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of the service did not at once produce the effect of wholly curing all appointing officers of the widely prevailing spoils disease.
It was found that those of them who were unscrupulous enough to care more for party politics than for the public interest, as well as others who had not courage enough to stand up against the pressure of political influence, would make arbitrary removals for the purpose of opening a chance for some trick by which, in spite of the competitive system, they might put the favorites of power into the vacated places,—and not seldom they succeeded, either by way of arbitrary promotions, or of emergency appointments, or by other devices. And it may be said that nothing has done more to shake the popular belief in the good faith of the merit system than such dishonest practices.
To such artful violations of the spirit of the civil service law President McKinley's order is intended to put a stop. It does not make a removal subject to a formal judicial proceeding. It does not limit the discretion of the executive officer to an extent prejudicial to the discipline of the service; but it does make the reason assigned for every removal as well as the answer thereto a matter of public record, and it will thus render the executive officer for every removal from a place under the competitive rule amenable to the judgment of public opinion as well as to the judgment and the corresponding action of his superiors. The new rule, if carried out with fidelity and firmness, will thus be well apt to rid the service of a very offensive and dangerous abuse, and President McKinley fully deserves all the praise he has received for this achievement.
To secure the enforcement of the order the Secretary of the Treasury, Mr. Gage, with recommendable promptness issued excellent instructions to executive officers under the Treasury Department prescribing an appropriate mode of procedure, and containing the important injunction that reductions in grade and salary should be treated in all things like removals—this to put a stop to the tricky device followed by some unscrupulous executive officers, of forcing worthy public servants to resign by arbitrarily reducing them to a lower grade which they could not accept with self-respect—a practice most objectionable on account not only of its injustice, but also of its peculiarly sneaking character. This
