While “offensive partisanship” is publicly forbidden, it is generally recognized on the inside that no activity of a partisan character is “offensive” so long as it is quiet, and is exercised in favor of the party in power. Public officials, of the rank of postmasters, customs and internal revenue collectors, and district attorneys are not expected to be delegates to political conventions, but I have never known their superiors, when of the same political faith, to object to their being in the town while the convention is in session, maintaining suitable headquarters at the hotel, and even volunteering valuable advice to those who happen to call, as well as to those who are sent for. But politics is not the only weakness of the system. The public has been taught to believe that Civil Service examinations result in securing the most efficient. This is a serious delusion. Those who take civil service examinations usually find their names rejected or upon the eligible list within six months. It takes about that long to classify. Any time within two years thereafter the applicant is liable to be certified and called. When a requisition is made the Commission certifies three names. It is not at all likely that they are the three whose examinations show them the best qualified. That question is not considered—applicants either pass or fail. They are simply the three names at the head of the list from the state whose quota is not exhausted. The officer calling for the clerk examines the records of the certified names and makes a selection. Thereupon the applicant is notified to present himself at a given place where the minimum salary—in normal times seven hundred dollars per annum—awaits him. Even though he took his examination only twelve months before, the chances are he declines, giving as his reason that he is now getting a thousand dollars with good prospects of promotion. It is only a question of time, however, when some applicant will be found who, during the period between examination and certification, varying from six months to two years and six months, has been unable to get a job at seven hundred dollars and he jumps at the chance to “serve his country.” You knew this must be the way but probably you had not stopped to analyze it. The Civil Service screen is so constructed as to catch the small fish and allow the large ones to escape. And there is no way known to man to change it without opening wide the door for favoritism, which the Civil Service system is supposed to close and effectively bar. Nevertheless some of the clerks and employees selected in this way develop a good degree of efficiency and prove far better than anyone would expect from an inspection of the machinery by which they are secured. With scarcely an exception they are honest and conscientious toilers, with very little ambition. A few have ambition but these should, and usually do, soon resign.