either disqualified on the ground of incompetency or lack of character. These men frequently turn up at municipal elections and make themselves prominent against Councillors who have declined to aid them. Councillors write these lines to managers of departments, but they are to be looked upon as an introduction and not a recommendation. They merely secure an interview" (Forsyth, Stewart, Battersby).

"It was not as a cure for an evil that I introduced the resolution but as a prevention. I would stop these lines altogether, because they may lead to abuse. I do not follow up these cases unless they are very necessitous, and then I sometimes call upon the manager personally. It is not the chairman or conveners of committees that send lines-they do not use their influence in this direction." "The lines are not sent on behalf of mechanics or tradesmen, but mainly for common laborers. Other cases where this influence is found is that on behalf of Irishmen and non-residents who get preferences over rate-payers, through Irish members of the Council. A prominent Orangeman in my district has been able to get lines from several Councillors on behalf of his friends. I have known cases where a man made application, was refused, but afterwards received a line from a Councillor, and got appointed" (Forsyth).

"Of the 15,000 men in municipal employment the number engaged having lines from Councillors cannot exceed 2,000 at the outside. The superintendents have the sole power of taking on and discharging all employees, and that they exercise that power there is not the slightest doubt. Fifteen years ago when I entered the Council nobody could get into the municipal service without influence, but with the increase in the size of the Council, with the exposure of this and other practices. and with the influence of the Labor Councillors, this has greatly decreased, and is now continually diminishing" (Battersby). ... "No doubt there is a certain justification on the part of superintendents in refusing to take men from the Labor Bureau, because the better class of workmen do not patronize that Bureau-they consider that it places them in poor company-and those who are trade-unionists have their own house of call' where they register when out of work" (Battersby, Stewart, Forsyth).

"Our main object was to induce all the unemployed, and, especially the respectable unemployed to register at the Labor Bureau, and thus to be able to know the state of the labor market, since the capitalist members of the Council denied that there was any serious lack of employment. We considered that if the municipal departments were compelled to select their employees through the Labor Bureau, then the unemployed would go to the Bureau" (Stewart).

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Inquiry among other members of the Council and among the heads of departments confirms the statement that workmen are continually appealing to Councillors for cards or "lines" of recommendation. New Councillors sometimes have as many as five to ten applicants a day. They ask that the Councillor "send a line" to so-and-so, head of such-and-such department. The "lines sent are usually simply the Councillor's card with "To introduce," and the name of the applicant on the back. Another one reads: "Dear Sir,-The bearer is trustworthy, reliable man. If you have an opening in your department will you kindly give him a start?" Several Councillors, in addition to sending "lines," have come many times to managers and have pressed them to take men on. Councillors and managers say that they would be glad to be rid of these importunities, but they look upon them more as a nuisance than an evil. One chairman said to his manager, when the latter was appointed, "I shall doubtless send you many cards,

but pay no attention to them." Others advise their managers that the cards are merely to be looked upon as an introduction. The convener of the Tramways Committee, Mr. Hugh Alexander, a large manufacturer and employer of labor, was first elected to the Council on this very issue. A certain Councillor, Cronin, who posed as a "labor man," had boasted in public that he had found some forty-seven places in the tramways department for his friends, and he promised the municipal employees generally that he would remedy their grievances. He had been sitting for that ward for several years, but Mr. Alexander attacked him and appealed to the voters on the ground that a man of such influence was corrupting and a menace to efficient management of the department. Alexander was successful by a good majority. He brought up the claims of Cronin at the first meeting of the Council and satisfied himself that Cronin's boast was unfounded and that he had not secured positions for anybody. He was afterwards made chairman of the Tramways Committee. This election has done much to educate the public and to strengthen the hands of Councillors and managers against yielding to the importunities of applicants. Extensive inquiries among both the friends and opponents of municipalization in Glasgow indicate that Cronin's is the only case of a Councillor who has made boasts or promises of this kind.

At the same time, Councillors would like to be relieved of the pressure of applicants, and they state that if the resolution regarding the Labor Bureau had not been made compulsory upon the managers, but had been limited to requiring Councillors to refer applicants to the Labor Bureau, it might have been adopted. The issue, however, was evidently confused by the attempt of the Labor members to convert what is really an ordinary private employment bureau into both a private bureau and a civil service commission. The combination was impossible, because, as is agreed by all, the great majority of registrations at the bureau were those of relatively inefficient, often weak and underfed and almost unemployable laborers. The managers of departments were able to make it plain to Councillors that they could not consent to be limited in their choice of employees to the applicants who came through such an agency. And no proposition was made or even imagined of instituting a civil service commission. Such a measure was not considered because it was recognized that the conditions of municipal employment have greatly improved during the past twenty years, and managers are given greater freedom and responsibility. The reasons for this improvement are the greater publicity and public interest, and the exposures of even the slightest indiscretions in the management of departments, such as those above mentioned. Twenty years ago a Convener would have thought nothing of recommending old and inefficient men to easy positions, such as lamplighting, cleaning, watching, etc., but since the Labor Councillors have secured the minimum wage resolution of twenty-one shillings for municipal employees that form of pensioning worn-out employees of private firms has been stopped. The quasi-pensioners of

the present time are those who have grown old in the department and are transferred to lighter work. Of these there is a considerable number in the gas department, but not many in the other younger departments.

Besides Councillors and managers, several subordinate managers who have the immediate supervision of employees were interviewed and the methods and records of appointments, promotions and dismissal were examined. The policy of Glasgow in the case of chief and superior officials is to promote or transfer its own men rather than advertise for applicants. This policy has critics among those Councillors who believe that the positions should be advertised. The issue was drawn especially at the appointments of Mr. John Young and Mr. James Dalrymple as managers of the tramways department. Mr. Young had been for several years manager of the cleansing department, and had brought it to a high state of efficiency, introducing many new features and greatly enlarging its scope. Certain members of the Council contended that the chief of the new tramways department should be an electrical engineer, which Mr. Young was not, and advertised for from the outside, but they were overruled. Mr. Young on taking with him to the tramways several of his subordinates from the cleaning department, criticism was made that they were his friends. and relatives. It was shown that they were not relatives, though they may have been friends. One of his assistants was Mr. Dalrymple, a chartered accountant, who had been in the Chamberlain's and Registrar's departments for thirteen years. Mr. Dalrymple was made assistant manager, and when Mr. Young left Glasgow to accept a position with the Yerkes underground road in London on a much greater salary objection was made to the promotion of Mr. Dalrymple that he also was not 'an electrical engineer, and it was again urged that the position should be advertised. A similar policy of promotion, rather than advertisement, was followed in the appointment of the present managers of both the Gas and Electricity Departments. In these cases, however, the appointees were technical engineers. Mr. Wilson had been with the Gas Light and Coke Company of London thirteen years, and was resident manager of the Dawsholm station in Glasgow for thirteen years when he was promoted to his present position. Mr. Lackie, Chief of the Electrical Department, had been manager of one of the stations, and when the former chief accepted a position with a private company, objection was made to Mr. Lackie's appointment on the ground of his youth and inexperience, but the advocates of promotion carried their point over the advocates of advertisement.

A useful publication of the Glasgow corporation, established in 1898, is the "Annual Return of Officials and Salaries," showing names, periods of service, salaries, and dates and amount of last increase. From this return the following table is compiled, showing the period of service of the leading officials in the three undertakings investigated. It demonstrates clearly the results of the policy of promotion and transfer.

Period of Service, Officials Having Salaries £200 and Over-Glasgow, 1906.

This policy of promotion is followed in all of the departments. It is not governed by any rule or standing order of the Council, and there is no rule of seniority, but the promotions, like the original appointments, are made on the authority and responsibility of the General Manager. The Labor member of the Council who had charged that "promotion comes in some cases from outside influence being asked regarding the matter, said that he had reference to the meter-readers in the gas department, and he considered that they should be appointed by promotion from among the mechanics of the department instead of being selected from outside the department. It turned out, however, that he was not aware of the fact that the meter-readers are appointed by the Gas Treasurer, and not by the Gas Manager, and that the Gas Treasurer, under the Glasgow system, is a co-ordinate oflicial with the Gas Manager, each of them being independent of the other, and, indeed, intended to be a check on the other, and both being responsible directly to the Gas Committee. On this theory the Gas Treasurer appoints his own force, and he looks upon his meter-readers as a part of his clerical force. He might appoint them from among the mechanics if he chose to do so, but such an appointment would be in the nature of a transfer rather than a promotion.

Clerks. One of the Labor Councillors made the charge that preference in the appointment of clerks was given to the graduates of a certain commercial school. On inquiry this Councillor stated that in his opinion those positions should be opened to all who have passed the common schools. He was not aware that the actual method of appointment to clerical positions is through advertisement; in fact, these are the only positions that are regularly filled by advertisement. The procedure is to advertise anonymously in a Glasgow newspaper, and then to set an examination for the applicants who appear. Those who stand highest on the examination are appointed. In this way naturally the graduates of the commercial school obtain preference over those who have merely passed the common schools. Recommendations play no part in these appointments except to the extent that the applicant is requested to give the names of former employers, and these are then asked to write a reply to inquiries regarding his character. In the tramways department the chairman of the committee has recommended but one applicant since holding his present position, and that was a lad who was employed as office boy. An examination of the appointments made during the past six months shows that none of the appointees was introduced by members of the Council.

Tramways-Permanent Way Department. One difficulty in measuring the extent to which cards from Councillors are influential in getting positions for applicants is the fact that usually the departments do not keep a record of these cards. There is one exception to this statement, namely the permanent way department of the tramways department. The superintendent of this department, under instructions from the General Manager, has kept such a record, beginning September 18, 1905. The object was to enable