Year: 1877

Messrs John jay, Lew Turnure and J
II. Robinson, composing the Commission Of
Investigation into the New York Custom
House, have submitted their report to the
Secretary of the Treasury the Secretary has
submitted it to the Executive. and the Presi-
dent has approved the recommendations OF
the Commission. The Commission find
that the force now employed in the custom
house, the naval ol6ce, and the surveyors
Office, numbering together l,O3S men lex
cluding for the present the appraiser s de-
partment) may safely be reduced by about
70 per cent; that the appointments
have been made in great part under
political pressure from Iarty consider
tiOns, and with insufficient regard to the fit
ness of the appointees; that part
service are deficient in proper attention
to business, a. well Us in business qualities
and integrity of character; that few of
them are employed more or less in private
business. to the possible detriment in some
cases cf tine interests Of the service. and
that some iraudulently accept moneys for
services rendered in their official capacity.


The Commission say that the iucumbents
Of office in the customs service. however
high, responsible, or difficult may be the
duties, requiring often the skill and expert
enee of experts, are appointed generally at
the request of politicians and political asso-
Citations il New York and other States, with
little or no examination into their fitness he
yond the recommendations Of their friends.
The Commission pronounce this manner OF
appointment to be unsound in principle, dan
gcrous in practice, demoralizing in its iu-
duence on all connected with the custouns
service, and calculated to encourage aud
pprpetuate official ignorance, ineficienry,
and corruption. They believe there can be
no adequate protection in the customs ser
vice for the honor of the Government. the
rights of importers, and the interests Of the
nation until the service is freed from the





control of party, or organized on strictly
business basis, with the same guarantees
for efficiency and fidelity in the selection ct
the subordinate officers that would he re-
q1ired by prudent merchant In CON
cluson .he Commission state that under
the present system the officers who are ap-
pointed through political influence are ex-
pected to make their officers contribute 10
turn to the support of the party, and that
the amount of the contributions asked from
the men Is fixed by percentage on their
respective salaries. Most of the officials
thus assessed accede to the demand, and
some of them repair their diminished sala-
ries by e1actiug or accepting from the mer-
chants unlawful gratuities- These party
assessments seems to have been quietly per
mitted, if not openly sanctioned, and the
improper acceptance oi grstuities has con-
tinued for quarter Of a century to defy the
law and demoralire the service. They be-
lieve thorough reform in these particulars,
and the success of every effort through the
customs service to relieve the national com
mercs and industry from the evils wrought
by mismanagemcnt and corruption, can he
accomplished only by the emancipation OF
the service from partisan control


The report is endorsed by the President
in the following letter to the Secretary OF
the Treasury