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examination with the highest credit, such certification to be accompanied by a detailed report showing the qualifications of each person certified. It provides, finally, for the readmission, under certain conditions, of persons separated from the service without fault or delinquency on their part, and also for the transfer, without examination, from the Department of State to the consular service, or from the consular service to the Department of State, of persons in a corresponding grade who have served for two years. There are no provisions with reference to removals.
The Burton bill provides likewise for a fixed classification and for original appointments to the sixth, or lowest, grade. It sets forth in detail the subjects of the examinations to be held for appointment to ordinary consulates, as well as to consulates that exercise and extra-territorial jurisdiction. The examining board is, however, to consist of the Secretary of State, or such person in the Department of State as the President shall designate, in conjunction with the Civil Service Commission—a provision which, I may remark by the way, seems to me preferable to that contained in the Lodge bill, for the reason that, to guard against the intrusion of influence the examining board should, as far as considerations of efficiency permit, be independent of the appointing power. The provisions regarding the recall of present incumbents for a qualifying examination, and the certification of five names for single appointments, and various other details, are the same as those in the Lodge bill. But the Burton bill finally provides that, after service of twelve months, “no consul shall be dismissed from the service except for due cause presented to him in writing, and he shall have power to defend himself from such charges as may be brought against him, and the board of three persons who shall be appointed by the President, from the consular service or from the Department of State, or both, shall weigh the charges brought against him, and his defence, if any, and may summon and examine witnesses.”
It is not my purpose to discuss the various features of these two bills further than to say that while they might, perhaps, in this or that particular point be strengthened by amendment, the contain very valuable provisions—I mean not only the essential requirement of full competition, but also the appointment to grade instead of localities, the promotion from lower
