Cabinet of the United States Information

The Cabinet of the United States is composed of the most senior appointed officers of the executive branch of the federal government of the United States, which are generally the heads of the federal executive departments. The existence of the Cabinet dates back to the first American President, George Washington, who appointed a Cabinet of four people (Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson; Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton; Secretary of War Henry Knox; and Attorney General Edmund Randolph) to advise and assist him in his duties. Cabinet officers are nominated by the President and then presented to the United States Senate for confirmation or rejection by a simple majority. If approved, they are sworn in and begin their duties. Aside from the Attorney General, and previously, the Postmaster General, they all receive the title Secretary. Members of the Cabinet serve at the pleasure of the President, which means the President may remove them at will.

Contents 1 Federal law 2 Salary 3 Cabinet and Cabinet-level officials 3.1 Cabinet 3.2 Cabinet-level officers 4 Former Cabinet departments 5 Renamed Cabinet offices 6 Executive officials no longer of Cabinet rank 7 Proposed Cabinet departments 8 Lists of Cabinets 9 See also 10 References 11 Further reading 12 External links

Federal law

There is no explicit definition of the term "Cabinet" in either the United States Code or the Code of Federal Regulations. However, there are occasional references to "cabinet-level officers" or "secretaries", which when viewed in their context do refer to the heads of the "executive departments" as listed in 5 U.S.C. § 101.

Under 5 U.S.C. § 3110 Federal officials are prohibited from appointing family members to certain governmental posts, including seats in the Cabinet. Passed in 1967, the law was a response to John F. Kennedy's appointment of his brother Robert F. Kennedy to the office of the United States Attorney General.

Salary

Main article: Executive Schedule

Cabinet officials receive an amount of pay determined by Title 5 of the United States Code. According to 5 U.S.C. § 5312, Cabinet level positions qualify for Level I pay, which amounts to $199,700. Some cabinet-level officials, including the Vice President and the White House Chief of Staff, have their salaries determined differently.

Cabinet and Cabinet-level officials

The Obama Cabinet (2009) See also: Confirmations of Barack Obama's Cabinet

The men and women listed below were nominated by President Barack Obama to form his Cabinet and were confirmed by the United States Senate on the date noted. An elected Vice President does not require Senate confirmation, nor do White House staff positions (e.g. the chief of staff or press secretary).

Cabinet

Department	Office	Incumbent	Image	in office since
Department of State	Secretary of State	Hillary Clinton		January 21, 2009
Department of the Treasury	Secretary of the Treasury	Timothy Geithner		January 26, 2009
Department of Defense	Secretary of Defense	Leon Panetta		July 1, 2011
Department of Justice	Attorney General	Eric Holder		February 2, 2009
Department of the Interior	Secretary of the Interior	Ken Salazar		January 20, 2009
Department of Agriculture	Secretary of Agriculture	Tom Vilsack		January 20, 2009
Department of Commerce	Secretary of Commerce	John Bryson		October 21, 2011
Department of Labor	Secretary of Labor	Hilda Solis		February 24, 2009
Department of Health and Human Services	Secretary of Health and Human Services	Kathleen Sebelius		April 28, 2009
Department of Housing and Urban Development	Secretary of Housing and Urban Development	Shaun Donovan		January 26, 2009
Department of Transportation	Secretary of Transportation	Ray LaHood		January 22, 2009
Department of Energy	Secretary of Energy	Steven Chu		January 20, 2009
Department of Education	Secretary of Education	Arne Duncan		January 20, 2009
Department of Veterans Affairs	Secretary of Veterans Affairs	Eric Shinseki		January 20, 2009
Department of Homeland Security	Secretary of Homeland Security	Janet Napolitano		January 20, 2009

Cabinet-level officers

Agency	Office	Incumbent	Image	in office since
Office of the Vice President	Vice President	Joe Biden		January 20, 2009
Executive Office of the President	White House Chief of Staff	Jacob Lew		January 27, 2012
Office of Management and Budget	Director of the Office of Management and Budget Acting	Jeffrey Zients		January 27, 2012
Environmental Protection Agency	Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency	Lisa P. Jackson		January 23, 2009
Office of the Trade Representative	Trade Representative	Ron Kirk		March 18, 2009
United States Mission to the United Nations	Ambassador to the United Nations	Susan Rice		January 22, 2009
Council of Economic Advisers	Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers	Alan Krueger		November 3, 2011
Small Business Administration	Administrator of the Small Business Administration	Karen Mills		January 13, 2012[1]

Former Cabinet departments

• Department of War (1789–1949): subsumed into new Department of Defense.
• Department of the Navy (1798–1947): subsumed into new Department of Defense.
• Post Office Department (1829–1971), headed by the Postmaster General: reorganized as the United States Postal Service, an independent executive agency.

Renamed Cabinet offices

• Secretary of Foreign Affairs: created in July 1781 and renamed Secretary of State in September 1789.^[2]
• Secretary of Commerce and Labor: created in 1903 and renamed Secretary of Commerce in 1913 when its labor functions were transferred to the new Secretary of Labor.
• Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare: created in 1953 and renamed Secretary of Health and Human Services in 1979 when its education functions were transferred to the new Secretary of Education.

Executive officials no longer of Cabinet rank

• Director of the Federal Security Agency (1939–1952): Abolished, most duties transferred to the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare
• Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (1996–2001): created as an independent agency in 1979, raised to Cabinet rank in 1996,^[3] lost Cabinet rank in 2001.^[4]
• Director of Central Intelligence (1995–2001)^[5][6][7]
• Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (1993–2009)^[8][9]

Proposed Cabinet departments

• U.S. Department of Commerce and Industry (proposed by business interests in the 1880s)
• U.S. Department of Agriculture and Labor (proposed by members of U.S. Congress)
• U.S. Department of Peace (proposed by Congressman Dennis Kucinich, Senator Matthew Neely, and other members of the U.S. Congress)^[10]
• U.S. Department of Public Welfare (proposed by President Warren Harding)
• U.S. Department of Natural Resources (proposed by former President Herbert Hoover, the Eisenhower administration, President Richard Nixon and the GOP national platform in 1976)
• U.S. Department of Social Welfare (proposed by President Franklin Roosevelt)
• U.S. Department of Public Works (proposed by President Franklin Roosevelt)
• U.S. Department of Conservation (proposed by Interior Secretary Harold L. Ickes)
• U.S. Department of Urban Affairs (proposed by President John F. Kennedy)
• U.S. Department of Business and Labor (proposed by President Lyndon Johnson)
• U.S. Department of Community Development (proposed by President Richard Nixon; to be chiefly concerned with infrastructure)
• U.S. Department of Human Resources (proposed by President Richard Nixon; essentially a revised Department of Health, Education, and Welfare)
• U.S. Department of Economic Development (proposed by President Richard Nixon; essentially a consolidation of the Departments of Commerce and Labor)
• U.S. Department of Environmental Protection (proposed by Senator Arlen Specter)
• U.S. Department of International Trade (proposed by the Heritage Foundation)
• U.S. Department of Global Development (proposed by the Center for Global Development and others)
• U.S. Department of Culture (proposed by Quincy Jones)^[11]

Lists of Cabinets

See also: List of United States Cabinets

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Cabinet of the United States

• Kitchen Cabinet
• Black Cabinet
• List of first African Americans to hold U.S. Cabinet Secretaryships
• List of female United States Cabinet Secretaries
• List of United States political appointments that crossed party lines
• List of US Cabinet Secretaries who have held multiple cabinet-level positions
• Living former cabinet members

References

1. ^ SBA head, Maine native Mills to be elevated to cabinet level position
2. ^ The office of Secretary of Foreign Affairs existed under the Articles of Confederation from October 20, 1781 to March 3, 1789, the day before the Constitution came into force.
3. ^ "President Clinton Raises FEMA Director to Cabinet Status" (Press release). Feberal Emergency Management Agency. 1996-02-26. http://web.archive.org/web/19970116185236/www.fema.gov/home/NWZ96/cabinet.htm. Retrieved 2009-05-22.
4. ^ Fowler, Daniel (2008-11-19). "Emergency Managers Make It Official: They Want FEMA Out of DHS". CQ Politics. http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?docID=hsnews-000002988269&cpage=1. Retrieved 2010-03-03. "During the Clinton administration, FEMA Administrator James Lee Witt met with the cabinet. His successor in the Bush administration, Joe M. Allbaugh, did not." (Archived by WebCite at http://www.webcitation.org/5ny13zsIv)
5. ^ Tenet, George (2007). At the Center of the Storm. London: HarperCollins. p. 136. ISBN 0061147788. "Under President Clinton, I was a cabinet member - a legacy of John Deutch's requirement when he took the job as DCI - but my contacts with the president, while always interesting, were sporadic. I could see him as often as I wanted but was not on a regular schedule. Under President Bush, the DCI lost its Cabinet-level status."
6. ^ Schoenfeld, Gabriel (July/August 2007). "The CIA Follies (Cont'd.)". Commentary. https://www.commentarymagazine.com/viewarticle.cfm/the-cia-follies--cont-d--10897?page=all. Retrieved 2009-05-22. "Though he was to lose the cabinet rank he had enjoyed under Clinton, he came to enjoy “extraordinary access” to the new President, who made it plain that he wanted to be briefed every day."
7. ^ Sciolino, Elaine (1996-09-29). "C.I.A. Chief Charts His Own Course". New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/1996/09/29/us/cia-chief-charts-his-own-course.html?scp=5&sq=John%20M.%20Deutch%20cabinet%20rank&st=nyt&pagewanted=all. Retrieved 2009-05-22. "It is no secret that Mr. Deutch initially turned down the intelligence position, and was rewarded for taking it by getting cabinet rank."
8. ^ Clinton, Bill (1993-07-01). "Remarks by the President and Lee Brown, Director of Office of National Drug Control Policy". White House. http://clinton6.nara.gov/1993/07/1993-07-01-presidents-remarks-at-swearing-in-of-lee-brown.html. Retrieved 2009-05-22. "We are here today to install a uniquely qualified person to lead our nation's effort in the fight against illegal drugs and what they do to our children, to our streets, and to our communities. And to do it for the first time from a position sitting in the President's Cabinet."
9. ^ Cook, Dave (2009-03-11). "New drug czar gets lower rank, promise of higher visibility". Christan Science Monitor. http://features.csmonitor.com/politics/2009/03/11/new-drug-czar-gets-lower-rank-promise-of-higher-visibility/. Retrieved 2009-03-16. "For one thing, in the Obama administration the Drug Czar will not have Cabinet status, as the job did during George W. Bush’s administration."
10. ^ "History of Legislation to Create a Dept. of Peace". http://www.thepeacealliance.org/content/view/54/130/.
11. ^ Clarke, Jr., John (2009-01-16). "Quincy Jones Lobbies Obama for Secretary of Culture Post". Rolling Stone. http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/15765/90864. Retrieved 2010-08-19.

Further reading

• Bennett, Anthony. The American President's Cabinet. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Macmillan, 1996. ISBN 0-333-60691-4. A study of the U.S. Cabinet from Kennedy to Clinton.
• Grossman, Mark. Encyclopedia of the United States Cabinet (Santa Barbara, California: ABC-CLIO; three volumes, 2000; reprint, New York: Greyhouse Publishing; two volumes, 2010). A history of the United States and Confederate States cabinets, their secretaries, and their departments.
• Rudalevige, Andrew. "The President and the Cabinet", in Michael Nelson, ed., The Presidency and the Political System, 8th ed. (Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 2006).

External links

• Official site of the President's Cabinet
• U.S. Senate's list of cabinet members who did not attend the State of the Union Address (since 1984)

Cabinet of President Barack Obama (since 2009) Cabinet Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (2009–present) Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner (2009–present) Secretary of Defense Robert Gates (2009–2011) Leon Panetta (2011–present) Attorney General Eric Holder (2009–present) Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar (2009–present) Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack (2009–present) Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke (2009–2011) John Bryson (2011–present) Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis (2009–present) Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius (2009–present) Secretary of Education Arne Duncan (2009–present) Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Shaun Donovan (2009–present) Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood (2009–present) Secretary of Energy Steven Chu (2009–present) Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric Shinseki (2009–present) Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff (2009) Janet Napolitano (2009–present) Cabinet-level Vice President Joe Biden (2009–present) White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel (2009–2010) William Daley (2011–2012) Jacob Lew (2012–present) Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency Lisa Jackson (2009–present) Director of the Office of Management and Budget Peter Orszag (2009–2010) Jacob Lew (2010–2012) Trade Representative Ron Kirk (2009–present) Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice (2009–present) Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers Christina Romer (2009–2010) Austan Goolsbee (2010–2011) Alan Krueger (2011–present) Director of the Central Intelligence Agency Leon Panetta (2009–2011) David Petraeus (2011–present) Administrator of the Small Business Administration Karen Mills (2012–present)* * took office in 2009, raised to cabinet-rank in 2012 See also: Confirmations of Barack Obama's Cabinet

Current members of the Cabinet of the United States Obama Biden Bryson Chu Clinton Daleyc Donovan Duncan Geithner Holder Jacksonc Kirkc Kruegerc LaHood Lewc Millsc Napolitano Panetta Ricec Salazar Sebelius Solis Shinseki Vilsack Zientsca c - cabinet-level; a - acting

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