In 1881, James Garfield became the second U.S. President to be assassinated.

But while Abraham Lincoln died a martyr 16 years earlier for union and liberty,

Garfield was killed for a less glorious cause, civil service reform.

Well that doesn't seem like a big deal now, it was then.

This was a time when most government positions were obtained through political connections.

This practice, known as patronage or the spoils system, was the way both Republicans and Democrats

held power.

It created a lot of party loyalty. You owed your job to the party, but also led to a lot of

incompetence and corruption. Garfield was the first president to seriously challenge this system.

He took on the party bosses who doled out jobs and instead

appointed qualified civil servants on the basis of merit. This courageous act

cost America's 20th president his life. James Garfield was born on November 19th, 1831 near Cleveland, Ohio.

His father died before James was two, leaving his strong-willed mother, Eliza, to raise him and his three siblings alone.

His mother and his older brother Thomas recognized there was something special about James,

and they made every possible sacrifice to get him an education. James didn't disappoint them. He was an excellent

student with an exceptional work ethic. It wasn't enough for him to merely master a

subject. He had to be the best in his school and invariably he was.

He put himself through college by studying during the day and working as a janitor by night.

The same year he graduated, 1856, he joined the new anti-slavery Republican Party.

A committed abolitionist he got himself elected to the Ohio State Senate in 1859 at age 28.

When the Civil War began in 1861, Garfield abandoned politics

joined the Union Army. As fate would have it, Garfield became one of the first

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