Nation: Unlocking Cabinet Conversations

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Carter's interest in reducing bureaucracy is a constant theme, and his appointees respond to it eagerly. On Sept. 12, 1977, Secretary of Agriculture Bob Bergland reported that he had attended 45 hours of hearings on the 1978 budget for the Agriculture Department. "At present," the minutes note, "he said that the USDA is 'a mess.' "

More like a coach than a leader, Carter helpfully recommends books and articles to his Cabinet. Some examples: New York Times articles on foreign affairs and David McCullough's history of the Panama Canal, The Path Between the Seas, as well as CIA briefings.

The minutes record only rare instances of dissent. On Sept. 12, 1977, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Patricia Harris told Attorney General Griffin Bell that "she had read an early draft of the Bakke brief and that, in her opinion, it needed considerable improvement." But there were no recorded dissents during several meetings last fall when Secretary of Labor Ray Marshall incorrectly calculated that the odds were against a coal strike, or on Nov. 7, 1977, when Treasury Secretary Blumenthal argued that the position of the dollar abroad "is not as bad as it may appear here."

In a sense, the chief surprise of the minutes is that they contain no surprises. Some of the criticism, debate and groping for new ideas that are notably missing from the summaries doubtless go unrecorded or take place in smaller and more private sessions with Carter. Still, the minutes provide an overall sense of an Administration providing orderly and dedicated, if not exactly brilliant, caretaking—an image that may explain why no one at the White House seemed very upset that the minutes had been made public.