the Republican candidate, Benjamin Harrison.
When Mr. Harrison was elected, he would have liked to put the young
campaigner into the State Department. But Mr. Blaine, who became
Secretary of State, did not care to have his plain-spoken opponent and
critic under him. So the President offered Roosevelt the post of Civil
Service Commissioner.

The spoils system had become habitual and traditional in American public
life by sixty years of practice. It had received its first high sanction
in the cynical words of a New York politician, "To the victor belong the
spoils." Politicians looked upon it as a normal accompaniment of their
activities. The public looked upon it with indifference. But finally a
group of irrepressible reformers succeeded in getting the camel's nose
under the flap of the tent. A law was passed establishing a Commission
which was to introduce the merit system. But even then neither the
politicians nor the public, nor the Commission itself, took the matter
very seriously. The Commission was in the habit of carrying on its
functions perfunctorily and unobtrusively. But nothing could be
perfunctory where Roosevelt was. He would never permit things to be
done--or left undone unobtrusively, when what was needed was to obtrude
the matter forcibly on the public mind. He was a profound believer in
the value of publicity.

When Roosevelt became Commissioner things began swiftly to happen. He
had two firm convictions: that laws were made to be enforced, in the
letter and in the spirit; and that the only thing worth while in the
world was to get things done. He believed with a hot conviction in
decency, honesty, and efficiency in public as in private life.

For six years he fought and infused his fellow Commissioners with some
of his fighting spirit. They were good men but easy-going until the
right leadership came along. The first effort of the Commission under
the new leadership was to secure the genuine enforcement of the law. The
backbone of the merit system was the competitive examination. This was
not because such examinations are the infallible way to get good public
servants, but because they are the best way that has yet been devised
to keep out bad public servants, selected for private reasons having
nothing to do with the public welfare. The effort to make these
examinations and the subsequent appointments of real service to the
nation rather than to the politicians naturally brought the Commission
into