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The Federal Civil Service System and the Problem of Bureaucracy: The Economics and Politics of Institutional Change (National Bureau of Economic Research Series on Long-Term Factors in Economic Dev)

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Based on a surprisingly thorough review of the available literature, Johnson and Libecap make a plea for a return to political patronage as the primary means of insuring the "loyalty" of federal civil servants to elected officials. They observe however, that patronage maybe effective only for managing small governmental units. "...the problems of managing a large patronage labor force are too great, relative to any political benefits that might be obtained from abandoning a merit system." So, they don't say it, but the only way to implement their goal would be to break up the U.S. into small feudal fiefdoms where personal government could again be practiced.

However, this large order has proved no obstacle to the current (2005) Administration, which is busy corrupting the professional civil service in any way possible. Read the Washington Post daily, and the newsletters of PEER, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (www.peer.org).