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Theoretically, the examinations for promotions should be increased in difficulty proportionately to the rank of the places to be filled. So far as the three higher grades of clerkships are concerned, it has been found practically impossible, with the present organization of the Board, to carry this theory into practice. To prepare a separate set of questions and hold a separate examination for each vacancy in each of the three higher grades in each of the seventeen offices of the Department would require more labor than could possibly be spared for the purpose. The practice has been to fill all the vacancies in the upper grades of an office from one examination, certifying the highest of all the competitors on the list for the vacancies in class four, when any exist, the highest of the clerks of class two and class one for the vacancies in class three, and the highest of the clerks of class one for the vacancies in class two. This plan has been found to work well. Were different duties assigned to different grades of clerks, as in the custom-houses, a distinct examination for each grade would be required. As a matter of fact the duties of the clerks do not usually change upon promotion; but it has been the practice to retain a man who has been doing a certain kind of work satisfactorily on the same work after promotion. The question in making promotions is not who is the fittest man to perform the technical duties of the grade in which the vacancy exists, for there are no such technical duties, but who is the best man in the place he now holds; and this question the mode of examination adopted is best fitted to decide. Whenever, however, there is vacant a clerkship requi ringspecial qualifications, which the general examination usually employed is not competent to test, a special examination. can readily be prepared for the purpose.

It is a noticeable fact, and one that has an important bearing on the question of the efficacy of examinations as tests of competency, that clerks of the higher grades, as a rule, pass better examinations than those of the lower. (See Appendix, Table E.) This fact bears a lesson for both the advocates and the opponents of Civil Service reform. To the former, who believe in the examination as a test of competency, it proves, what was before apparent to those familiar with the Treasury. Department, at least under its present administration, that, whatever particular exceptions there may have been, promotions have, as a rule, been made on account of merit; while to the latter, satisfied with the justice of the former system, it shows that the examination, no less than the practical test, rates men according to their real value.

The remark is opportune at this point, that, despite many marked and often notorious exceptions, political reasons did not have so con

trolling a weight in making promotions in the Department under the old system as is commonly supposed. In the first place, however earnest an advocate of the system of rewarding so-called political services by public position the head of an office might be, he could not fail to see that, in order to insure the success of his administration, he must have competent men in the more important and responsible positions under him. The competency of the better clerks also becomes known, to a greater or less extent, throughout the Department, and thus a sort of popular sentiment in their favor is created, which no chief of an office desiring the good opinion of those around him would care to outrage too often by the promotion of political favorites over their heads.

The average of competency and efficiency throughout the Departments might doubtless be largely increased, but there are in every office men of culture, capacity, and administrative ability, possessing often high literary or legal acquirements, whose services are worth much more than the meagre salaries which they receive, and whose stay in public employ is a matter of surprise to all who know their worth. Men of this class have usually won their way by force of merit to the higher places in the Department, and hence few of them have come before the Board, so that their excellence has made but little impress on the results of the examinations. Lest this tribute to their worth, and the fact that they are willing to remain in the service, should be understood as qualifying the remarks elsewhere made in regard to the insufficiency of salaries, it should be mentioned that the greater part of them were thrown out of business or professional employment by the late war, and entered the Department during its continuance or shortly after its close, accepting employment under Government in most cases as a temporary makeshift until they should be able to resume their former pursuits. Once here they found themselves out of the current of private business; the ties which bound them to their former professional or business associates became weaker and weaker until their severance from their old pursuits was complete, and the temporary makeshift came to be a permanent pursuit, or at least as permanent as the uncertain tenure of public office would permit it to be. Of late years, men of this class have rarely entered the Department, and the service has been gradually depleted of those already in it by private persons or corporations, who have by chance or business intercourse learned their worth and have been willing to pay them adequately for their services. In those offices which are brought most in contact with the business world this depletion of the service of its

best men has been very marked, and many instances could be given of men of brilliant talent whom offers of better pay have drawn away

from the Department.

The fear which has been often expressed that the provision of the rules which permits all the clerks of lower grades to compete for vacancies in the higher grades, instead of limiting the competition to the grade next below that in which the vacancy exists, would result in the advancement of clerks of lower grades to high positions over their superiors in rank and efficiency, to the detriment of the service, has not been justified by experience. But four instances have occurred where a clerk was promoted more than one grade on one examination, and in one of those the promotion was not forced on the head of the office, (since the other names presented for the place were those of clerks of the next lower grade,) but was made because of the unquestioned worth of the candidate. This result is due to the fact already mentioned, that, setting aside those of all grades whose low standing in the examination places them beyond the reach of promotion, candidates usually take rank in the examination according to their rank in their offices.

In considering the scope and nature of the examinations for admission, it should be borne in mind that, under the Civil Service rules, admission to the lowest grade of a group is, potentially, an appointment to the highest. The Department must draw upon the lowest grade, either directly or ultimately, to fill all the vacancies in all the higher grades that are within the rules. It is important, then, that admission to the service should be carefully guarded, and that something more should be exacted of a candidate than the capacity to perform the duties of the desk to which he may be at first assigned. That desk might be one at which nothing but simple copying was done, but it would be extremely unwise to require nothing more of him than that he should write legibly and neatly. The next week a vacancy might occur at a desk requiring a higher order of capacity, and it might be desirable to assign him to it. But if his attainments were limited to the ability to copy correctly, he would be unequal to the emergency, and it would be necessary to search elsewhere, perhaps at the expense of both time and convenience, for a person of the requisite capacity. The largest general intelligence and capacity that the salaries command should be required of persons entering the service. To exact anything less is to commit a wrong against both the Government and the candidates.

The examinations for admission are no more difficult than a large

portion of the work of the Department, and call for no greater knowledge. This work is now performed either indifferently, or by the better class of men chosen for the purpose from the mass. It certainly would be a great gain to the Department if the examinations could exact from all persons entering it capacity equal to the immediate performance of its most exacting duties.

The crying want of the Civil Service is adaptability, flexibility, ability to grasp new subjects. The routine positions can be filled more or less acceptably, but when a position requiring wider knowledge and more general capacity becomes vacant, it is difficult to fill it satisfactorily. A very dull or ignorant man, if he can but read and write, may acquire, under proper training, the ability to perform the duties of any one of a large portion of the minor positions in the Department; but his capacity will be limited to the duties which he has been taught. If the clerk at the next desk falls sick, he is too likely to be entirely unable to fill the vacant place. This want, Civil Service re*form aims to supply, by making the examinations for admission tests of general intelligence and capacity. So, in examinations for promotion, it is the aim of the system of examination to secure the promotion of the man of the widest knowledge both of general subjects and of the business of his office, and therefore of the largest capacity for usefulness.

The examinations would unquestionably furnish a more exact test of the candidates' knowledge, if the number of questions under each head could be somewhat increased. With the small number of questions on each subject to which the examination is limited by the time allowed, it is impossible to measure with perfect accuracy the relative attainments of a large number of candidates. It may chance that one candidate, although not possessing a larger fund of general knowledge. than another, has happened to acquire a greater familiarity with the questions set in the examination. Although the variances in standing resulting from this cause are not great and tend to offset each other, so as to make the general result a fair one, it is probable that mere accidental coincidence between the questions put and the strongest or weakest point in a candidate's knowledge sometimes introduces a disturbing element into the examination. This holds true especially as between various examinations, from one to another of which the standing of candidates is brought forward. It is impossible, even with the utmost care, to keep the examinations upon exactly the same level. There is no means of weighing with exactness the relative degrees of difficulty of different questions, and it sometimes hap

pens that a question, which appeared to the examiners extremely simple, proves a stumbling-block to a whole class of candidates, while those thought to be more complex are solved with readiness. This difficulty can be obviated only by increasing the number of questions under each head, so as to reduce the effect of the variations due to accidental causes to the smallest amount. The only difficulties in the way of such a change are, the limitation of each examination by the regulations to one official day, and the fact that the time of the officers and clerks of the Board, under even the present limited range of examination, is fully occupied.

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The second of the regulations governing examinations for promotion declares that, in such examinations, "due weight will be given to the efficiency with which the several candidates shall have previously performed their duties in the Department." In the practical enforcement of this provision, two questions at once presented themselves: How shall the efficiency be ascertained, and what is its due weight? It was apparent that it would be impracticable for the Board to make a satis factory personal examination into the efficiency of the large number of clerks who were likely to present themselves as candidates for promotion. It was thought most fit that the estimate of the efficiency of candidates should be made by the heads of the Bureaus in which they are employed. Accordingly, at the suggestion of the Board, the heads of the several Bureaus were requested by the Acting Secretary of the Treasury to meet the members of the Board, for the purpose of considering a proposition from it, that the head of each office should furnish an estimate of the efficiency of such of his clerks as should compete for promotion. It was not, however, the intention of the Board to submit to the decision of the meeting the weight to be given to the marks for efficiency. The result of the meeting was the adoption of the following resolution by the heads of Bureaus:

"Resolved, That it be recommended to the Advisory Board, that it adopt, as a part of the regulations for the Civil Service, that in all cases of the examination of candidates for promotion, of persons already in the Department, the Examining Board shall make their estimate of the relative qualification of the candidate on the basis of 100. The Chief of the Bureau to which an applicant may belong shall give his certificate to the Examining Board, wherein he shall rate the merits of the applicant, all qualifications considered, in figures, of which the maximum shall be fifty. He shall also state the specific work on which it is intended that he shall be employed. The Examining Board shall then, on examination, allow in figures, of which thirty

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