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agree that "public office is a public trust," and should be bestowed and exercised for the public good and not for private ends.

Every intelligent man admits that the Civil Service of the government depends upon the qualifications of the officer for the position he fills, and not the mere political opinions he may entertain.. It is not intended to interfere with or destroy parties, which are believed to be essential to the faithful and honest administration of government. One party is necessary to look after and criticise the short-comings of the other. But parties should be based on principle, and not the cohesive power of public plunder. A public servant should be held to a faithful discharge of his public duty, and not held as the henchman to do dirty work. For a candidate to pay money for his election is confessedly bribery, and to purchase his preferment by the promise of office is in every sense political bribery.

It is not expected nor desired that the party in power should not reward its adherents. It is but the popular decree issued at the ballot-box. The appointing power and the responsibility for selection should be left where the laws have placed it, and those in authority should not be harassed by intermediaries urging the appointment of their henchmen and partisans. No reformer will dispense with political parties, nor with their efficient organization for all legitimate purposes. It is a false assumption to claim that they have no higher aim or object than the mere fruits of office. The British Civil Service has been freed from partisau control, and yet no more bitter, active, or unrelenting political contest has been witnessed in that kingdom than was seen in their last election. The Civil Service law existed in this country during our last presidential election, and yet for bitterness, unscruplousness, and personal detraction its like had not theretofore been seen.

That the public service has been purified and elevated by the efforts of the Civil Service Commissioners, aided and sustained as they have been by the president, cannot be successfully denied. That the clerical service is being rendered more and more efficient is sincerely believed to be true. To accomplish this, the whole time of the Commissioners is required in the discharge of their unpleasant duties — unpleasant because they are compelled to resist the importunities and complaints of friends, the mistrust and cavils of their opponents, and the denunciations of the many who may fail to secure positions. The Civil Service law is the great breakwater to many politicians, who employ it as an excuse for failure to secure positions for friends, and sometimes unjustly attack the law and those who execute it.

The duties of the Commissioners extend throughout the thirtyeight States and Territories of the Union. They have to supervise the examination and employment of about 15,000 employees, which requires the exercise of mind, tact and energy. They are the hardest worked and most poorly paid of any officers of the government, when their responsibilities and duties are considered.

As this reform has come to stay, it is highly important that the best talent should be placed at the command of the president in order to secure the services of such men as are willing to fill the office for a reasonable compensation, and not accept the position merely through the hope of filling it temporarily as a stepping stone to future preferment; for the character of the Commissioner, the ability and disinterestedness with which he discharges his duty, and the ardor with which he may enlist in the cause will go far towards elevating the service, and render it more efficient by the knowledge derived from experience which contented and faithful service alone can render.

APPENDIX F.

CIVIL SERVICE STATUTES,

AMENDED RULES,

REGULATIONS, ETC.-STATE ACT, RULES, REGULATIONS, ETC.

ORGANIZATION OF THE NEW YORK CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION.

Commissioners.-John Jay, New York; Augustus Schoonmaker, Kingston; Henry A. Richmond, Buffalo.

Officers, etc. President, John Jay; Chief Examiner, James E. Morrison; Secretary, Clarence B. Angle; Stenographer,Clerk, John C. Birdseye.

General office in Capitol, Albany.

General Board of Examiners at Albany. - Hiram E. Sickels, Chairman; Charles W. Cole, Willis E. Merriman, Richard G. Milks, Charles V. Hooper, Secretary.

THE CIVIL SERVICE STATUTES.

AN ACT to regulate and improve the Civil Service of the State of New York (chap. 354), passed May 4, 1883, as amended by chapter 357, passed May 24, 1884, and chapter 410, passed May 29,

1884.

SECTION 1. The governor is authorized to appoint, by and with the advice and consent of the senate, three persons, not more than two of whom shall be adherents of the same party, as Civil Service Commissioners, and said three commissioners shall constitute the New York Civil Service Commission. They shall hold no other official place under the State of New York. The governor may remove any commissioner; and any vacancy in the position of commissioner shall be so filled by the governor, by and with the advice and consent of the senate, as to conform to said conditions for the first selection of commissioners. The three commissioners

shall each receive a salary of two thousand dollars a year. And each of said commissioners shall be paid his necessary traveling expenses incurred in the discharge of his duty as a commissioner. § 2. It shall be the duty of said commission:

First. To aid the governor, as he may request, in preparing suitable rules for carrying this act into effect; and when said rules

shall have been promulgated, it shall be the duty of all officers of the State of New York, in the departments and offices to which any such rules may relate, to aid, in all proper ways, in carrying said rules, and any modification thereof, into effect.

Second. And, among other things, said rules shall provide and declare, as nearly as the conditions of good administration will warrant, as follows:

1. For open, competitive examinations for testing the fitness of applicants for the public service now classified or to be classified hereunder. Such examinations shall be practical in their character and, so far as may be, shall relate to those matters which will fairly test the relative capacity and fitness of the persons examined to discharge the duties of that service into which they seek to be appointed.

2. All the offices, places and employments so arranged or to be arranged in classes shall be filled by selections from among those graded highest as the results of such competitive examinations.

3. There shall be a period of probation before any absolute appointment or employment aforesaid.

4. Promotions from the lower grades to the higher shall be on the basis of merit and competition.

5. No person in the public service is for that reason under any obligation to contribute to any political fund, or to render any political service, and no person shall be removed or otherwise prejudiced for refusing to do so.

6. No person in said service has any right to use his official authority or influence to coerce the political action of any person or body.

7. There shall be non-competitive examinations when competition may not be found practical.

8. Notice shall be given in writing by the appointing power to said commission of the person selected for appointment or employment from among those who have been examined, of the place of residence of such persons, of the rejection of any such persons after probation, of transfers, resignations and removals, and of the date thereof, and a record of the same shall be kept by said commission. And any necessary exceptions from said eight fundamental provisions of the rules shall be set forth in connection with such rules, and the reasons therefor shall be stated in the annual reports of the commission.

Third. Said commission shall, subject to the rules that may be made by the governor, make regulations for, and have control of such examinations, and, through its members or the examiners, it shall supervise and preserve the records of the same; and said commission shall keep minutes of its own proceedings.

Fourth. Said commission may make investigations concerning the facts, and may report upon all matters touching the enforcement and effect of said rules and regulations, and concerning the action of any examiner or board of examiners hereinafter provided for, and its own subordinates, and those in the public service, in respect to the execution of this act; and, in the course of such investigations, each commissioner and their secretary shall have power to administer oaths.

Fifth. Said commission shall make an annual report to the governor for transmission to the Legislature, showing its own action, the rules and regulations and the exceptions thereto in force, the practical effects thereof, and any suggestion it may approve for the more effectual accomplishment of the purposes of this act.

* § 3. Said commission is authorized to employ a chief examiner, a part of whose duty it shall be, under its direction, to act with the examining boards so far as practicable, whether at Albany or elsewhere, and to secure accuracy, uniformity and justice in all their proceedings, which shall be at all times open to him. The chief examiner shall be entitled to receive a salary at the rate of $3,600 a year, and he shall be paid his necessary traveling expenses incurred in the discharge of his duty. The commission is authorized to employ a secretary, who may be one of its own number, who shall receive a compensation of $1,000 per annum, and who shall also be paid his necessary traveling expenses incurred in the discharge of his duty, and also a person to act as stenographer and copyist, who shall be entitled to receive a compensation of $1,000 a year, or in its discretion may from time to time employ stenographers and copyists at an expense not to exceed in the aggregate the sum of $1,000 a year. The commission may appoint a messenger, to act also as clerk, at a salary not exceeding $900 a year, and may dismiss him at pleasure. The commission may, at Albany, and in any other part of the State where examinations are to take place, designate and select a suitable number of persons in the official service of the State of New York, after consulting the head of the department or office in which such person serves, or, in its discretion, persons not in the official service, to be members of boards of examiners, and may at any time substitute any other person in or out of such service in place of any one so selected. Any person not at the time in the official service of the State, or of any political division thereof, serving as a member of the board of examiners, shall be entitled to compensation for every day actually and necessarily spent in the discharge of his duty as examiner at the rate of five dollars a day; but the aggregate compensation of any such examiner shall not exceed $100 in any year. It shall be the duty of the officers of the State of New York, or of any political division

*As amended by section 1 of chapter 357, passed May 24, 1884.

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