CHAPTER XXXIV APPOINTMENTS TO OFFICE
Among the great satisfactions in the life of public men is that of sometimes being instrumental in the advancement to places of public honor of worthy men, and of being able to have a great and salutary influence upon their lives. I have always held to the doctrine of what is called Civil Service Reform, and have maintained to the best of my ability the doctrine of the absolute independence of the Executive in such matters, as his right to disregard the wishes and opinions of members of either House of Congress, and to make his appointments, executive and judicial, without advice, or on such advice as he shall think best. But, at the same time, there can be no doubt that the Executive must depend on some advice other than his own, to learn the quality of men in different parts of this vast Republic, and to learn what will be agreeable to public opinion and to the party which is administering the Government and is responsible for its administration. He will, ordinarily, find no better source of such information than in the men whom the people have shown their own confidence by entrusting them with the important function of Senator or Representative. He will soon learn to know his men, and how far he can safely take such advice. He must be careful to see to it that he is not induced to build up a faction in his party, or to fill up the public offices with the partisans of ambitious but unscrupulous politicians. When I entered the House of Representatives, before the Civil Service Reform had made any progress, I addressed and had put on file with the Secretary of the Treasury a letter in which I said that I desired him to understand when I made a recommendation to him of any person for public office, it was to be taken merely as my opinion of the merit of the candidate, and not as an expression of a personal request; and that if he found any other person who would in his judgment be better for the public service, I hoped he would make the selection without regard to my recommendation.
I have never undertaken to use public office as personal patronage, or to claim the right to dictate to the President of the United States, or that the executive was not entirely free, upon such advice as he saw fit, or without advice, if he thought fit, in making his selection for public office.
It has been my good fortune to have influenced, or I think I may fairly say, procured the appointment to public office of many gentlemen who would not have been appointed without my active efforts. I have no reason to be ashamed of one of the list. I believe that the following gentlemen, beside others less distinguished, who have been very satisfactory, able and faithful public servants, owe their appointment to my original suggestion, or would not have been appointed without my earnest efforts.
Charles Devens, Attorney-General; Alanson W. Beard, Collector
of the Port of Boston; Horace Gray, first to the office of
Reporter of the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, and later
to that of Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United
States; J. Evarts Greene, Postmaster of Worcester; Thomas
L. Nelson, Judge of the District Court of Massachusetts; Francis
C. Lowell, Judge of the District Court of Massachusetts; Howell
E. Jackson, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the
United States; John D. Washburn, Minister to Switzerland.
I think I may also fairly claim that the election of William B. Washburn as Governor of Massachusetts was due not only to the fact that I originally proposed him as a candidate, but to my active efforts in the campaign which preceded the Convention which nominated him.
There is no man in this list of greater ability or of higher quality of manhood than Evarts Greene. Mr. Greene was compelled by the illness of his wife to remain fast-bound in one spot, instead of going to some large city where his great talent would have commanded a very high place indeed in his profession as editor. When he edited the Worcester Spy, it was one of the most influential Republican newspapers in the country. The Spy got into pecuniary difficulties. Mr. Greene, with some reluctance, accepted the office of Postmaster, an office which, according to usage in such cases, was in my gift.
Just before Postmaster-General Wanamaker, whose executive ability no man will question, went out of office, he requested Mr. Greene to send to the Department an account of the improvements he had made and proposed in the post-office service. This was sent in a circular all over the country to other like post-offices.
Just before Mr. Greene died, President Roosevelt visited Worcester. In passing the post-office, where the persons employed in the service were collected, he stopped and said he was glad to see "what we have been accustomed to consider the record post-office." This, as may well be believed, gave Mr. Greene great satisfaction.