A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents | Page 7

taken for granted. Our citizens domiciled for purposes
of trade in all countries and in many of the islands of the sea demand
and will have our adequate care in their personal and commercial rights.
The necessities of our Navy require convenient coaling stations and
dock and harbor privileges. These and other trading privileges we will
feel free to obtain only by means that do not in any degree partake of
coercion, however feeble the government from which we ask such
concessions. But having fairly obtained them by methods and for
purposes entirely consistent with the most friendly disposition toward
all other powers, our consent will be necessary to any modification or
impairment of the concession.
We shall neither fail to respect the flag of any friendly nation or the just
rights of its citizens, nor to exact the like treatment for our own.
Calmness, justice, and consideration should characterize our diplomacy.
The offices of an intelligent diplomacy or of friendly arbitration in
proper cases should be adequate to the peaceful adjustment of all
international difficulties. By such methods we will make our
contribution to the world's peace, which no nation values more highly,
and avoid the opprobrium which must fall upon the nation that
ruthlessly breaks it.
The duty devolved by law upon the President to nominate and, by and
with the advice and consent of the Senate, to appoint all public officers

whose appointment is not otherwise provided for in the Constitution or
by act of Congress has become very burdensome and its wise and
efficient discharge full of difficulty. The civil list is so large that a
personal knowledge of any large number of the applicants is impossible.
The President must rely upon the representations of others, and these
are often made inconsiderately and without any just sense of
responsibility. I have a right, I think, to insist that those who volunteer
or are invited to give advice as to appointments shall exercise
consideration and fidelity. A high sense of duty and an ambition to
improve the service should characterize all public officers.
There are many ways in which the convenience and comfort of those
who have business with our public offices may be promoted by a
thoughtful and obliging officer, and I shall expect those whom I may
appoint to justify their selection by a conspicuous efficiency in the
discharge of their duties. Honorable party service will certainly not be
esteemed by me a disqualification for public office, but it will in no
case be allowed to serve as a shield of official negligence,
incompetency, or delinquency. It is entirely creditable to seek public
office by proper methods and with proper motives, and all applicants
will be treated with consideration; but I shall need, and the heads of
Departments will need, time for inquiry and deliberation. Persistent
importunity will not, therefore, be the best support of an application for
office. Heads of Departments, bureaus, and all other public officers
having any duty connected therewith will be expected to enforce the
civil-service law fully and without evasion. Beyond this obvious duty I
hope to do something more to advance the reform of the civil service.
The ideal, or even my own ideal, I shall probably not attain. Retrospect
will be a safer basis of judgment than promises. We shall not, however,
I am sure, be able to put our civil service upon a nonpartisan basis until
we have secured an incumbency that fair-minded men of the opposition
will approve for impartiality and integrity. As the number of such in the
civil list is increased removals from office will diminish.
While a Treasury surplus is not the greatest evil, it is a serious evil. Our
revenue should be ample to meet the ordinary annual demands upon
our Treasury, with a sufficient margin for those extraordinary but
scarcely less imperative demands which arise now and then.
Expenditure should always be made with economy and only upon

public necessity. Wastefulness, profligacy, or favoritism in public
expenditures is criminal. But there is nothing in the condition of our
country or of our people to suggest that anything presently necessary to
the public prosperity, security, or honor should be unduly postponed.
It will be the duty of Congress wisely to forecast and estimate these
extraordinary demands, and, having added them to our ordinary
expenditures, to so adjust our revenue laws that no considerable annual
surplus will remain. We will fortunately be able to apply to the
redemption of the public debt any small and unforeseen excess of
revenue. This is better than to reduce our income below our necessary
expenditures, with the resulting choice between another change of our
revenue laws and an increase of the public debt. It is quite possible, I
am sure, to effect the necessary reduction in our revenues without