Job Appointment Quotes
This quotation is valuable because it illustrates the classic implementation of the political spoils system before there was civil service with a merit system. This was not only typical of how people get government jobs, but it was the virtually the only way. In the language of the day, this letter from the Governor to a major political boss says: “Give this fellow a job. He is a loyal party man. Don’t give him a good job—a minor job will do, He is not that important.”
In a Senate confirmation hearing for Alfred S. Regnery as the director of the Justice Department's Office of Juvenile Delinquency, the nominee admitted that he had no direct experience in the field and couldn't name a single work he had ever read on the subject of juvenile delinquency. Senator Metzenbaum said:
