Secretary of State

There is much buzz about whether Barack Obama will appoint Hillary Clinton to be secretary of state. Bill Richardson's name is also mentioned in that context.

As I wrote here, it has been rare in recent years for presidents to appoint elected politicians to that job. There have been two exceptions in the last half-century, when the office became vacant late in a president's tenure. In that earlier post, I mentioned Jimmy Carter's appointment of Maine Senator Edmund Muskie in 1980. The other such case was Dwight Eisenhower's appointment of former Massachusetts Governor Christian Herter, after Ike's longtime Secretary of State John Foster Dulles resigned in 1959, shortly before he died of cancer.

The most recent president to appoint an elected politician to that post at the beginning of his presidency was Franklin Roosevelt. In 1933, he appointed Tennessee Senator Cordell Hull, who headed the State Department for almost all of Roosevelt's long presidency, resigning in 1944.

Most of the recent appointees were college professors, international lawyers, or career military men.

It has not always been that way, though. Many future presidents had been secretary of state during the first 60 years of the department's existence, including Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, J.Q. Adams, Van Buren and Buchanan.

Why did that trend stop? My guess is that, with the improvements in transportation and communication technology that have allowed presidents to take more direct control of foreign policy, that position, while still considered a prestigious Cabinet post, became more of a bureaucratic job than a policy-making role. As such, it might no longer have been attractive to top-level politicians.

I find it hard to believe that that will change in Obama's administration. But we shall see.

Nate Silver, in the 538 blog, speculates about whether Senator Clinton sees the secretary of state position as a potential stepping-stone to the presidency, as it often was in the early 19th century. Joe Biden will probably be too old to try to succeed Obama in 2016. Clinton will be up there a bit herself, at 69, but that one last chance might be available to her.