Mr. JOHNSON. Those three men, provided for in this year's appropriation at $2,000 are lifted into this item, are they not, under the same name, but this is intended as a promotion?

Gen. BLACK. It is intended to give them a little additional compensation. That whole paragraph may be included in the explanation which has been offered. Examiners, one at $2,400, who may act as chief of division; three at $2,000 each, four at $1,800 each, five clerks of class 4. There comes the beginning of the real increase. There are now four clerks of class 4.

Mr. JOHNSON. General, is it contemplated to promote somebody already in the office or to go outside to get some one to fill this position?

Gen. BLACK. It is contemplated to get the best man possible. We are not looking for an outside man, and would prefer that the promotion should go to one already in the office; but if the needs of the service require it, we will go outside and find our man; but the present contemplation is a promotion.

Mr. JOHNSON. I have some very decided notions about promotions. I do not believe there are many places in the Government service where there is not some man already in that division who is capable of being promoted, and if you promote him from $1,800 to $2,000 that enables you to put somebody else up all along the line and increase the pay of half a dozen men in that same lot of clerks; but if you go outside to get the man to put in the higher places, you do not help another man in the office, and it is hard for me to believe there is not a division here where you could not find a man competent to do the work and worthy of the promotion and thereby help quite a number of them.

Gen. BLACK. That is the feeling we have about the matter, but it might happen in this way; that the inclusion of some branch of the public service would require a man with other qualifications than those that have been developed in a clerical line.

Mr. JOHNSON. That may be true in regard to technical positions, but as to average clerkships I believe what I have stated holds good. Gen. BLACK. We are entirely in harmony with those views.

ADDITIONAL CLERICAL FORCE.

Mr. JOHNSON. You next ask us for 26 clerks of class 3 instead of 21. Gen. BLACK. Yes; that is an increase of 5; and the next item is for 34 instead of 29, an increase of 5; and the next is an increase of 6 of class 1.

Mr. JOHNSON. General, state as briefly as you can, and as forcibly as you can, why you think we ought to give you that additional force. Gen. BLACK. That provides for a total addition, I believe, of 10 clerks, and 4 that have been estimated for originally, 14 clerks.

FOURTH-CLASS POST OFFICES.

[See also p. 37.]

I want to call your attention, Mr. Chairman, to this statement: On the 15th of October, 1912, the President, by Executive order, added to the employees under the jurisdiction of the civil service 36.236 offices.

Mr. GILLETT. Fourth-class post offices, I suppose?

Gen. BLACK. Fourth-class post offices. They are divided into two classes by a horizontal line, those that are above $500 and those that are below $500. Those that are above $500 are 4,457, besides 3,411 that were already included; and those that are below the $500 line are 31,799, added by the order to 10,575 who already were in the service, and that makes a total of fourth-class postmasters of 50,222 places, 36,236 having been added, as I said before, on the 15th of October. Now the men that are below $500 are appointed primarily upon an inspection made by the post-office inspectors under certain regulations, but there is not one of those appointments that may not at some time or another come within the purview of the commission and present facts that may require an investigation.

Mr. GILLETT. Do they not have an examination, General, for these offices?

Gen. BLACK. They have an examination made by an inspector, which is an inspection that relates to personal fitness and to the availability of the office to be occupied for the use of the public-the conveniences of the office.

Mr. GILLETT. I did not know that. Do you mean that one inspector is sent out, and he decides who shall be postmaster?

Gen. BLACK. One inspector does that, and he makes a report to the department, and the department sends a copy of the report over to us. We may challenge it or we may wait until the citizens challenge it, but in either event we would have jurisdiction to make an investigation as to that matter. I am not undertaking to give you all the details as to how we get jurisdiction, but am simply stating the fact that we have that jurisdiction. In regard to those above the $500 mark, the commission has examinations regularly conducted, and certifies under the ordinary practice three of each kind to the department for the selection of the postmasters.

Mr. JOHNSON. Let me ask you a question in that connection. The President's order has been promulgated putting these offices under the civil service, and that of itself covers all of the postmasters who are already in the service, and you do not have anything to do until there is a vacancy?

Gen. BLACK. We do not have anything to do until there is a vacancy, but they are constantly occurring.

Mr. JOHNSON. About how many offices were under the civil service prior to the late order of the President?

Gen. BLACK. You mean the whole body of them or the fourthclass postmasterships?

Mr. JOHNSON. The postmasterships.

Gen. BLACK. In round numbers, they were about 15,000.

Mr. JOHNSON. With 15,000 post offices under the jurisdiction of the Civil Service Commission, how many vacancies did you have a month, on an average?

Gen. BLACK. How many vacancies occurred on an average?

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes; because if you can tell us how much work it involved to supervise 15,000 offices, then you can make a calculation as to how much work it will take to supervise 50,000 or any other number, assuming that the vacancies will occur in about the same mathematical proportion.

Gen. BLACK. In the last year, ending June 30, 1912, there were 18,585 examinations for the post offices.

Mr. JOHNSON. That was the number of people who stood examination?

Gen. BLACK. Yes.

Mr. JOHNSON. How many offices became vacant that necessitated holding examinations?

Mr. GILLETT. That must cover others besides fourth-class post offices.

Gen. BLACK. Yes.

Mr. GILLETT. Mr. Johnson meant fourth class.

Gen. BLACK. I wanted to add a little bit to that statement as to the work to be done.

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes; I merely interrupted you with that question, and while they are looking up that information you can proceed with your statement, and we will come back to it a little later. If I may state what is in my mind, I just wanted to find out if there are 15,000 post offices under the Civil Service Commission, about how many vacancies occurred during each year, and what force it takes in your office to take care of that work, and if there are 30,000 or 50,000 other post offices added, we could make a calculation as to how much additional work will be placed upon the commission. Now go ahead, General, with your statement as you were making it. Gen. BLACK. The fact is, you know, that the service reaches out so far and is so active that all of the details that may be inquired after by your committee I could not well prepare for. I have here a paper which shows the reported work in the Division of Appointments in certifications on one day, and that gives a little light on the subject about which you were inquiring. This is not a day picked out for the quantity of the work, but simply the day that was nearest to this examination to-day. In the temporary offices there were 108 departmental people employed that had been certified under appointments passed upon by the commission. There were 511 certifications and choices from them; and as showing the grind of the offices, here is a statement showing the number of eligibles received as 78; number of eligibles entered on registers, 10; certificates issued from eligible registers, 11; certificates canceled, 2; temporary appointments approved or extended-departmental, 105; post office, 8; circulars and forms mailed, 115; appointments gained, 3; lost. 3; apportionment waived, 0; certificates checked, 20; selections entered, 29; declinations noted, 10.

Every day nearly there are a number of assistant postmasters, but it happened this day there was not 1 added, but ordinarily there are from 1 to 20 of the assistant postmasters who are classified, and of the first class and of the second class there are also ordinarily from 1 to 20 or 25, as the case may be. Now, Mr. Johnson, will you tell me exactly what it was you wanted to know about the work of the day or of the year?

Mr. JOHNSON. I had read your note here in reference to requiring additional force, and was listening to your remarks about wanting an increase in force on account of these offices being placed under the civil service, and I wanted to know how many people it took to care now for the 15,000 offices under the civil service, so we can estimate the increased work that would be placed upon the commission by reason of the President's order.

Mr. GILLETT. I suppose the chances are you have not got those fourth-class offices by themselves.

Mr. WASHBURN. No; that is just the point. The work all comes in under the several divisions, and no one has attempted, I think, to estimate exactly what part belongs to the fourth-class postmaster work. It could be done, I think, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. JOHNSON. I thought if we knew how many vacancies occurred during a year out of the number of offices that were covered by the Civil Service it would help us.

Gen. BLACK. Here is an answer in part to your question. On June 30, 1911, there were 14,278 classified postmasters, which was before the issuance of this order, and that gives you a fixed figure.

Mr. GILLETT. Mr. Johnson means, General, in that 14,000 how many changes had occurred during the year?

Gen. BLACK. Two hundred and twenty-four offices have been discontinued during the year, 118 of them for want of applicants. During the year 1,043 vacancies occurred, 714 by resignation, 142 by removal, 127 by death, and 60 by establishment of new offices. That makes a total of vacancies occurring of 1,043. For filling them the commission examined 1,617 persons, and there were 995 appointments during the year. That gives you the main figures that you inquired about.

May I call attention to one further matter that Mr. McIlhenny calls to my attention. In fourth-class postmasters every vacancy means a separate examination and inspection, as a rule, so that the work of this branch of the service is multiplied many times over the usual work of the commission, where we can examine 20 or 30 men at one examination, for half a dozen or a dozen different offices. Inasmuch as the offices are separated there is a single examination for each one of them, and each may involve the examination of half a dozen applicants.

Mr. JOHNSON. I believe you stated when you were here before that that examination does not cost the Government anything except the traveling expenses of the representative of the Civil Service Commission in that district?

Gen. BLACK. No; it costs nothing, except the salaries of the officials who are already in the service and the traveling expenses.

Mr. GILLETT. While that is true, General, you have to have a special examination in each case, and in a majority of the cases you do not have any examination at all, because they are below the $500 mark, and you simply have an inspection.

Gen. BLACK. The examinations I think clearly indicated where the line of demarkation was.

Mr. GILLETT. But you can not tell, of course, in that thousand cases, how many of them had to have examinations. The chances are not more than one in three.

Mr. McILHENNY. In the thousand cases mentioned here is meant, I take it, that the examinations were held by the Civil Service Commission, and we did not record and do not record in that 1,043 vacancies those vacancies filled by the post-office inspectors.

SYSTEM OF EFFICIENCY RECORDS.

[See also p. 39.]

Mr. JOHNSON. There is another reason given here for the increase in the force, and that is the efficiency law which was placed in the legislative bill at the last session.

Gen. BLACK. That is obligatory. Mr. JOHNSON. The efficiency record of the clerks is still kept in the various departments, is it not?

Gen. BLACK. It is presumed to be.

Mr. JOHNSON. And they transmit to the Civil Service Commission a card showing the standing of the employees?

Gen. BLACK. Yes. Whatever efficiency record is kept is kept in the department at this time.

Mr. JOHNSON. And transmitted to you?

Gen. BLACK. And sent to us on our request when questions of pro

motion are up.

Mr. JOHNSON. You have a kind of card system by which you keep those records?

Gen. BLACK. We hope to have that.

Mr. JOHNSON. How many people will it take to handle those cards? Gen. BLACK. I think every man we have requisitioned for. It will take at least the 10 additional clerks we have asked for, and they will have to be good men, too.

Mr. JOHNSON. That is not a wild guess? You have studied it out? Gen. BLACK. We went over the matter in the meetings of the commission again and again, figuring as well as we could as to the amount of work that would have to be done and what each man would be able to do, and while it is impossible to mathematically state it—we estimated at a low and favorable view-it would take at least 10 additional clerks to get up this work in time for any use during the current year.

Mr. McILHENNY. That is for the mere physical installation of the system, Mr. Chairman, and the taking care of the actual physical work, irrespective of the study that will be necessary to be made by the commission of each kind and class of work in the departments, so as to arrive at a stable and equitable basis upon which promotion regulations should be established.

Mr. JOHNSON. The rules to be prescribed by the commission and approved by the President have not yet been promulgated? Gen. BLACK. No, sir.

Mr. GILLETT. You will have to frame those rules, and I should think that would mean a great deal of work, but after they are once promulgated, the commission does not have anything more to do but to keep copies of the records.

Mr. McILHENNY. Before the commission can formulate the rules it must go into every bureau of the departments and make a careful and detailed study of the work of that bureau, so that it may understand the proper unit of value upon which the efficiency of the different classes of clerks in that bureau are to be estimated. So that it is going to be an extremely slow process of inclusion or imposition upon the service as it stands to-day.

Mr. GILLETT. I recognize that.

Mr. McILHENNY. And I think we expect to go very slowly in establishing this system, and learn from the steps that we take as to what necessary improvements should be made upon the method as originally outlined.

Mr. GILLETT. I recognize it will be a very serious and hard matter to determine, but after it is once done then really your work practically is over, is it not?