be encouraged to avail themselves
fully of its advantages.

The prohibition of the importation into several countries of certain of
our animals and their products, based upon the suspicion that health is
endangered in their use and consumption, suggests the importance of such
precautions for the protection of our stock of all kinds against disease
as will disarm suspicion of danger and cause the removal of such an
injurious prohibition.

If the laws now in operation are insufficient to accomplish this
protection, I recommend their amendment to meet the necessities of
the situation; and I commend to the consideration of Congress the
suggestions contained in the report of the Commissioner of Agriculture
calculated to increase the value and efficiency of this Department.

The report of the Civil Service Commission, which will be submitted,
contains an account of the manner in which the civil-service law has
been executed during the last year and much valuable information on this
important subject.

I am inclined to think that there is no sentiment more general in the
minds of the people of our country than a conviction of the correctness
of the principle upon which the law enforcing civil-service reform is
based. In its present condition the law regulates only a part of the
subordinate public positions throughout the country. It applies the test
of fitness to applicants for these places by means of a competitive
examination, and gives large discretion to the Commissioners as to the
character of the examination and many other matters connected with its
execution. Thus the rules and regulations adopted by the Commission have
much to do with the practical usefulness of the statute and with the
results of its application.

The people may well trust the Commission to execute the law with perfect
fairness and with as little irritation as is possible. But of course no
relaxation of the principle which underlies it and no weakening of the
safeguards which surround it can be expected. Experience in its
administration will probably suggest amendment of the methods of its
execution, but I venture to hope that we shall never again be remitted
to the system which distributes public positions purely as rewards for
partisan service. Doubts may well be entertained whether our Government
could survive the strain of a continuance of this system, which upon
every change of Administration inspires an immense army of claimants for
offic