2. 8 The Executive Branch and the Federal Bureaucracy
President Obama and his national security team watch live coverage of the capture of Osama bin Laden.
Rex Features/AP Images

3. 8
Learning Objectives
The federal bureaucracy, also known as the thousands of government agencies and institutions that administer federal laws and programs, is often called "the fourth branch of government." In this chapter we will examine what the bureaucracy is, how it works, and how it is controlled. We will look at how it evolved following the Civil War and both World Wars.
Trace the growth and development of the federal bureaucracy.
8.1
Describe modern bureaucracies, and outline the structure of the modern bureaucracy.
8.2

4. 8 Learning Objectives Determine how the bureaucracy makes policy. 8.3
Evaluate controls designed to make agencies more accountable.
8.4

5. Roots of the Federal Bureaucracy
8.1
Roots of the Federal Bureaucracy
As we'll learn in this section, the size of the federal bureaucracy grew from just a small Cabinet that served President Washington to one that critics often argue is too large, too powerful, too wasteful, and too unaccountable. Many Americans are calling for smaller government, less bureaucracy. Yet many of those same Americans who have a negative opinion about the federal government as a whole are more satisfied with the service they have received from departments or agencies.
The Civil War and the Growth of Government
From the Spoils System to the Merit System
Regulating Commerce
The World Wars and the Growth of Government

6. The Civil War and the Growth of Government
8.1
The Civil War and the Growth of Government
The Civil War left its mark on our country in countless ways. Its impact on the size and scope of the federal bureaucracy is no exception. As the nation geared up for war, President Abraham Lincoln authorized the addition of thousands of new employees to existing departments.
Poor harvests, a casualty of the war, led Lincoln to create the Department of Agriculture in 1862 to ensure enough food was grown to feed the soldiers. Congress also created the Pension Office in 1866 to pay benefits to Union veterans who had fought in the war. These changes set the stage for the addition of future departments and the growth of government.
Civil War changes
Creation of the Department of Agriculture
Creation of the Pension Office
Authorization of thousands more employees
Permanent changes to the bureaucracy

7. From the Spoils System to the Merit System
8.1
From the Spoils System to the Merit System
Over the years the patronage system, in which federal government jobs were given to friends and supporters of successful political candidates, had become the norm. By the time James A. Garfield was president, reformers were calling for changes in the loyalty system, also known as the spoils system.
Garfield's predecessor, Rutherford B. Hayes, had favored the idea of replacing the spoil's system with a merit system, in which federal employment is based on qualifications, test scores, and ability, rather than on loyalty. Congress, however, failed to pass the legislation he proposed. Garfield took up the cause, but was assassinated, ironically, by a frustrated job seeker. Public reaction to Garfield's death led Congress to create the beginnings of the current merit-based civil service system, which now covers 90 percent of federal employees.
Patronage system (spoils system)
Federal jobs given to loyal supporters
Merit system
Jobs given according to ability
Civil Service system
Current system based on merit

8. 8.1 Which U.S. president popularized the spoils system?
Here, a political cartoonist depicts how President Andrew Jackson might have been immortalized for his use of the spoils system. Note that President Jackson is shown riding a pig, rather than a horse. Words written in the ground below the animal include "fraud," "bribery," and "plunder."
Bettmann/Historical/Corbis

9. Regulating Commerce 8.1 Growth of big business Additional departments
Following the Civil War, the nation experienced tremendous growth. Urbanization and Industrialization led to widespread price fixing and other unfair business practices. In particular, exorbitant freight-hauling fees charged by the railroads led Congress to create the Interstate Commerce Commission.
Progressives began calling for more worker protections and a curbing of the big business monopolies. In 1913, it became apparent that one agency could not represent both employers and employees. So President Woodrow Wilson divided the Department of Commerce and Labor. Congress followed a year later with the creation of the Federal Trade Commission to protect small business from monopolies.
Finally, the Sixteenth Amendment gave Congress the authority to levy a federal income tax, which became a revenue source to fund growth in the bureaucracy.
Growth of big business
Unfair business practices
Additional departments
Reaction to railroad shipping rates
Protect workers and small businesses from big businesses
Sixteenth Amendment
Federal income tax

10. The World Wars and the Growth of Government
8.1
The World Wars and the Growth of Government
The stock market crash of 1929 and the resulting Great Depression called for government action. President Franklin D. Roosevelt responded with a series of programs and agencies that regulated business practices and other aspects of the national economy.
The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor launched the U.S. into World War II, and jobs were created to support the war effort. Tax rates went up to pay for the new federal agencies and programs needed during the war, and those rates never went back down. The revenues were used after the war to expand the federal bureaucracy even more to support veterans with schooling under the GI Bill and housing.
Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society, with its focus on creating equal opportunity through the recognition of civil rights and reduction of poverty, created even more government programs.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Social programs during Depression
World War II veterans benefits
G.I. Bill
Housing
Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
Housing and Urban Development
Transportation

11. 8.1 FIGURE 8.1 How many employees work in
the federal executive branch?
The size of the federal executive branch has fluctuated with the needs of the nation. The line graph above tracks these changes from the country’s creation to the twenty-first century. Notice the overall growth marked by periods of decline.
Source: Office of Personnel Management,

12. How did World War II change government?
8.1
During World War II, the size of the federal government grew dramatically. Men went off to war and women were encouraged to work in factories in order to help the war effort, as exemplified by this famous poster of Rosie the Riveter. When the war ended, veterans returned to their jobs.
AP Images

13. 8.1
8.1 What agency was created to help control the railroad shipping rates?
As we've discussed, the federal bureaucracy grew to meet the needs of a growing nation. Do you remember which of these was the first independent regulatory agency?
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
Federal Trade Commission
Interstate Commerce Commission
Civil Service System

14. 8.1
8.1 What agency was created to help control the railroad shipping rates?
This first independent regulatory commission was created to help stabilize and regulate the railroad shipping rates.
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
Federal Trade Commission
Interstate Commerce Commission
Civil Service System

15. The Modern Bureaucracy
8.2
The Modern Bureaucracy
Bureaucrats are workers in the federal bureaucracy. Unlike workers in the private sector, who are rewarded for ambition and taking risks, often bureaucrats are motivated by the fear of making a mistake. Bureaucracies do not act like businesses, and bureaucrats are considerably more risk-averse than private sector employees.
One key to understanding the modern bureaucracy is to learn who bureaucrats are, how the bureaucracy is organized, how organizations and employees within the bureaucracy affect each other, and how they all navigate the political process.
Activity: Ask students to evaluate the organization and efficiency of your university. How is it organized? Who is employed in what types of positions? Who are the bureaucrats and how efficiently do they perform their jobs? Do these bureaucrats have the same challenges in implementing policy that federal bureaucrats face?
Who Are Bureaucrats?
Formal Organization
Government Workers and Political Involvement

16. Who Are Bureaucrats? 8.2 Covered by the Civil Service System
Federal bureaucrats are career government employees who work in Cabinet-level departments and agencies that comprise more than 2,000 bureaus, divisions, branches, offices, services, and other subunits of the federal government. There are more than 3 million of them, and one quarter of those work for the U.S. Postal Service.
Some 90 percent of these employees are covered by the Civil Service System. Some may have to pass exams to be hired; others submit a resume online. The 10 percent of federal employees not covered by the civil service system tend to fall into one of these three categories:
•presidential appointees
•independent regulatory commissioners
•low-level, non-policy patronage positions, which generally are secretarial assistants
Some bureaucrats hold onto their jobs for a long time. In other agencies, such as the Department of Homeland Security, turnover is high.
Covered by the Civil Service System
90 percent of federal employees
Not covered by the Civil Service System
10 percent of federal employees
Turnover
High in some agencies, low in others

17. 8.2
FIGURE What are the federal agency regions, and where are their headquarters located?
To bring the federal bureaucracy closer to citizens and increase the efficiency of providing government services, the federal agencies maintain an office in Washington, D.C. and in ten other regional locations across the country. These cities are shown on the map above.
Source: Department of Health and Human Services,

18. Formal Organization 8.2 Cabinet departments
Today, the federal government consists of four different types of organizations: Cabinet departments, independent executive agencies, independent regulatory commissions, and government corporations.
Cabinet departments generally are large organizations responsible for a broad section of policy such as education, national defense, and transportation. About 60 percent of the federal workforce are employed in these departments.
Independent executive agencies tend to have narrower responsibilities for a specific policy area, such as the environment.
There are also independent regulatory commissions, which are not under the control of the president or a department. They have a specific policy mission, such as regulating nuclear power, and their members are drawn from both political parties and are appointed in staggered terms over the course of more than one administration.
Government corporations, like the U.S. Postal Service, have independent boards and are supposed to be run like a business.
Cabinet departments
Independent executive agencies
Independent regulatory commissions
Government corporations

19. 8.2 FIGURE 8.3 What are the Cabinet departments?
Cabinet departments reflect the government's permanent interest in a particular issue area. The modern Cabinet includes fifteen agencies focusing on issues ranging from commerce and foreign affairs to education and health.

20. 8.2 What do government corporations do? Gerald Herbert/AP Images
Amtrak provides train service across the United States. Its most profitable line runs through the Northeast Corridor from Boston to Washington, D.C. Thousands of travelers use these train lines to navigate the important business centers and congested airspace of the Northeast. Vice President Joe Biden is among these commuters; he frequently takes the train from the nation's capital to his home in Wilmington, Delaware.
Gerald Herbert/AP Images

21. Government Workers and Political Involvement
8.2
Government Workers and Political Involvement
As the number of federal employees grew in the 1930s, many Americans began to fear that these workers would play major roles in electing members of Congress and even the president. In response, Congress passed the Political Activities Act of 1939, commonly called the Hatch Act. It prohibited federal employees from becoming directly involved in a political campaign. Critics said it was too harsh, however, and it was later amended to allow federal employees to run for public office in nonpartisan campaigns, contribute money to political organizations, and campaign for or against political candidates— but not during working hours.
Hatch Act
Limits federal employees' political activities
Amendments to Hatch Act
Rules relaxed somewhat

22. 8.2 TABLE 8.1 What does the Hatch Act stipulate?
Table 8.1 shows the limits placed on federal employees' political involvement by the Hatch Act.
Source: U.S. Special Counsel's Office. 

23. 8.2
8.2 Which of the following
organizational entities has a narrow focus on a specific policy issue?
Let's review the various organizations that make up the federal bureaucracy. Can you answer this brief question?
Cabinet departments
Independent agencies
Independent regulatory commissions
Government corporations

24. 8.2
8.2 Which of the following
organizational entities has a narrow focus on a specific policy issue?
Independent agencies, such as the Environmental Protection Agency, have a narrower focus on specific issues, such as the environment.
Cabinet departments
Independent agencies
Independent regulatory commissions
Government corporations

25. How the Bureaucracy Works
8.3
How the Bureaucracy Works
German sociologist Max Weber believed bureaucracies were rational ways for complex societies to organize themselves. Such bureaucracies would include a chain of command, division of labor, clear lines of authority, a goal orientation that helped shape the organization's structure, impersonality, in which all employees are treated fairly, and productivity. This is the ideal, of course, but government agencies do try to work this way.
Congress creates the departments and agencies of the bureaucracies, and give them broad guidelines, because it cannot be involved in every detail of government. How agencies carry out Congressional wishes is called implementation.
The relationships and interaction among federal agency workers, interest groups, and key congressional committee staffers has been called the iron triangle of implementation. More recently the complexity of those relationships has changed and they are now called iron networks.
Activity: Ask students if they feel that federal spending provides assistance and services to the greatest number of citizens, across the greatest possible spectrum. Why or why not?
Then ask them to consider the services provided by the government. Which do they think the government should not provide? Why? How would such services be provided instead? How would Weber approach the topic of bureaucracy? Why did he view bureaucracy so positively?
Making Policy
Rule Making
Administrative Adjudication

26. 8.3 FIGURE 8.4 What constitutes an iron triangle?
Iron triangles are the relatively stable relationships formed between bureaucratic agencies, congressional committees, and interest groups. Cooperation between these three policy actors may make policymaking in some issue areas, such as veterans' affairs, an insular process confined to a small clientele.

27. Making Policy 8.3 Rule making Administrative adjudication
Many decisions are left up to individual government employees on a day-to-day basis. Government employees have administrative discretion, and can choose how to implement congressional or executive intentions. There are two formal procedures for this: rule making and administrative adjudication.
Rule making is the quasi-judicial process resulting in regulations that have the force of law. Put simply, bureaucratic rule- makers often act both as lawmakers as well as law enforcers when they make rules or write regulations to implement congressional acts.
The Administrative Procedures Act was passed in Among other things, it requires that the public be made aware of proposed rules and be given the chance to comment.
If people or businesses are not in compliance with federal laws, rules or regulations, the agencies may resort to administrative adjudication. This is a quasi-judicial process that settles disputes between two parties much like the way disputes are handled in court. An administrative law judge presides over the hearings. The judge's rulings can be further reviewed and challenged in court.
Rule making
Quasi-legislative process
Regulations have force of law.
Administrative adjudication
Quasi-judicial process

28. 8.3 FIGURE 8.5 How is a regulation made?
The 1946 Administrative Procedures Act spells out a specific process for rule making in the federal bureaucracy. Similar to the process of making legislation, a proposed rule has many opportunities to fail to be implemented. Affected citizens also have a number of opportunities to offer their opinions of a proposed rule.

29. 8.3 TABLE 8.2 How many comments do agencies receive on proposed rules?
This table shows how many thousands of comments agencies may receive from the public on proposed rules.
Source: Gregory Korte, 'Comments Slow Down Rules Process.' USA Today (May 25, 2011): A5; and

30. Making Policy 8.3 Administrative adjudication Quasi-judicial process
If people or businesses are not in compliance with federal laws, rules or regulations, the agencies may resort to administrative adjudication. This is a quasi-judicial process that settles disputes between two parties much like the way disputes are handled in court. An administrative law judge presides over the hearings. The judge's rulings can be further reviewed and challenged in court.
Administrative adjudication
Quasi-judicial process 30

31. 8.3 What helps keep government
agencies running smoothly on day-to-day issues?
This section covered how bureaucracy works. Let's recall what we've covered with this brief question.
Administrative Law Judge authority
Administrative Procedures Act
Administrative rule making and regulations
Administrative discretion

32. 8.3 What helps keep government
agencies running smoothly on day-to-day issues?
This gives government employees the leeway to make choices on a day-to-day basis.
Administrative Law Judge authority
Administrative Procedures Act
Administrative rule making and regulations
Administrative discretion

33. Toward Reform: Making the Bureaucracy Accountable
8.4
Toward Reform: Making the Bureaucracy Accountable
So which branch of the federal government controls the federal bureaucracy? The answer, as you will see in this last section, is that they all do. The president, under the Constitution, is in charge of executing the laws of Congress. But Congress certainly has an interest in how its laws are implemented. And, as with most other matters, the judicial branch has the ultimate authority to review the actions of the bureaucracy.
Executive Control
Congressional Control
Judicial Control

34. Executive Control 8.4 Delegating Powers Reorganizing the Bureaucracy
Given the growth in the size of the federal government over the last half-century, presidents have delegated more and more power to the bureaucrats. But that delegation has come with its own challenges. Sometimes, those agencies don't always seem to hear even the words of the highest authority: President John F. Kennedy once complained that to give a directive to the Department of State was like putting the directive in a dead-letter box. Nothing would happen. So presidents have learned how important it is to appoint the right person to head up an agency.
Presidents can also reorganize aspects of agencies, with congressional approval. Finally, presidents can issue executive orders, which direct agencies to follow certain rules or regulations. Such executive orders have the force of law.
Delegating Powers
Challenges with agency responsiveness
Reorganizing the Bureaucracy
Needs Congressional approval
Executive Orders
Directions to agencies that have the force of law

35. Congressional Control
8.4
Congressional Control
Congress checks the power of the federal bureaucracy in several important ways. It must confirm the president's nominees for key government bureaucracy posts. Congress also has oversight power and can investigate when it suspects an agency has not implemented its laws properly. Finally, it controls the money by authorizing agencies to spend revenues and then determining a specific allocation of funds to be spent.
To help Congress oversee the bureaucracy's financial affairs, Congress created the General Accounting Office in That office is now known as the Government Accountability Office (GAO).
Confirms president's picks for agency heads
Can approve or reject
Oversight and Investigations
Proactive or reactive
Power of the purse
Controls the budget

36. 8.4 Table 8.3 How are agencies made accountable?
This table provides an overview of how authority and control are divided among the three branches.

37. 8.4 How does government oversee environmental disasters?
Congressional oversight hearings examined the causes of a massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in The results of these hearings helped the U.S. Coast Guard, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and numerous other agencies to design ways to minimize the effects of this spill and craft strategies to prevent future disasters.
John Moore/Getty Images 37

38. Judicial Control 8.4 Injunctions or orders Requires due process
Compared to the executive and legislative oversight of the bureaucracy, judicial oversight is more subtle but no less important. Federal judges can issue injunctions or orders to a federal bureaucracy even before a rule has been publicized. Due process must be granted to individuals who are affected by rules and regulations. Finally, specialized courts have developed expertise in certain policy areas and are less likely to simply take an agency's word in a case. One such court is the Court of International Trade.
Injunctions or orders
Even before a rule is publicized
Requires due process
Individuals can litigate.
Specialized courts
Have expertise in certain issues

39. 8.4 What is one check Congress has
on government agencies?
One final multiple-choice question for this chapter on the checks on the bureaucracy.
Authorizes maximum amount of funding
Issues injunctions to halt regulations
Nominates heads of agencies
Determines best way to implement regulations

40. 8.4 What is one check Congress has
on government agencies?
Congress controls the funding for an agency. Money is a powerful way to coerce bureaucrats into implementing policies.
Authorizes maximum amount of funding
Issues injunctions to halt regulations
Nominates heads of agencies
Determines best way to implement regulations

41. 8
Discussion Questions
Why does the bureaucracy have so much power in a democratic regime when it is unelected?
What gives the bureaucracy its power? How does it make policy?
What checks do the three branches of government have on the bureaucracy?

42. 8 Further Review Listen to the Chapter Study and Review the Flashcards
Study and Review the Practice Tests