The Executive Office of the President: An Historical Overview

Source: CRS Congressional Report – Harold C. Relyea Specialist in American National Government Government and Finance Division

Since 1939, federal agencies immediately assisting the President have been located in an enclave known as the Executive Office of the President (EOP). Within these entities are many, if not most, of the President’s closest advisers and assistants on matters of policy, politics, administration, and management. Some of these EOP components have been creations of the President; others have been established by Congress. While some have endured, others have been brief experiments; some have been transferred to other quarters of the executive branch, others have been abolished with no successor. In large measure, the tenure and durability of an Executive Office agency is dependent upon its usefulness to the President — as a managerial or coordinative auxiliary, a national symbol, or a haven of political patronage, among other considerations. Assessing the historical record, former presidential aide and student of the Presidency Theodore Sorensen once quipped that some Presidents use the Executive Office “as a farm league, some use it as a source of experts and implementers, and some use it as Elba.”1 The Executive Office of the President represents an institutional response to needs felt by every occupant of the Oval Office, beginning with George Washington, who, of course, served before there even was a White House. Primarily, these were, and remain, needs for advice and assistance. Undoubtedly, there have always been many who are ready and more than willing to offer the President their advice. However, what has probably always been desired by Presidents in this regard were a few loyal and intelligent individuals who would offer counsel when asked and would keep such consultations confidential. Loyalty, competence, and ability to keep confidences were also qualities to be sought in individuals providing immediate assistance — with correspondence and records maintenance, appointments and scheduling, bookkeeping, and, in time, many more sophisticated tasks. Executive Office Agency Precursors The first experiments with special institutions to assist the President occurred during the administration of President Woodrow Wilson and the initial term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

The council was briefly revived by President Roosevelt in 1940 as a vehicle for coordinating veiled U.S. mobilization efforts. A few months later, the Office for Emergency Management became the principal mobilization coordinator. Ultimately, the council’s functions were unofficially usurped by the National Security Council in 1947. Authority (continued…) by Congress, with Wilson’s concurrence, in 1916. In announcing the formation of the council, the President indicated its chief functions would be: ! coordination of all forms of transportation and the development of means of transportation to meet the military, industrial, and commercial needs of the Nation; [and] ! extension of the industrial mobilization work of the Committee on Industrial Preparedness of the Naval Consulting Board. Complete information as to our present manufacturing and producing facilities adaptable to many-sided uses of modern warfare will be procured, analyzed, and made use of.4 The council’s members included the Secretaries of Agriculture, Commerce, the Interior, Labor, the Navy, and War — the Cabinet minus the Attorney General, Secretary of State, Postmaster General, and Vice President. Its statutory mandate also provided that the council was to be assisted by a presidentially appointed advisory commission “consisting of not more than seven persons, each of whom shall have special knowledge of some industry, public utility, or the development of some natural resource, or be otherwise specially qualified … for the performance of the duties … provided.”5 During U.S. involvement in World War I, the council and its advisory commission organized a large number of shifting subunits, largely composed of prominent persons who placed their services at the disposal of the federal government without compensation.6 The result was a network for the exchange of information and advice between executive branch leaders of the American war effort and counterpart leaders in industry, business, science, and engineering. Certainly the President and his subordinates benefitted from this advisory structure, as well as from the additional staff made available by the existence of the council. With the close of hostilities in Europe, the council began to curtail its operations. Council appropriations for FY1922 were denied, and the panel officially discontinued its activities on June 30, 1921.

In combating the Great Depression, President Roosevelt seemingly preferred to assign newly created emergency programs to agencies freshly established, rather than to existing departments. To effect executive branch coordination, he chartered a temporary Executive Council with E.O. 6202A of July 11, 1933. The panel’s 24 members — inclusive of the entire Cabinet, the Director of the Bureau of the Budget, and the heads of the various economic recovery agencies — met at the White House on Tuesday afternoons. Roosevelt himself presided over the sessions. He was assisted by the council’s executive secretary, Frank C. Walker, who performed “such duties as may be prescribed him by the President” and was the only professional staff assistant serving the panel. Walker’s role was purely administrative and was limited to the activities of the council: when FDR was absent from council meetings, the senior Cabinet officer present presided. After a few months, the panel, in one estimation, “proved too cumbersome for effective discussion.”8 The weakness of the council was its limited staffing and lack of power to coordinate department and agency efforts at combating the depression. However, it was a useful forum for the exchange of ideas by the President, department heads, and the leaders of the new emergency agencies. Indeed, the council meetings provided valuable information and advice, and Walker ably assisted FDR as a behind-the-scenes trouble shooter.9 Recognizing the deficiencies of the Executive Council, Roosevelt established another coordinating organization with a more limited membership. On November 17, 1933, he issued E.O. 6433A setting up the National Emergency Council. Composed of the Secretaries of the Interior (or Administrator of Public Works), Agriculture, Commerce, and Labor, the Administrators of Agricultural Adjustment and Federal Emergency Relief, the chairman of the Home Owners Loan Corporation, the governor of the Farm Credit Administration, and a representative from the Consumer’s Council, the National Emergency Council had field directors in each of the states to coordinate federal relief efforts. Furthermore, responsibility for the dissemination of information and guidance to the public about federal recovery and relief activities was vested in the council.10 Like the Executive Council, the National Emergency Council met every Tuesday, but at two-week intervals. The agenda was set by the executive director in consultation with the President. The member agencies submitted progress reports to inform other participants and reduce misunderstandings and conflicts in administration. With the President presiding, disputes might be settled at his decision. Frank Walker initially acted as the council’s executive director.

Recognizing the limitations of the National Emergency Council for coordinating the activities and administration of New Deal programs in the area of relief and unemployment, the President, with E.O. 6889A of October 31, 1934, consolidated the Executive Council, the National Emergency Council, and a National Recovery Administration oversight panel called the Industrial Emergency Committee. The executive director of the reorganized National Emergency Council was given sweeping new authority, but it could only be effectively exercised with the full support of the President. Slipping into decline after December of 1935, the council held its last meeting on April 28, 1936.11 Subsequently, on September 16, 1937, Roosevelt issued E.O. 7709A abolishing the panel at the end of the year. He then changed his mind, however, thinking the council might be useful for dealing with the recession that had become widespread by November, and he extended the life of the panel. FDR thought the Emergency Council experience “a wonderful essay in democracy.” He called it a New England town meeting that gave everybody a chance to “blow off.” By his own admission, he learned things that some of his subordinates “wouldn’t have liked me to know anything about.” Eventually, Roosevelt admitted, the council became “too big to do much actual work.” At the end, he was, he said, making “stump speeches” when he would have preferred to be receiving advice.12 Nonetheless, it has been observed that FDR’s experience with such super-Cabinet entities may well have convinced him that the coordination he desired could be better achieved through strengthened presidential staff rather than collegial bodies of department and agency leaders.13 Toward an Executive Office FDR turned to a group of planners after his super-Cabinet experiments failed to result in the kind of coordination he wanted. Shortly after the Federal Emergency Administration of Public Works was established in June of 1933,14 Harold Ickes, as the head of the new program, had created the National Planning Board to establish evaluation criteria and advise him on project selection. Its members included political scientist Charles E. Merriam, economist Wesley C. Mitchell (succeeded by George Yantes), and city planner Frederick A. Delano, who was the President’s uncle. As Roosevelt became familiar with the board’s work and as the board’s members became increasingly aware of the lack of adequate information available for use in planning the development and application of the nation’s resources, it was agreed that a permanent, broadly based planning body was needed. The result was the conversion of the National Planning Board into the National Resources Board and Advisory Committee, an independent Cabinet committee, with E.O. 6777 of June 30, 1934. When this new entity lost its statutory charter due to Supreme Court CRS-5 15 Schechter Poultry Corporation v. United States, 295 U.S. 495 (1935).

Turning to the presidency, Merriam called for greater development of the President’s capabilities for management and administrative supervision of the government. He acknowledged that some steps — in personnel, budgeting, and planning — had been taken in this regard, but thought some analysis of the situation should be made, and called for “a study directed toward the institutional arrangements, general understandings and practices which would most effectively aid the Executive in the double task of management plus political leadership and direction.” Merriam indicated that such a study of administrative management might be undertaken by the Public Administration Committee of the Social Science Research Council. Chaired by Brownlow, this committee, Merriam pointed out, was already engaged in an assessment of the administration of the Works Progress Administration, “and it might be persuaded to broaden the scope of its inquiry.”

Roosevelt shied away from passing the study project on to the Social Science Research Council and, instead, sought his own study committee, instructed by the President. The result was the President’s Committee on Administrative Management, announced on March 22, 1936, and consisting of Merriam, Brownlow, and Luther Gulick.21 Its task, as revealed in the President’s letter to Congress, would be to make “a careful study of the organization of the Executive branch of the Government … with the primary purpose of considering the problem of administrative management.” FDR went on to stress that “many new agencies have been created during the emergency, some of which will, with the recovery, be dropped or greatly curtailed, while others, in order to meet the newly realized needs of the Nation, will have to be fitted into the permanent organization of the Executive branch.” Little concern with efficiency and economy through government reorganization was evident in the President’s letter. Instead, the emphasis was upon structuring the Chief Executive’s authority for effectively executing his constitutional responsibilities. The Brownlow committee reported approximately ten months later. Among its recommendations was a proposed addition of six assistants to the President’s staff and vesting responsibility in the President for the continuous reorganization of the executive branch.23 Released to Congress on January 12, 1937, the report soon became lost in high politics. Three weeks after submitting the Brownlow committee’s report to Congress, FDR announced he wanted to enlarge the membership of the Supreme Court. His “court packing” plan not only fed congressional fears of a presidential power grab, but also so preoccupied Congress that the Brownlow committee’s reorganization recommendations were ignored. The Brownlow committee’s report made no recommendation for an Executive Office of the President. What was sought was a modest enlargement of the number of congressionally authorized presidential assistants. The President had initially been granted funds in 1857 to employ a private secretary; in 1929, Congress was persuaded to add two more secretaries and an administrative assistant to the presidential payroll.

The current situation, in the view of the Brownlow committee, called for more. The President needs help. His immediate staff assistance is entirely inadequate. He should be given a small number of executive assistants who would be his direct aides in dealing with the managerial agencies and administrative departments of the government. These assistants, probably not exceeding six in number, would be in addition to the present secretaries, who deal with the public, with the Congress, and with the press and radio. These aides would have no power to make decisions or issue instructions in their own right. They would not be interposed between the President and the heads of his departments. They would not be assistant presidents in any sense. Their function would be, when any matter was presented to the President for action affecting any part of the administrative work of the Government, to assist him in obtaining quickly and without delay all pertinent information possessed by any of the executive departments so as to guide him in making his responsible decisions; and then when decisions have been made, to assist him in seeing to it that every administrative department and agency affected is promptly informed. Their effectiveness in assisting the President will, we think, be directly proportional to their ability to discharge their functions with restraint. They would remain in the background, issue no orders, make no decisions, emit no public statements. Men for these positions should be carefully chosen by the President from within and without the Government. They should be men in whom the President has personal confidence and whose character and attitude is [sic] such that they would not attempt to exercise power on their own account. They should be possessed of high competence, great physical vigor, and a passion for anonymity. They should be installed in the White House itself, directly accessible to the President. In the selection of these aides, the President should be free to call on departments from time to time for the assignment of persons who, after a tour of duty as his aides, might be restored to their old positions.26 While this particular recommendation did not attract fervent opposition in Congress, the forces of resistance carried sway, and Roosevelt’s hopes for executive branch reforms died in the 75th Congress. Creating the Executive Office Although efforts at gaining legislative approval of the Brownlow committee’s recommendations lay in ruin in the spring of 1938, the buoyant Chief Executive had not deserted the cause. By July, FDR was meeting with Brownlow, Merriam, and Gulick. Their committee would not be officially reassembled, but he wanted each man’s help with a reorganization authority proposal. Roosevelt sought out the Democratic congressional leadership to discuss the new reorganization measure. Legislative strategy was set in early December 1938 by Roosevelt, Merriam, Gulick — Brownlow was convalescing from a heart attack — and Senator James Byrnes, the chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Government Organization and manager of the reorganization legislation. Byrnes asked that the bill be initiated in the House, where debate could be limited and the Senate would be free to pursue pending business of the moment. The resulting measure — H.R. 4425 — empowered the President to propose reorganization plans, subject to a veto by a majority vote of disapproval in both houses of Congress, and to also appoint six administrative assistants. After three days of discussion and debate, the House adopted the bill on March 8, 1939. Twelve days later, the Senate began considering the proposal. Following two days of sparring over amendments, the Senate adopted the bill.

A quick  conference cleared the measure for Roosevelt’s signature on April 3. Earlier, FDR had asked Brownlow, Merriam, and Gulick to return to Washington and assist with the preparation of his initial reorganization plans. Following consultations with Budget Director Harold D. Smith, the Brownlow group presented two reorganization proposals to Roosevelt on April 23. Plan 1, submitted to Congress on April 25, indicated that certain agencies were transferred to the Executive Office of the President, but offered no explanation of that entity. In Plan 2, the National Emergency Council was abolished and most of its functions were transferred to the Executive Office.30 While both plans were acceptable to legislators, their effective dates were troublesome in terms of accommodating fiscal calendar necessities. By joint resolution, Congress provided that both plans would be effective on July 1, 1939. Following this action, the President, on September 8, issued E.O. 8248 formally organizing the Executive Office and, thereby, defining it in terms of its components.32 Brownlow, who drafted the initial reorganization plan, viewed the Executive Office as the institutional realization of administrative management and “the effective coordination of the tremendously wide-spread federal machinery.” He called the initial version “a little thing” compared to its later size. It grew under Roosevelt and “it continued to expand and was further regularized by statute, by appropriation acts, and by more reorganization plans” during the succeeding years.33 Composition and Growth The Executive Office organized by E.O. 8248 was to consist of the White House Office, the Bureau of the Budget, the National Resources Planning Board, the Office of Government Reports, which assumed the information responsibilities of the defunct National Emergency Council, the Liaison Office for Personnel Management, and, “in the event of a national emergency, such office for emergency management as the President shall determine.” The Office for Emergency Management was created by an administrative order on May 25, 1940, and its functions were further specified in an administrative order of January 7, 1941. It subsequently served as a parent unit for a number of subordinate emergency management bodies. Its functions were largely assumed by the Office of War Mobilization and Reconversion CRS-9 35 See Herman M. Somers, Presidential Agency (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1950).

At the time of Roosevelt’s death, the United States Government Manual indicated six principal EOP units, plus the Council of National Defense. However, the Office for Emergency Management, which, it was explained, “is primarily a framework within the confines of the Executive Office of the President, within which framework various civilian war agencies have been established,” counted 16 major agencies. At the end of his first term as President, Harry S. Truman had an Executive Office of eight principal units, as well as the Council of National Defense, and the Office for Emergency Management had two subsidiary agencies. New Executive Office units created by Congress included the Council of Economic Advisers, the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Council, and the National Security Resources Board.36 At the end of his second term, Truman had 11 Executive Office units, but the Office for Emergency Management was dormant. Manuals for the Presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower indicate eight Executive Office components at the end of his first administration and nine at the conclusion of his second term. At the time of his assassination, John F. Kennedy also had nine Executive Office entities, and Lyndon B. Johnson counted 11 such units at the conclusion of his Oval Office tenure. When Richard Nixon resigned the Presidency, he left behind 15 Executive Office agencies. His successor, Gerald Ford, also had 15 EOP components when he departed from the White House, but the next President, Jimmy Carter, had a reduced total of 11 entities at the end of his term. Ronald Reagan finished both of his administrations with nine Executive Office units, George H. W. Bush had 11 such agencies when he completed his term, and William Clinton had ten EOP entities during his presidency.

Among the more enduring constructs of the Executive Office are the White House Office and the Office of Management and Budget (formerly the Bureau of the Budget), which were among the initial EOP structures. The Council of Economic Advisers, established in 1946,38 and the National Security Council, created in 1947, also appear to hold permanent status. Both the Office of the Special Representative Office for Trade Negotiations and the Council on Environmental Quality have endured for over two decades. It also seems unlikely that the President’s administrative support staff unit, known as the Office of Administration, will soon be eliminated. If such did happen, its functions would most likely have to be assumed by the White House Office, which would increase both its personnel and budget. Indeed, the Office of Administration was created, in part, in response to criticism that the White House staff was too large and too costly. The number of units within the Executive Office of the President has not been a serious issue over the years. Congress, respecting the Constitution’s separation of powers, has allowed the President to exercise a free hand with regard to the Executive Office. He may create a temporary EOP body and use appropriated discretionary funds to finance such a unit. However, it is expected that the creation and functioning of this entity, at a minimum, will not contravene prevailing statutes, and that its continued existence will be subject to congressional approval through the legislative or appropriations process. Congress routinely appropriates funds, directly or indirectly, for all Executive Office agencies. When controversy has risen, it has usually involved resources for, and the powers of, Executive Office entities. As noted earlier, Congress was suspicious of Roosevelt’s national planners; the National Resources Planning Board came to be seen as meddlesome, a threat to traditional political relationships, and a waste of money, so it was abolished. Concerned that the director of the Office of War Mobilization, a unit of the Office for Emergency Management created by E.O. 9347 of May 27,1943,41 was becoming too powerful, Congress created a replacement agency, the Office of War Mobilization and Reconversion, and made its director subject to Senate confirmation, gave him a two-year term, and specified his authority.

More recently, during the 1970s, congressional concern about the growth of the staff of the Executive Office ultimately resulted in an authorization statute setting personnel ceilings for the White House Office, the Vice President’s Office, the President’s domestic policy staff, and the Office of Administration.43 In the summer of 1981, the House Committee on Appropriations denied the budget request of the Office of Policy Development in its entirety because witnesses from the agency refused to appear at a subcommittee hearing to discuss their funding. “After the subcommittee mark-up occurred,” said the committee report, “the head of that Office met informally and off the record with the subcommittee to discuss the matter.” Additional information on “the legal basis for refusing to appear” was to be provided, but, because it was not subsequently received, the committee took its action. The Office of Policy Development and other segments of the federal government were funded shortly thereafter through an emergency resolution continuing appropriations. It might be noted in this regard that, while the initial 1993 report of the National Performance Review (NPR) offered a dozen major recommendations concerning the organization and operations of the Executive Office, none of these were of an administrative management character. Furthermore, neither the 1993 NPR report nor President Clinton indicated a governance theory of administrative management. See Office of the Vice President, From Red Tape to Results: Creating a Government that Works Better & Costs Less; Report of the National Performance Review (Washington: GPO, 1993), pp. 139-140. for FY1982.45 Office of Policy Development officials did not again refuse to appear before an appropriations subcommittee. In his 1958 autobiography, Louis Brownlow commented that he was quite certain that FDR, when creating the Executive Office, “had not in his wildest dreams” envisioned the expansion that later occurred. Indeed, Brownlow himself was surprised. He might also be surprised that administrative management, stressed by the Brownlow Committee, has not been a major concern of many of the men succeeding Franklin D. Roosevelt as President. The past two decades have seen little awareness of or demonstrated interest in administrative management on the part of the men occupying the Oval Office. This situation is reflected in their public remarks, the relatively unchanging composition of the Executive Office, and the general absence of executive branch reorganization activities or plans. However, significant changes in the composition and staffing of the Executive Office, other than an isolated addition of a new unit or a few personnel, could occur depending upon the approach future Presidents have toward administrative management considerations for the execution of the duties of the Presidency.