It happened to be at the time of the
silver agitation in the West, and the Rocky Mountain States accordingly
figured in a large percentage of the answers. Some of the men thought
that Chicago was on the Pacific Ocean. Others, in answer to a query as
to who was the head of the United States Government, wavered between
myself and Recorder Goff; one brilliant genius, for inscrutable reasons,
placed the leadership in the New York Fire Department. Now of course
some of the men who answered these questions wrong were nevertheless
quite capable of making good policemen; but it is fair to assume that
on the average the candidate who has a rudimentary knowledge of the
government, geography, and history of his country is a little better
fitted, in point of intelligence, to be a policeman than the one who has
not.
Therefore I felt convinced, after full experience, that as regards very
large classes of public servants by far the best way to choose the men
for appointment was by means of written competitive examination. But
I absolutely split off from the bulk of my professional Civil Service
Reform friends when they advocated written competitive examinations for
promotion. In the Police Department I found these examinations a serious
handicap in the way of getting the best men promoted, and never in any
office did I find that the written competitive promotion examination did
any good.
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