The Writings of Carl Schurz/From Samuel Bowles, July 3d, 1877
FROM SAMUEL BOWLES
You may like to read what I say of Father Adams's last. It looks as if there was to be a sharp cleavage. The politicians on both sides are uniting to break down Hayes. Will he reach out for the people on both sides; will the people on both sides reach out to sustain him? That is the point.
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I am so vexed with you, and myself too, that Cabot Lodge is n't your assistant secretary! I thought of him when you were looking for one, but thought he would n't accept, and so did n't speak of it, and now I find he would have been glad to. Nobody could have been better for you. We need to import into the Departments, just such men—fellows who have the working temperament, as he has, who have high patriotic purposes, and while independent of their salaries, will abundantly earn them. With such a man at your right hand, you would have simply doubled yourself, while you could have had the benefit of all the other kind of material in the next places below.
I hope you keep in good heart and hope. The theory of civil service reform at Washington is beautiful, but the practice is often pretty bad. But the comfort is that it seems to me you have gone so far that you cannot go back—that you must go through and find still waters beyond.
I am pretty feeble of body, this summer, but tolerably brave of soul, and am always, Heartily yours.