Former White House position
Abraham Lincoln and his secretaries
John G. Nicolay
and
John Hay
photographed by
Alexander Gardner
on November 8, 1863 in Washington, D.C.
The
Secretary to the President
is a long-standing position in the United States government, known by many different titles during its history.
In the 19th- and early 20th-century it was a
White House
position that carried out all the tasks now spread throughout the modern
White House Office
. The Secretary would act as a buffer between the president and the public, keeping the president's schedules and appointments, managing his correspondence, managing the staff, communicating to the press as well as being a close aide and advisor to the president in a manner that often required great skill and discretion. In terms of rank it was a precursor to the modern
White House Chief of Staff
until the creation of that position in 1946.
During the mid 20th century, the position became known as the "appointments secretary", the person who was the guardian of the president's time. He had the responsibility of acting as "gatekeeper" and decided who got to meet with him.
The modern-day position of the president's secretary is fulfilled by a
administrative assistant
or
personal assistant
in the White House Office
Oval Office Operations
department who has a desk directly outside the
Oval Office
.
History
[
edit
]
During the nineteenth century, presidents had few staff resources.
Thomas Jefferson
had one messenger and one secretary (referred to as an
amanuensis
in the common parlance of the time) at his disposal, both of whose salaries were paid by the president personally. In fact, all presidents up to
James Buchanan
paid the salaries of their private secretaries out of their own pockets; these roles were usually fulfilled by their relatives, most often their sons or nephews.
James K. Polk
notably had
his wife
take the role.
It was during Buchanan's term at the White House in 1857 that the
United States Congress
created a definite office named the "Private Secretary at the White House" and appropriated for its incumbent a salary of $2,500. The first man to hold such office officially and to be paid by the government instead of by the president, was Buchanan's nephew
J. B. Henry
.
[1]
By
Ulysses S. Grant
's presidency, the White House staff had grown to three.
[2]
By 1900, the office had grown in such stature that Congress elevated the position to "Secretary to the President", in addition to including on the White House staff two assistant secretaries, two executive clerks, a
stenographer
, and seven other office personnel. The first man to hold the office of Secretary to the President was
John Addison Porter
whose failing health meant he was soon succeeded by
George B. Cortelyou
.
[1]
Radio and the advent of media coverage soon meant that
Theodore Roosevelt
and
Woodrow Wilson
too expanded the duties of their respective secretaries to dealing with reporters and giving daily press briefings.
[3]
At the time of its peak the Secretary to the President was a much admired government office held by men of high ability and considered as worthy as a cabinet rank;
[4]
it even merited an oath of office.
[5]
Three private secretaries were later appointed to the Cabinet:
George B. Cortelyou
,
John Hay
and
Daniel S. Lamont
.
Under
Warren G. Harding
, the size of the staff expanded to thirty-one, although most were clerical positions. During
Herbert Hoover
's presidency however, he tripled the staff adding two additional private secretaries (at a salary of $10,000
[6]
each ? increased from $7,200
[7]
) added by Congress. The first Hoover designated his Legislative Secretary (the senior Secretary now informally referred to by the press as the president's "No.1 Secretary"
[8]
), the second his Confidential Secretary, and the third his Appointments and
Press Secretary
.
[9]
In 1933,
Franklin D. Roosevelt
converted Hoover's two extra secretaries into the permanent
White House Press Secretary
and Appointments Secretary, but from 1933 to 1939, as he greatly expanded the scope of the federal government's policies and powers in response to the Great Depression, Roosevelt relied on his "
Brain Trust
" of top advisers. Although working directly for the president, they were often appointed to vacant positions in agencies and departments, from whence they drew their salaries since the White House lacked statutory or budgetary authority to create new staff positions. It wasn't until 1939, during Franklin D. Roosevelt's second term in office, that the foundations of the modern
White House staff
were created using a formal structure. Roosevelt was able to get Congress to approve the creation of the
Executive Office of the President
reporting directly to the president, which included the
White House Office
. As a consequence, the office of Secretary to the President was greatly diminished in stature (mostly due to the lack of a sufficient replacement to Roosevelt's confidant
Louis McHenry Howe
who had died in 1936) and had many of its duties supplanted by the Appointments Secretary.
The appointments secretary was the guardian of the president's time. He had the responsibility of acting as "gatekeeper" and decided who got to meet with him.
Eisenhower appointed
Arthur H. Vandenberg Jr.
to the position, but he took a leave of absence before Eisenhower's inauguration and later withdrew without ever having served.
In 1946, in response to the rapid growth of the U.S. government's
executive branch
, the position of
Assistant to the President
of the United States was established, and charged with the affairs of the White House. Together with the Appointments Secretary the two took responsibility of most of the president's affairs and at this point the Secretary to the President was charged with nothing other than managing the president's official correspondence before the office was discontinued at the close of the
Truman administration
.
In 1961, under
Republican
President
Dwight D. Eisenhower
, the president's pre-eminent assistant was designated the
White House Chief of Staff
. Assistant to the President became a rank generally shared by the Chief of Staff with such senior aides as Deputy Chiefs of Staff, the
White House Counsel
, the
White House Press Secretary
, and others. This new system didn't catch on straight away.
Democrats
Kennedy and Johnson still relied on their appointments secretaries instead and it was not until the
Nixon administration
that the Chief of Staff became a permanent fixture in the White House, and the appointments secretary was reduced to only functional importance. The Appointments Secretary position was eliminated in 1981, with the responsibilities transferred to the recently created
White House Deputy Chief of Staff
position.
The prior role of Secretary to the President should not be confused with the modern president's personal secretary who is officially an administrative assistant in the Executive Office of the President. The role of personal secretary to the president should also not be confused with the
personal aide to the president
(commonly known as the "body man" or "body woman").
List of presidential secretaries
[
edit
]
Private Secretary
[
edit
]
- ^
Washington had several young assistant secretaries who made copies of his correspondence. Among these were
Robert "Bob" Lewis, Howell Lewis, Bartholomew Dandridge, Jr., and George Washington Craik.
- ^
As
aide-de-camp
.
- ^
His wife
Sarah Childress Polk
, it is said, too was his personal secretary.
Private Secretary to the White House
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
f
As Military Secretary.
- ^
"Bob," as he was called, was an alcoholic and was in asylums for treatment during several periods of his father's presidency.
[10]
- ^
a
b
c
Grant was closer to his military secretaries who did most of the work normally associated with the Private Secretary.
Secretary to the President
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
c
As "Correspondence Secretary to the President"
Appointments Secretary
[
edit
]
Personal secretary to the president
[
edit
]
- ^
As Deputy Director of Oval Office Operations
- ^
As Confidential Aide to the President
References
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
"White House ? Secretaries To The Presidents"
. Old and Sold Antiques Digest. 1908. Archived from
the original
on October 26, 2008
. Retrieved
2009-09-05
.
- ^
Burke, John P.
"Administration of the White House"
.
Miller Center of Public Affairs
. Archived from
the original
on 2010-11-17
. Retrieved
2008-11-06
.
- ^
Watson, Robert P. (2004).
"4"
.
Life in the White House
.
SUNY Press
. p. 87.
ISBN
978-0-7914-6098-6
. Retrieved
2009-05-18
.
- ^
Herring, Pendleton (2006).
"5"
.
Presidential Leadership
.
Transaction Publishers
. p. 101.
ISBN
978-1-4128-0556-8
. Retrieved
2009-05-18
.
- ^
"The Presidency: Ted for Ted"
.
Time
. 1932-05-09. Archived from
the original
on October 27, 2010
. Retrieved
2009-05-18
.
- ^
"Big Job"
.
Time
. 1929-02-11. Archived from
the original
on October 27, 2010
. Retrieved
2009-05-09
.
- ^
"$7,500 Pay for Tumulty"
.
The New York Times
. 1913-02-03
. Retrieved
2009-05-18
.
- ^
"Description"
.
Time
. 1929-03-04
. Retrieved
2009-05-09
.
[
dead link
]
- ^
"Big Job"
.
Time
. 1929-02-11. Archived from
the original
on October 27, 2010
. Retrieved
2009-05-09
.
- ^
Bergeron, Paul H. (2001). "Robert Johnson: The President's Troubled and Troubling Son".
Journal of East Tennessee History
.
73
. Knoxville, TN: East Tennessee Historical Society: 1?22.
ISSN
1058-2126
.
OCLC
760067571
.
- ^
"Stephen B. Bull (White House Special Files: Staff Member and Office Files) | Richard Nixon Museum and Library"
.
www.nixonlibrary.gov
.
Archived
from the original on 2019-02-13
. Retrieved
2019-02-13
.
- ^
https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/July-1-2019-Report-FINAL.pdf
- ^
https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/July-1-2020-Report-FINAL.pdf
- ^
Kumar, Anita (3 February 2021).
"In Biden's White House, surprise visits with staff replace late-night tweets"
.
POLITICO
. Retrieved
5 February
2021
.
- ^
https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/July-1-2023-Report-Final-Version.pdf
Sources
[
edit
]
|
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|
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(
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,
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,
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,
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,
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)
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(
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)
| |
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|
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(
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)
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|
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