Proceedings at the Forty-First Annual Meeting of the National Civil Service Reform League at Detroit, Michigan PUBLISHED BY THE NATIONAL CIVIL SERVICE REFORM LEAGUE 8 West 40th Street New York Morning Session, Hotel Statler Richard Henry Dana, President of the League, presided. The Annual Report of the Council of the League was read by Hon. Arthur R. Kimball, and upon motion, the report was adopted. The report is as follows: REPORT OF THE COUNCIL. The new administration which went into office March 4, 1921, was pledged by its platform to see "that the civil service law shall be thoroughly and honestly enforced and extended." President Harding wrote this League that "The time has come for the federal government to organize its agencies of employment in accordance with the principles which have been tested and approved by the best modern business practice. I believe the Republican Party concurs and will give relief not only in words but in deeds. It is outrageous for public administration, which should be an example and a guide to our people, to indulge in waste and extravagant inefficiency. Though the necessity for a budget system is great, perhaps even greater is the need for a system which will give federal employes a square deal in promotions, pay and continuity of service while obtaining for the nation's taxpayers, in return, a high standard of skill and continued loyalty among the employes who serve them. "If I may apply these principles and suggest legislation which furthers them, I trust that I will find in your League a great assistant whose long and conscientious study and service will be of greatest value. "I understand from you that your program of correction, remedy and betterment includes: "A larger appropriation for the Civil Service Commission and a wider acceptance of its counsels. "An extension, under tests, of the merit system of appointment and promotion to a larger group of federal employes, not to create a bureaucratic inflexibility which would rob a great private business as well as a great public business of its efficiency, but to give promise to those of merit and capacity that federal employment has all the stimulus of competition and reward that is offered elsewhere in private business. "A readjustment of rates of pay, and of the system of making these rates, to the end that several hundred thousand faithful employes shall have recompense sufficient to hold them content in service and that incompetent persons and those doing overlapping work shall not continue to receive the money of our taxpayers. "A closer contact between federal employes and the Civil Service Commission, so that, representing the Government, the Commission may act for the employer as the friend of the employe, hear and adjust his grievences and be closely associated with his promotions and be a close observer of his efficiency. This will save unrest and waste and assist the heads of the ten departments in the now impossible task of deciding employment questions. "If these are your policies, they are all one with mine.” At the time this important letter was written, Congress had before it the Report of a Congressional Joint Commission describing in great detail: (a) "Serious discontent among the federal employes;" (c) (d) (f) "Much injustice and inefficiency;" "Unbusinesslike handling of service;" A turnover of 33 per cent, which amounts almost to an and it said: First: "The United States Government, the largest employer in the world, is without a central employment agency having adequate powers; in short, without an employment policy. This lack of comprehensive and consistent employment policy, and of a central agency fully empowered to administer it, has produced most glaring inequalities and incongruities in salary schedules, pay-roll titles and departmental organization with much resultant injustice, dissatisfaction, inefficiency and waste." These conditions have driven over 75 per cent of the federal employes into the ranks of union labor, if we may credit the statement of the official organ of the National Federation of Federal Employees, an organization limited to the government service, but affiliated with the American Federation of Labor. These conditions call for prompt and effective remedy. Tó aid the President as he had requested, this League prepared a bill to carry out the recommendation of the Joint Congressional Commission for establishing a comprehensive national employment system for all federal employes in the executive civil service based upon principles of merit and justice and using for the promotion of economy, efficiency and loyalty only those devices of modern employment which have been thoroughly tested and have been found in practice to produce the desired results. The League believes that to render employes loyal, they must be justly treated and that its bill will meet every reasonable test of fairness and justice. It feels confident that the bill embodies the best thought and experience on modern scientific employment; that it is a measure of economy. But above all, the League believes that if it should become law, its enactment will leave no occasion and no excuse for the affiliation of federal employes with outside labor organizations; this with the assent of the federal employes themselves. It has always been the essential principle of civil service reform that the public service belongs to the whole people and not to any class or party. Notwithstanding the urgency of this situation, which the President seems to recognize, Congress has failed to take action and the President has been occupied with petty and troublesome questions of patronage. For example, one year after the President wrote the League the letter quoted above, he is reported to have written to a surveyor-general of the Land Office in Utah (surely a technical position with duties which can have nothing to do with politics): "I need not tell you of the current demand for the recognition of aspirants within our party for consideration in the matter of patronage. I take you to be a practical man who knows of these developments with a sweeping change in National administration. Under all these circumstances I would like to have a new appointment in the office which you occupy." Again the President has been pestered with requests for special exceptions from the civil service rules which govern all citizens, other than those who can extract these marks of special favor. Forty-three such favors have been extracted in seven months. For example, the position of superintendent of prisons is excepted from the rules and the President's brother-in-law, the Reverend Heber Votaw, appointed without test or examination as to his qualifications. While these exceptions are lawful and may have at least plausible reasons, it is unfortunate that the President should be called upon to determine who should and who should not receive special consideration. If he gives these matters careful attention it must distract his attention from important matters, and it is very unfortunate to place a premium upon importunity and extend an undemocratic system of favoritism. |