STALKING THE PATRONAGE WOLVES

Although the provision for a single civil service administrator to replace the present commission was one of the questionable virtues of the now deceased reorganization bill, the extension of the merit system "upward, outward, and downward" was widely hailed as a reform of revolutionary character, and its defeat was the most unfortunate result of the recent House action. Nevertheless, the hope of reform is far from destroyed, for last Monday the Senate defeated the notorious McKellar spoils bill, and accepted a substitute measure.

Thus the present situation in Congress is unique: for the first time, both the Senate and the House have agreed to measures tentatively taking top-ranking postmasters out of the reach of patronage-hungry congressmen. What will emerge from the conference is hard to predict, for while the Ramspeck bill which has passed the House would give the postmasters life tenure, the Senate version provides for only an eight year term, and while the former would life the burden of senatorial confirmation, the latter retains this, the "good old way" of patronage appointments. Both bills would be an improvement over the situation existing up until July, 1936, but neither would equal the sweeping reform provided by the president's executive order of that month.

Some reform of the civil service seems inevitable. The only regret is that it should be so halting and so incomplete when the political condition in Washington seemed ripe for real reform. Should the G.O.P. regain power in 1940--something far from impossible, could a leader be found--then the long-suffering Civil Service might have to wait another three long years until the patronage wolves again became relatively satiated. Certainly the country fervently hopes that Congress will heed Senator Norris warning: "You Democrats said . . . 'We pledge the immediate extension of the civil service.' You had six years' time to do it and you have not done it yet. The word 'immediate', it seems to me, ought to cry out to you 'stop, look, and listen' before you go back to the people again and ask them to have confidence in your platform pledges."