The US Constitution never established a presidential cabinet—the delegates to the Constitutional Convention explicitly rejected the idea. So how did George Washington create one of the most powerful bodies in the federal government? On November 26, 1791, George Washington convened his department secretaries—Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, Henry Knox, and Edmund Randolph—for the first cabinet meeting. Why did he wait two and a half years into his presidency to call his cabinet? Because the US Constitution did not create or provide for such a body. Washington was on his own. Faced with diplomatic crises, domestic insurrections, and constitutional challenges—and finding congressional help lacking—Washington decided he needed a group of advisors he could turn to. He modeled his new cabinet on the councils of war he had led as commander of the Continental Army. In the early days, the cabinet served at the president’s pleasure. Washington tinkered with its structure throughout his administration, at times calling regular meetings, at other times preferring written advice and individual discussions. Lindsay M. Chervinsky reveals the far-reaching consequences of Washington’s choice. The tensions in the cabinet between Hamilton and Jefferson heightened partisanship and contributed to the development of the first party system. And as Washington faced an increasingly recalcitrant Congress, he came to treat the cabinet as a private advisory body to summon as needed, greatly expanding the role of the president and the executive branch.

Fully revised and updated, this new edition of Simon James’s comprehensible and accessible text provides an excellent insight into the work of the Prime Minister and Cabinet government. It draws on the wealth of new material that has become available in recent years to shed light on the mechanisms and processes of the Cabinet system in Britain, focusing on the post-1979 period. Its coverage includes: ministers and their departments; collective decision-making; the role of the Prime Minister; the strengths and weaknesses of the Cabinet system; and the future of the Cabinet system. Prime Minister and Cabinet Government will give both A-level students and undergraduates a clear understanding of the realities of this central aspect of British politics.

A close examination of the constitutional relationship between legislature and executive in parliamentary regimes.

Portfolio allocation in presidential systems is a central tool that presidents use to deal with changes in the political and economic environment. Yet, we still have much to learn about the process through which ministers are selected and the reasons why they are replaced in presidential systems. This book offers the most comprehensive, cross-national analysis of portfolio allocation in the Americas to date. In doing so, it contributes to the development of theories about portfolio allocation in presidential systems. Looking specifically at how presidents use portfolio allocation as part of their wider political strategy, it examines eight country case studies, within a carefully developed analytical framework and cross-national comparative analysis from a common dataset. The book includes cases studies of portfolio allocation in Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, the United States, Peru and Uruguay, and covers the period between the transition to democracy in each country up until 2014. This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of political elites, executive politics, Latin American politics and more broadly comparative politics.