Chapter XI: A Betrayal of Reform

These are the words applied to an act of the Republican Governor of New York by one of the ablest and stanchest Republican journals of that State, the _Mail and Express_ of New York City. It goes on to say:

Gov. Black's approval of the bill to place the civil service of
this State at the mercy of machine politics is a perversion of
Republican principle and a betrayal of reform. There is not one
legitimate public interest that this measure will benefit; not a
single purpose of honest administration that it will strengthen,
nor an object of sound party policy that it will help to
accomplish.

The Governor's bill is a step backward from the advanced position
of the party on the civil-service issue. It is a trick to nullify
the merit principle in appointments to public office, and it opens
the way for a full restoration of the spoils system. There is not a
boss nor a machine politician in the State who does not indorse it.
There is not an intelligent supporter of honest civil service who
will not denounce it.

The rank and file of the Republican party repudiate the Governor's
bill and disclaim all responsibility for it. Party sentiment has
spoken against it in unmistakable terms. The Governor's reflections
upon those who opposed the bill are neither well grounded nor in
good taste. They mean nothing save that he is sensitive to the
criticism which his ill-advised measure has provoked--criticism
which, it may truthfully be said, is abundantly warranted by the
character of the bill itself as well as by his own amazing advocacy
of the spoils system in the public service.