hundred?
But with all his diminishing change
presidents and cabinet officers are
harassed for weeks on end when there
is a change in the party in power,
There are a score of applicants for
every office that may be filled without
to the civil service eXamina-
ton.
NE number Of positions to be filled
in the government service without
examinations is not as
large as the number filled by COM
petitive examinations. There are
positions under the govern
ment subject to such examinations,
and about 200, 900 not subject to them.
The latter number includes $4,000
in fourth class post offices who
no direct compensation from
the government, the 10000 presiden-
tial employees, the $1,000 minor en-
ployees on the Panama canal, the 49,
600 unclassified employees in the field
service, and the 5000 navy yard en-
ployees. 1t also includes the 5000
of the judicial service and
a like number of employees under
congress-.
The striking thing about the reduce
ton in the number of positions open
to patronage is the large number that
are outside of Washington. More
than 100000 civil service positions
ullttT tIlG gov eIIIiltlll are OulSlue %
as compared with "a, 900
in Washington.
1t is the common impression that
The civil service of the United States
is made up of people who
no entrance examinations, but
who got their positions under the
'spoils system and then were covered
over in the civil service. In many
cases, no doubt, this is true. The
,ourth class ~postmasters, $4,000 in
number who have been transferred to
he classified service, did get their
positions under the "spoils system
and We're covered over into the civil
service without examination. The
thing happened before each party
'hange that has taken place since the
service law was passed, and many |
# the best friends of civil service re-
gard it as a wholly unfair use of the
service principle. But, with all
hat, before the fourth class post
masters We're put there last fall, IS out
If every hundred people under the
service got there through
Competitive examinations.