§ Mr. STEPHEN COLLINSasked the Secretary to the Treasury with reference to the recent nomination of Mr. Chandler, a junior assistant clerk in the Customs Statistical Office, for promotion on the ground of exceptional merit to a junior clerkship over the heads of all the senior assistant clerks and the minor staff officers in that office, and in view of the facts that Mr. Chandler has been employed in practically one division of the office only and on one particular class of work, that his qualifications for a number of years have been reported upon by the same principal, that one of the minor staff officers for several years as assistant clerk was engaged upon the same particular class of work and obtained his promotion to minor staff officer for the meritorious manner in which he performed those duties, and that it is the practice for minor staff officers to act in the place of junior clerks when the latter are absent on holiday or through sickness, if he will state what are the qualifications which constitute exceptional merit in the Statistical Office which are stated to have been exhibited by Mr. Chandler, and which by inference are not to be officially discovered in the minor staff officers?
Mr. McKINNON WOODMr. Chandler's qualifications for the post to which he has been appointed were considered by the responsible heads of the Department superior to those of the minor staff clerks.