The Bozeman courier. (Bozeman, Mont.) 1919-1954, 1923-01-31
SHALL CLASSIFIED
SERVICES OSSIFY

When Woodrow Wilson. a former
president of the National Civil Serv-
ice Reform Association, got into ac-
ton as a spoilman, the people of this
country gained a fair comprehension
of the insincerity of the band Of up
IN hotel bedrooms occasionally insor-
der TO record their own belief in their
own sanctity and their depreciation of
the corruption" involved in filling
appointive as we'll as elective offices
on a political basis. j
Andrew Jackson was the last two
term Democratic president prior to
Woodrow Wilson. The reputed in
ventor of the "spoils system" would
have remained the last two-term
Democratic president if the natural
political honesty Of a scholar and jur-
ist in politics hadn't thought up the
idea Of keeping us out of war until
after his second election. But in the
matter of craftsmanship Andy Jack
son was a mere retailer, while the
former president of the National Civil
Service Reform Association went into.
the wholesale trade. No five of his
predecessors combined ever handed
out so many jobs to deserving party
henchmen.s He not only "fired" Re-
publicans out of every place available
to spoilsmen at the time of his inau-
guration, but having been elected on
a platform pledge in favor of cutting
down the number of offices, his ad-
ministration saw the number multi
piled again and again. 1t was q
mighty liStless Democratic worker
who couldn't load himself or some of
his friends on the government pay.
roll in the halcyon days of Tumulty
and McAdoo.
A clean sweep was made Of the
presidential postoffices, with a few
exceptions maintained for exhibition
purposes. Without warrant in law,
Republican rural carriers were forced
off their routes by the thousands.
When the civil service commission
presumed to mildly criticize the post
master general for his wholesale pitil-
realization of the postal service with
out regard to the rules and regula-
tions, the former president of the
Civil Service Association, then presi-
dent of the United States, "fired" the
civil service commission enmasSe, and
appointed one that would be sure TO
be more subservient. In cases where
the law required the appointment Of
men of some political faith other than
that of the administration, President
Wilson almost invariably selected in
violation of the spirit if not the letter
of the law, former Republicans or So.
cialists who had voted for him.
While all this orgy of spokesman
ship was going on, the bedroom pro-
tests of the National Civil Service Re-
form League subsidized. No cry of
horror came from that quarter.
Whether the erstwhile purificationists
Of this band of delectables were get
ting an occasional whiff of the flesh
pots through the kindness of their
former comrade in the uplife cause,
or whether they were merely ashamed
to proclaim to the world the downfall
of one of the saints, remains a mys-
terry. But the fact is that the whole
company OF the super-pure and faith
| full was seized with lockJaw and writ
ers' cramp-an affliction that to them
must have seemed cruel and inhuman
| punishment contrary to the terms OF
the federal constitution,
No sooner had their kindred spirit
departed from the White House by
well night unanimous consent, how
ever, than this long-suppressed vol
cano of outraged virtue went once
more into eruption. The bedroom
resolutionaries began to note with
surprise and horror that once more
men were being appointed to political
offices on political grounds. The de-
Serving Democrats who got their Jobs
through work in the trenches for the
d. 0. p. were in danger, in some cases,
of being supplanted after having IN
dergoue that publication incident To
a time exposure to the public payroll.
The belief Of the civil service reform
e r that what we need in this country
is an office-holders' caste and a civil
service that has become an ossifiec
service of superannuated barnacles
responsible TO nobody for any affor1
other than that involved in signins
their pay checks, began to be reas-
serted.
The present president of the Ma
tional Civil Service Reform Associa
ton is William Dudley Foulke, of In
diana, sufficiently blessed with un
earned increment to be a gentleman Of
leisure. He is more or less of a lit
erary light, running chiefly at present
to bad poetry and political piffle
His latest contribution to the sum OF