[Sidenote: Results of the spoils system.] Being based upon a false doctrine the spoils system was pernicious in its results. It filled the administrative offices of the land with party henchmen who were incompetent to perform the difficult work of administration; it resulted in such frequent changes of officials that a man no sooner learned the duties of his position than he was removed to make room for someone else; it debased the whole tone of the public service. It spread from the national government to the states and from the states to the cities, making the government service everywhere less efficient than private enterprise. Presidents, senators, and representatives were forced to spend a large portion of their time in listening to the pleas of office-seekers. Even Lincoln, in the dark days of the Civil War, could not escape the deluge of applicants for appointments.[28] Not everyone who sought office could be appointed, of course, and where refusals were made they often caused much bitterness. The seriousness of the whole situation was strongly impressed upon the public mind in 1881, when President Garfield was shot by a man whose request for an appointment had been refused. =The Rise of the Civil Service System.=—Popular aversion to the spoils system ultimately moved Congress to pass the Civil Service Act of 1883. Although this statute has been several times amended and its provisions broadened, it still remains the basis of the merit system as applied to federal appointments. Briefly, it provides for a Civil Service Commission of three persons appointed by the President with the confirmation of the Senate. It gives the President power to classify the various subordinate offices, with the provision that all offices so classified must thereafter be filled by competitive examinations. When the law went into force only about fourteen thousand positions were placed in the classified service but the list has been steadily widened until today more than three hundred thousand positions in the employ of the national government are filled by examination. These examinations are conducted by the Civil Service Commission. [Sidenote: The spread of civil service.] From the national government the civil service system spread to many of the states and cities where it has steadily made progress although it is yet far from being universally established. More than half the states are even yet without civil service laws. In the larger cities the adoption of the merit system had been more general; nearly all of them have now established it in one form or other. The system of patronage is everywhere losing its hold although the politicians often fight hard to retain it. From the present outlook it is only a question of time until all administrative offices except the very highest will be filled under civil service rules. [Sidenote: The nature of civil service tests.]