Cabinet. But, while Grant displayed pleasure in the
companionship of these eminent men, they never possessed his complete
confidence. When the machinations for place and favor began, Hoar and
Cox were in the way. Hoar had offended the Senate in his recommendations
for federal circuit judges (the circuit court was then newly
established), and when the President named him for Justice of the
Supreme Court, Hoar was rejected. Senator Cameron, one of the chief
spoils politicians of the time, told Hoar frankly why: "What could you
expect for a man who had snubbed seventy Senators!" A few months later
(June, 1870), the President bluntly asked for Hoar's resignation, a
sacrifice to the gods of the Senate, to purchase their favor for the
Santo Domingo treaty.

Cox resigned in the autumn. As Secretary of the Interior he had charge
of the Patent Office, Census Bureau, and Indian Service, all of them
requiring many appointments. He had attempted to introduce a sort of
civil service examination for applicants and had vehemently protested
against political assessments levied on clerks in his department. He
especially offended Senators Cameron and Chandler, party chieftains who
had the ear of the President. General Cox stated the matter plainly:
"My views of the necessity of reform in the civil service had brought
me more or less into collision with the plans of our active political
managers and my sense of duty has obliged me to oppose some of their
methods of action." These instances reveal how the party chieftains
insisted inexorably upon their demands. To them the public service was
principally a means to satisfy party ends, and the chief duty of the
President and his Cabinet was to satisfy the claims of party necessity.
General Cox said that distributing offices occupied "the larger part of
the time of the President and all his Cabinet." General Garfield wrote
(1877): "One-third of the working hours of Senators and Representatives
is hardly sufficient to meet the demands made upon them in reference to
appointments to office."

By the side of the partizan motives stalked the desire for gain. There
were those to whom parties meant but the opportunity for sudden wealth.
The President's admiration for commercial success and his inability to
read the motives of sycophants multiplied their opportunities, and in
the eight years of his administration there was consummated the baneful
union of business and politics.

During the second