Political appointments in the United States federal government until 1883. In 1820 Congress limited federal administrators to four-year terms, which led to constant turnover; by the 1860s and the Civil War, patronage had led to widespread inefficiency and political corruption. Although it used to be confined to cabinet positions, department heads, and foreign ambassadorships, by the 1860s patronage had spread to low-level government positions. This meant that when the incumbent political party lost a presidential election, the federal government underwent wholesale turnover. On July 2, 1881, Charles J. Guiteau, a disaffected and mentally unstable political office seeker, assassinated President James Garfield. This highlighted how much the
USS Holly (1881) USS Holly (1881) USS "Holly" (1881) was a lighthouse tender borrowed by the U.S. Navy from the U.S. Commerce Department during World War I and armed as a patrol craft. "Holly" was used to patrol the waters near Norfolk, Virginia. Post-war she was returned to the Commerce Department. The first ship to be so named by the Navy, "Holly", a wood and steel lighthouse tender, was built in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1881, and was owned by the Department of Commerce, Lighthouse Service, until being taken over by the Navy 15 April 1917. She served in the 5th Naval District, operating