and all who are examined cannot get offices, it is a plain duty to take effective precautions against a monopoly and injustice. It was therefore made the fundamental conditions (1) that notifications for examination shall be in the order entered upon the Record of receiving the applications, and (2) that certifications for appointment shall be in the order of grade on the Registers, no regard being had to the date of examination. The provision in Rule 16 as to remaining on a Register more than one year is to prevent a monopoly of the chances of an appointment.

DROPPING APPLICANTS FROM THE RECORDS.

But these conditions might not prevent large numbers getting upon the Records and Registers*, and thereby monopolizing for an unreasonable time the opportunities of examination and certification. So many might get upon a Record as to prevent for years any others being examined. To prevent this monopoly was the sole object of clause 3 of Rule 13, already cited, for dropping applicants from the Record. This precaution was indispensable, especially in the District of Columbia, in the States near Washington, and in a few others where the art and habit of office seeking were highly developed under the spoils system. There were more applicants in the District and four or five such States than in all the rest of the Union. At a few postoffices there were more applicants than it would be useful to examine in two or three years. See further facts on this subject in Table No. 8 of Appendix No. 6.

For such reasons, and in order to give other applicants their just opportunities, the Commission has lately exercised the authority conferred by that clause. Those dropped can, of course, again apply and take their chances for another six months. Doubtless some of them will complain that they were not retained on the Record until called for examination, but to admit that plea would be not only to disregard the just claims of others, but to make the dropping of any one impossible— in other words, to make an unjust monopoly easy and certain. The course adopted will strongly tend to caution in pressing unreasonably for examination. Applicants will have the good sense to inquire whether there are great numbers before them. In this matter, as in all others, the supply and demand, we think, will soon accommodate themselves to each other.

TIME AND PLACE OF HOLDING EXAMINATIONS.

Before an applicant or any other person takes the trouble to write the Commission concerning the time, place, or subjects of the examinations, he will do well to read what is said on these points in this report.

*The Records are the books in which the names of applicants for examination are entered. The Registers are the books in which the names of those found eligible for appointment after examination are entered.

He will doubtless find most of his questions more fully answered than the limited clerical force of the Commission enables it to answer in separate letters. It is a part of the object of the report to give clear and full information on those points. (See, especially, Instructions to Appli cants, to be found in Appendix No. 5.)

Many applicants ask when and where the next examination will be held before the Commission knows in what State they have their residence, what branch of the service they seek to enter, or whether they desire a General, Limited, or Special examination. It is only after the application has been sent in, giving exact information on these points, that the Commission has the facts needed for answering such questions. Even then it is not always possible to state the date and place of holding the next examination which should be attended by any particular applicant. If he is seeking to be examined for any office in the Customs or Postal service, the only answer to his question must be, if an examination has not already been ordered for the office, that these examinations are held with such frequency as are necessary to keep an adequate number on the Register, eligible for appointment, to fill the vacancies likely to happen. The examinations are not held at stated periods, irrespective of the fact whether they are necessary or not, but are held just as often as the public interests require. If he is seeking to be examined for the Departmental service, nearly the same observations apply, with these additional facts, that regard must be had to the need of apportioning the proper number to each State in the ratio of its population, as well as to the aggregate needs of the Department. Examinations for the Departmental service, using different grades of ques tions, are often held at the same time and place with examinations for the Customs and Postal service. Hence, in fixing a date, the convenience of more than one branch of the service is taken into account. When examinations for the Departmental service are held for the local convenience of applicants, at points other than where they are held for the Customs and Postal service also, such points are selected as will best accommodate the applicants from parts of several different States, if practicable. But these definite answers may always be given: First: that every applicant will receive due notice in writing of the time and place of the proper examination for him to attend; and second, that when all applicants cannot, by reason of lack of space in the examination room, or for other good reason, be notified for the same day, they will be notified subsequently in the order of the reception of their applications. And it must further be borne in mind that a particular examination may be primarily for those from a single State deficient in the number on its register, or only for those applying for some one of the special examinations, or for those who can supply the deficiency in those eligi ble for appointment of one grade or sex; in which event, only those who can supply that need may be notified, but always in the order of the applications.

It sometimes happens that an applicant living in the same village or county with another applicant, finding the latter but not himself notified of an examination, writes to the Commission to complain of injustice or to declare he has been forgotten. The explanation is likely to be that the grades or kinds of examination sought by the two applicants are quite different. One may be seeking examination for the Patent Office and the other for the State Department or Pension Office. The examination may be for males only or for one State only, and the two applicants of different sexes or residents of different States, though temporarily in the same State.

THE EXAMINERS.

The Civil Service Act requires the examiners, other than the Chief Examiner, to be selected by the Commission from among those in the official service of the United States. This was required by Congress not only in the interest of economy but to secure examiners who should be familiar with the real needs of the offices for which applicants were to be examined. They are paid no extra compensation. The Commission has used the greatest care in their selection in order to secure gentlemen of candor, good judgment, and concientiousness, united with a high order of intelligence and practical experience. We wish to bear testimony to the efficient and satisfactory manner in which, almost without exception, the duties of these Boards have been performed.

The result has shown what those best acquainted with the public service anticipated, that there are in every office and department officers ready to make sacrifices and efforts for the public good who welcome tests for admission which will substitute demonstrated merit for partisan influence and secret favor. Ample numbers have been found in the offices fully competent for conducting the examinations under the new system, which they believe will improve alike the reputation and the efficiency of that service of which they are a part and to the honor of which they are justly sensitive. Even if an appropriation could have been secured to pay outside examiners, they would have known far less of the needs of the service. The employment of outsiders would have been justly regarded by those in the service as an offensive and unwarranted condemnation of their capacity and fidelity.

Many of the examiners have now become skilled in the discharge of their duties and are able to render far more valuable service than could be secured at the hands of persons without their experience. No inconsiderable part of that experience has been gained in hours of extra work, which, in some offices, their new functions have unavoidably imposed upon them. In the interest of justice to the examiners, President Cleveland has so amended Rule 4 as to make it require that sufficient time shall be allowed them, during office hours, having due regard to other public business, for doing the work connected with the examina

tions. Except in some cases in the Customs and Postal service, the examiners hardly ever know whose papers they are marking. Their fidelity to the system intrusted so largely to their care merits the highest commendation. The Commission has yet to learn of the first instance in which any member of these Boards has betrayed his trust, though cases have not been wanting in which it has cost both courage and vigilant effort to perform their duties.

THE QUOTA OF A STATE.

Under the old system a certain share of all the places was, with some rough measure of exactness, either by law or usage, assigned to a State or to its members of Congress. It was by them, after a fashion, subdivided among the members or leaders of the party controlling the administration. This share or number was called the "quota" of that State. Every official belonging to that "quota,” was known by name, and the member or leader who put in one of the "quota" was called the "influence." As soon as there was a vacancy in any one of these "quota” places, a competition arose between the various "influences" and applicants for filling it. That system has been superseded, but the theory of a "quota," with its mischievous and misleading consequences, still survives, though with diminishing effect. No State now has any claim over another upon any particular vacancy, or any "quota,” upon the old theory. The Civil, Service Act requires all appointments to the Classified Departmental Service made subsequent to July 16, 1883, to be apportioned among the States, Territories, and the District of Columbia in the ratio of their populations respectively. When a vacancy occurs, in whatever Department, the selection to fill it is to be made from one of the States or Territories which have received the least proportional share of all the appointments then made under the Act, as will be more particularly explained when we come to Certifications.

It was doubtless true that under the old system the apportionment of appointments-required by law for the Treasury Department alone— was very unequal not only as between States, but in reference to different parts of the Union. There was no adequate means of testing legal residence. It seems to have been often declared by applicants to suit their own convenience or that of their influence. Every assumption, therefore, in regard to the actual apportionment must be considered with reference to such facts.*

In consequence of this inequality of apportionment complaints have been made, most of them perhaps by those who did not help the passage of the Civil Service Act, if indeed they are not now opposed to it, because it did not provide for a prompt correction of this inequality. We

*It is believed to have been by no means a rare occurrence for an "influence,” i. e., a member of Congress or a patronage purveyor, to consent, when he could thus secure an appointment he specially desired, to have the appointee charged to his own State or district, though in fact and law his residence was elsewhere.

say prompt correction, because the facts given elsewhere make it plain. that in a very few years-say about eight or ten years-it will disappear under the operation of that Act. The reasons why no such attempt was made-and some of them are perhaps strong enough even yet to defeat such an attempt if now made-seem to have been these:

(1) That injustice or abuse was a part of those vicious consequences of the old system, which were so closely intertwined together and so powerfully intrenched in influence and selfish interest, as to be quite beyond the strength of the reform movement in 1883.

(2) Had the attempt been made by the Civil Service Bill itself to cast out all those claimed to be in excess from any State, Territory, or the District of Columbia, it would not only have required a long and difficult investigation to find out the bona fide residences of those threatened, but the "influences" behind them, if not as potent for keeping them in as for putting them in, would have been drawn into a combination strong enough, perhaps, to defeat the Bill itself. In many cases it would have been no easy matter to determine the legal residence of a clerk.

(3) There was as much need for some provision for casting out supernumeraries, for ascertaining and removing those originally incompetent, and for relieving those who had become superannuated in the service, to say the least of it, as for rejecting a worthy clerk merely because he was a resident of New Jersey rather than of New York, or of North Carolina rather than of South Carolina. Had the attempt been made by the Bill to redress at once all those abuses of the old system it seems certain that the combination against it would have been irresistible. Only a limited reform was possible, and, this accomplished, it would be far easier to extend the work in the future.

CERTIFICATION AND APPORTIONMENT.

The making of the apportionment just referred to is so intimately connected with certifications for appointment that both can be best explained together. Rule 16 provides for making the certifications in such order as to bring about the apportionment; but the certification has other conditions and objects of importance. Four persons and no more are always to be certified; except that the Commission may, for good reasons, certify a different number from a special register which we have seen relates to only those very few places where special qualifications are required, and for which examinations are conducted under clause 5 of Rule 7.

The reasons for certifying as many as four are twofold:

*The inquiry is sometimes made why the whole number examined are not certified so as to give the appointing officer a larger choice. It is probable that if he should always be both at liberty and inclined to select the best man, there would be some advantage in these general certifications. But if many were certified at once he would have the friends of many interfering with his liberty and pressing him for a