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and platforms deal, that our guest has devoted these elder, but still these young and always active years of his. In 1891 be became a member of the Executive Committee of the National Civil Service Reform Association; and from that time down his gifts of eloquent, luminous, convincing statement have been dedicated to this effort to exalt the politics of our land by destroying political corruption at its source. It is nearly seven years ago when, at the end of the beautiful and fruitful career of George William Curtis, the president of the National Association, Mr. Schurz took his place. From that time down he has borne the supreme burden of this great struggle.
Consider that the effort to accomplish this reform has held a conspicuous place in our national politics during the last twenty years, that it has compelled candidates for great offices and parties in their platforms to deal with it, and that it has made a really amazing progress; and you will be astonished to learn that the whole cost of the movement over the whole United States has been a few thousand dollars a year, no more than the annual salary paid to single officers by many corporations in this city. Is it not a wonder that so great a work could have been done, by so small a body of people? It is for this very wonder that it has been fashionable to sneer at the meetings of Civil Service reformers. It is quite true that such meetings usually consist of a handful of gentlemen in a parlor. But there it is lies the wonder of the leverage they have exercised in our public life. I suppose there is no test of ability more trustworthy than the power to accomplish great results with small resources. This ability has been the characteristic of
