Patronage System

A PATRONAGE SYSTEM, or a system that selects public officials on a political basis, rather than job-related factors, was present through much of the 18th century, until politicians and citizens realized the negative consequences it produced. In this system, office winners were allowed to place their political allies and those who supported them in a political campaign into government positions, often producing chaos as supporters of the previous administration were ousted. Since Andrew lackson's election in 1828, and until the end of the 1800s, patronage was largely practiced in the national government. In the beginning, the idea was accepted among politicians and citizens, but as time passed, people became dissatisfied. Great political strides were made to do away with the patronage system, and gradually they succeeded in mostly eliminating it in the national government. Patronage still exists in government, but today merit-based hiring standards are widely used.

The patronage system allows politicians to distribute public jobs for political support, rather than using objective selection standards such as merit, examination, or job-related competence. This system allows politicians of both parties to use taxes to indirectly pay people who supported or worked on their campaign and to raise money to help finance campaigns. The patronage system emerged out of Andrew lackson's election in 1828. Andrew lackson began to reward political supporters by giving them public office, starting what is known as the Second Party System. Other presidents used patronage, such as Abraham Lincoln to support the war effort and the Republican Party, and Thomas lefferson, who attempted to keep the Federalists from being public officials. However, lackson is largely credited with its beginning. In 183, patronage became commonly known as the spoils system when Senator William Marcy of New York criticized lackson [Page 491]in a debate with Senator Henry Clay for seeing nothing wrong with “to the victor belong the spoils.”

Citizens and politicians supported the spoils system in the beginning. Jackson strongly upheld the egalitari-anism philosophy by stating that the spoils system would encourage the common person to participate in politics, would make politicians more accountable when their appointees did a bad job, and would deal with corruption because he contended that serving for long periods of time in an official position corrupts individuals. In addition, people supported the minor role the federal government played in the process. In the 1840s, the patronage system was at an all-time high in state, local, and the federal government. However, as time went on, citizens and politicians became dissatisfied with it, especially in the years following the Civil War.

The spoils system had several problems. First, Jackson had attempted to make the sample of political appointees more representative of the population as a whole, but had little success due to the limited number of qualified appointees, most of whom were well-to-do and upper-class. This led people to begin viewing election practices as corrupt. In addition, this led to the perception that politics and administration were intertwined and incompetent. Second, there was chaos after the administration changed and the old supporters had to be replaced by the new ones. Finally, there were conflicts over presidential and congressional appointments that ultimately led to the 1869 impeachment trial of Andrew Johnson.

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