 | | tive Office scrutiny of regulations begun under presidents Gerald R. Ford and Jimmy Carter, and it has taken steps to strengthen financial controls in the executive branch. It has also furthered the review of federal credit activities and accelerated the move to establish a regular credit budget. In addition, its "Cabinet Councils" have improved internal executive branch communication. Beyond that, the administration has given greater salience to the potential role that both private-sector institutions and state and local governments can play in dealing with public problems. (Ibid., 23)
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However, as with Nixon, these advances came at a price.
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Political Costs of Reagan's Administrative Strategy
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There are strengths to the Reagan approach to political appointments: "loyalty to the president, a clearance process that touches all bases, and clear White House control of appointments in the administration." However, there are weaknesses as well, related to
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| | slowness due to the elaborate clearance procedures, the narrowness of the pool of potential candidates (due to ideological criteria and bias against previous experience), and the large volume that must be handled by the White House personnel office since clearances extended to the lowest levels. (Pfiffner 1987a, 73-74)
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Other factors slowed the Reagan appointment process, as well. Primary energy went to the legislative strategy group that was successfully moving the economic policy program through the Congress. "The disclosure requirements of the 1978 Ethics Act had to be applied for the first time [and] the Presidential Personnel Office was deficient in staff and operations" (Newland 1983, 4).
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Pressure from the Republican right wing also slowed the Reagan screening and appointment process, as mentioned. It charged that many of the candidates had not supported Reagan soon enough and were "retreads" from previous Republican administrations (Pfiffner 1987a, 73).
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| | The ideological battles over appointments and the elaborate clearance procedures resulted in significant delays in staffing the administration. Despite claims that the administration was making major appointments faster than Presidents Carter or Kennedy, the
National Journal
reported that after 10 weeks Reagan had submitted to the Senate 95, as compared to Carter's 142 nominations.
Time
calculated that, as of the first week in May, of the top 400 officials, only 55 percent had been announced, 35 per-
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