ARUNDEL GOOD GOVERNMENT CLUB OF BALTIMORE: Mrs. George Huntingdon Williams.

CHAMBER OF COMMERCE OF CLEVELAND, OHIO: Harry A. Garfield.

CIVIC CLUB OF PHILADELPHIA: Mrs. I. M. Oakley, Mrs. George Burnham, Jr., Mrs. Charles Richardson, Mrs. C. R. Woodruff.

CIVIC CLUB, HARTFORD: Mrs. Appleton R. Hillyer, Miss Annie R. Trumbull.

CIVIC SERVICE HOUSE, BOSTON: Meyer Bloomfield.

LIBRARY HALL ASSOCIATION OF CAMBRIDGE: Richard Henry Dana, Samuel Usher.

MASSACHUSETTS REFORM CLUB: Winslow Warren, A. M. Howe, C. H. Fiske, Jr.

MASSACHUSETts State FedERATION OF WOMEN'S CLUBS: Mrs. May Alden Ward.

CONNECTICUT STATE FEDERATION OF WOMEN'S CLUBS: Miss Rebecca D. Beach, Mrs. H. W. Gerard.

MAYOR'S ASSOCIATION OF CONNECTICUT: Cyrus C. Beck

with.

MERCHANTS' ASSOCIATION OF NEW YORK: William R.

Corwine.

MUNICIPAL LEAGUE OF PHILADELPHIA: George Burnham, Jr., Charles Richardson, Clinton Rogers Woodruff, Stuart Wood, L. J. Lautenbach.

MUNICIPAL LEAGUE OF PROVIDENCE: Thomas W. Bicknell, John C. Pegrem, Amasa M. Eaton, Charles Sisson, William H. Spencer.

MUNICIPAL LEAGUE OF MELROSE: Henry Brown, Charles C. Barry, Charles E. Schaedel.

TWENTIETH CENTURY CLUB, BOSTON: Edward H. Chandler, Charles H. Adams, Prescott F. Hall, Robert Treat Paine, Jr.

WOMEN'S HEALTH PROTECTIVE ASSOCIATION, BROOKLYN, N. Y.: Mrs. James Scrimgeour, Mrs. Jere Johnson, Jr.

HEALTH PROTECTIVE ASSOCIATION OF PHILADELPHIA: Mrs. M. B. Mallon.

MEETINGS OF THE LEAGUE.

THE

HE headquarters of the League during the period of the meeting were at the Hotel Somerset on Commonwealth Avenue. The hours from 9.30 to 11.30 on the morning of the 12th were occupied by a meeting of the Council. The proceedings at the several general sessions of the League, commencing on the morning of the 12th, were as follows:

THE

FIRST SESSION.

HOTEL SOMERSET, THURSDAY MORNING, DECEMBER 12.

'HE League convened at 11.30 o'clock, a. m., the President, Dr. Daniel C. Gilman, in the chair.

The minutes of the last annual meeting having been printed and distributed, the reading of the same was, on motion, omitted.

The annual report of the Council was presented and read by Charles J. Bonaparte, of Maryland, Chairman of the Council. It was moved that the report be accepted, and that it be printed with the proceedings of the meeting, and the motion was carried.*

The report of the Committee on the Civil Service in Dependencies, was presented and read by the chairman of that Committee, Clinton Rogers Woodruff of Philadelphia. It was moved that the report be accepted and referred to the Council to be selected by the League at its session of tomorrow, for such action as, in its judgment, may be necessary; and the motion was carried. †

The report of the Committee on Superannuation was presented and read by the chairman of that Committee, Richard

*Printed in full at page 29.

+ Printed in full at page 33.

Henry Dana of Boston. On motion this also was accepted and referred to the Council for such action as, in its judgment, may be necessary.*

The Secretary, for the Committee on Legislation, made a verbal report with reference to measures now pending in Congress. He stated that the file of bills introduced at the opening of the session had been carefully examined; that all those relating in any way to the organization of the civil service had been set aside for the Committee's consideration, and that the Committee expected to propose to the League whatever action concerning each might in future prove necessary. He mentioned in particular the following measures:

(1) A bill extending the preference in competitive appointments to disabled veterans, over civilians, to all veterans of the Civil War, without regard to personal necessities resulting from disability. This measure, which is similar to the bill originating in the Senate at the last session and defeated then, largely through the opposition of the League, had been presented in the House by Representative Grosvenor of Ohio;

(2) The bills to reorganize the Consular Service, substantially similar to those pending at the last session, which have been reintroduced in the Senate and House by Mr. Lodge and Mr. Adams respectively; the bill of Senator Lodge, however, containing some important amendments suggested by the conference of commercial bodies organized during the summer at Buffalo;

(3) The various bills providing for the retirement of superannuated employees. The latter would be referred for consideration to the League's special committee on Superannuation.

The Secretary, on behalf of the Committee on Legislation, also called attention to the proposed introduction of a bill to transfer to the classified service the 2,500 clerks still remaining on the rolls of the Census office, who were appointed on the nomination of members of Congress, after pass examinations. To render these clerks eligible to appointment in the classified service, without further examination, would exclude virtually all appointments from the clerical lists of the Civil Service Commission for possibly two or three years, and would

* Printed in full at page 40.

nullify the Commission's work to that degree. The Committee proposed to adopt every practicable means to oppose such a bill if it be introduced*. On motion the report was received.

The order of miscellaneous business having been reached, Mr. Richardson of Buffalo asked what progress had been made toward securing a construction of the Federal civil service law as to the legality or propriety of payments of salary to persons appointed to positions in the classified service without compliance with the provisions of the rules-a matter considered at the last previous annual meeting of the League. The Secretary stated that, while the Law Committee had been considering this subject during the year, a most satisfactory solution had been reported from Washington within the past two or three days, President Roosevelt having issued an executive order forbidding fiscal officers to pay the salaries of any persons whose appointment has been shown to be irregular, and amending the rules in other important respects. These he outlined as follows:

I. That Government officers and employees shall give sworn testimony betore the Commission when required to do so in connection with its investigations;

II. That where an appointing officer declines to make regular appointment from a register containing less than three names and insists upon making a temporary appointment, the temporary_appointment shall be made from such register;

III. That whenever the Commission shall find that any person is holding a position in the civil service in violation of the civil service act and rules, it shall, after notice to the person affected, certify to the head of the proper department information of the violation, and it such person be not then dismissed within thirty days, the Commission shall give notice of the fact to the proper disbursing and auditing officers, who shall not then permit to be paid to such person any salary or wages accruing after the receipt of such notice; provided that any question of law which may thus be raised respecting the power to appoint or employ may be submitted by the

*The effect of the passage of legislation of this character, and of the passage of the preference bill, is explained in more detail in the remarks of Mr. Foulke, printed on page 49.j

President or head of department to the Attorney General for opinion.

IV. That no person shall be transferred from one classified position to another unless such person actually served for six months in the office in which he became classified, or in some position therein which at the time of the request for his transfer is within the competitive classified service.

At the suggestion of the Secretary, Mr. Foulke, of the U. S. Civil Service Commission, explained the effect of the fourth amendment in detail, showing that it would prevent in future the practice of appointing postal clerks without examination, by sending them to small local post-offices immediately in advance of the classification of such offices, and transferring them afterward to competitive offices in larger post offices, or in the departments at Washington.

Mr. Everett P. Wheeler of New York then read a paper entitled "How to Specialize Civil Service Examinations Most Effectively". Some discussion followed, in the course of which it was stated by Col. Ela of the Chicago Civil Service Commission, Mr. Potts of New York, and others, that their experience had led them to believe that, so far as practicable, examinations should be held for classes of positions rather than for individual positions, and that the employment of special examinations should be confined, as far as practicable, to those positions of peculiar character-professional, scientific and otherwise-that are not classifiable in grades, and the qualifications for which must be ascertained with reference to the peculiar duties to be performed.

The Secretary then read a paper written by Mr. Edward Cary of New York, who was unable himself to be present, on "The Standard of Merit in the Higher Offices".t

The order of reports from local Associations having been reached, the President called upon Mr. Charles J. Bonaparte, of Baltimore, to report for Maryland:

Mr. Bonaparte reported that, while there had been plenty of work in a general way for reformers in that State during the past year, the Civil Service Reform Association had not been particularly active. The hopes entertained at one time that the Merit System would be applied

* Page 58.

+ Page 63.