Carl Schurz

“ The American people have hardly ever beheld a rush for the spoils of office more tumultuous than that which followed President McKinley's accession to power. Nor have we ever heard a more furious, and, I may add, a more disgraceful clamor from party men for the breach of party faith than that of Republican politicians demanding the repeal, or at least the disembowelment, of the civil service law by a President and a majority in Congress solemnly pledged to its maintenance and extension. ”

“ It is a significant fact that in England, so long as the government was essentially aristocratic, the spoils system flourished—that is to say, public employment was bestowed by the favor of the powerful. But as the government became more and more democratic, the merit system took the place of favoritism and public employment was thrown open to free and public competition.
I say, therefore, that in contending for the merit system we contend for the right of the people to the offices instituted for their benefit. Whoever opposes it, fights against true democracy. ”

“ Is it not a foul slander upon our national character to say, that, while in England, Germany, Italy, France, Belgium, Switzerland, Norway, the popular interest in public affairs does not need the stimulus of office plunder, the American people have become such a lot of mercenary wretches, that only the promise of reward, the prospect of official salaries will inspire them to maintain political parties, and keep them alive to the honor and the welfare of this great republic?—This staggers our spoilsman somewhat but he does not give up. ”

“ On the other hand we behold the American citizen, the freeman, no matter whether rich or poor, whether backed by the influence of the powerful or not, independent of the favor of anybody, claiming and obtaining the right to compete for public employment upon equal terms with other freemen, the poorest with the richest, the lowliest with the most powerful, the best man to have the best chance. ”

“ While thus almost all the objections to the merit system brought forward by its enemies are easily and conclusively refuted either by the public record or by the simplest reasoning, there is one which has a certain plausibility for those who form their judgment upon superficial impressions. It is, that, one American citizen having as much right to public employment as another, a system making appointments dependent upon the result of examinations removes public offices from the reach of the people and confines them to a privileged class, which will bring forth an officeholding aristocracy. ”

“ On the one hand we behold the group of political magnates, the bosses, the Senators and the Representatives, the party leaders—the dukes, the earls, and the barons of politics—doling out by way of favor their recommendations, which are usually equivalent to appointments, among the applicants for office who appear as petitioners before them, the favored petitioner to feel himself under constant obligation to the political magnate to whom he owes his place, knowing that he will be secure in his place only so long as that favor continues. ”

“ Those in power should never permit themselves to forget that when an office, the subjection of which to the competitive rule is at all practicable, is withheld from the domain of that rule, or whenever an office already under the competitive rule is without the clearest necessity withdrawn from it and is thus made a matter of patronage commanded by influence, the people are robbed of their right of free competition for that public employment. ”

“ Here is the sorely aggrieved patriot who has been accustomed to be taken care of by influential politicians, who finds himself debarred from the public crib by the merit system, and who insists that a boss, or a party committee, or a member of Congress is a better judge of a man's fitness for office than an examining board. ”

“ Such are the hostile forces the friends of civil service reform has to contend with. Can our victory be doubtful? The enemy being desperate, the struggle now before us may be arduous and bitter. But it is likely to be the last. General Grant's Wilderness campaign of 1864 was the bloodiest of the civil war. But when it began the rebellion was in fact already broken and doomed. Whoever still fights for the spoils system sacrifices himself for a lost cause. The final victory cannot fail to be with sound democratic principles, reason, and civilization. ”

“ There stood the President of this great republic with the solemn vow honestly and thoroughly to enforce the civil service law and, wherever practicable, to extend it—with that vow still warm on his lips; and, facing him a group of persons pretending to represent a great organization “embracing the young and active men of the party,” coolly insisting that this President should by one of his first official acts break and dishonor his party's and his own pledge and thus before the American people and all the world declare his party to be a cheat and himself a dishonest man. ”

“ And I cannot too strongly impress upon the mind of everyone concerned that every public employment unnecessarily withdrawn from the domain of the democracy of merit and turned over to the aristocratic rule of influence is an encroachment on popular rights. There is constant urgency on the part of so-called practical politicians, and sometimes also from executive officers who are exposed to political pressure, for the withdrawal of this or that class of positions which are now in the classified service, from the competition rule. ”

“ Now I ask any unprejudiced and candid man, which of the two systems is most apt, not only to give the republic an honest and efficient service, but to put public employment most impartially within the reach of everybody? ”

“ You reply that this rule may hold good as to the conduct of private business where the head of an establishment enjoys real freedom in the selection of his clerks or agents; but that according to universal experience, a public officer under the spoils system is not permitted that freedom; that whenever he has any place to fill he is instantly set upon by party managers, or bosses, or other politicians of influence, who urge upon him their creatures or favorites; that he is apt to be compelled by a fierce pressure to accept men as his subordinates whom his own judgment would have rejected ”

“ You answer him by pointing out the fact, that political parties do exist without patronage in ever so many foreign countries, and that they did exist in this country without the use of offices or patronage before the spoils system was introduced, and that they were then as full of life and energy as ever since.—He excitedly asks you whether you really think that a party can win without patronage, and whether the popular interest in politics can be kept up without holding out to the people the prospect of a large distribution of offices if their party wins. ”

“ It was found that those of them who were unscrupulous enough to care more for party politics than for the public interest, as well as others who had not courage enough to stand up against the pressure of political influence, would make arbitrary removals for the purpose of opening a chance for some trick by which, in spite of the competitive system, they might put the favorites of power into the vacated places,—and not seldom they succeeded, either by way of arbitrary promotions, or of emergency appointments, or by other devices. ”

“ In his endeavor to uphold and extend the merit system the President will have a larger majority of the people on his side than any of his predecessors ever had, for what formerly seemed to be only a dream of idealists, is now a practical fact, well understood and recognized in its beneficial effects by the enlightened public opinion of the country. As I pointed out in my last annual address, not one of President McKinley's predecessors has, since the enactment of the civil service law, failed to distinguish his administration by large and important extensions of the domain of the merit system. ”

“ The American people like an honest man. They admire a man of courage in the right, who will stand firm as a rock against the pressure even of his friends when they demand what is wrong and dishonorable. And the people saw in President McKinley's order a vigorous manifestation of his patriotic purpose to make true his words: “Civil Service reform has come to stay.” ”

“ Cleveland's great executive order made by the Republican spoils politicians is utterly futile. That order did not protect any public servant covered by it against removal—proof of which is the simple fact that a considerable number of them actually have been removed. The effect of the order simply was that, if any of those places were vacated they could not be arbitrarily filled by way of political or personal favor with incompetent or otherwise unsuitable persons; for the order subjected candidates for such places to competitive examinations. ”

“ But I have seldom seen men of prominent position commit themselves to statements which everybody in the slightest degree conversant with the subject knew to be untrue, with such wild imprudence as some of them do in their struggle against civil service reform. ”

“ There is good reason for believing that the necessities of the consular service have already engaged his care; and whoever undertakes seriously the task of putting that, as well as any other, branch of the government service upon a footing of thorough efficiency, will soon recognize that the first requirement is its absolute emancipation from the influence of the patronage mongers.
There is a force working for civil service reform which is now far more effective than ever before. ”

“ Not that in every instance, or in a majority of cases the favored individual was a scapegrace or a dunce—for it is true, able and decent men got into public employment that way. Not that every drunkard or drone was kept in the service by political intercession, for some were really turned out. It is also true that there have been conscientious Congressmen who would not recommend unworthy persons. But the story I have told was rendered not only possible by the spoils system, but it has actually so happened hundreds of times. ”

“ Could they forget that if it really were true that the young men of the Republican party can be inspired to strenuous effort only by the prospect of spoil, and that to obtain that spoil they would have their party dishonor itself by breaking a time honored vow, and by repudiating its faith, the moral vitality of that party would soon be gone? ”

“ In saying this you have touched a sore point; for the statesman you address is likely to be himself one of those public men whose statesmanship consists mainly in the handling of the patronage and who would be in danger of speedy extinction, were that resource of political sustenance taken from him. It is a delicate matter for him to discuss, and he therefore changes his tack and begins to impeach the efficiency of the merit system itself. ”

“ If our commercial community wants a real reform in the method of appointment to consular positions, it must insist upon three things: competitive examinations for admission to the lowest grade of the consular service, promotion only for merit, and removal only for cause. ”

“ The carpenter's son, without political claims, without influence, will get the clerkship, while the young man with all the power of wealth and political pull at his back will have to look to his rich uncle or to honest work outside of the government service for support. Young Smith will first receive a probationary appointment, for, say, six months, to prove his practical capacity and adaptation to the work he is to do. ”

“ That right cannot be too jealously guarded, especially by the men and women who are poor, or without influential backing, or too self-respecting to make themselves dependent upon the favor of the powerful instead of their own work, and who, when serving the public, will not make themselves anybody's political slaves. ”

“ Nothing could be more edifying to the people of Ohio than an open denunciation of the honored son of their State who now stands at the head of the republic, by members of his own party for doing his manifest duty as President and patriot. ”

“ You answer by reminding him of our own experience that in the last four presidential elections that party which possessed the patronage was regularly beaten; that therefore the patronage has certainly not proved an element of strength sufficient to save a party from defeat; that it is rather an element of weakness in creating disappointments and animosities, and in making, by its inevitable abuse, the party possessing it odious to public spirited citizens. ”

“ He will admit that, there being untold thousands of them, they cannot all have offices, unless we create an office with a salary for every applicant of that kind. Who, then is to select from among the untold thousands of patriotic wanderers those who are to be blessed with place and pay? Why, Mr. Grosvenor tells us that the members of Congress are the fittest men to make that selection, and of those members of Congress Mr. Grosvenor is one. Their “people,” therefore, are those whom this aristocracy of influence find it convenient to favor. ”

“ Nothing is more ridiculous than the manner in which the spoils politicians seek to obscure this feature of the question. The carry the word “people” constantly at their tongues' end and mean only those for whom they want public places and salaries. Mr. Grosvenor loudly protests that the men who “in 1896 marched thousands and thousands of miles to hear the words of encouragement and instruction from the President as he stood upon the steps of his home in Canton” shall not be excluded from places in the department by troublesome civil service tests. ”