Abstract
What flexibility does a newly elected, or re-elected, president have to alter the organization of the White House? Is not the White House—like all important federal institutions—born in and framed by statute? Would a president have to get laws amended to change the structure of the White House? To respond to the chapter’s title and to these three initial questions requires a look-back of sixty-nine years, and produces a surprising answer: the White House staff is not a creation of law but is almost entirely the product of executive action.
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Notes
The author is indebted here to Matthew J. Dickinson, Bitter Harvest: FDR, Presidential Power and the Growth of the Presidential Branch ( New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997 ), Pt. II, Sec. 3.
See Patterson, “The Bush White House.” in George W Bush: Evaluating the President at Mid-Term, ed. Hilliard, Lansford, and Watson ( Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2004 ).
Patterson, Bradley H., The White House Staff: Inside the West Wing and Beyond (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2000 ), pp. 348, 373–383.
Marshall Wittman, quoted in “On Kerik Nomination, White House Missed Red Flags,” The Washington Post, December 15, 2004, p. A4.
Nicholas Lemann, The Controller, The New Yorker, May 12, 2003.
Jim VandeHei, “Pipeline to the President for GOP Conservatives,” The Washington Post, December 24, 2004, p. A15.
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© 2006 Robert Maranto, Douglas M. Brattebo, Tom Lansford
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Patterson, B.H. (2006). The Bush White House Staff in the Second Term: New Structures? New Faces? New Processes?. In: Maranto, R., Brattebo, D.M., Lansford, T. (eds) The Second Term of George W. Bush: Prospects and Perils. The Evolving American Presidency Series. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781403984418_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781403984418_3
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