The public interest is not very large in the retention of such persons. The ordinary graduates of the high schools of the country are competent for all those duties. But the clerks of this class are not removed in mass, and they never will be, under any administration. Even a fresh man at the head of a department will soon find that the fancied political advantages are no adequate compensation for the trouble that he assumes and the risk of error and fraud that he runs when he takes new and untried persons in the place of those who have been tested. As late as 1870 about thirty per cent. of the employees of the Treasury in 1860 were in office, and this notwithstanding that the Treasury furnished recruits for both armies. During my time and for years afterward, the post of Assistant Secretary was held by Mr. Hartley, a Democrat from the days of Pierce and Buchanan. He was experienced, diligent and entirely trustworthy. Of the first class of employees it is to be said that there is no occasion to embalm them in their offices, and if their pay is adequate there is no ground for placing them upon the pension rolls. Their duties are not as exacting as the duties and labors of men in corresponding stations in private life. As to the second class, their relations to the public are such that no public obligation arises except to pay them the stipulated salaries. It is essential to a proper administration that the Secretary or the President should have the power of removal, and it should never be coupled with the duty of making a statement of the cause. Not infrequently a statement would be the occasion of scandal and of suffering by innocent parties. The power may be abused as every power may be, in the hands of dishonest or corrupt men. This is one of the perils to the public, a peril from which no government can escape. With us a change of rulers is a remedy for political wrongs that do not belong to the catalogue of crimes. It may be said, however, that this power of removal gives to a dishonest administrator of a department the opportunity to secure the appointment of his political friends in the place of political opponents removed, and this whatever may be the method of appointment. The candidates may pass the competitive examination, and they may enter upon their duties, but their chief in thirty or sixty days may find them lacking in practical aptitude, and so on, until those of the true faith shall be sent forward by the examining board.