New York, N. Y.: Everett P. Wheeler, R. R. Bowker, Norwich, Conn.: William Appleton Aiken. Providence, R. I.: L. F. C. Garvin, Amasa M. Eaton, Philadelphia, Pa.: R. Francis Wood, Lincoln L. Eyre, Westchester Co., N. Y.: Frederick W. Holls. A general invitation was extended to such as desired to listen to the address of Mr. George William Curtis, the President of the League, and the church was well filled by an intelligent and appreciative audience. Mr. Curtis spoke as follows: THE YEAR'S WORK IN Civil-Service Reform. Ar the last annual meeting of the National civil-service reform league, two resolutions were unanimously adopted which announced the special objects to be sought by the league and the friends of reform during the year now ended. One of the resolutions recommended to all the reform associations in the country to make strenuous and unceasing efforts to secure the repeal of the laws of the United States which fix the tenure of certain ad ministrative offices at four years. The other resolution urged the associations to spare no efforts to procure the passage of laws extending the principles of the reform bill to the civil service of the states and cities of the country. It is now my duty to report to you what progress has been made in accomplishing these results. The limitations imposed by the law of 1820 and by the subsequent acts upon the term of certain offices, was an abandonment of the practice that prevailed during the first 30 years of the government, and the change was introduced for the purpose of vacating the offices that they might be filled by the appointing It power. It was intended to facilitate the prostitution of the public service to personal and party ends, and the result has fully proved the sagacity of the political schemers who designed the law. Six years after the law was passed, a special committee of the Senate declared that it defeated its own professed object by turning out faithful officers instead of retaining them. That is to say, it defeated its professed purpose by accomplishing its real purpose. did not improve the public service of the country, but it greatly benefited the private service of the politicians who controlled the patronage. The law of 1820 and the subsequent acts vacate during every presidential term the offices upon which the vast multitude of minor places in the public service depend, and, as re-appointment is not necessarily secured by official fidelity and efficiency, but is determined by personal and political favor and intrigue, the public employè is naturally engaged in propitiating the influence which can retain him in place. This is one of the most obvious ways in which the spoils system strikes at the self-respect of the public employè, and at the same time influences the zeal of the office-seeker to cultivate a still stronger influence to thrust the incumbent from his position. In accordance with the recommendation of the National league, the reasons of the proposed action were submitted to the country. When Congress met in December a bill repealing the acts in question was introduced in both houses, and petitions signed by eminent citizens were presented from various states asking the passage of the bill. The appeal was pressed before the committee of the House with ample knowledge, eloquence, and ability by committees of the league and of local associations who went to Washington for the purpose, and the passage of the bill repealing the four years' tenure was unanimously recommended to the House by the committee on reform in the civil service. Meanwhile signs of some reaction of feeling upon the subject naturally appeared. At the opening of the session of Congress, both Houses in filling the minor positions in their service utterly disregarded the fundimental principle of the reform bill which they had passed a year before. This action was followed early in the session by two propositions introduced in the House of Representatives to repeal the law, and at the same time Mr. Pendleton, whose name is honorably associated with the reform bill, was defeated in the Legislature of Ohio for reëlection to the Senate of the United States. His advocacy of reform was one of the objections which were warmly urged against him; and his successful competitor, in a public speech after his election, showed his utter want of sympathy with the reform spirit, as well as his total ignorance of the practical methods and scope of the reformed system. Such re-actionary tendencies, however, are not surprising, nor are they discouraging. There are always bats and owls overtaken by the rising sun, but, despite their blinking and hooting and fluttering, the sun" goes marching on." It was on the 21st of April that Mr. Mutchler of Pennsylvania moved in the House of Representatives to suspend the rules to take up the bill to repeal the four years' law, which was unanimously recommended by the committee on reform in the civil service. Mr. McMillin of Tennessee opposed the repeal on the ground that the tenure of office act requiring the consent of the Senate for the removal of an officer would create a life tenure, and Mr. McMillin deprecated a life tenure as intolerable, arguing that if an officer be faithful it is but little trouble to reappoint him, but if he is not faithful, he thought that his term of service should be allowed to expire, and that then without any executive act he should be dropped from the service. It seemed not to have occurred to Mr. McMillin that, if it be little trouble to reappoint such an officer, it is still less trouble to leave him undisturbed until there is some proper reason for disturbing him. Nor did Mr. McMillin appear to see clearly that the executive oath honestly to enforce the laws requires not that an unfaithful officer should be allowed to serve out his term, but that he should be peremptorily dismissed as soon as his unfaithfulness is known. The abuse of the four years' law is not that inefficient officers are suffered to drop from the service at the end of their terms, but that efficient officers are dropped when their terms end, and, although it is but little trouble to renominate them, they are not renominated, because their places are wanted not for the public advantage but for party or personal profit. And it is for the very reason that this wrong is effected without any executive act of removal that the repeal of the law is sought, in order that the responsibility for the removal of faithful officers shall rest in the eyes of the country where it belongs, upon the appointing power. The present laws serve the purpose for which they were designed, namely, to place all the officers at the disposition of the president and to enable him for any political or personal purpose, noiselessly and without an order of removal, to dismiss any officer, however faithful, capable, and experienced he may be. There is no more ingenious device than the four-years' law for promoting, as Mr. Jefferson said, intrigue and corruption, and the constant and demoralizing greed of place. Having earnestly protested against the repeal and warned the House against a life tenure, Mr. McMillen concluded by de |