THE BUREAUCRACY: Servant or Master?

Servant or Master?

Everybody knows about the Eisenhower Administration's struggles with members of Congress. Perhaps more important in the long run is a hidden struggle inside the executive branch of the Government. This is not the too-familiar rivalry between presidential appointees; the Eisenhower Administration, so far, has been remarkably free of high-level backbiting. The significant struggle is the quiet war of the President and his appointees to get control of the vast governmental machine, manned by civil servants (and military men) who operate under protective rules designed to keep them partially independent of their nominal bosses.

The permanent establishment of the Government is not supposed to make policy. But it does. It is even more influential in strangling efforts by political appointees to change the quality and direction of Government and to make new policy.

A few figures reveal what Eisenhower & Co. are up against: out of 2,300,000 people on the federal payroll (exclusive of armed forces), the Eisenhower Administration has succeeded in appointing fewer than 2,500 of its own men, and by no means all the 2,500 are in key jobs. In the 1,200,000-man Defense Department, there are less than a score Eisenhower appointees.

The U.S. public is conditioned to read into this situation the old conflict of patronage-hungry politicians against the merit system. That conflict does exist, and the Administration would have an easier time with Congress if it had some more jobs to dole out.

But the patronage drought is relatively a very minor factor in the present struggle. Far more important is the question of whether the men who bear the constitutional and legal responsibility for running the executive branch will, in fact, be able to get into their hands the power to run it. Eisenhower promised the people reduction in the cost of Government, decentralization of power, a stronger and more coherent foreign policy and a more efficient defense policy. Whether he succeeds or fails in these promises depends largely, perhaps mainly, on his ability to get control of the permanent establishment.

Reform at a Price. In the first few decades of U.S. history, Cabinet officers hired their staffs without restriction, took credit or blame for the results. With the rise of political parties and patronage officials began to distribute jobs with an eye more to party spoils than to the nation's business.

As Government services grew more important and more complex, protests arose against the quality of public employees produced by the patronage system. After 20 years of agitation, the Pendleton Act of 1883 established a merit system of appointment for some Government employees. Steadily, but very slowly, the merit system spread within the U.S. Government. Its next sensational gain was made under Theodore Roosevelt, but even at the end of his Administration, little more than 60% of federal civilian employees had civil-service protection. Herbert Hoover extended it further until at the end of his term about 80% of employees were covered.

The New Deal found a bureaucracy well-entrenched, but there was little conflict between this group and Roosevelt's top political appointees. As the New Deal vastly expanded the scope and power of Government, thousands of civil servants gained rapid promotion. At the same time, much of the New Deal's business was transacted in new agencies which were staffed without competitive civil-service examinations. By 1936, only 60% of Government civilian employees had entered Government through competitive civil-service tests. Many of the 40% were patronage appointments, and most of them were New Deal enthusiasts. World

War II brought another huge wave of Government employees who did not win their jobs competitively.

The Truman Administration took a series of steps which blanketed this expanded bureaucracy under civil-service protection against firing. It is one of Harry Truman's fondest boasts that he extended civil-service protection to more Government workers than any other President. When Truman left office, at least 95% of Government civilian employees had civil service or similar protection of tenure.

Inertia in the Mass. The typical civil servant will not deliberately defy or sabotage clear orders from above. But, in the complexity of modern government, clear, sensemaking orders cannot be written from above without willing cooperation below. In the present state of the U.S. Government, the wafer-thin layer of political appointees at the top has great difficulty swinging the massive organization beneath. A Republican appointee with considerable experience in business and Government administration describes the inertia that faces many an Eisenhower executive: "He wants to do something that in business he would handle by a phone call or a letter. He calls in his Government help to tell them about it. First thing, they say it can't be done, or it can't be done the way he wants to do it. The reasons why not are likely to be complicated. When that has happened to him half a dozen times, he starts feeling, 'My God, you can't do anything.' He starts lashing out blindly."

Nobody wants to end or to impair the merit system, without which modern government could not be conducted. But the merit system was never advocated or defended as an influence (mostly negative) on policymaking or a brake upon change. What Eisenhower's aides are seeking is enough leverage over the permanent establishment to restore to the responsible officials the power to carry out their policies. All reforms have their price, and the price now exacted by the merit system is too high. The price can be reduced without damage to the essentials of the career service.

More Leverage. To this end, the President recently issued two executive orders dealing with what the civil service calls Schedule A employees: men who hold Government jobs of a confidential or policymaking nature.* Schedule A was originally established to give Government executives a freer hand in hiring and firing top assistants, and these essentially political employees did not possess the job security enjoyed by regular civil servants. In 1947, Harry Truman signed an order giving most of them the equivalent of civil-service protection. In April, Eisenhower partially undid Truman's work by ordering that top bureaucratic policymakers (about 800) be stripped of their job security. Last month, in a further return to the status quo ante Truman, Ike decreed that all nonveterans who held full-time Schedule A jobs (nearly 54,000) should thenceforth be subject to dismissal at the will of their bosses.

Wholly aside from the fact that many of the "careerists" are in fact patronage-appointed Democrats, no civil service ever cooperates efficiently with a Government dedicated to cutting expenses, and no Government dominated by a civil service was ever notable for making clear, forceful, coordinated top policy.

These were the characteristics of the last years of Truman. They will also characterize the first years of Eisenhower unless he gets the civilian career service--and the Pentagon --under control.

*Not all Schedule A men are actually policymakers. Over the years, Schedule A has also become a catchall for people who do not fit into the regular civil-service merit system, e.g., Coast Guard lamplighters, Hindi interpreters.

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