The Wilmington morning star., 1945-05-28
Taking Form
Bv ARTHUR KROCK


relation of the Cabinet to the President, all
new Chief Executives eventually appoint
new set of Ministers to advise them on gen
eral and specific problems as well as TO d.
rect the departments OF the Government.
This natural, desirable-and tnereloIe lnev.
;table-process was disclosed IN wnat might
he called it's first current phase by President
Tr,,n,a an today when he announced three more
changes in his top advisory group, which
counting the previous announcement as to
the Postmaster GeneraD make four actual out
of ten possible, just forty-one days after his
accession.
N retain in office members Of the Cabinets
If their predecessors longer and more numer-
ously than elected Presidents are, and the
reasons are obvious. Elected Presidents who
follow Chief Executives of the same party
sometimes, and for the same reasons, have
reappointed one or two Cabinet members OF
the previous Administration. Presidents who
have moved up from Vice President have often
waited for term by election to make a clean
sweep and it may be that Mr.. Truman will
follow this custom if he is a successful candi-
date in 1948 But on the whole, with all the
past records in mind, his changes are beyond
the average in the circumstances.
Not to go back too far in the archives,
Andrew Johnson kept all but two of Abraham
Lincoln's Ministers, and of those two Stanton
stayed for two years as Secretary of War.
Chester A. Arthur replaced six of James A.
Garfield's Cabinet but he took longer time
in some instances than Mr.. Truman has. Theo-
dore Roosevelt made only three changes, and
two were on the personal insistence of William
McKinleys appontees. Calvin Coolidge re-
tanned the services Of nine out of ten for vary
ing periods, some remaining after he was
chosen President in his own right and sew
eral changes before that were forced on him
by death, by the determination of members
Of Warren G.. Harding's group to resign, or
by the fact that Ministers became political
liabilities, which condition the President re-
luctantly conceded.
On the basis of this comparative record
Mr.. Truman can therefore be said to have
begun to make his own Administration on
broader scale than is customary thus early
after Vice Presidents accession. But at the
same time the changes cannot fairly be de-
scribed as sweep because four of the most
important members of Mr.. Roosevelts Cabi-
net are not affected-the Secretaries of State,
Treasury, War and Maryland the President
said specifically he would not have accepted
Mr. Morgenthau's resignation if it had been
resubmitted and contemplates no change at
fecting Mr.. Stettinius.
The President was careful to point out
that the designations of all the Cabinet are
on file and he can accept them any day he
chooses. But until men Of his own selection
occupy at least two of the four offices named
above, and that of the Secretary of the In
terror, Mr.. Truman's executive group will re-
main a continuing link with the past. The
five are the Cabinet members who operate in
the highest fields of policy, and, headed by
Mr.. Stettinius, all are in the line of Preslden-
tial succession in the event OF the death or
disqualification of 4 Chief Executive who has
no Vice President.
Nevertheless, the changes are important
and they begin to give definite and separate
outlines to what history will call 'the Truman
Administration or, if he is elected in 1948l
''the first Truman Administration. The new
Cabinet members will be directly and po-
tently associated with problems of labor, food
law enforcement and political policy. And, as
the Presidents legal counsel as well as the
chief law officer of the Administration, At
torney General-Designate Clark will have a
great deal to do with shaping legislation, with
official courses toward industry, with the
character Of the Federal bench and bar, and
with what may be termed the moral eli
mate of the Truman regime.
Some Attorneys-General in the past have
taken the position that it is their business to
find for the President claw for whatever he
may want to do and the moral character of
an Administration thus served is likely to be
precisely that of the President. Others have
felt it their duty to oppose short cuts, slick
legal devices and standards of judicial ap-
pointment based on getting politically minded
courts when Administration measures are be-
ing legally tested. Presidents served by At
torneys-General of this type have left in
situations better than, or at least as sound as,
they were. The attitude and record of Mr..
Clark accordingly will have much to do with
whatever score for high-mindedness is made
by Mr.. Truman.
Mr.. Hannegan, when he becomes Post
master-General, will also have responsibility
in this quarter. But the other new appointees
will be judged, and will help or hurt the Pres-
dent, the country and the world, by practical
administrative tests. These will be. plain in
the case of Representative Anderson, who is
to be Secretary of Agriculture, for they exist
in every household here and abroad. They will
be plain, too, with respect to Judge Schwellen-
bach, whose field, more contentious than any
other, is swarming with political species that
have often devoured the seeds of wholesome
policy as soon as planted
The President will now have his own men
to depend on in these important matters But
he is not yet ready for full New Deal in
PERSONAL---VERY. York Times.
-V--
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