A History of the United States Department of State 1789-1996

Abstract

A History of the United States Department of State 1789-1996 Released by the Office of the Historian, July 1996 Introduction The Emerging State Department, 1789-1860 The Department Comes of Age, 1861-1895 Managing the Foreign Affairs of a Great Power, 1900-1940 The Department of State and the U.S. as a Superpower, 1945-1960 The Department of State's Role in the U.S. Foreign Affairs Community, 1961-1996 Modernizing the Department of State and the Foreign Service Conclusion Introduction In 1996, the Department of State is in its third century as the flagship foreign affairs agency of the U.S. Federal Government. The Department has provided support and expertise to Presidents and Secretaries of State, worked with Congress, and served and protected the citizens of the United States as the nation grew to become a great power. For over 200 years, the Department of State has conducted American diplomacy through war and peace, amidst the competing currents of isolationism and internationalism that have shaped American foreign policy and its commitment to liberty and democracy. The Emerging State Department, 1789-1860 The Constitution of the United States, drafted in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787 and ratified by the states the following year, gave the President responsibility for the conduct of the nation's foreign relations. It soon became clear, however, that an executive branch was necessary to support President Washington in the conduct of the affairs of the new Federal Government. The House and Senate approved legislation to establish a Department of Foreign Affairs on July 21, 1789, and President Washington signed it into law on July 27, making the Department of Foreign Affairs the first Federal agency to be created under the new Constitution. This legislation remains the basic law of the Department of State. In September 1789, additional legislation changed the name of the agency to the Department of State and assigned to it a variety of domestic duties. These responsibilities grew to include management of the Mint, keeper of the Great Seal of the United States, and the taking of the census. President Washington signed the new legislation on September 15. Most of these domestic duties of the Department of State were eventually turned over to various new Federal departments and agencies that were established during the 19th century. President Washington appointed Thomas Jefferson in September 1789 to be the first Secretary of State. In February 1790, Jefferson reluctantly returned from Paris where he was serving as the American Minister to France. The new Department of State under Secretary Jefferson was set up briefly in New York until the capital was moved to Philadelphia. Under Jefferson and his immediate successors, the Department consisted of several clerks and a part-time translator. The Department of State and the rest of the new government finally moved to its permanent home in Washington D.C. in early 1800. During the first 35 years under the Constitution of 1789, the Department of State was led by the greatest leaders of the new republic. For Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, and John Quincy Adams, service as Secretary of State proved to be the stepping stone to election as President. At no time in the history of the United States would foreign relations be critical to the very existence of the nation and the well being of its citizens. During these years of the Napoleon wars and their aftermath, the new republic, its Secretaries of State and their tiny Department of State, had to complete its revolutionary struggles, free itself from the entangling alliances with the old world, and complete the largest part of the expansion of the country to the Caribbean, across the Mississippi, and, with the Louisiana Purchase, to the Pacific Ocean. The Department of State, which grew to more than 20 employees by 1825, also continued to carry out a wide variety of domestic duties assigned to it by Congress in 1789. From 1825, when John Quincy Adams left the Department to become President, until the Civil War, America experienced the great initial expansion of its industry and commerce and the surge of the populations westward across the Great Plains and the western mountains and deserts. Foreign affairs, while important, mostly lost the urgency of the founding years. The Department of State focused upon managing the gradual broadening of U.S. diplomatic relations and the spread of American ships and commerce to all corners of the world. There were few major foreign policy problems: negotiating with the British the northern border with Canada and resolving, through diplomacy and sometimes war, the conflicts with Mexico over the southwestern frontier. Congress gradually removed from the Department of State its domestic duties and transferred them to new departments and agencies such as the Department of Interior and the Census Bureau. The Secretaries of State continued to be the preeminent members of the President's cabinet, but only twice more (Martin Van Buren and James Buchanan) would former Secretaries of State become President. Presidents from Andrew Jackson to James Buchanan made the nation's few really important foreign affairs decisions. The Department of State changed little during these years. John Quincy Adams was the first Secretary of State to introduce some basic organizational and management practices so that the small agency could handle its slowly expanding responsibilities. In 1833 Secretary of State Louis McLane carried out the first overall reorganization of the Department, the most important aspect of which was the establishment of bureaus, including the Diplomatic, Consular, and Home Bureaus. The number of employees grew from 8 in 1790 to 23 in 1830 and to 42 in 1860. (See Personnel Table, 1781-1997) The American diplomatic service expanded slowly in the late 18th and early 19th centuries when the nation was adamantly opposed to extensive diplomatic contacts with European nations. In 1790, the United States sent ministers plenipotentiary to only two countries--France and Great Britain. By 1830, the number grew to 15; by 1860 to 33. The consular service, on the other hand, grew steadily during this time. Consuls, commercial agents, and consular agents protected American ships and crews abroad and promoted the expansion of American commerce. American consular posts grew in number from 10 in 1790 to 141 in 1831 and 253 in 1860. (See Consular and Diplomatic Posts Table, 1781-1997) The Department Comes of Age, 1861-1895 Under William Henry Seward, the office of Secretary of State became a position of unprecedented power and importance during the Civil War. Secretary Seward was President Abraham Lincoln's principal counselor on a broad range of urgent wartime domestic matters as well as on the vital diplomatic effort to prevent European powers from recognizing or assisting the Confederacy. The success of the State Department and American diplomatic representatives abroad in the early years of the Civil War were critical to isolating the South until Union armies and navy could be mobilized to win the struggle. The State Department's authority grew in size and activity even as the whole Federal Government was centralized, expanded, and strengthened during the Civil War. After the Civil War, the State Department gained a more appropriate bureaucratic structure to deal with its increasing responsibility of serving the interests of a rapidly industrializing America whose economic growth was beginning to outdistance most European powers. In 1870, Secretary Hamilton Fish redefined the Department's bureau structure and issued a series of rules and regulations updating its administrative practices. Fish also secured from Congress the addition of a Third Assistant Secretary of State (Secretary Seward had a Second Assistant Secretary added to the Department in 1866). Continuity and experience in the conduct of the responsibilities of the State Department and of the management before, during, and after the Civil War were assured by the long-term presence of William Hunter. Hunter, who served in the Department for more than 40 years, was Chief Clerk from 1852 until 1866 when he was promoted to the newly established position of Second Assistant Secretary of State. He also served as Acting Secretary while Secretary Seward recovered following the April 1865 assassination attempt on his life by a conspirator of John Wilkes Booth. Hunter occupied the position of Second Secretary under seven Secretaries of State until his death in 1886. In so doing he confirmed the establishment of a leadership role for the most senior member of the Department's permanent bureaucracy. Hunter was succeeded as Second Assistant Secretary by Alvey A. Adee who filled that post until his death in 1924. The long service of William Derrick, William Hunter, and Alvey Adee as the top career officers of the Department of State from 1841 to 1924 had a profound impact upon American foreign affairs by serving in their time as institutional memories and coordinating the work of the Department. During the three decades after the Civil War, the United States reverted to a basically isolationist foreign policy and confronted no real overseas crises. Beneath the orderly management of minor diplomatic issues of America's Gilded Age, the rapidly expanding American economy was pushing the nation and its State Department toward important changes in the conduct of foreign affairs. The American presence and commerce abroad increased at an astounding rate. Between the end of the Civil War and the outbreak of the Spanish-American War 34 years later, American exports tripled, and the United States was second only to Great Britain in export trade. The consular service became the lead instrument in the search for American markets abroad. In 1860, there were 480 consulates, commercial agencies, and consular agencies abroad, and by 1890 this number ha