.^ EDITORAL |^« 



The United States Civil Service Commission in announcing 

 an examination for scientific assistants requires among other 

 things that apphcants shall have a college degree. In this 

 manner does the Commission set the seal of its approval upon 

 the proposition that practical horticulturists, animal husband- 

 men, dairymen and the like are inferior to the college-made 

 variety. As a matter of fact, college teaching runs so much 

 to theory that the individual who received his training in 

 some practical horticultural or agricultural establishment is 

 often far superior to the man with a degree. It is c[uite na- 

 tural that those with college degrees should be prejudiced in 

 favor of others with similar qualifications, but it is manifestly 

 unfair to an immense number of able men who secured their 

 knowledge without being tagged by a university. Some pro- 

 vision should be made to admit to the examinations those 

 practical people who can deliver all the goods but the degree. 

 The attempt to exclude from the Government service in this 

 nation of more than a hundred million people everybody ex- 

 cept the college man is a piece of beureaucracy that a free 

 -people ought not to tolerate. With reference to the system the 

 Natioual Republican well says: "The scheme of selecting 

 government employees by scholastic examinations is so asinine 

 tliat no private business has ever thought of imitating it. In 

 the .stupidity of that method of picking employees the Govern- 

 ment stands alone — forced into the position not by public senti- 

 ment but bv the machinations of theorists." The jobs for 



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