THE PRESENT ORGANIZATION 35 



ments of the federal government are political and admin- 

 istrative devices which have grown up almost wholly out- 

 side of the written Constitution. It is true that in the 

 enumeration of the powers and duties of the executive 

 branch of the government, reference is made to " executive 

 departments " and to the principal officers thereof ;* but 

 there is only the slightest indication as to how these depart- 

 ments are to be brought into existence and organized. In 

 speaking of the President's power of appointment the Con- 

 stitution enumerates certain officers, " and all other officers 

 of the United States whose appointn.ents are not herein 

 otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by 

 law." Goodnow thinks we may assume from these clauses 

 that the men who framed the Constitution intended that 

 there should be executive departments and that the power to 

 organize them was to be vested in Congress.^ 



The President's Cabinet, says Dr. Learned, " came into 

 being as one result of the discretionary power with which 

 the makers of the Constitution intended to endow the chief 

 magistrate. It was created by President Washington in the 

 opening years of our Government under the Constitution in 

 response to a demand of the President for a board of quali- 

 fied assistants and confidential advisers, a demand so fun- 

 damental and natural as to be felt, but not anywhere at that 

 time definitely formulated or at all clearly expressed."^ 



If we grant that the formation of a small advisory coun- 

 cil grew out of the immediate needs of the President for 

 such assistance when the Government was first established 

 under the Constitution, the same cannot be said of the crea- 

 tion of the executive departments of which these first 

 officers, and others of similar rank, have become the heads. 

 The power to create and organize all of the machiner\' of 

 government, except that which is specifically provided for 

 in the Constitution itself has from the first been assumed 

 and exercised by Congress. To what extent Congress shall 



* Art. 2, sec. 2. 



"Goodnow, Principles of Administrative Law of the U. S., p. 122. 



* H. B. Learned, The President's Cabinet, p. 369. 



