The President's Call: Executive Leadership From FDR to George Bush (25 page)

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Authors: Judith E. Michaels

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BOOK: The President's Call: Executive Leadership From FDR to George Bush
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Appointments and Appointees in a Politicized Atmosphere: Distinguishing People from Voters
How do presidents choose the company they keep? What qualifie
s
a person to be a presidential appointee? How do appointees affect the governmental apparatus? What effect does the growth of appointees in the modern era have on the bureaucracy? To answer these questions it is instructive to look to the larger issues in the recent past because this history, while evolving with each administration, tends toward repetition. Consequently, this chapter analyzes the legitimacy and power of political appointees, their selection and confirmation in the modern era, and the effects of increased numbers of appointees and their deeper infiltration into the bureaucracy. It also examines personal and political qualities that create competence and the costs and benefits of the short-term personnel system in the dance of bureaucracy. The chapter concludes with an overview of five recent studies of the public service and its improvement.
What legitimizes the existence of political appointees in the federal bureaucracy? How do they justify their exercise of authority over career bureaucrats in the system? While neither they nor their career counterparts are specifically mentioned in the Constitution of the United States, article 2, section 2 gives the president the authority to make appointments to the federal bureaucracy. As that article states:
[The president] shall nominate and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the Supreme Court, and all other officers of the United
 
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States, whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by law: but the Congress may by law vest the appointment of such inferior officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the courts of law, or in the heads of departments.
History has also given the nation additional statutes regarding its bureaucracy. The political context of those later statutes created a federal personnel and organizational structure of some complexity and confusion:
In examining the table of organization for the federal government, it is not uncommon to find a bureau the chief of which is appointed by the president juxtaposed to another bureau of similar size and responsibility where the chief is appointed by a department head. Nor is it uncommon to find a pair of similar offices, both filled by presidential appointment but only one of which requires confirmation by the Senate. (Macy et al. 1983, 4)
While later reforms standardized most of the position titles, resulting in relative uniformity across the agencies, considerable complexity still exists. The designation of executive level (EL) remains the clearest indication of place at the top of the political federal hierarchy.
As the constitutional language makes clear, the appointment process is a shared and two-step process: the president nominates and the Senate confirms PAS executives. However, there is relatively little to counter the aspirations of the president, as the Senate, while a significant partner with the president in the appointment process, has often been a silent one. In general, it withholds its consent ''only in those rare cases when serious questions have arisen about the competence, integrity, policy views, or freedom from bias of a particular candidate for appointment" (ibid., 5).
From the beginning of the Republic, presidents, having few alternate sources and limited time and staff resources, relied on political allies close to them, such as members of Congress, personal acquaintances, or party leaders for suggestions for appointments.
Not surprisingly, this made for some odd bedfellows. Presidents in the 19th and 20th centuries often presided over cabinets and administrations in which comity and cooperation were scarce commodities. Because the selection of their appointees had followed from no consensual definition of a presidential philosophy or approach to government management, appointees were often ill-suited to that task. And because they realized that
 
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their appointments had resulted not from the personal preferences of the president himself but rather from the recommendations of party leaders, their loyalty to the president's objectives and their responsiveness to his orders were anything but ensured. Appointment decisions vibrated to the rhythms of political exigency; administrative considerations rarely intervened. (Bonafede 1987a, 35)
Until Roosevelt's "vision and political practicality" produced reforms that would restructure the presidency itself, the political parties, "the dominant force in American politics," controlled the distribution of political patronage positions. However, as discussed above, the Rooseveltian reforms accelerated a trend toward a centralized presidency that has led to the administrative presidency in its various contemporary manifestations (ibid., 35).
This centralizing trend is buttressed by the political and governmental developments of the past several decades, according to Bonafede (ibid., 32). Among them are: 1. The power of the national parties as broker and conduit for patronage declined. This was largely due to an emphasis on grassroots politics and political reforms that increased the role of state primaries at the expense of the parties. Presidents, no longer obligated to the parties for their election, had less need to extend patronage to them.
2. The emergence of political action committees and changes in election finance laws reduced somewhat the influence of major contributors, many of whom in earlier days had been repaid with prestigious presidential appointments. 3. The movement toward a centralized, strong presidency worked against the competing powers of the Congress and the bureaucracy.
4. The rapid growth of government created jobs that of necessity accompanied that growth. 5. The need for substantive knowledge and managerial competence escalated as domestic and international issues, such as arms control, tax reform, federal deficits, and trade imbalances, grew and became more complex.
As discussed above, the 1937 Brownlow Report sparked what Bonafede refers to as "evolutionary changes" toward a centralized presidency. From it, the Executive Office of the President (EOP) was created, the Bureau of the Budget was integrated into the president's domain, and the president's personal staff was substantially increased. This was the genesis of the bureaucratization of the presidency. It was given further credibility by the proposals of the Hoover Commissions of 1949 and 1955 to extend the president's control over the executive branch through a strengthened White House staff and cabinet. According to presidential ad-

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