The large number
of men who believe vaguely in good are pitted against the smaller but
still larger number of men whose interest it often becomes to act
very concretely and actively for evil; and it is small wonder that the
struggle is doubtful.
During my six years' service as Commissioner the field of the merit
system was extended at the expense of the spoils system so as to include
several times the number of offices that had originally been included.
Generally this was done by the introduction of competitive entrance
examinations; sometimes, as in the Navy-Yards, by a system of
registration. This of itself was good work.
Even better work was making the law efficient and genuine where it
applied. As was inevitable in the introduction of such a system, there
was at first only partial success in its application. For instance,
it applied to the ordinary employees in the big custom-houses and
post-offices, but not to the heads of these offices. A number of the
heads of the offices were slippery politicians of a low moral grade,
themselves appointed under the spoils system, and anxious, directly
or indirectly, to break down the merit system and to pay their own
political debts by appointing their henchmen and supporters to the
positions under them.
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