ing on their
regular work, made their reports during the last half of 1906. The
Committee informed itself fully regarding the business methods of
practically every individual branch of the business of the Government,
and effected a marked improvement in general efficiency throughout the
service. The conduct of the routine business of the Government had never
been thoroughly overhauled before, and this examination of it resulted
in the promulgation of a set of working principles for the transaction
of public business which are as sound to-day as they were when
the Committee finished its work. The somewhat elaborate and costly
investigations of Government business methods since made have served
merely to confirm the findings of the Committee on Departmental Methods,
which were achieved without costing the Government a dollar. The actual
saving in the conduct of the business of the Government through the
better methods thus introduced amounted yearly to many hundreds of
thousands of dollars; but a far more important gain was due to the
remarkable success of the Commission in establishing a new point of view
in public servants toward their work.

The need for improvement in the Governmental methods of transacting
business may be illustrated by an actual case. An officer in charge of
an Indian agency made a requisition in the autumn for a stove costing
seven dollars, certifying at the same time that it was needed to keep
the infirmary warm during the winter, because the old stove was worn
out. Thereupon the customary papers went through the customary routine,
without unusual delay at any point. The transaction moved like a glacier
with dignity to its appointed end, and the stove reached the infirmary
in good order in time for the Indian agent to acknowledge its arrival in
these words: "The stove is here. So is spring."

The Civil Service Commission, under men like John McIlhenny and
Garfield, rendered service without which the Government could have been
conducted with neither efficiency nor honesty. The politicians were
not the only persons at fault; almost as much improper pressure for
appointments is due to mere misplaced sympathy, and to the spiritless
inefficiency which seeks a Government office as a haven for the
incompetent. An amusing feature of office seeking is that each man
desiring an office is apt to look down on all others with the same
object as forming an objectionable class with which _he_ has nothing in
co