MULLING over the governmental structure of the newborn United States, Thomas Jefferson went on record as favoring "little or no diplomatic establishment." That wistful measure of the proper size for the U.S. State Department prevailed for more than a century. At the time when Secretary of State William Seward was boldly buying Alaska, he was head of an office with two assistants and 60 clerks. Secretary John Hay negotiated the Panama treaty and otherwise carried out Teddy Roosevelt's active diplomacy on a departmental budget of less than $190,000 a year. Before World War...
To continue reading:
or
Log-In
