Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1913-03-08

will be seen that his main patronage left
amounts to only a beggarly 1900 good
jobs for the whole United States. And
many times Presidents have wished they
could get rid Of them. 1t is a work in
vOlving great strain to hear and decide
the dozens of claims for each office that
arise in the course of the presidential
travels on the treadmill Of patronage.
The President who called 1T a "treadnill'
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 un-
makes Presidents, and that the public of
fetal in every walk of life is beginning
to realize that three enemies are made to
every friend won in the dispensation OF
Offices.
What riot Of patronage. what a satur-
MALTA of contending ambitions and poIit-
ical rivalries there would be in the United
States If the policy Ito the victor belongs
the spoils'' were to be In force today.
Four hundred thousand positions, lmpor-
tant and petty. to fill! Four million per-
sons aspiring to fill them, and each feel
ing that he has peculiar abilities. peculiar
political claims for appointment and
peculiar reasons for being recognized.
*
There were only about $4,000 positions
Of every kind and description in the en-
tire federal serv-
Capital Overrun ice when An
in Jackson's Time. was President,
and yet with that comparatively small
number Washington was overrun with
victors who thought they were entitled
to a share of the spoils. There We're
LOCO, 600 voters in the country then, as
compared with 1900. 600 this year. II
there were tragedies without number
then as disappointed officesceker after
disappointed officeseeker exhausted the
patience of the government omcials, the
finances of their pocketbooks, the creoit
of their boarding house Keepers. ana tne
hopes of their lives, what would De the
result when the number Of voters Is null
tiplied by fourteen and the accessibility
of Washington by hundred?
But with all this diminishing change
Presidents and cabinet ofnccrs are mar
assed for weeks on end when there Is q
change in the party In power. There are
a score of applicants for every office that
may be'filled without recourse to the cival
service examination.
The number of positions to be filled IN
the government service without COM
petitiye examinations is not as large as
the number filed by competitive exami-
nations. There are 272,OOO positions un-
der the government subject to sucn ex-
aminations, and about OO.OOO not SUD-
ject to them. The latter number includes
"a 900 clerks in fourth-class post offices
who receive no direct compensation from
the government. the 1900 presidential
employees. the $4,000 minor employees on
the Panama canal, the $4,000 unclassified
employees In the field service and the
$500 navy yard employees. It also in
cludes the 5000 employees Of the judicial
service and a like number of employees
under Congress.
More than 100000 civil service positions
under the government are outside OF
w a 8 hington.
Federal Positions as compared
Outside Washington. Washinston. =
1t ID the common impression that the
civil service OF the United States largely
is made up of people who stood no en-
trance examinations, but who got their
positions under the "spoils system" and
then were covered over in the civil serv-
The fourth-class postmasters, $1,000 in
number, who have been transferred to the
classified service, did get their positions
under the "spoils SYSTEM" and were COW
cred over into the civil service without
The same thing happened
before each party change that has taken
place since the civil service law. was
passed, and many of the best friends of
civil service regard it as a wholly UNI
fair use Of the civil service principle.
But, with all that, before the fourth
class postmasters were put there last
fall seventy-eight out of every hundred
people under the classified service got
there through competitive examinations.
The change in administration in the
United States now, even when it involves
a change of party, does not affect the
personnel to any great extent. Policies
change, and the men who make them
change with them, but the man who
goes into the government service to make