[Footnote 2:  This system is not always carried out perfectly in practice.  In some cases an officer is termed commissioner who is more properly a chief of division, and vice versa.  In other cases the title of commissioner or chief of division is represented by a more technical designation as Director of the U.S.  Geological Survey, Comptroller of the Currency, etc.] The President and heads of departments appoint all officers in the executive departments.  It is manifestly impossible for them to base their appointments upon personal knowledge.  Hence has arisen the custom of filling almost all offices not controlled by the Civil Service Commission upon the recommendation of congressmen, each of whom controls for the most part the patronage of his own district.  Only the Secretaries, Assistant Secretaries, Commissioners, and other chief officials are really appointees of the President on his own responsibility.

Prior to the first administration of Jackson the positions of government clerks in the departments were permanent.  In 1828 Jackson inaugurated the so-called spoils system, which means that to the victor belongs the spoils.  Only 74 removals had been made from 1789 to 1828.  Jackson removed during the first year of his administration 2,000 clerks.  Since then, until 1883, each party, on gaining control of the government, has removed almost all the clerks in office who were of the opposite political faith, replacing them with members of its own party.  In 1883 was passed the Civil Service Act, by which it is provided that all future appointments of subordinate clerks in the executive departments are to be made only from those who have passed successfully an examination set by the Civil Service Commission created by the act.

_#The State Department.#_—­The Department of State was the first department established. (Act of July 27, 1789.) There are three Assistant Secretaries.  Their salaries are, Secretary $8,000, First Assistant $4,000, and the other two $3,500.  The department is divided into seven bureaus, (1) Diplomatic, (2) Consular, (3) Archives and Indexes, (4) Accounts, (5) Statistics, (6) Rolls and Library, and (7) Claims.

The Secretary of State is charged, under the direction of the President, with the duties appertaining to correspondence with the public ministers and consuls of the United States, and with the representatives of foreign powers accredited to the United States; and to negotiations of whatever character relating to the foreign affairs of the United States.  He is also the medium of correspondence between the President and the chief executive of the several States of the United States; he has the custody of the great seal of the United States, and countersigns and affixes such seal to all executive proclamations, to various commissions, and to warrants for pardon, and the extradition of fugitives from justice.  He is regarded as the first in rank among the members of the Cabinet.