New Jersey Lawyers BlogNew Jersey’s Civil Service Appeals
Our employment law attorneys represent government employees in New Jersey Civil Service appeals.
One of the most criticized but least understood areas of New Jersey employment law is the Civil Service System. Employers complain that New Jersey’s Civil Service System makes it too difficult to fire employees who are not carrying their weight. Employees, especially prospective employees, complain that civil service makes it too difficult to obtain jobs. However, the Civil Service System is there for an extremely important reason.
New Jersey – gasp – has a history of corruption and political patronage when it comes to awarding government jobs, and while the old civil service system helped, it did not eliminate it. After the long reign of Frank (“I am the law”) Hague in Jersey City, New Jersey said enough is enough. It held a constitutional convention, and the New Jersey Constitution of 1947 provided that civil service selections and appointments had to be based on merit, determined by test if possible. This was to take politics, corruption, nepotism and favoritism out of employment decisions so that merit was the only reason employees obtained or kept their jobs.