ABRAM S. HEWITT TO TILDEN
"House of Representatives, July 26th, 1867.
"My dear Governor,—We have got over another day, thanks to an election case, without action on the silver bill. We believe now that we shall be able to defeat action, if not vote down the measure. It has been a hard fight, and, if we win, it will be due to considerations of expediency rather than of principles on the part of the Southern members.
"The object of this note is mainly to suggest something in regard to the civil-service plank. A very intelligent newspaper man says that the real issue is not so much in the personnel of the clerks as in the modes and machinery of administration in the several departments of the Govt. In other words, that the abuses are largely due to the defective organization of the department, that the business has outgrown the methods and machinery devised by Hamilton, and that it is the framework of the government machine which needs reformation, reconstruction, and adaptation to the requirements of the public business. In this view, the mere appointment and discharge of a few clerks is of but little consequence, compared with such a reform in the mode of conducting the public business.
"This crude statement seems to contain the germ of a position in politics in regard to civil service, far higher and more practical than the declaration of Hayes.
"The P. S. dept. may be instanced to illustrate the state of affairs. When it was a small affair it was not of such consequence, and before the days of railroads and telegraphs indispensable, perhaps, that it should use its receipts to pay its expenses and pay over to the Treasury any balance that might remain at the end of the fiscal year. Now, however, when the receipts are very great, they should be paid all into the Treasury, and the expenses drawn thence by warrant, as in other departments of the government. This is not the case, but the Postmaster-General, having the control of the money, authorizes and allows expenditures, such as repairs and improvements to buildings, amounting to large sums, without any authority from Congress, such as is necessary in the other departments for such outlays.
"So the bookkeeping of the government is not in accordance with the experience of the times, but is crude, old-fashioned, unsatisfactory, and even contradictory. Now a broad declaration from you that you will endeavor to reform these abuses which are of a gravity far greater than the incompetence or negligence of clerks, and that this reform is the most urgent and will receive careful attention would, I think, strike the public favorably.
"Faithfully y'rs,
"Abram S. Hewitt.
"Scott Wicks, of Ill., one of our best members, and who stood by us on the banking and currency committee, has lost his renomination in consequence. It is a severe blow to him and to me, and if we win he must be taken care of. He is a first-class man.
"I do not think you begin to appreciate the bitterness of these Western inflationists."