Unencumbered by deals or embarrassing political debts, Dwight Eisenhower last week started picking his team to run the U.S. Government. He moved with sureness and crisp decision, filling two-thirds of the Cabinet posts faster than any other President-elect in U.S. history. All of his appointees were men with impressive records (see THE NEW ADMINISTRATION).
The appointments completely knocked down the Democratic campaign predictions that Robert Taft would run the Eisenhower Administration. Of the first eight appointees, only two—Ezra Benson of Salt Lake City and George Humphrey of Cleveland—were Taft supporters, and Humphrey's appointment had not been suggested by Taft.
At first Eisenhower wanted to give the most important Cabinet post—Secretary of State—to Tom Dewey, but Dewey felt strongly that he should stay on in Albany. He warmly recommended John Foster Dulles for the job, and Ike readily agreed.
Eisenhower said as long ago as last September that he wanted to "get business brains in a 60-billion-dollar business [i.e., the Defense Department]." Taft submitted the names of three businessmen for the post, but Eisenhower rejected them all and chose General Motors' Charles Erwin Wilson, whom he has long admired. Wilson will accompany Eisenhower on his Korean trip.
One of the men for whom Eisenhower developed warm friendship and admiration during the campaign was Herbert Brownell. Ike gave him his choice of the Justice Department or Postmaster General; Brownell chose Justice. As for Secretary of the Treasury, Eisenhower agreed with his advisers, including Brownell, that he should not be a "Wall Street" banker type. Banker Winthrop Aldrich, an Eisenhower supporter who was himself mentioned for the Treasury job, heartily agreed. Then General Lucius Clay suggested Industrialist George Humphrey.
For Interior, a Westerner was almost inevitable since Interior's most important sphere of action is in the West (power development, conservation, etc.). An early possibility was Governor Dan Thornton of Colorado. Eisenhower advisers remembered the feud between Colorado and Arizona and California over division of the Colorado River water, advised against a Colorado man. Ike chose Oregon's Governor Douglas McKay, whom he had met during his campaign in the Northwest and liked for his independence and common sense.
Another man Eisenhower learned to appreciate during the campaign was Harold Stassen, who had accepted the death of his own presidential chances with good grace and became a valued member of the Eisenhower strategy staff. Ike considered him for Labor or the Mutual Security Administration (foreign aid); Stassen, long deeply interested in international affairs, preferred MSA.
An early prospect for Secretary of Agriculture had been Representative Clifford Hope, Ike's able campaign adviser on farm policy. Eisenhower and his advisers, however, decided it would be unwise to lose him as chairman of the House Agriculture Committee (a job he will hold next January). Hope's successor would have been Minnesota's August Andresen, who represents a dairy state and might therefore antagonize grain farmers who suspect all dairymen of trying to lower grain prices. Ike's final choice: Ezra Taft Benson, a Utah marketing expert.