Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 2.djvu/146

126 you may follow them even to another place in some of these splendid public buildings of ours—a side office, where they pay their respects to a young gentleman who at first must appear to you one of the high dignitaries; and you are somewhat astonished when you hear that he is the appointment clerk, who very graciously receives the representatives of the people, with their hats in their hands, and condescendingly dispenses his favors upon them, or with polite regret assures them that he cannot accommodate them all. Sir, it is by no means with a feeling of pride that I make the confession, but I must say that, carried away by the system which prevails, I have been there myself and I have witnessed the scene.

And now, sir, what are all these men engaged in? What does this spectacle of frantic hurry and pressure mean? It means nothing more nor less than that the President, the members of the Cabinet, Senators and Representatives and the whole multitude which fills the capital are busy in taking to pieces the whole machinery of the government immediately after the accession to power of the new Administration, then to recompose it again out of new materials. From the collector of customs in New York down to the meanest postmaster in the country, from the Minister Plenipotentiary down to the tide-waiter, all must be removed to make room for new men. Nobody is to be spared but some old experts here and there in Government offices, without whose experienced aid the machinery would come to an absolute standstill. Such, you are told, has become the established custom in this great Republic of ours; and the same spectacle repeats itself every four years.

You ask yourself, is this necessary, is it desirable? And if it were necessary or desirable would this be an opportune moment for doing it? Why, sir, the President and heads of the Departments, just having been put in