[801] New York Tribune, July 10, 1877.
[802] The first step towards a change in the manner of appointments and removals was a bill introduced in Congress on December 20, 1865, by Thomas A. Jenckes of Rhode Island "to regulate the civil service of the United States." A few months later Senator B. Gratz Brown of Missouri submitted a resolution for "such change in the civil service as shall secure appointments to the same after previous examinations by proper Boards, and as shall provide for promotions on the score of merit or seniority." On March 3, 1871, Congress appended a section to an appropriation bill, authorising the President to "prescribe such regulations for the admission of persons into the civil service as may best promote efficiency therein and ascertain the fitness of each candidate in respect to age, health, character, knowledge and ability for the branch of service in which he seeks to enter; and for this purpose he may employ suitable persons to conduct such inquiries, prescribe their duties, and establish regulations for the conduct of persons who may receive appointments." Under this authority President Grant organised a commission composed of George William Curtis, Joseph Medill, Alexander C. Cattell, Davidson A. Walker, E.B. Ellicott, Joseph H. Blackfan, and David C. Cox. This commission soon found that Congress was indisposed to clothe them with the requisite power, and although in the three years from 1872 to 1875, they had established the entire soundness of the reform, an appropriation to continue the work was refused and the labours of the commission came to an end.
[803] New York Tribune, June 25, 1877.
[804] New York Tribune, July 28, 1877.
[805] Ibid.
[806] In his speech at Woodstock, Conn., on July 4, Blaine disapproved the President's action; a gathering of Republicans in New Jersey, celebrating the return of Robeson from a foreign tour, indicated an unfriendly disposition; the Camerons of Pennsylvania, father and son, exhibited dissent; one branch of the New Hampshire Legislature tabled a resolution approving the President's course; and an early Republican State convention in Iowa indirectly condemned it.
[807] In H.R. 45th Cong., 3d Sess., No. 140, p. 48 (Potter report) is a list of those connected with the Louisiana count "subsequently appointed to or retained in office."
[808] These conventions occurred as follows: Ohio, August 2; Maine, August 9; Pennsylvania, September 6; Wisconsin, September 12; Massachusetts, September 20; New Jersey, September 25. See New York papers on the day following each.
[809] New York Tribune, February 28, 1877.
[810] "Platt and I imbibed politics with our earliest nutriment. I was on the stump the year I became a voter, and so was he. I was doing the part of a campaign orator and he was chief of the campaign glee club. The speech amounted to little in those days unless it was assisted by the glee club. In fact the glee club largely drew the audience and held it. The favorite song of that day was 'John Brown's Body,' and the very heights of ecstatic applause were reached when Brother Platt's fine tenor voice rang through the arches of the building or the trees of the woodland, carrying the refrain, 'We'll hang Jeff Davis on a sour apple tree, while John Brown's soul goes marching on.'"—Chauncey M. Depew, Speeches, 1896 to 1902, p. 237.