Chapter Vii How the Executive Departments Work

We had occasion in a preceding chapter to name the different executive departments. We shall now glance briefly at the different functions they separately perform. Each of them, of course, is divided into numerous bureaus and divisions with duties so varied and extensive that the mere description of the work of one corner would fill pages of a book like this. Their machinery is exceedingly complex; and most of them are continually expanding. We cannot do more than give the barest outline of their functions.

The Department of State has charge of the relations of this country with other countries. It negotiates treaties, sends and receives diplomatic correspondence, issues passports, and gives instructions to our ambassadors and ministers abroad. It also has charge of the consular service with representatives scattered all over the world.

The Secretary of State is also the custodian of the national archives and the keeper of the great seal of the United States.

The Department of the Treasury is the financial agency of the government. It collects the public revenues and is the custodian of the public funds. It supervises the work of the customs officers and of the collectors of internal revenue. It issues regulations relating to the revenue and customs service and decides appeals from the rulings of subordinate officers. It audits the accounts of all departments, supervises and regulates the national banks, has charge of the coinage of money, and at present has the responsibility for the enforcement of the National Prohibition Law. This department also has the duty of preparing an annual budget; but it has no actual authority in determining expenditures or financial measures. These matters remain in the hands of Congress; but the Secretary of the Treasury and his assistants may and do advise Congress regarding them. Congress, however, may give scant heed to the Secretary’s advice.

The War Department is chiefly concerned with military affairs. It has charge of the military forces and defenses of the nation. Even in time of peace its tasks are of great magnitude and importance. But, in addition to his military authority, the Secretary of War has considerable civil authority. He has supervision of certain public works undertaken by the National Government, such as the dredging of harbors and the improvement of waterways. His department has jurisdiction over all navigable waters, and no obstruction to navigation, such as a bridge, may be erected without its consent. The War Department also supervises the administration of our insular possessions, like Porto Rico and the Philippines.

The Navy Department has all the duties implied in its name. The construction and distribution of naval vessels, the maintenance of navy yards, and the general administration of the country’s armed forces on the water, all come under the jurisdiction of this department.

The Department of Justice has charge of the nation’s legal affairs. It gives legal advice to the federal authorities and it conducts all the litigation in which the United States is concerned. All the district attorneys in the different judicial districts of the country are subordinate to the Attorney General, and so are all the United States commissioners and marshals. The Attorney General is, in short, the chief law officer of the federal government.

The Post Office Department, under the Postmaster General, has the largest number of employees, and is one of the largest single business enterprises in the world. In addition to transporting the mails, the department operates a vast financial system in the handling of money orders and the operation of postal savings banks.

The Department of the Interior has been facetiously called “the department of things in general,” because its functions are so varied. Anything that did not seem to fit anywhere else appears from time to time to have been turned over to this department. It has charge of patents, of pensions, of Indian affairs, of public lands, of the geological survey, of the reclamation service and of the educational work of the National Government, to mention just a few of its unrelated fields of activity.

The Department of Agriculture, as its name indicates, has a varied number of duties, but they all relate to the subject of agriculture. It maintains experimental stations and institutions for the study of soils, plants and live stock. It establishes cattle quarantines and has charge of the inspection of meats and other food products. It makes scientific studies of such subjects as road construction, irrigation, and drainage, and issues bulletins for the information of the public. It controls the weather bureau, compiles crop reports, and fights noxious insects. In fact, it is superlatively a department of constructive service.

The Department of Commerce exists for the primary purpose of developing foreign and domestic trade. It has developed into an instrument of vital value and importance to American business. Among some of the specific functions of this department are the licensing and inspection of steamboats, the regulation of fisheries, the lighthouse service, the making of coast and geodetic surveys, the taking of the census, the maintenance of the bureau of standards, and the publication of commercial statistics.

The Department of Labor has as its main duty the advancement of the welfare of labor; and in that connection one of its functions is the adjustment of the relations of capital and labor. It has charge, also, of the immigration service and of the administration of the naturalization laws. The department includes a women’s bureau, a bureau of conciliation, a bureau of labor statistics, and a bureau of industrial housing.

These are the ten regular departments. But in addition there are a number of other federal agencies, usually called boards or commissions, that deal with various matters outside the scope of the work of the regular departments. A few of them are the Civil Service Commission, the Interstate Commerce Commission, and the Veterans’ Bureau.

A moment’s consideration of the varied interests and duties of any one of the departments described will be sufficient to convince one that the head of the department and the heads of the different bureaus and divisions have their time fully occupied, particularly as committees of Congress and individual members are constantly making demands for information and data and requesting favors or making suggestions. The worst trouble with the whole complicated system is that it has grown up in haphazard fashion and has never been properly classified or integrated.