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The Cabinet (Importance (Individually members of the cabinet can be very…
The Cabinet
What is It?
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It's an advisory group selected by the president to help him make decisions and co-ordinate the workings of the federal government
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The president will select people who are likely to share his opinions eg. Trump made James Mattis Defence Secretary, who shares similar views on Islamic State
Cabinet Recruitment
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Members cannot serve in Congress at the same time, which means giving up their seat if they are willing to. Not many congressmen are willing to do this and before 2009 fewer than 1 in 5 cabinet officers had any experience in congress. However, of Obama's 15 cabinet officers, four had congressional experience. An example of a current former congressman in the cabinet is attorney general Jeff Sessions who used to be a senator.
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Usually there are academics in the cabinet which is not the case for Trump's cabinet. Rick Perry was the former governor of Texas and is now head of the department of energy. The last two heads of this department were award-winning scientists.
Presidents tend to like to make their cabinets diverse in terms of age, region, race and gender. Obama's was the most diverse cabinet in history, but Trump's is the most white and male cabinet since Reagan.
All cabinet appointments have to be confirmed by a simple majority in the Senate. After a lot of controversy to do with domestic abuse allegations, the Senate rejected Andrew Puzder, who Trump nominated as secretary of labour.
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Cabinet Meetings
Trump's cabinet meetings have been described as 'cult-like' with each officer taking turns to praise Trump eg. Ben Carson thanked God for Trump as president.
Most presidents like Obama hold cabinet meetings once a month or so, Clinton only held a few a year and Reagan held hundreds.
The number of meetings tends to decline as time goes on because the president becomes busier when running for re-election and presidents tend to become disillusioned with their cabinet officers.
Cabinet meetings do serve some important functions for the president: engender team spirit, appear to be collegial, give information to all cabinet members, debate policies, check up on legislation going through Congress and see cabinet members he wouldn't normally see.
With Trump, the main purpose seems to be serving his own ego
For the cabinet members it serves the following purposes: get to know the other members and the president, sort out inter-departmental issues, gain them prestige at their department by telling the president what he wants to hear.
Importance
Individually members of the cabinet can be very important as they run executive departments and spend huge budgets. For instance the attorney general is in charge of justice. However, collectively they can never be important for the following reasons::
- Article II says all executive power is vested in the president
- There is no doctrine of collective responsibility- they can all act as they wish
- The president is most important- he's not first among equals; he's just first
- Cabinet officers aren't his rivals so he can treat them how he likes
- They have a problem of divided loyalty as well as proximity to the president
- The president uses the Executive Office of the President as his advisors instead.
- They are accountable to congress as well as the president because congress decides on their budgets. They are also accountable to interest groups and the bureaucracy.