to every department of the civil
service. It should be understood by every officer of the general
government that he is expected to conform his conduct to its
requirements."

It must be a source of gratification to the alumni and faculty of
Harvard College that its president and governing boards were, in June,
1877, in the judicious minority, and recognized their appreciation of
Hayes by conferring upon him its highest honorary degree. Schurz, who
had received his LL.D. the year before, accompanied Hayes to Cambridge,
and, in his Harvard speech at Commencement, gave his forcible and
sympathetic approval of the "famous order of the President," as it had
now come to be called.

A liberal and just Southern policy, the beginning of a genuine reform in
the civil service and the resumption of specie payments, are measures
which distinguish and glorify President Hayes's administration, but in
July, 1877, public attention was diverted from all these by a movement
which partook of the nature of a social uprising. The depression
following the panic of 1873 had been widespread and severe. The slight
revival of business resulting from the Centennial Exposition of 1876 and
the consequent large passenger traffic had been succeeded by a reaction
in 1877 that brought business men to the verge of despair. Failures of
merchants and manufacturers, stoppage of factories, diminished traffic
on the railroads, railroad bankruptcies and receiverships, threw a
multitude of laborers out of employment; and those fortunate enough to
retain their jobs were less steadily employed, and were subject to
reductions in wages.

The state of railroad transportation was deplorable. The competition of
the trunk lines, as the railroads running from Chicago to the seaboard
were called, was sharp, and, as there was not business enough for all,
the cutting of through freight rates caused such business to be done at
an actual loss, while the through passenger transportation afforded
little profit. Any freight agent knew the remedy: an increase of freight
rates by agreement or through a system of pooling earnings. Agreements
were made, but not honestly kept, and, after a breach of faith, the
fight was renewed with increased fury. As the railroad managers thought
that they could not increase their gross earnings, they resolved on
decreasing their expenses, and somewhat hastily and jauntily they
announced a reduction of ten per cent in the wages of their employee