The "principal officer in each of the executive departments" has a staff of subordinates. The various officers of the United States constitute the machinery of government, and the appointment of a large proportion of them is vested in the President. These various civil officers, so appointed, are for the execution of public business. The conduct of public business and the care of the public interests are, under the President's supervision and control, largely committed to these functionaries. With the growth of the country in territorial area, population, and wealth, the enormous increase of taxation and expenditures and the assumption by the Federal Government of State duties and prerogatives, the number of officials has increased to 100,000. The civil list in 1859 numbered 44,527; in 1875, 94,119. The rolls show a larger list of paid dependents since the war than there was during the war. All these officers hold their places by the tenure of the President's will. They are to be found in every neighborhood in the Union, and constitute a large army, dangerous to the welfare and perpetuity of the republic. The theory is that all public offices are for administrative efficiency and the public weal. Up to the beginning of General Jackson's term of office, there had been, during the forty years of his six predecessors, 112 removals of such officers as required for their appointment "the advice and consent of the Senate." These few removals were not made from caprice, or to punish enemies, or to reward partisans, but for cause and by strict rule. The power of removal was exerted so exceptionally, only for just and salutary purposes, and was never used as an instrument of party success. Public policy dictated its exercise. Offices were not regarded as the private property of the President, or as the perquisites of a party, but as trusts for the general good. General Jackson's accession to the Presidency began a revolution. Differences of opinion were punished by removal from office, and partisanship was rewarded with places of profit. His successors have adhered too closely to a precedent which has almost solidified into a party law, or a principle of American politics. No party can claim exemption from the sin of using the civil list for party ends. The Whig, Democratic, and Republican parties, in the distribution of "patronage," in Federal, State, and municipal governments, are alike obnoxious to censure. The poison has infiltrated every vein and artery of the body politic. Every branch of federal and of State service has suffered from the vicious maxim that offices are spoils to be divided among the victors in a party contest. Too often the condition precedent to appointment is unquestioning submission to party decrees, indiscriminate support of party candidates and party measures. The right to remove incumbents is now a conceded Presidential prerogative, acquiesced in by all parties.