Presidents and Their Cabinets: Dwight Eisenhower
When popular General Dwight D. Eisenhower returned home from Europe after World War II, many assumed that he would some day become President of the United States. Eisenhower was a professional soldier and like Zachary Taylor a century before, no one was sure what his politics were. Democrats and Republicans alike courted him as their party's candidate for President. President Harry Truman had lobbied Ike to run for his party. In 1945 Truman told Eisenhower, during the Potsdam Conference, that if Eisenhower wanted to be President, Truman would help the general win the 1948 election. In 1947, anticipating defeat in the next election, Truman offered to run as Eisenhower's running mate on the Democratic ticket. Eisenhower chose to sit out the 1948 election. In 1951 Truman once again pressed Eisenhower to run for the office as a Democrat. By this time Eisenhower had decided that he had some major disagreements with the Democratic Party and declared himself and his family to be Republicans.
With Ike out of the political closet, he and Ohio Senator Robert A. Taft (son of former President William Howard Taft) were the two front-runners for the Republican presidential nomination as the 1952 Republican presidential primaries approached. Other candidates were Governor Earl Warren of California, and former Governor Harold Stassen of Minnesota. Taft led the conservative wing of the party, a wing which rejected many of the New Deal social welfare programs created by the Democrats. Taft held a non-interventionist foreign policy stance, believing that America should stay out of the rest of the world's business. This was Eisenhower's major disagreement with Taft. Taft had been a candidate for the Republican nomination in 1940 and 1948, but had been defeated both times by moderate Republicans from New York: Wendell Willkie in 1940, and Thomas E. Dewey in 1948. Taft blamed his loses on the New York Republican Party's excessive influence over the national party.
Thomas Dewey had been the Republican Party's presidential nominee in 1944 and 1948. He knew that he could not win a third nomination. He and other Eastern moderates decided that the party needed a man like Eisenhower as their candidate. They began a "Draft Eisenhower" organization in September 1951. Two weeks later, at the National Governors' Conference meeting, seven Republican governors endorsed Eisenhower for President. At the time Eisenhower was serving as the Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, and he was reluctant to openly become involved in partisan politics. But he was concerned about American's foreign policy. He disagreed with Taft's non-interventionist views, and he did not like the direction the Democrats were leading the country in. Eisenhower saw NATO, an important deterrent against Soviet aggression. He was also disgusted at the corruption that had crept into the federal government during the later years of the Truman administration. In late 1951 Eisenhower announced that he would not oppose any effort to nominate him for president, although he refused to openly seek the nomination himself.
In January 1952, Senator Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. announced that Eisenhower's name would be entered in the March New Hampshire primary. The result in that race was" 46,661 votes for Eisenhower, 35,838 for Taft and 6,574 for Stassen. In April, Eisenhower resigned from his NATO command and returned to the United States. When the 1952 Republican National Convention opened in Chicago that summer, Eisenhower won the nomination on the first ballot. Senator Richard Nixon of California was nominated by acclamation as his vice-presidential running mate. Nixon was selected because of his relative youth (he was 39 years old) to counterbalance the assertion that Eisenhower was too old, and Nixon had solid anti-communist credentials at a time when Senator Joseph McCarthy was alleging that communists were infiltrating the State Department.
Truman announced his retirement in March 1952. Delegates to the 1952 Democratic National Convention, also held in Chicago, nominated Illinois governor Adlai E. Stevenson for president on the third ballot. Senator John Sparkman of Alabama was selected as his running mate. Stevenson's biggest liability was Truman's unpopularity, even though Stevenson had not had been a part of the Truman administration. Republican strategy focused on Eisenhower's popularity and their slogan was "I Like Ike". Eisenhower traveled to 45 of the 48 states. His plain talk was a positive contrast to Stevenson's academic and professorial speaking style. In his speeches, Eisenhower never mentioned Stevenson by name. Instead he relentlessly attacked Truman, emphasizing three Truman administration failures: "Korea, Communism, and corruption". His campaign survived a potentially devastating allegation that Nixon had received $18,000 in undeclared "gifts" from wealthy California donors. Nixon responded to the allegations in a nationally televised speech, the "Checkers speech," on September 23. (The highlight of the speech was when Nixon said that a supporter had given his daughters a gift—a dog named "Checkers"—and that he would not return it, because his daughters loved it.) The public responded to the speech with an outpouring of support.
On election day, Eisenhower won a landslide victory, winning 55.2 percent of the popular vote and 442 electoral votes. Stevenson received 44.5 percent of the popular vote and 89 electoral votes. Eisenhower won every state outside of the South, as well as Virginia, Florida, and Texas. Republicans also won control of the House of Representatives and the Senate. Now came the task of picking a cabinet.
Eisenhower brought the same management style to the White House that he had used in the army. He selected good subordinates and delegated. The job coming up with a list of potential cabinet members was given to of the selection of his cabinet to two close associates, Lucius D. Clay, a former general, and Herbert Brownell Jr., who had been Eisenhower's lawyer. Brownell had been the campaign manager for Thomas Dewey in Dewey's election as governor of New York, and in Dewey's 1944 and 1948 campaigns for president. From 1944 to 1946, Brownell served as the chairman of the Republican National Committee.
John Foster Dulles was another lawyer who also had close ties to Dewey. Eisenhower picked Dulles as his secretary of state. Dulles had previously had a part in developing the both the United Nations Charter and the Treaty of San Francisco. He traveled nearly 560,000 miles during his six years in office and was integral in planning Eisenhower's foreign policy.
Eisenhower sought out leaders of big business for many of his other cabinet appointments. As he Secretary of Defense he picked someone with a business background as opposed to a military background in his selection of Charles Erwin Wilson, the CEO of General Motors. During his confirmation hearings, Wilson was asked if he could make a decision as Secretary of Defense that would be adverse to the interests of General Motors, Wilson answered that he could, but said that he couldn't imagine such a situation "because for years I thought what was good for our country was good for General Motors, and vice versa". This statement has subsequently been misquoted as "What's good for General Motors is good for the country". In 1957, Wilson was replaced by president of Procter & Gamble president, Neil H. McElroy.
Eisenhower poached other corporate CEOs for cabinet posts. For the position of secretary of the treasury, Eisenhower picked George M. Humphrey, the CEO of several steel and coal companies. His postmaster general, Arthur E. Summerfield, and first secretary of the interior, Douglas McKay, were both automobile distributors. Eisenhower appointed Joseph Dodge, a longtime bank president who also had extensive government experience, as the director of the Bureau of the Budget. Dodge was the first budget director to be given cabinet-level status. As his Secretary of Commerce, Eisenhower chose former Massachusetts Senator Sinclair Weeks. He had been a member of the Republican National Committee from 1941 to 195 and had also been president of the American Enterprise Association from 1946 to 1950.
For the position of Secretary of Agriculture, Eisenhower picked Ezra Taft Benson, a high-ranking member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Benson was selected because he belonged to the Taft wing of the party. Benson was a distance cousin of Taft's.
One of Eisenhower's most interesting appointments was Oveta Culp Hobby, who became the first secretary of the newly created Department of Health, Education, and Welfare in 1953. She was the second female cabinet secretary (Franklin Roosevelt had picked Frances Perkins as his Secretary of Labor). During World War II she had been in charge of the War Department's Women's Interest Section for a short time and then became the Director of the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps (later the Women's Army Corps, known as the WACs). This was an agency created to fill gaps left by a shortage of men. The members of the WAC were the first women other than nurses to wear U.S. Army uniforms and to receive military benefits through the GI Bill. Eisenhower had named her as head of the Federal Security Agency, a non-cabinet post, and she was invited to sit in on cabinet meetings. Just a month into his presidency, on April 11, 1953, she became the first secretary, and first female secretary, of the new Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, which later became the Department of Health and Human Services. Among other decisions and actions at HEW, she made the decision to approve Jonas Salk's polio vaccine.
Rounding out the cabinet was Martin Patrick Durkin, a Democrat and president of the plumbers and steamfitters union. Durkin was selected as secretary of labor. Eisenhower would joke that his first Cabinet was composed of "nine millionaires and a plumber." But Durkin soon became dissatisfied with Eisenhower's labor policies and resigned after less than a year in office. He was replaced by James P. Mitchell, a businessman from New Jersey who was nicknamed "the social conscience of the Republican Party. Mitchell was an advocate of labor. He fought against employment discrimination, opposed right-to-work laws, and was concerned about the plight of migrant workers.
Two other notable non-cabinet appointments made by Eisenhower were New Hampshire Governor Sherman Adams as White House Chief of Staff, credited as the first Chief of Staff to turn the role into a power position. Milton S. Eisenhower, the president's brother and a prominent college administrator, was another important adviser to the President. Eisenhower also elevated the role of the National Security Council, and Robert Cutler served as the first National Security Advisor.
Eisenhower organized his administration somewhat like a military staff. Men below him were supposed to work out in detail what needed to be done. As President expected to make the ultimate decision, but he disliked doing any of the detail work. Biographer Jean Smith wrote of Eisenhower, "He looked to the future, not the past, and his presidency provided a buffered transition from FDR's New Deal and the Fair Deal of Harry Truman into the modern era." He continued New Deal programs and expanded Social Security, he took the lead in building the Interstate Highway System in 1956, and the establishment of NASA as a civilian, rather than military, mandate. Eisenhower signed the first significant civil rights bills of the 20th century, and he sent federal troops to Arkansas to enforce a court ruling mandating school desegregation. Consensus among most presidential scholars is that Eisenhower is in the upper echelon among rankings of presidents.
With Ike out of the political closet, he and Ohio Senator Robert A. Taft (son of former President William Howard Taft) were the two front-runners for the Republican presidential nomination as the 1952 Republican presidential primaries approached. Other candidates were Governor Earl Warren of California, and former Governor Harold Stassen of Minnesota. Taft led the conservative wing of the party, a wing which rejected many of the New Deal social welfare programs created by the Democrats. Taft held a non-interventionist foreign policy stance, believing that America should stay out of the rest of the world's business. This was Eisenhower's major disagreement with Taft. Taft had been a candidate for the Republican nomination in 1940 and 1948, but had been defeated both times by moderate Republicans from New York: Wendell Willkie in 1940, and Thomas E. Dewey in 1948. Taft blamed his loses on the New York Republican Party's excessive influence over the national party.
Thomas Dewey had been the Republican Party's presidential nominee in 1944 and 1948. He knew that he could not win a third nomination. He and other Eastern moderates decided that the party needed a man like Eisenhower as their candidate. They began a "Draft Eisenhower" organization in September 1951. Two weeks later, at the National Governors' Conference meeting, seven Republican governors endorsed Eisenhower for President. At the time Eisenhower was serving as the Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, and he was reluctant to openly become involved in partisan politics. But he was concerned about American's foreign policy. He disagreed with Taft's non-interventionist views, and he did not like the direction the Democrats were leading the country in. Eisenhower saw NATO, an important deterrent against Soviet aggression. He was also disgusted at the corruption that had crept into the federal government during the later years of the Truman administration. In late 1951 Eisenhower announced that he would not oppose any effort to nominate him for president, although he refused to openly seek the nomination himself.
In January 1952, Senator Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. announced that Eisenhower's name would be entered in the March New Hampshire primary. The result in that race was" 46,661 votes for Eisenhower, 35,838 for Taft and 6,574 for Stassen. In April, Eisenhower resigned from his NATO command and returned to the United States. When the 1952 Republican National Convention opened in Chicago that summer, Eisenhower won the nomination on the first ballot. Senator Richard Nixon of California was nominated by acclamation as his vice-presidential running mate. Nixon was selected because of his relative youth (he was 39 years old) to counterbalance the assertion that Eisenhower was too old, and Nixon had solid anti-communist credentials at a time when Senator Joseph McCarthy was alleging that communists were infiltrating the State Department.
Truman announced his retirement in March 1952. Delegates to the 1952 Democratic National Convention, also held in Chicago, nominated Illinois governor Adlai E. Stevenson for president on the third ballot. Senator John Sparkman of Alabama was selected as his running mate. Stevenson's biggest liability was Truman's unpopularity, even though Stevenson had not had been a part of the Truman administration. Republican strategy focused on Eisenhower's popularity and their slogan was "I Like Ike". Eisenhower traveled to 45 of the 48 states. His plain talk was a positive contrast to Stevenson's academic and professorial speaking style. In his speeches, Eisenhower never mentioned Stevenson by name. Instead he relentlessly attacked Truman, emphasizing three Truman administration failures: "Korea, Communism, and corruption". His campaign survived a potentially devastating allegation that Nixon had received $18,000 in undeclared "gifts" from wealthy California donors. Nixon responded to the allegations in a nationally televised speech, the "Checkers speech," on September 23. (The highlight of the speech was when Nixon said that a supporter had given his daughters a gift—a dog named "Checkers"—and that he would not return it, because his daughters loved it.) The public responded to the speech with an outpouring of support.
On election day, Eisenhower won a landslide victory, winning 55.2 percent of the popular vote and 442 electoral votes. Stevenson received 44.5 percent of the popular vote and 89 electoral votes. Eisenhower won every state outside of the South, as well as Virginia, Florida, and Texas. Republicans also won control of the House of Representatives and the Senate. Now came the task of picking a cabinet.
Eisenhower brought the same management style to the White House that he had used in the army. He selected good subordinates and delegated. The job coming up with a list of potential cabinet members was given to of the selection of his cabinet to two close associates, Lucius D. Clay, a former general, and Herbert Brownell Jr., who had been Eisenhower's lawyer. Brownell had been the campaign manager for Thomas Dewey in Dewey's election as governor of New York, and in Dewey's 1944 and 1948 campaigns for president. From 1944 to 1946, Brownell served as the chairman of the Republican National Committee.
John Foster Dulles was another lawyer who also had close ties to Dewey. Eisenhower picked Dulles as his secretary of state. Dulles had previously had a part in developing the both the United Nations Charter and the Treaty of San Francisco. He traveled nearly 560,000 miles during his six years in office and was integral in planning Eisenhower's foreign policy.
Eisenhower sought out leaders of big business for many of his other cabinet appointments. As he Secretary of Defense he picked someone with a business background as opposed to a military background in his selection of Charles Erwin Wilson, the CEO of General Motors. During his confirmation hearings, Wilson was asked if he could make a decision as Secretary of Defense that would be adverse to the interests of General Motors, Wilson answered that he could, but said that he couldn't imagine such a situation "because for years I thought what was good for our country was good for General Motors, and vice versa". This statement has subsequently been misquoted as "What's good for General Motors is good for the country". In 1957, Wilson was replaced by president of Procter & Gamble president, Neil H. McElroy.
Eisenhower poached other corporate CEOs for cabinet posts. For the position of secretary of the treasury, Eisenhower picked George M. Humphrey, the CEO of several steel and coal companies. His postmaster general, Arthur E. Summerfield, and first secretary of the interior, Douglas McKay, were both automobile distributors. Eisenhower appointed Joseph Dodge, a longtime bank president who also had extensive government experience, as the director of the Bureau of the Budget. Dodge was the first budget director to be given cabinet-level status. As his Secretary of Commerce, Eisenhower chose former Massachusetts Senator Sinclair Weeks. He had been a member of the Republican National Committee from 1941 to 195 and had also been president of the American Enterprise Association from 1946 to 1950.
For the position of Secretary of Agriculture, Eisenhower picked Ezra Taft Benson, a high-ranking member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Benson was selected because he belonged to the Taft wing of the party. Benson was a distance cousin of Taft's.
One of Eisenhower's most interesting appointments was Oveta Culp Hobby, who became the first secretary of the newly created Department of Health, Education, and Welfare in 1953. She was the second female cabinet secretary (Franklin Roosevelt had picked Frances Perkins as his Secretary of Labor). During World War II she had been in charge of the War Department's Women's Interest Section for a short time and then became the Director of the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps (later the Women's Army Corps, known as the WACs). This was an agency created to fill gaps left by a shortage of men. The members of the WAC were the first women other than nurses to wear U.S. Army uniforms and to receive military benefits through the GI Bill. Eisenhower had named her as head of the Federal Security Agency, a non-cabinet post, and she was invited to sit in on cabinet meetings. Just a month into his presidency, on April 11, 1953, she became the first secretary, and first female secretary, of the new Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, which later became the Department of Health and Human Services. Among other decisions and actions at HEW, she made the decision to approve Jonas Salk's polio vaccine.
Rounding out the cabinet was Martin Patrick Durkin, a Democrat and president of the plumbers and steamfitters union. Durkin was selected as secretary of labor. Eisenhower would joke that his first Cabinet was composed of "nine millionaires and a plumber." But Durkin soon became dissatisfied with Eisenhower's labor policies and resigned after less than a year in office. He was replaced by James P. Mitchell, a businessman from New Jersey who was nicknamed "the social conscience of the Republican Party. Mitchell was an advocate of labor. He fought against employment discrimination, opposed right-to-work laws, and was concerned about the plight of migrant workers.
Two other notable non-cabinet appointments made by Eisenhower were New Hampshire Governor Sherman Adams as White House Chief of Staff, credited as the first Chief of Staff to turn the role into a power position. Milton S. Eisenhower, the president's brother and a prominent college administrator, was another important adviser to the President. Eisenhower also elevated the role of the National Security Council, and Robert Cutler served as the first National Security Advisor.
Eisenhower organized his administration somewhat like a military staff. Men below him were supposed to work out in detail what needed to be done. As President expected to make the ultimate decision, but he disliked doing any of the detail work. Biographer Jean Smith wrote of Eisenhower, "He looked to the future, not the past, and his presidency provided a buffered transition from FDR's New Deal and the Fair Deal of Harry Truman into the modern era." He continued New Deal programs and expanded Social Security, he took the lead in building the Interstate Highway System in 1956, and the establishment of NASA as a civilian, rather than military, mandate. Eisenhower signed the first significant civil rights bills of the 20th century, and he sent federal troops to Arkansas to enforce a court ruling mandating school desegregation. Consensus among most presidential scholars is that Eisenhower is in the upper echelon among rankings of presidents.