Page:The Presidents of the United States, 1789-1914, v. III.djvu/167

 RUTHERFORD BIRCHARD HAYES 133 department of the civil service. It should be under stood by every officer of the general government that he is expected to conform his conduct to its requirements.&quot; The policy thus indicated found much favor with the people generally, and not a few men in public life heartily approved of it. But the bulk of the professional politicians, who saw themselves threatened in their livelihood, and many members of congress, who looked upon gov ernment patronage as a part of their perquisites, and the distribution of offices among their ad herents as the means by which to hold the party together and to maintain themselves in public place, became seriously alarmed and began a systematic warfare upon the president and his cabinet. The administration was from the beginning sur rounded with a variety of perplexities. Congress had adjourned on March 3, 1877, without making the necessary appropriations for the support of the army, so that from June 30 the army would remain without pay until new provision could be made. The president, therefore, on May 5, 1877, called an extra session of congress to meet on Octo ber 15. But in the meantime a part of the army was needed for active service of a peculiarly trying kind. In July strikes broke out among the men employed upon railroads, beginning on the line of the Baltimore and Ohio railroad and then rapidly spreading over a large part of the northern states.