PING
This is something that repeatedly needs to be drilled. The administrative state didn’t start sometime in the early 2000s, it wasn’t born of the 1960s radicals, and naming FDR also misses the boat. Even this article gets it slightly wrong.
Yes, most of it as stated in the article does in fact start with Woodrow Wilson, but it all begins with Theodore Roosevelt. Wilson wrote the first dreams, but Teddy did more than anybody to actually do the act of giving birth.
Anti-trust and the issues surrounding the ICC between 1903 and 1908 must be eliminated or else why bother complaining about the administrative state in the first place?
Overall, this is a good article and a great brief primer.
Thanks for posting this.
President Chester A Arthur, stalwart Republican, VP of the murdered James Garfield signed the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act into law in 1883. I believe that is the true beginning of the Administrative State. Prior to that, even minor government jobs were treated as patronage. A new party wins the White House and the new President could/would fire everyone hired by the previous occupant. The very reason Garfield was murdered was due to Charle Guiteau being denied a patronage job when he felt he deserved it.