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What do you know about Rutherford B. Hayes?
You know, he was one of those bearded guys, the president of the United States somewhere back there amidst other invisible presidents...all those guys that were fillers between Ulysses Grant and Teddy Roosevelt.
Hmm...is that all we got? Well no...
First, he was the 19th president of the United Sates and served one term from 1877 to 1881, directly following the Civil War hero Grant. He won the weirdest election ever (yes weirder than Bush/Gore) when he lost the popular vote by a fair margin, but was handed the election by a partisan congressional commission who gave him twenty disputed electoral votes so that he won by one...yes, one, electoral vote.
And then there's this...
He despised patronage. You know, that all too American system in which politicians reward supporters by giving them leadership positions in government. You help someone get elected and you might get a plum job.
Hayes had another thought. He had the audacious idea that government positions, particularly those of responsibility, should be earned on merit.
Let me say that again. Hayes' belief was that federal government positions should be earned based on merit rather than given away as the spoils of victory. He felt that that was the best way to insure that qualified men and women got those jobs.
He believed in the voters' trust. He believed that the American government owed it to the American people to put the best possible people in positions of responsibility.
Patronage.
Is there any wonder American leadership is riddled with incompetency? When leaders are elevated to positions of authority based on anything but the fact that they earned it, we infuse our organizations with a cancer...often a cancer of weak, sadistic and inefficient leadership.
And then Hayes did this...hold onto your seats for this one...he tried to put his beliefs into action.
Yes, he stood against the system. He tried to replace government patronage with a merit system.
What? Really?!
And he got shelled for it. The screams could be heard from one end of the government corridors to the other. Bitterness foamed to the surface, open rebellion to his ideas ran amuck. He was blasted and hated and torched.
All because of one ideal; that leaders should earn their positions instead of having them handed to them as gifts; that America should have the very best leaders in her most important positions; that the business of State is too important to leave to carpetbagging, gift-seeking amateurs.
Rutherford B. Hayes never got a second term. As a matter of fact, after being hounded and shouted down for four years, he refused to be nominated for a second term. He had had enough.
He went out into that good night...retiring to his home in Ohio, where he continued as a voice for social and educational reform.
So if you look at our government and you see incompetency. If the thought of patronage-the idea that men and women can trade principle for position-turns your stomach. And if you wonder why we don't change this corrupt, gangrenous system.
You'll know that one man tried. And the thousands who had their hand in the cookie jar punished him for it. They were brutal and ruthless until they got what they wanted: the radical voice of reason was gone.
Now do you know Rutherford B. Hayes a little better?
Well folks, I'll be on vacation so you won't receive a newsletter from me for the next two weeks. See you again October 29th!
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