I have heard it said that this system of examination proposes to present only a scholastic test; that it proposes only to give advantage to those who are college-bred, and have had the advantage in early life of superior education. The committee investigated that subject to some extent, and I have here the result in the city of New York. Says Mr. Burt:

About two-thirds of the appointees had a common school education; had not even an academic education.

Of course these examinations must be proper; of course they must be regulated upon common-sense principles; of course they must be conducted to test the fitness of the men who are to be appointed to particular offices. You have tests everywhere. Today the law requires that there shall be a test of examination in the various departments here in Washington. They are pass examinations; they are imperfect; they are insufficient; they are not thorough. Mr. Graves himself says that the only examination in his case was that the superior in the department looked over his shoulder while he was writing and said, "I think you will pass." That was when he entered the service twenty-odd years ago.

If you have examinations why not have competitive examinations? If you have private examinations, why not have open examinations? If examinations are made in the departments by subordinates of the departments, why not have them made by responsible examiners amenable to the authority of the President under a system devised by the best intelligence that can be supplied?

I hear the system of competitive examination spoken of as if it were something extraordinary. Within the last fifteen years it has gotten to be a custom that I might almost say is universal that when a member of Congress has the right to appoint a cadet to West Point or to the Naval Academy he asks his constituents to compete for it. Formerly it was never done; it was looked on as the mere perquisite of a member of Congress.

Nor are there any aristocratic tendencies about this system, as I have heard suggested; for while it does not in any wise create an official caste it does in words and in effect open up the possibility of the public service to the poorest and the humblest and least influential in the land.

It has been said that the abandonment of the spoils system will exclude Democrats from office when the day of our victory shall come. I do not think it. On the contrary, I believe that

the adoption of this policy as our party creed will hasten the day of the victory of our party and its adoption as a law will under any administration fill many offices with Democrats. I think it will bring to our aid very many men not hitherto of our political faith who believe this reform a vital question in our politics. I think it will disarm and disorganize and neutralize the trained bands of officeholders who have wrested from us at least two presidential elections.

The bill was passed by the Senate on December 27 by a vote of 38 to 5, the minority all being Democrats. The House passed the bill on January 5, 1883, by a vote of 155 to 47. Thirty-nine of the minority were Democrats. President Arthur approved the bill on January 16.

The Democratic opponents of the bill were of the Jacksonian school which held that "to the victors belong the spoils." In 1885, when Pendleton's term as Senator expired, this element in Ohio put forward as his successor General Durbin Ward, known as the "WarHorse" of the old "Moss-back" Democracy. The young reform element, known as the "Kids," endeavored to reëlect Senator Pendleton. The legislature was Democratic. Pledges were secured from the Democratic legislators in favor of one or the other of these candidates; and it seemed as if one or two votes would decide the contest, and that only at the end of a long "deadlock." However, on the first ballot, a millionaire, Henry B. Payne, was elected, to the great surprise of everybody, including the legislators themselves who voted for Payne. It was charged by responsible newspaper editors in the State, of both parties, that the election was brought about through the "influence" of the Standard Oil Company, of which Mr. Payne's son, Oliver, who had been active in his father's support, was a prominent officer. Each legislator voting for Payne had been "persuaded" to cast a "complimentary" vote for the heretofore unmentioned candidate in recognition of his "services" to the party, being kept in ignorance of the fact that a majority of the legislators had promised to do the same. After the vote quite a number of these men

found excuses not to return to their constituents until the indignation of these had cooled down.

The Senate ordered an investigation into the election. The committee found in favor of allowing Mr. Payne to retain his seat. Senator Pendleton was appointed by President Cleveland Minister to Germany, which office he held until his death in 1889.

Murat Halstead, editor of the Cincinnati Commercial, was named by President Harrison as Minister Pendleton's successor, but owing, it is said, to his having denounced the Payne investigation as a "whitewashing” process, the Senate refused to confirm the nomination.

CHAPTER XI

THE SPEAKER AS "CZAR"

Autocratic Rulings of Thomas B. Reed [Me.], Speaker of the House, in Disputed Election Cases-Committee on Rules Introduces a New CodeJoseph G. Cannon [Ill.] Presents Majority Report; John G. Carlisle [Ky.], and Samuel J. Randall [Pa.], Present Minority Report-Debate: In Favor, Mr. Cannon, Elijah A. Morse [Mass.], Edward P. Allen [Mich.], David B. Henderson [Ia.], Leonidas C. Houk [Tenn.], William D. Kelley [Pa.]; Opposed, Charles F. Crisp [Ga.], Roger Q. Mills [Tex.], Benton McMillin [Tenn.], William S. Holman [Ind.], William McAdoo [N. J.], Amos J. Cummings [N. Y.], Asher G. Caruth [Ky.], Benjamin F. Shively [Ind.]; the Rules Are Adopted.

I

N the session of 1889-90 the Republicans of the House had a rather slender majority with which to carry through their measures, and it was therefore of partisan advantage for them to unseat a number of Democratic Representatives. This they set about doing, disclaiming, however, that there was any animus in their action other than the maintenance of purity in national elections; indeed, they produced a vast amount of evidence tending to show that gross fraud and intimidation had been perpetrated in the contested cases.

The Democrats insisted that the charges of the Republicans were trumped up for partisan purposes, and they felt justified, on this account, in resorting to "filibustering" to enable the Representatives in question to retain their seats as long as possible.

In order to prevent the filibustering, Thomas B. Reed [Me.], Speaker of the House, exerted his official powers to discriminate in favor of Republicans as against Democrats by recognizing speakers who should have the floor and by counting members who were present but not voting as present for quorum purposes-a violation of long established custom.