as soon as the people of the nation make known their desire for the adoption and application of a thorough-going merit system for appointments in the civil service, just so soon will the political organizations provide for it. The system itself, as Roosevelt has said, is as democratic as the public school system. It should have the same attention in the nation, the states and all of the civil divisions of the states as is given to the principle of public education.

Much public discussion has taken place in the last year over the alleged failure of the great political parties to represent clearly differentiated principles, but so long as patronage, federal, state and local, remains to be fought for as a major aim of political organizations parties can never be made to function primarily as sincere and courageous organs of public opinion and exponents of political principles. The way to make principles rule is to abolish all spoils.

PROGRESS AND THE FUTURE

By Samuel H. Ordway

Annual Address of Acting President
of the League

The National Civil Service Reform League is to be congratulated upon the progress made during the past

year.

Just a year ago, during the sessions of the annual meeting of the League, President Coolidge, in his First Message to the Congress, emphasized his support of the Merit System, saying, "The best method for selecting public servants is the Merit System." In that Message he also advocated the classification of postmasters at first, second and third class offices, and the repeal of the four year term of office. He also recommended that the field service for prohibition enforcement should be brought within the Classified Civil Service without covering in the present membership.

In his Second Annual Message sent to the Congress a few days ago President Coolidge reasserted the same views and recommendations, saying, "The Merit System has long been recognized as the correct basis for employment in our Civil Service. * Whatever its defects, the Merit System is certainly to be preferred to the Spoils System."

*

It is evident that the League has the hearty support of President Coolidge in its advocacy of the Merit System, and may be confident that the President will not only oppose any backward step, but will advocate progressive measures.

The League is to be congratulated upon the passage into law of the Rogers Bill for the reorganization and improvement of the Foreign Service, which took effect on July 1, 1924. This Act constitutes the most note

worthy forward step which has been taken with regard to our foreign service in more than one hundred years. For many years our foreign service has been neither adequately organized, nor adequately equipped, and the compensation and allowances for expenses have been insufficient to attract the most desirable men unless they happened to possess large private means. Down to the administration of President Roosevelt and President Taft appointments to diplomatic and consular positions were generally made for political reasons, and those offices were treated as the spoils of Party victory. In 1919 the League, through a special committee, made a careful investigation of, and issued an exhaustive report, covering the whole situation, recommending certain specific changes in the law. The report of the League's committee aroused very general public interest, and various business organizations throughout the country interested themselves in the subject because of the direct bearing that an efficient foreign service has upon the development of our foreign trade. Largely as the result the Bill introduced by Congressman John Jacob Rogers, of Massachusetts, who has for many years shown a keen interest in and an intelligent grasp of the needs of the foreign service, has become law. The more important provisions of this Act are as follows:

(1) The amalgamation of the diplomatic and consular services into a single foreign service on an interchangeable basis. This relieves the present inelasticity and the limitations upon the present consular career and makes it possible effectually to co-ordinate the political and economic branches of the service.

(2) The adoption of a new and uniform salary scale with a view to broadening the field of selection by increasing the compensation of the positions and by eliminating the necessity for private incomes and per

mitting the relative merits of candidates to be adjudged on the basis of ability alone.

(3) The granting of representation allowances which, if appropriated by Congress, will lessen the demands on the private fortunes of Ambassadors and Ministers, and render it practicable to promote a greater number of trained officers to those positions.

(4) The extension of the Civil Service Retirement and Pension Act with modifications appropriate to the foreign service.

All of these provisions were recommended by the League's special committee.

Following the passage of this Act, and in order to carry out its provisions, President Coolidge has issued two executive orders of great importance, which provide for putting into effect other recommendations of the League's special committee. They provide for a strengthening of the examination system for original entrance, first, by the creation of an examining board to maintain control over all applications and examinations for entrance and promotion in the service, and second, by the creation of a foreign service school in the Department of State in Washington. A new foreign service personnel board is created to have control of the foreign service school and of all the examining work, including the maintenance of service records for all members of the foreign service. The service records are to constitute the chief factor in determining the eligibility of candidates for promotion. Provision also is made that in case of a vacancy in a post of minister the personnel board shall recommend on the basis of the service records those candidates who in the discretion of the board merit consideration for promotion from the lower grades to the rank of minister.

By the adoption of these reforms through legislative and executive action the United States has laid the

foundation for a foreign service which will become equal, if not superior, to the foreign service of any other nation. Secretary Hughes has informed the League that in the first six months of the operation of the Rogers law and the executive orders adopted thereunder the records of 120 diplomatic and 520 consular officers have been scrutinized. Eight diplomatic and thirteen consular officials with records below the standard required by the personnel board have been demoted. Two of the diplomatic officers affected by this action of the personnel board have resigned. An unassigned list of officials has been abolished and five diplomatic officers were not reinstated. Through the operation of the newly created superannuation system one diplomatic and thirty-one consular officers over the age of sixty-five have been retired. These figures bear ample testimony to the benefits to the nation which may be derived from the new system.

Too much praise cannot be given to Secretary Hughes for his constant support of the Rogers Bill during its passage through the Congress, and for his actions in carrying into effect its provisions. He has been at all times a most earnest believer in and supporter of the principles of the Merit System.

I believe that the public at large does not generally understand the importance of these reforms in our foreign service. Mr. John T. Doyle, Secretary of the United States Civil Service Commission, has written to the League that "the final conquest of patronage in the foreign service seems to have been attained." We all hope that Mr. Doyle may be right, but it must be borne in mind that, so far as the present strict observance of the Merit System is concerned, the law is not compulsory and that it is in the power of future Presidents and Secretaries of State to retrogress. The pressure of a sustained, watchful and insistent public