otherwise provided for in the Constitution or
by act of Congress has become very burdensome and its wise and efficient
discharge full of difficulty. The civil list is so large that a personal
knowledge of any large number of the applicants is impossible. The
President must rely upon the representations of others, and these are
often made inconsiderately and without any just sense of responsibility.
I have a right, I think, to insist that those who volunteer or are
invited to give advice as to appointments shall exercise consideration
and fidelity. A high sense of duty and an ambition to improve the
service should characterize all public officers.

There are many ways in which the convenience and comfort of those who
have business with our public offices may be promoted by a thoughtful
and obliging officer, and I shall expect those whom I may appoint to
justify their selection by a conspicuous efficiency in the discharge of
their duties. Honorable party service will certainly not be esteemed
by me a disqualification for public office, but it will in no case be
allowed to serve as a shield of official negligence, incompetency, or
delinquency. It is entirely creditable to seek public office by proper
methods and with proper motives, and all applicants will be treated with
consideration; but I shall need, and the heads of Departments will need,
time for inquiry and deliberation. Persistent importunity will not,
therefore, be the best support of an application for office. Heads of
Departments, bureaus, and all other public officers having any duty
connected therewith will be expected to enforce the civil-service
law fully and without evasion. Beyond this obvious duty I hope to do
something more to advance the reform of the civil service. The ideal,
or even my own ideal, I shall probably not attain. Retrospect will be a
safer basis of judgment than promises. We shall not, however, I am sure,
be able to put our civil service upon a nonpartisan basis until we
have secured an incumbency that fair-minded men of the opposition will
approve for impartiality and integrity. As the number of such in the
civil list is increased removals from office will diminish.

While a Treasury surplus is not the greatest evil, it is a serious evil.
Our revenue should be ample to meet the ordinary annual demands upon our
Treasury, with a sufficient margin for those extraordinary but scarcely
less imperative demands which arise now and then. Expendit