Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 April 1895 — LAW HAS WEAK SPOT. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

LAW HAS WEAK SPOT.

CIVIL SERVICE ACT DOESN’T PROTECT EMPLOYES. Head of an Executive Department Need Not Give Reasons for Dispensing with the Services of a Government Clerk —One Report Missing. Capital City Chat. Washington correspondence:

THAT the Civil Service act is inadequate to protect Government employes is showu in the fact that the • rules do not prevent or regulate dismissals, even nominally, except for political or religious reasons, and even then experience has shown %ppj>-that they are practicully useless. In the recent ease of EuGaddis, who applied for an into prohibit I II I. his dismissal from i" ’ the Treasury De-

partuient by Secretary Carlisle for pelitical reasons, the court held that there was nothing in the Civil Service rules that required the head of an executive department to give reasons for dispensing with the services of a clerk, and therefore the law will permit a cabinet officer to dismiss as many clerks as he pleases for any reason whatever. His power of removal is absolute, and the Civil Service Commission is not advised of his action in this respect except where appointments are made to the vacancies thus created. The commission has jurisdiction over appointments only. I have been endeavoring to ascertain the actual number of persons removed from the executive departments during the present administration, but find it almost impossible to obtain accurate information. During the fiscal year ending June 30, 1894, according to the records of the Civil Service Commission, there were 4,855 appointments in the executive departments of the Government. Of these 2,281 were made to fill vacancies caused by dismissals and 2,440 to fill vacancies caused by resignations, but there is nothing to show how many of these resignations were voluntary and how many were compulsory. The number of vacancies caused by death was only 234. These figures do not include the changes in the government printing office, where it is estimated 2,500 persons have been discharged by Mr. Benedict since he succeeded Mr. Palmer as public printer last spring. Nor does the total include 609 persons who have been dismissed from the censtfs office since Col. Wright took charge in October, 1893. But their removal was necessary and proper because the work on which they were engaged was completed, and they have understood from the beginning that their employment was only temporary The census is taken once in ten years, and it usually requires about four years to prepare the returns for publication. There are now 385 persons in the census office, and the most of them will not be needed after March 1.

On July 1 last, by act of Congress, the offices of Commissioner of Customs and Second Comptroller of the Treasury were abolished, which threw out of employment, permanently, 164 clerks, and made an .annual saving of $160,000 in the pay rolls i_f the Government, but only about ninety of the clerks have been actually dismissed. The remainder are retained to close up the affairs of the bureau under a special appropriation of $30,000, but their employment will continue only a few weeks longer. There were also 400 persons discharged from the War Department under the act of Congress reducing the force of the record and pension division because their services were no longer necessary, and this caused a reduction of over $500,000 in the annual pay roll of this department. The total number of changes, therefore, since the present administration came into power has been 8,364, of which 5,790 were removals, and 7,355 new appointments have been made.

Report Is Missing. There is a good deal of inquiry at the Capitol for the annual report of the ser-geant-at-arms of the House, which, under the law, is required to be submitted at the beginning of every session. It was laid on the Speaker’s desk the morning Congress met, but was not presented to the House, nor were any newspaper correspondents allowed to see it. The Speaker returned it to the sergeant-at-arms for revision and it has not been returned. No explanation has been given, but it is understood that the portion of the re-port which refers to the deductions made in the salaries of members for absence is not satisfactory. Early last session when the Democrats had such hard work to keep a quorum in Washington, the House got very virtuous and passed a resolution directing the sergeant-at-arms, who is their paymaster, to enforce the law and to require from each member a sworn certificate saying how many days he was present during the month, and then to deduct his pay for the days he was absent. There was a great deal of nicking at this, and the Judiciary Committee made a report that the law was repealed several years ago when the section of the statutes regulating the pay of members was revised, and it is understood that the order of the House has not been enforced. Those who voluntarily informed the pay clerk that they were absent have been docked, but those who said nothing about it or drew on the ser-geant-at-arms for their salary through some bank did not suffer. A Horrifying Discovery. The swagger society in Washington has just received a severe shock upon the discovery that a certain wealthy widow, who assumed and was supposed to be descended from ancient and famous ancestry, is only the daughter of an honest, energetic and successful Irish contractor in the city of Philadelphia, who made a large fortune digging sewers and cellars, grading and paving streets, building railroads and canals and making other useful public improvements. She has worn a crest upon her carriage and her note paper, apd there has always been a difference of opinion as to whether she came from the Huguenot Protestants of France or the old merchants of Flanders, because her name has a French appearance and a foreign sound, but legal proceedings in which she is involved have disclosed the fact that her father and mother were Irish, and she is Irish too. Her house is closed this winter, and it is understood that she intends to spend three or four years in Europe in order to secure another veneer, and to let people forget that her money was acquired by honest and respectable toil and not by entail.