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This Work Is Protected by Copyright and Other Intellectual Property Rights This work is protected by copyright and other intellectual property rights and duplication or sale of all or part is not permitted, except that material may be duplicated by you for research, private study, criticism/review or educational purposes. Electronic or print copies are for your own personal, non- commercial use and shall not be passed to any other individual. No quotation may be published without proper acknowledgement. For any other use, or to quote extensively from the work, permission must be obtained from the copyright holder/s. THE WHITE HOUSE STAFF PhD Thesis Submitted To THE UNIVERSITY OF REELE VOLUME II S BENN SUMMER 1983 CHAPTER ▼ THE DEVELOPHEHT AID OEGAHIZATIOH OF THE VHITE BOOSE STAFF 340 - INTRODUCTION This chapter addresses two questions: why did the White House staff grow; and how have they been organized by successive Presidents. The two are interlinked. The ground on which they are joined underpins the continuous theme of this discussion: whether the development and organization of the staff derive solely from the cumulative influence of successive Presidents or owe to forces beyond the control of any individual President. Forming a background to this chapter's analysis is the perpetual debate about the nature of presidential power in the United States. Since the 1930's this de­ bate has itself shifted its ground perceptibly; such changes being always reflected in the position of the White House staff. In the first part of this chapter the development of the White House staff is considered in relation to other major features of the American political system; for example, the general structure of the federal government and successive attempts at its reorganization. The influence of other features, such as the political party system, the Cabinet, and the Press and media, is similarly weighed for its impact on the emergence of the staff as an integral part of the Presidency. Has the rise of the staff been inevitable or has it owed to the inadequacies of its potential rivals for political power? The second part of this chapter is devoted to a detailed analysis of individual présidences from Roosevelt to Ford. The emphasis here is on the discernible developments of staff organization. Transcending the merely quantitative factors, what does the experience of forty years tell us about the variety of different methods of organizing the White House staff? 341 The Postwar Political Consensus Why have the White House staff grown in size and power? To answer this question is really to ask why the Presidency itself emerged in the modern era as apparently the most powerful institution of American government. The growth and development of the White House staff have been dependent upon the condition of the Presidency itself for they have both shared the same underlying causes of their growing mutual need. It was no accident that the White House staff effectively made their first appearance during a Presidency that spanned a period of modern American history that witnessed a fundamental shift in the balance of political power towards the Executive. Roosevelt's legacy was derived from two decisive developments in domestic and foreign affairs respectively, the Great Depression and World War Two, out of which the welfare state and the warfare state emerged (encapsulated in such phrases as the New Deal and the Cold War). The experience of the Great Depression in the 1930's, and the demonstrable need for effective national action to tackle the prolonged economic crisis, led to a significant increase in the perceived responsi­ bility of the federal government for the economic health and welfare of the country. The focus of this newly-acquired and quickly entrenched responsi­ bility became, by necessity and design, the Presidency. To this period can be traced back the origins of the modern American 'domestic Presidency'. In a comparable sense the experience and aftermath of World War in the 1940's produced an equally significant quantum increase in the responsibilities of the United States in world affairs. America emerged from the War with a self-propelled global role as a world superpower. The focus of these new­ found responsibilities was again the Presidency; more emphatically so in 342 the light of the predisposition of the United States Constitution in favour of less fettered presidential powers in this area. To this period can be traced back the origins of the modern American 'international Presidency'. These two powerful experiences in successive decades revolutionized the conditions within which American national government and the Presidency operated. Of the Roosevelt years it was observed that "the White House became the focus of all government - the fountainhead of ideas, the initiator of action, the representative of the national interest."1 Roosevelt's Presidency and his New Deal had such a lasting effect upon the national political consciousness that it perforce became a yardstick by which to measure succeeding presidencies. In thus acquiring a major new political leadership role both at home and abroad - in which, it seemed, was readily invested a whole generation's hopes for political economic, and social pro­ gress - the liberal ethos of the 'strong' Presidency was born and embedded O itself as the new political consensus of the postwar era. Nothing less was deemed sufficient to fuse together the various roles, traditional and new-found, that were now accorded to, or assumed by, the modern Presidency. Besides being Head of State, Commander-in-Chief, and Chief Executive, the President emerged as the chief proposer of, and lobbyist for, legislation; guarantor of both the nation's economy and security; political leader of party and moral Leader of the Western World. Not least was all this accompanied by a relentless 'personalisation of the Presidency' that had a 3 profound effect upon the public projection of these roles. The strong Presidency reflected a growing belief that strong centralised control over the decision-making process could only be provided by the one institution of government thought best able to represent the national interest. In this context President Kennedy's appeal to 'get the country 343 moving again' seemed a telling reflection on a decade marked by a President unwilling and a Congress unable to break through parochial and conservative constraints in domestic affairs. President Kennedy's rhetoric was but one example; many others could be cited. This was a majority view dominant for a generation. It was rarely discouraged by the Judiciary; usually acquiesced in by the Congress; strongly supported by the academic community; adopted by the Democratic Party; assiduously nourished by the Press and media; absorbed by the public and electorate at large; perpetuated by postwar economic prosperity; and exemplified by a succession of Presidents. The Concentration of Power The political upheaval wrought by the elevation of the Presidency to a pre-eminent position spread far and wide. Most notable was the concen­ tration of power embodied in the President as head of the most powerful country in the world. The formal constitutional provisions, such as the separation of powers and the system of checks and balances, remained broadly unaltered but the real political power of the Presidency in relation to the other branches of government undeniably increased in several crucial respects. Firstly, where a greater concentration of decision-making was needed a greater concentration of political power was invariably the result. This axiomatic process was readily reflected in many areas of government, and several 344 - examples may be cited: the formulation of economic policy and the prepa­ ration of the Budget, which fell firmly under presidential supervision;6 the balance of power in the initiation of legislation, which swung markedly in favour of the Executive Branch (as the explosion of domestic legislation in the New Deal so clearly demonstrated); and the pre-eminence of the President s role in foreign affairs, which has on occasion been dramatic. Secondly, where a greater speed of decision-making was needed a greater con­ centration of political power was also invariably the result. Great though the likes of men such as Washington, Jefferson, Jackson and Lincoln may be in the pantheon of Presidents they would all be astounded at the accelerated pace of political life in the modern day. This pace of events, and the speed with which nations and their political leaders must react to them, often decisively dictate the flow of political power within each country s political system - and the United States has been no exception. Both in domestic, and more especially foreign, affairs, it has fallen first and foremost to the Presidency to act or react on behalf of the United States because that branch of government is best equipped to do so.6 Examples are littered across the pages of contemporary history. The term "crisis management" has almost become synonymous with the Presidency, and exemplified par excellence by the Cuban Missile Crisis by 1962. The assumption of these massive responsibilities in domestic and foreign affaira by the Presidency and the federal government together with the nature of events at home and abroad combined to alter the size of American government beyond all recognition. The staggering physical size and organizational complexity of today's government, its enormous growth over the past decades, and the concommitant scale of its problems have themselves become powerful factors
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