CHAPTER XIII. RAIDERS MASKED BY CIVIL SERVICE.

One other raid into the postal revenues I must notice before passing to a consideration of the parcels post question, in which consideration of other raids and raiders will be mentioned.

Here I desire to refer to that band of raiders—thousands in number—who are carried on the payrolls of the Postoffice Department—carried at salaries ranging into the thousands in many cases—and who do little or nothing of service value for the money paid them.

The Postoffice Department is a large institution and does a big business—a huge business which has much detail and extends over a vast territory. To handle such a business properly, necessarily requires the service of a large force of operatives. Most of the work of the department is of that sort which human brain and muscle alone can do. The machine can touch but a few of the minor details of the vast amount of work our Postoffice Department handles. It may cancel stamps, perforate documents, etc., but it cannot collect, sort, distribute, carry and deliver mail. It requires human muscle and brains to do such work. Much of it requires skill—the trained eye and hand as well as academic knowledge.

Well, the Postoffice Department employs a large force—a vast army of men, and some women, I believe. Counting the employes in its legal, purchasing and inspection divisions with the postmasters, assistant postmasters, railway and office clerks, city and rural carriers, messengers, etc., there must be somewhere around 330,000 people employed in our federal postal service.

Whether that is too large or too small a force for the proper handling of our postal service is beyond my purpose here to discuss. That the business now handled by the department could be far better handled by 330,000 employes than it now is, and that such a service force could, if properly directed and disciplined, handle a business much larger than that now transacted by the department, I do not hesitate to assert. I base that assertion chiefly on the following observed conditions:

First: There are frills and innovations in handling the business[294] which take up the time of employes and which have little or no service value.

Second: There is, not too much “politics,” as Mr. Hitchcock and his immediate predecessors have modestly but wrongfully called it, but too much political partisanship—dirty, grafting, thieving, partisanship—not only in the appointment of people to the service, but also in making partisan, often grafting, crooked use of them after appointment.

Third: There are too many non-producers—non-service producers—among that army of 330,000.

It is the last, or third, condition named that I shall here briefly consider, or such observed phases of it as, in my judgment, so trench into the postal revenues as not only amounts to a raid in itself, but which also encourages others to graft and loot.

First, I desire to say that there are many thousands in that postal service, many who are honest, faithful and competent workers. There are about seventy thousand (69,712 according to the department’s report for 1910) carriers, city and rural, most of whom work industriously and efficiently and who are underpaid for the service they render.

There are about 50,000 clerks employed. Of these, the 1909-10 report says, 16,795 are railway clerks. Quoting the same report, there were 33,047 postoffice clerks in the service. All or nearly all of these are employed in the “Presidential” postoffice—offices of the first, second and third classes. Of the total number of clerks, 31,825, are employed in offices of the first and second classes. There were 424 offices of the first class and 1,828 of the second. That placed the service of 31,825 clerks in 2,252 offices. The report (1909-10), from which these figures are taken states 5,373 as the number of third-class offices. The remainder of the reported number of clerks (1,222) are, it is presumed, distributed among those 5,373 third-class offices. At any rate, in the statement of expenditures for the fiscal year ended June 30, 1910, the Second Assistant Postmaster General, Mr. Stewart, presents the following showing of expenditures as compensation to clerks:
Clerks in first and second-class postoffices (31,825)     $31,583,587.37
Clerks in third-class postoffices, lower grade     540,891.31
Clerks in third-class postoffices, upper grade     663,632.20

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The lower grade of third-class postoffices comprise those which yield the postmasters an annual income ranging from $1,000 to $1,500 and the higher grades are those with a compensation of $1,600 to $1,900 to the postmasters. In this connection, it should be noted that for the fiscal year there was paid, in addition to the amounts above named, the sum of $325,953.44 for what are called “temporary” and “substitute” clerks.

Adding these various sums gives a total of $33,114,064.32 paid for clerk hire for clerks in first, second and third-class offices—in the “Presidential postoffice,” or offices to which the President has, by law or otherwise, been granted or permitted the right to appoint the postmasters.

As previously stated, there is a total of 7,625 Presidential postoffices on the payrolls of which are carried the names of 33,047 clerks. In addition to these are 16,795 railway postal clerks. Beyond saying that the appointment and advancement of these last-mentioned clerks have been in the past—and yet are—largely influenced by assistant postmaster generals, superintendents and other chiefs of division in the Washington or department office and by Senators, Congressmen and postmasters in offices of the first and second-classes, I shall not consider them further here, nor do I include them in the adverse criticisms I shall make of the clerical force and service of the department.

It should, however, be noted in this connection that in addition to the 31,825 clerks employed in the 2,252 offices of the first and second classes, there are 2,237 assistant postmasters. These were paid $2,536,997.24 for the year ended June 30th, 1910. There were in offices of the first and second-classes 2,252 postmasters. To these was paid the sum of $5,814,300. That makes the service personnel of the first and second class offices, not counting carriers, messengers, etc., 36,314, and gives a total of annual expenditures for this service amounting to $40,465,361.56.

The reader will please keep in mind the fact that the foregoing figures apply only to postoffices of the first and second-classes. There may be a few clerks and also assistant postmasters in offices of the third-class. If so, there are so few of them that the department did not deem it worth while to account for them in that position in any of its fiscal statements, so far as I have been able to find. I[296] would ask the reader also to bear in mind that while the following strictures are intended to apply to all three classes of Presidential postoffices, their application is less general and less forceful in offices of the second than in offices of the first class, and less in offices of the third-class than in either of the two higher class offices.

There has been much talk by Postmaster Generals in recent years about efforts made and making to get the employes of the Postoffice Department into the classified service—getting them under civil service protection. Not only has this been made subject of urgent advocacy in almost every annual department report of recent years, but Postmaster Generals have made prolix and voluble reference to and favorable comment upon the progress that has been made in “taking the department out of politics.” Mr. Hitchcock in the 1909-10 report commends highly the progress made in that direction. See pages 13, 14, 24, 85, 86 and others of the report. The party stump and banquet oratory of the past twelve or more years has sparkled—fairly scintillated it might be said—with rhetorical coruscations about what “the administration has done” to remove the federal service from the “baleful clutch and influence of politics.”

Now do not misunderstand me. I am not saying this because the Republicans have been in control of things. Had Democrats been at the helm of the national craft, they would have done the same. The Democratic politicians might have done more or less than the Republicans have done to get the civil service of the government away from corrupt and corrupting partisan influences. The Republicans have done only what they have been compelled to do—compelled by general public demand. So the Democrats would have done, had they been in power. Politicians do not want a civil service free from party control. The “jobs” have been and are a source both of spoils and of continued power to the so-called “practical” politician of either party—of any political party. That is why the party leaders—“bosses”—fight so persistently and craftily to retain control of the civil jobs. That is why almost every civil service law or “executive order” for placing civil employes under a merit or efficiency classification carries a “joker” somewhere about its clothes. That is true of most all such laws and orders so far enacted or issued, whatever be their field of application—city, county, state or nation.

So I desire the reader to understand that there is no political[297] or party animus in what I may say in adverse criticism of the jokes and jokers which so conspicuously decorate the Republican display of effort to place federal postal employes under classified civil service and which, it is said, “has taken them out of politics and will keep them out.” The Man on the Ladder believes in civil service, but he does not believe in either legislative or executive “jokers” which, under the guise and pretense of establishing a protected merit classification of public servants, makes stealthy crooks and turns to keep their own partisans on the jobs, regardless of either their ability, merit or fitness.

Now let us return to our subject—to the points which make much if not most of the alleged “progress” in the postal department toward the institution of a merit classification of its office employes but little more than a move on lines to keep administration partisans on postal service jobs, and which makes this much-talked of progress toward efficiency conserve party more than service interests.

But some readers may urge that this is mere assertion. Well, let me present a few facts and conditions which support the assertions, or which, to me, seem to make the statements assertions of fact.

Mr. Hitchcock rightly asserts (page 13 of 1909-10 report) “that the highest degree of effectiveness in the conduct of this tremendous business establishment cannot be attained while the thousands of postmasters, on whose faithfulness so much depends, continue to be political appointees. The entire postal service should be taken out of politics.”

Well and good. Following the foregoing, he mentions the fact that all assistant postmasters have been placed in the classified service by order of the President. Mr. Hitchcock, “as a still more important reform,” recommends that “Presidential postmasters of all grades, from the first class to the third, should be placed in the classified service.” He also speaks of efforts made and making to place the fourth-class postmasters under its laws and regulations. He points out some valid difficulties to be surmounted if such desired result is attained without impairment rather than betterment of the service. The First Assistant Postmaster General, C. P. Granfield, states in his report, that, under an executive order dated November 30, 1908, all fourth-class postmasters in fourteen states have been put into the classified service. He also explains briefly the method of procedure in filling vacancies—when they occur.

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That is probably sufficient preliminary. Now for a few of the observed and observable conditions which govern in civil service as thus far applied in the Postoffice Department. Taking the fourth-class postmasters first, it may be said the method of appointing such postmasters by civil service examination scarcely rises to a dignity entitling it to serious consideration. While the method itself reads well, its application, in many instances, is but a joke—a tame joke at that. Postmaster General Hitchcock substantially admits, as previously stated, that conditions are met with which make its application extremely difficult if not quite impossible.

Certain it is that, so far as applied, the results have given a vast majority, if not all, of the certifications to persons of administration party affiliation.

Then, too, it might be asked by a person addicted to the habit of doing his own thinking—a habit very obnoxious to party “leaders” and to politicians of the so-called “practical” breed—it might be asked by any capable, independent thinker, if it was mere chance that selected twelve administration and two “doubtful”—chronically doubtful—states in which first to make application of a civil service method to the selection and appointment of fourth-class postmasters?

While there are, according to the last published department report, about 52,000 fourth-class postmasters in the country, a great majority of them are persons of little or no local political influence. Beyond their own votes, then, they are of little service to the administration party, save as distributing or disbursing agents of the party in power for its campaign literature and other promotion matter. They are used also to keep the county and state “bosses” of the party advised of local political conditions as they view them—flurries in the party atmosphere, as indicated by hitching-post and whittling discussions of party legislation and proposed legislation or of party policies, as set forth by the published utterances of state and national “leaders.”

In such and other minor ways, then, the fourth-class postmaster may be a helpful instrument in the retention of power by the political party in power—the party from which he has received appointment. So it is good “practical” politics to keep such a party agent on the job. To that end, then, the party in power—the administration—places the fourth-class postmaster in the classified civil service, thus[299] making his removal more difficult, if not impossible, in case an opposing party should win out at the polls and take charge of the government.

The foregoing is said, of course, on the presupposition that every reader knows that a vast majority of the postmasters and other personnel of the postal service today is of the political party in power. In saying that the party from which these postmasters and other postal service employes received their appointments has been and is using a civil service classification largely, if not wholly, for partisan ends. I say only—in fact have already said—that the Democratic party or any other party would, if in national control, make similar use of the civil classification. And such partisan manipulation of a merit service classification will continue so long as we fool people will stand for or permit it.

The chief “jokers” woven into most all civil service laws and executive orders are these:

First: The law or “order” directing the application of a classification of a service into certain grades, places those holding positions at the time of the enforcement of such law or order, into the various grades without any examination as to their merit or efficiency.

Second: Such laws and orders almost universally provide a promotion or advancement credit for “experience,” and the only factor or element recognized in the make-up of experience is time. The number of years an employe has been on his job or in the service is his “experience.”

Third: Such civil service laws or orders always provide for examinations—usually an “entrance” and “promotional”—and for “examiners.” Seldom is anything said as to the qualifications of the persons selected as examiners. Their selection is invariably left to a “Civil Service Commission,” and the membership of such commission is as invariably left to partisan appointment. There is usually a pretense of making such commissions “non-partisan,” that is, one of three or two of five of the appointed commissioners are to be of the minority party. Nevertheless, they are all appointed by the majority party—the party in power.

All three of these “jokers” are in the government civil service laws and the extension of those laws to the various divisions of the federal civil service is left largely or wholly subject to the orders of the[300] President. I object to a classified merit service under such statutory “jokers.” They provide a service more partisan than efficient. They permit a payroll raid upon the revenues from which employes are paid. They retain incompetent, inefficient persons in graded positions for partisan purposes—often “grafting” purposes—rather than for service reasons. They leave the promotion or advancement of honest, industrious and competent employes largely, if not wholly, subject to the will, wish and whim of a partisan appointed or elected superior or to a partisan civil service commission. They provide for advancement on an “experience”—a time service—which may not, and which in many cases does not, constitute an experience of any value whatsoever to the service.

I have said that the office personnel of the government’s postal service embraces a large number—thousands—of raiders on the postal revenues. I repeat that assertion here.

Most of these raiders occupy the higher salaried positions—postmasters of the “Presidential” classes, assistant postmasters, chief clerks and others who secured their positions through partisan “pull” or “drag.” These do little work of service value for the salaries paid them. Many of them are so occupied with affairs of their party that they have little time for service work even if they were inclined to do it. Most of them are not so inclined. Many of these raiders know of—some of them have been parties to—railway mail-weight, contract and other raids upon the department they are supposed to serve.

But this is only generalization, some one may say. In answer I say kick off your blanket of apathy. Go do a little investigating and then do a little—just a little—hard thinking. See what you shall see in even such a modest effort to put two and two together. Visit a “Presidential” postoffice in your county, preferably the one at the county seat or the one at the capital or at the metropolis of your state. These cities are the storm centers of partisan activity, likewise of partisan manipulations, bubble and crookedness. If you know the postmaster, so much the better. If you are of the same party affiliation as the postmaster, still better. If you are not, do not let that deter you. You visit him to see things for yourself, and an investigator is not only warranted but fully justified in appearing to be what he is not. Fix upon some subject of inquiry before you reach the[301] “presence” on that particular “Presidential” P. O. throne. Then, with ears spread and eyes shrewdly as well as interestedly open, go to it.

The postmaster will be glad to see you if he knows you. If he does not know you, he will be assumedly glad to see you anyway, after he learns where you are from and that you have an ingrown habit of voting the ticket of his party. He may even warm up to the extent of tendering a box of his favorite brand with an invitation to smoke up. Then he will probably want to know “how things look up your way.” It does not make much difference how or what you answer, so long as it is favorable to “the party.” He is handing you a case-hardened jolly. You must be gentleman enough to return the courtesy. “I know you are a very busy man, Mr. Jones, and I must not take up your time. I want a little information and decided I would come to the right place to get it,” etc., or something along such lines will do.

Then ask your question or questions. Preferably let them be about some detail or details in the handling of “the large business” of his office. Now you will begin to see things.

The postmaster will press a buzzer button. In response a well groomed gentleman appears whom, by introduction, you learn is his assistant. “Fred,” says the postmaster, “Mr. Smith here desires some information. He is from Brainville and—well, he is a friend of ours. Now, Mr. Smith,” with a real “glad-hand” shake, “you go with Fred. He’ll dig up any information you want, and, now, don’t forget to call on me the next time you are in town.”

Then you go off with Fred. He sluices a lot of kiln-dried small talk at you and rounds out with “How are things up at Brainville, Mr. Smith?” Of course you assure him that things “look good” to you, or that, in your opinion “there will be nothing to it but counting our majority.” By this time Fred has steered you to the chief clerk. To the latter he says, “Here, Baker, shake hands with Mr. Smith. Mr. Smith lives up at Brainville and is one of our friends. He wants some information. You see that he gets it will you?”

Fred, then, with another ingratiating hand shake, leaves you in Mr. Baker’s care. To him you state the points on which you wish enlightenment. “Oh, I see,” says Mr. Baker. “You just come with me and I’ll have you fixed out.” Then, if it be a postoffice of fairly large business, he will take you over to some chief or foreman of[302] division, tells him what you desire to know and instructs him to inform you. The division boss next takes you in tow and with much pleased and pleasing talk steers you down the line to some $900 or $1,200 a year clerk to whom he turns you over. This shirt-sleeved clerk knows the answer or answers and gives you the desired information in about three minutes.

Incidentally in your round of the postoffice, you have asked some conventional questions and have learned, among other things, that the assistant postmaster, chief clerk, division chief and other top-notchers in the service are all men of “experience”—have each been in the service five to ten years and “know the business from garret to basement.”

Once outside or on your way home, some questions will begin swimming a marathon in your think-tank. Such as these for instance:

“Did those top-notchers really know the business of their office?”

“If they did know, why did they troll you around for an hour to get information which a shirt-sleeved worker gave you in three minutes?”

“If they did not know, then what have they been doing during their five or ten years of service?”

“If they know so much, how many years would it take “Boob” Sikes of Boobtown to learn as little as they appeared to know?”

By the time the questions begin to take on this sort of “How old is Ann” character, you will have reached the conclusion that you have discovered something and have seen things to prove it.

Just here it may be pertinently asked, why those top-notchers in that postoffice should be blanketed by the stipulations of a civil service law which gives them merit credits and grades for the years they have been in the service? If you and I have been loafing on a job for five, ten or more years—been foozling with the duties of that job while heeling and fanning for a political party—why should the law credit those years to us as service “experience?”

In placing any service or a division of any service under a merit classification, the law should require that every position in such service be filled by examination, and such examination should be open alike to the shirt-sleeved employe already holding a position in such service and to outsiders. Such a requirement would show what of[303] service value there really was as a result of the years an employe had been in the service.

Do you ever go to Washington, D. C.? If so, the next time you go, take in one or more of the main divisions of the Postoffice Department. Some guide or clerk will probably be detailed to steer you through. Your pilot will talk considerable and his talk will listen well. You need not, however, hear all nor even much of what he says. As advised in your visit to the Presidential postoffice, keep both your ears and your eyes open to hear and see what the service employes say and do.

You will observe that a considerable number of the clerical force are doing something—are really trying to work. You will also discover before going far that a number of employes are industriously engaged in talking. The smiles and quiet laughter which embellish their conversation may lead you to believe that they are talking about some of the humorous incidents and features of the postal service. Do not, however, be hasty in arriving at such conclusion. If you get near enough to hear an occasional word, you may discover that their conversation is evidently about something which a humoresque writer has described as “the recently distant elsewhere,” and not about the department service at all. It may be about some feature or phase of Washington’s social flux or about some social function which is to stake a temporary claim in the circle in which the talkers circulate. In short, you will discover that the conversation is but commercially pasteurized small-talk and not business.

Moving on, you will observe other little groups in animated conversation. A glance at the an?mic appearance of some of the talkers will lead you to the immediate and sound conclusion that the subject of conversation cannot be weighty. Politics, even party politics, either practical or progressive, you will readily see would be some sizes too large for them. Getting within hearing range, you will learn that these industrious servants of the people are discussing the telling points in some prize fight “pulled off” the night before or of the ball game which some one or more of the coterie had seen the day before. Maybe some one of the group is turning loose his stem-winding, automatic bloviate ejector in telling his interested auditors about what a “ripping time” he had with Rose at some dance or other party last night. What you hear will be sufficient to convince you[304] that these “classified civil service employes” must put in considerable time in mental and physical exertion to work out of their systems the lessons they were taught at mother’s knee, and much more of their time trying to keep several laps behind their jobs. You will also see that some of the service men are workers—real workers—who earn more than the salaries paid them. So, too, are there many of them whose industry should make a more or less conspicuous service trench into four or five dollars a day. But when you get outside or get home, you will remember having seen numerous supervising and directing heads and many clerks who appeared to be actually tiring themselves out in exertions to keep away from work.

Yes, I repeat, the Postoffice Department carries upon its payrolls too many non-producers of service values—too many mere payroll-raiders on the postal revenues. Putting all these into graded classified service and under the protection of a “joker”-ridden law will not improve the actual service—will not stop the raid of which I have been writing.

The civil service of the government and subordinate division of it—city, county and state—should be controlled by law, not by political partisanship. Mr. Hitchcock is forcefully right in what he says on this very important subject. But laws providing rules and regulations for the betterment of a public service should not provide blind alleys and trenches through which dominating party officials and “bosses” may so easily obstruct or balk accomplishment of the purpose, or the alleged purpose, of the law. I have mentioned three objectionable features common to nearly all civil service laws—to all that I have read. There are other objectionable provisions in some of the laws. I am not, however, intending to discuss here the desirability or the objections to civil service, either as it is or as it should be, save in so far as the present federal law has applied, is applied and may be applied, to the postal service.

I have tried to show how three of its joker provisions—only three of them, mind you—have worked, have been and may be “worked,” to keep party henchmen on the jobs rather than to secure to the people industrious, capable and efficient servants. Of the three wire-tapping provisions of the law mentioned, I have suggested how two of them might, in my opinion at least, be remedied. The third is that of leaving it an easy possibility to victimize employes through the[305] agencies of partisan commissions selected to enforce or administer the law and of incompetent, biased and prejudiced persons such commissions may select to conduct examinations for entrance or promotions in the service. How remedy that?

Having civil service commissioners elected, instead of being selected by a temporary official over-lord would, in my judgment, go far toward correcting the abuses which now flourish so luxuriously under that third “joker” provision of the law.

Any service embracing a considerable number of persons in its execution, must be closely supervised if anything approaching efficiency is attained and maintained. An old German saying reads thus: “The eye of a master will do more work than both his hands.” If value is secured either in public or in private service, the people paid for delivering it must be kept under close supervision—must be kept under “the eye of the master.” A consciousness of having earned his pay should enable any service man, whatever his position, to shake hands with himself without blushing at the close of his day’s work. But if his superiors set him an example in loafing, of hitting the nail slack while on duty, most men will soon learn not only how to loaf but how to accept any amount of pay for services not rendered, and accept it, too, without a flicker of blush or jar of conscientious scruple.

So in closing our consideration of this phase of our subject, permit me to say that efficient civil service will never be attained—can never be attained—if department, division and other supervising and directing heads sit at their desks most of the time, approving documents and requisitions, reading reports and talking politics. If they expect men under them to work, they must get out on the job where they expect the work to be done, and that, too, whether the job be in the office or in the field.