his purpose to employ suitable
persons to conduct the requisite inquiries with reference to "the
fitness of each candidate, in respect to age, health, character,
knowledge, and ability for the branch of service into which he seeks
to enter;" but the law is practically inoperative for want of the
requisite appropriation.

I therefore recommend an appropriation of $25,000 per annum to meet
the expenses of a commission, to be appointed by the President in
accordance with the terms of this section, whose duty it shall be
to devise a just, uniform, and efficient system of competitive
examinations and to supervise the application of the same throughout
the entire civil service of the Government. I am persuaded that the
facilities which such a commission will afford for testing the fitness
of those who apply for office will not only be as welcome a relief
to members of Congress as it will be to the President and heads of
Departments, but that it will also greatly tend to remove the causes
of embarrassment which now inevitably and constantly attend the
conflicting claims of patronage between the legislative and executive
departments. The most effectual check upon the pernicious competition
of influence and official favoritism in the bestowal of office will
be the substitution of an open competition of merit between the
applicants, in which everyone can make his own record with the
assurance that his success will depend upon this alone.

I also recommend such legislation as, while leaving every officer as
free as any other citizen to express his political opinions and to use
his means for their advancement, shall also enable him to feel as safe
as any private citizen in refusing all demands upon his salary for
political purposes. A law which should thus guarantee true liberty
and justice to all who are engaged in the public service, and likewise
contain stringent provisions against the use of official authority
to coerce the political action of private citizens or of official
subordinates, is greatly to be desired.

The most serious obstacle, however, to an improvement of the civil
service, and especially to a reform in the method of appointment and
removal, has been found to be the practice, under what is known as
the spoils system, by which the appointing power has been so largely
encroached upon by members of Congress. The first step in the reform
of the civil service must be a complete divorce between Congress and
the Ex