Executive Branch Organization

Lecture 13-1

The EOP

• President’s personal advisors

• President’s institutional staff advisors

Executive Departments

• Executive department heads principally comprise the Cabinet

• Each department is an organizational “holding company” with in which a variety of small bureaucratic units are located

• An example is the national institution of Health within the Department of Health and Human Services

Independent Agencies

• Their heads, like those of executive departments are appointed by the president

• Their “independence” means that they are organizationally independent of the executive departments, a decision strongly influence by political considerations

Independent Regulatory Commissions

• Headed by commissioners, appointed by the president for specific terms and ordinarily not removable by the president.

• Commissions perform “quasi-judicial” and “quasi-legislative” duties.

• The ICC was the oldest, dating from 1887.

Government Corporations

• Provide services or goods for which people must pay

• Often these services which cannot, or will not, be provided by private businesses

• Not tied to the regular appropriations process