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into it the President's prohibition applies. Year by year men are coming to regard even unclassified places as less and less political in their character. The evil is constantly diminishing. A more extensive prohibition would probably not be enforced, especially if a new administration, less favorable than the present one to civil service reform, should come into power. I, therefore, believe that the important work for the League is not to seek any change in federal rule as at present promulgated, but to use their effort to see that state governments and city governments everywhere embody similar provisions in laws, ordinances and rules, and that these provisions are enforced by the appropriate authority.

Mr. Bonaparte:

DISCUSSION,

I think it may be perhaps of a little interest to know of an incident with which I became acquainted, not by reason of my official position at all, but for certain other reasons, and which illustrates how difficult it will be to establish a uniform standard of political activity or inactivity among any class of employees when the heads of the offices under whom these employees serve are themselves active, practical politicians. I became ac

quainted recently, though not during the present year, with the contributions obtained by a political party from the subordinates of two very important federal offices in the same city. At the head of one of these offices, both of which contained a large number of employees, was an extremely prominent and active politician. At the head of the other was a gentleman of the same political faith but who had never been active in politics and who was well understood completely to disregard political affiliations, party affiliations or political opinions in his administration of his office. Now, both of these chiefs were efficient officers with good records themselves. Both of them made liberal personal contributions towards the political work of the party to which they both belonged. In both offices the civil service law, I have every reason to believe, was strictly observed and I do not think it would be possible to obtain the slightest proof that in

either of them there was any coercion of employees. That being the case, the subordinate officers of the federal office which had at its head an active politician, contributed $1,500 towards the expenses of the party to which he belonged, and the subordinates of the office, which had at its head, as I have said, a gentleman who is known to be absolutely impartial in dealing with them, contributed the sum of $13 towards the expenses of the same party.

If there is any moral to be drawn from that experience, I think the League can be trusted to draw it

Mr. R. H. Dana:

In Dorman B. Eaton's invaluable work on Civil Service Reform in Great Britain, he relates the experience in that country. There it had been found that, before civil service reform was introduced, all the employees in the postal service secured their positions through politics and retained them on their political allegiance to their superior officers. Also in England at that time there was no voting by ballot; it was all viva voce, and the subordinates, as a matter of fact, were not free voters but cast their ballots in the way that would most please those to whom they owed their term of office.

To cure this state of things, a law was passed taking away the right of post office employees to vote. Afterwards, when civil service reform was introduced and these offices were taken out of politics, and when a secret ballot law was enacted and the employees were free from the undue influence exercised on them, the franchise was restored.

This is a very interesting experience, and seems to me to illustrate how a great and free people felt that for the good of the whole country, it was better to deprive these employees even of the power of voting under the old conditions that then existed, and how, just as soon as the conditions were changed, and the employees were free to vote as they wished, the practical minded British Parliament revoked the prohibition.

In the army and navy and among the judiciary in this country, there is a feeling that it is wisest on public principle not to take an active part in politics.

Competitive Examinations for Legal Positions

HON. JOHN LORD O'BRIAN.

Recalling the conditions in the public service which made possible the establishment of the merit system, it is strange that one anomaly in the administration of the civil service statutes has escaped general attention,-the fact with a few trifling exceptions the legal positions throughout the country have been and are entirely outside the operation of the merit system. And by legal positions we mean of course chiefly the staffs of the various law departments-national, state, county and municipal.

For the exemptions of the legal positions there have been undoubtedly two reasons first and foremost, the argument that all legal positions are in their nature essentially confidential, and second, the supposed difficulty of devising any kind of examination which would test satisfactorily the peculiar qualifications necessary for this class of positions. Twenty years ago, when the merit. system was receiving its first real trial in this country, conditions were undoubtedly such as to make both of these arguments effective, but the writer believes that the change in conditions has greatly weakened their potency.

In the first place, the Bar itself has undergone a great change. Twenty-five years ago there was no real or efficient standard governing admission to the Bar, there were practically no preliminary educational requirements; nor was there in general use any rational or scientific method for gauging the qualifications of an applicant. This condition existed generally throughout the country down to a time much later than twenty years ago. In those days the examining of applicants was done by hastily appointed committees, often made up of attorneys who happened to be in the court room at the time and

who were frequently quite as embarrassed and as much at sea as the candidates themselves. Under these circumstances the so-called examination often amounted to nothing more than a rough guess as to the candidate's knowledge, or a surmise as to what potentialities lay behind his appearance of self assurance or effrontery. In 1879 there were twenty-eight law schools in the country, only one of which had entrance requirements and only one of which used the case system; today we have one hundrd law schools with an attendance yearly of over 14,000 students and 64 of the schools require a 3 years' course preliminary to a degree. In 1879 there were only 7 states requiring three years' study for admission to the Bar; now 19 states require three years of study and 36 have state boards of bar examiners. In New York State the requirements are high; 3 years' study and a preliminary education equivalent to 2 or 3 years of high school work.

But the change in conditions is not confined to the matter of requirements for admission to the Bar; more significant is the change in the nature of the legal positions themselves. Twenty-five years ago these were comparatively few in number. Nothing in the history of civil government is more interesting than the development of these positions-particularly those concerned with the administration of municipal government. In days gone by-and especially as far back as the early '80's the occupants of these offices were pre-eminently the trial lawyers. The business of a city was then done under far different conditions than it is now. Look for instance at the growth of American cities: In 1880 only 22.57% of the population lived in cities of over 8,000 inhabitants; in 1890 over 33% lived in cities; while in the year 1901, 77.6% of the population of New York State lived in cities, and in New Jersey the percentage was 76.2%. Years ago the business of these offices,-and the same observation applies to the state and national law departments. was the business of litigation, mainly prosecutions for the enforcement of rights. Trial or court work was then proportionally a far larger element in the work of these offices than it is today. And the reason for this is not far to seek. The immense expansion of business,

the complexity of economic conditions accompanying this advance and the intensifying of our civilization have entirely changed the character of the work to be done in these law departments. The law is a constantly growing science, based on fundamental principles, but always developing, always adapting itself to changing and more complex conditions. Entirely aside from the great bulk of statute law, forever growing and forever vainly seeking to overtake the advance in business methods and changing socia! conditions, the increasing complexity which is a concomitant of civilization brings with it in the decisions of the Courts a continuous process of refinement in the interpretation of the law, a process of modification, of shading of precedents.

The practice of the law, as every attorney here knows, has become a well specialized science in which the general practitioners are daily becoming more rare. The stress has changed, the emphasis is now laid upon close study, discrimination, rather than upon the externals. And so in our various law departments there has been growing up during these years a new class of lawyers. Instead of being equipped with a small corps of "all round" men, our various law departments are equipped with large staffs a few of whose members are trial lawyers and advocates, but a greater number of whom might technically be called experts. These men rarely, if ever, have occasion to appear in court; they concern themselves in their various well defined spheres of work, with the preparation of cases for trial, the analysis of evidence, the preparation of pleadings, indictments, and of briefs for argument. Some are advisers of the department heads; others devote their entire time to investigating the terms and phraseology of contracts, or of bonds, and to the investigation of the legality of ordinances, of statutes, of assessment rolls, or to the study of economic data in connection with tax and franchise matters. Taking at its face value the assertion that now-a-days it is by means of the subtleties of taxation and unfair discrimination that men are oppressed and denied their "equal chance," the public law department appears in a new light, with changed and greatly increased responsibilities.

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