State's "Shake-Up"

When handsome, white-topped Edward R. Stettinius became Under Secretary of State, things perked up. The State Department's crusty old walls got a coat of paint. Higher-watt light bulbs blossomed in the dim hallways. Officials of the traditionally standoffish Department stepped up to NBC microphones with a weekly series of folksy Saturday night dialogues ("The State Department Speaks"). Last week the streamlining reached a climax. The Department announced a stem-to-stern shake-up of its whole shop--a reorganization to grapple more realistically with the new U.S. role in a new kind of world.

State's tireless critics have had three longstanding complaints. The Department, they said, was: 1) haughtily indifferent to what the public thought; 2) so inefficiently organized that high officials kept tripping over one another's feet; 3) downright reactionary.

The New Approach. On the air for the second time last week, State announced its big organizational shakeup. To students of administration, the plan looked excellent on paper. Duties of policymakers had been clearly staked out. There was no reason why top men, each one now busy with his new divisions and well-defined duties, should continue to grope and work at cross-purposes. There was to be a new emphasis on departmental administration. Operations would funnel through twelve new "line" officials. The Secretary would be aided in policymaking by two powerful steering committees (Policy & Postwar Programs). There was a well-staffed new Division of Public Information. An Assistant Secretary was to work full time at the essential job of relations with Congress. There was an Office of Economic Affairs, an excitement-charged Office of Special Political Affairs, a Liberated Areas Division. Hereafter, Planner Stettinius indicated, U.S. foreign relations should be conducted a good deal more smoothly.

The Old Faces. But good organization, though vastly important, is still less important than good men. The fresh new titles had been given to the same old officials. The Washington Post summed it all up for those who feared that a bold change of chart might mean no real change of State Department heart:

"Pressure of public opinion rather than pressure of events precipitated the reorganization. . . . So the Department, with a repugnance that was hard to conceal, set to work. . . . The jaundice with which we regard it isn't due to the new organization, but has to do with the men in it. They are precisely the same persons who upheld the organization which has now been leveled to the ground . . . well-known names, rare in lore of various kinds, rich in experience, and ripe in years. In short, they are 'safe.' They could not be otherwise. . . . Surely the Department can't call any of them 'new blood'. . . . The blunt fact is . . . the Department hasn't budged an inch. . . ."

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