The continued operation of the law relating to our civil service has added the most convincing proofs of its necessity and usefulness. It is u fact worthy of note, that every public officer who has a just idea of his duty to the people testifies to the value of this reform. Its stanchest friends are found among those who understand it best, and its warmest supporters are those who are restrained and protected by its requirements.

The meaning of such restraint and protection is not appreciated by those who want places under the government, regardless of merit and efficiency, nor by those who insist that the selection for such places should rest upon a proper credential showing active partisan work. They mean to public officers, if not their lives. the only opportunity afforded them to attend to public business, and they mean to the good people of the country the better performance of the work of their government.

It is exceedingly strange that the scope and nature of this reform are so little understood, and that so many things not included within its plan are called by its name. When cavil yields more fully to examination, the system will have large additions to the number of its friends.

Our civil service reform may be imperfect in some of its details; it may be misunderstood and opposed; it may not always be faithfully applied; its designs may sometimes miscarry through mistake or willful intent; it may sometimes tremble under the assaults of its enemies, or languish under the misguided zeal of impracticable friends; but if the people of this country ever submit to the banishment of its underlying principle from the operation of their government, they will abandon the surest guarantee of the safety and success of American institutions.

I invoke for this reform the cheerful and ungrudging support of the Congress.