sonnel than from a shifting, changeable, and temporary one, consisting largely of employees who are unable, on account of inexperience, to cope with even the ordinary run of Government work. Each recommendation for a temporary appointment is examined, and to receive favorable consideration it must show unmistakably that conditions justify the desired action. This procedure, and the surveillance of the Civil Service Commission of all temporary appointments, constitute what might be termed a double-check system.

PROMOTIONS.

The promotion of employees strictly on merit is one of the most important factors in raising and maintaining the efficiency of the service. This Department aims to reward those who perform the most efficient service and who possess the qualifications required in the positions to which promotions are made. The efficiency ratings submitted from time to time by the chiefs of bureaus and offices are used as the basis in determining who is best entitled to such promotions; and whenever an employee not having the highest rating in his class is recommended the officer making the recommendation is required to submit satisfactory reasons before favorable action is taken. In connection with the 1,378 promotions made during the current year, it was necessary in only 35 instances to request this additional information.

The doubtful results obtained through the promotion examinations which were held at one time, and the fact that the Civil Service Commission has not provided regulations on the subject, would seem to justify the statement that in the last analysis the real value of an employee can be best determined by the officer under whom he serves. Seniority should not determine the question; for if it did, the efficiency of the service would undoubtedly deteriorate, as there would be no incentive for employees younger in point of service to put forth their best efforts. Nor could anything be more demoralizing to an office than the promotion of an employee to a position requiring duties which he is unable to perform, for such a course would result only in decreased efficiency on the part of competent employees and, in many instances, their loss to the service.

TRANSFER RESTRICTIONS.

As the advantages which would accompany greater elasticity in the transfer rules were dwelt upon at some length in the last annual report, the Department desires merely to repeat its protest against such unnecessary restrictions to transfers as the three-year limit and apportionment rules have proved to be. The latter, in its practical application, has been found to be particularly objectionable,

due partly to the fact that it applies to every transfer from the nonapportioned to the apportioned service (both interdepartmental transfers and transfers within a department), and partly to the fact that it is practically impossible for a department to know prior to making formal request on the Civil Service Commission whether or not a transfer is permissible under the rules. Of course, the service suffers to just the extent of the time consumed by the Commission to decide the question and, if the decision is unfavorable, the additional time required to fill the position in some other way.

INQUIRY INTO THE EFFICIENCY OF THE PERSONNEL.

The Department has about completed the third inquiry into the efficiency of its subordinate officers and employees. In deciding upon this inquiry considerable weight was given to the fact that inquiries of this nature stimulate employees to increased activity and cause them to realize that they must give to the Government the service to which it is entitled. The primary object of the investigation, however, was the desire of the Department to obtain efficiency ratings to serve as a basis in determining the eligibility of employees for promotion, the records of two years ago having been found to be no longer satisfactory for this purpose. It is gratifying to note that the number of employees reported as inefficient is smaller than in the last investigation. This would seem to indicate that the beneficial results of that searching inquiry had been far-reaching, and that, in the majority of cases, the increased efficiency on the part of employees had been of a permanent rather than a temporary character.

SUPERANNUATION AND RETIREMENT.

Superannuation in the civil service and the proposed retirement of employees who have passed their age of greatest usefulness have attracted much attention. Considerable discussion of the subject has appeared in the public press, and many Government officials in reporting on conditions affecting the personnel of their respective departments or offices have laid more or less stress on the evils of superannuation in the service and the necessity of providing, as has been done by a number of countries and private business concerns, some equitable scheme of retirement of those who are no longer able to render a fair degree of service, but who would be left without adequate means of support if dismissed. Many difficulties, of course, may be expected to attend the passage of any law looking to the retirement on pay of superannuated employees in the civil service, whether such retirement is accompanied by annuities paid outright by the Government or whether it is made possible by contributions in whole or in part by the employees themselves.

Incomplete reports recently received from the bureaus show that there are 72 employees of this Department who are more or less superannuated; that the aggregate of their salaries is $73,385; and that their average age is 70 years. Perhaps a greater amount of superannuation and consequent loss to the Government may be found in the older departments and offices. As this Department last year recorded its opinion on the subject of superannuation, it is unnecessary to again point out the advantages and economy that would result from the retirement, which practically everyone admits should be on an adequate annuity, of the civil employees of the Government who have become inefficient through advancing age.

LEAVES OF ABSENCE.

In December, 1910, after considerable discussion had taken place with regard to the claim that the leave privilege was being abused in all departments, this Department instituted an investigation with respect to its own employees in the District of Columbia. Briefly, without including statistics involving the bureaus separately, the following general information was compiled from a consideration of the leave taken during the calendar year 1909:

With a view to determining whether an arbitrary rule should be formulated which would absolutely prevent any infringement of the leave privilege, the Department, in February last, addressed letters to the officers presiding over bureaus and offices in which employees had taken practically the full amount of annual and sick leave during the past three years, and requested them to suggest what, if any, remedial measures should be prescribed. The answers submitted show that the cases of apparent abuse are very rare, so it was deemed imprudent and injudicious to enforce an arbitrary rule which would affect the guilty and the innocent as well. It was decided, however, to send to each chief of bureau or office the names of the employees subordinate to him who had taken excessive leave, with directions that, notwithstanding the regulations on the subject, no sick leave be granted the employees referred to unless, in addition to the usual physician's certificate, the officer under whom the employee serves

is personally satisfied, and so certifies, that such person is actually so physically incapacitated as to be unable to appear for duty. The burden therefore rests, as heretofore, with such officers, under the careful supervision of the Department, to enforce the proper discipline with respect to this subject. Finally, as an additional safeguard to prevent the abuse of the privilege, the leave status of the employee was made an important part of his efficiency rating and therefore an essential element in determining questions relating to promotions.

EXECUTIVE ORDERS AFFECTING THE PERSONNEL.

During the year ended June 30, 1910, five Executive orders having direct application to the personnel of this Department were promulgated. During the past year there were only two such orders. One authorized the reinstatement of a clerk without reference to the year limitation of the reinstatement rule, because of her efficiency while in the service and the general good that would accrue to the service by her return thereto. The other authorized the transfer to the departmental service at Washington, D. C., without regard to the apportionment of the States of which they were legal residents, of certain employees whose services had been satisfactory but who had been furloughed without pay because of a general reduction in the force resulting from the reorganization of the Lighthouse Service.

CLASSIFICATION OF PRESIDENTIAL POSITIONS.

There are certain positions in the Department now in the presidential class and subject to confirmation by the Senate which might very properly be brought within the competitive classified service. These positions are supervising inspectors in the several districts of the Steamboat-Inspection Service; and agent, Alaska Salmon Fisheries; two assistant agents, Alaska Salmon Fisheries; warden, Alaska service; and four deputy wardens, Alaska service, of the Bureau of Fisheries.

There are apparently no reasons to be urged against the classification of supervising inspectors of the Steamboat-Inspection Service. While it is not unlikely that they were originally political offices and filled as a result of political favor, those conditions no longer exist, as is shown by the fact that the incumbents have retained their offices through changes of administration and that there has been a tendency of late to fill vacancies by promotion. If these positions were classified, all vacancies would undoubtedly be filled by promotion from within the service, and the Government would be benefited by having this particular line of its business under the management of well-trained officers.

One position of assistant agent and those of warden and deputy warden, in the Bureau of Fisheries, were created by the sundry civil act of March 4, 1911, effective July 1. When the annual estimates were submitted to Congress, it was the intention of the Department that these positions should be treated as classified, although possibly in some instances excepted from examination, but on June 1, 1911, the Attorney General expressed the opinion that, as there was no provision of law to the contrary, appointment to the positions was vested in the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate.

To classify the positions referred to would require an act of Congress bestowing upon the Secretary the power of appointment, and this may be conveniently accomplished by the incorporation of suitable language in the next appropriation act.

ALLEGED POLITICAL ACTIVITY.

Under Rule I, section 1, of the Civil-Service Rules, employees are prohibited from using their official authority or influence for the purpose of interfering with elections or affecting the results thereof, and from taking an active part in the management of political campaigns. They may, however, vote as they please and express privately their opinion on political subjects. Although a great deal of literature on the subject has been distributed among employees by the Department and the Civil Service Commission, it is but natural that in a great Department having thousands of employees in all sections of the country there should be some few who are unaware of the existence of this rule or perhaps unfamiliar or careless with its interpretation. During the last fiscal year only 10 cases of alleged political activity on the part of its employees were brought to the Department's attention. In 2 cases the charges were not proved; in 2 the employees were warned; while in the remaining 6 cases the employees concerned resigned from the Federal positions they were holding or from the political associations of which they were members.

DESIGNATIONS OF OFFICIALS TO ACT AS CHIEFS OF BUREAUS.

It was found during the past year that section 178 of the Revised Statutes, which designates the officer who shall act in the absence of the chief of a bureau or service whose appointment is vested in the President, could not be applied to certain bureaus in the Department. Under the terms of this statute, during the absence of the chief "the assistant or deputy of such chief or of such officer, or if there be none, then the chief clerk of such bureau," is authorized to perform his duties. Thus, no provision is made to cover bureaus where there are neither deputies nor chief clerks, such as, for instance, the Bureau of Standards and the offices of the different districts of the Steamboat-Inspection Service, and bureaus from which, although there may be a chief clerk,