Postscript: The Clinton Cabinet

Abstract

This book sets out to study the institution of the president’s cabinet during the seven administrations from Kennedy to Bush. However, we now have another president’s cabinet to study with the advent of the Clinton administration in January 1993. During the 1992 presidential election campaign, Governor Clinton made no promises regarding the use of his cabinet. It would have been surprising had he done so. For Bill Clinton saw himself as the Kennedy-style politician, someone who thrived on the cut and thrust of brainstorming sessions, think-ins and open-ended discussions. He was not in the Eisenhower or Bush mould of formal meetings with fixed memberships and prepared agendas. And, as we have seen, presidents tend to institute the modus operandi with which they feel comfortable. As Governor of California, Ronald Reagan had a strictly organised system of cabinet councils. As President Reagan, he would institute the same system in the White House. As Governor of Arkansas, Bill Clinton was someone who had a ‘tendency to straggle and talk to anyone who wanted to talk to him’ and whose management style was described as ‘loose’ and ‘free-ranging’.¹ This was not a politician who was going to think in terms of cabinet meetings, cabinet councils and formal lines of structure when he got to the White House. So no promises here of ‘cabinet government’.