Word: hewed
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Least Glamorous. For Abe Ribicoff, service in the Kennedy Administration had not brought much of either a voice or a vote. Ribicoff, an able and savvy politician, was an early Kennedy supporter, and he expected to become Attorney General. Instead, he was given the HEW appointment-after it proved impolitic to hand it to Soapy Williams. Then Ribicoff also got word that a long-discussed post on the Supreme Court was not for him; he disclaimed his candidacy before the first vacancy went to Whizzer White...
...Backwaters. Administering HEW turned out to be an excruciating task. HEW contains an unlikely collection of agencies whose activities range all the way from operating a school for the blind to child guidance, from caring for social security to financing cancer research. Ribicoff had responsibility for 110 programs, 75 separate budgets, and the work of 75,000 civil servants. He had voted against creating the post when he was in the House back in 1950; he still thinks the department should be divided into three parts. He was generally rated as a capable, hardworking administrator who got good marks...
Even before Ribicoff strode into HEW's grey concrete headquarters on Independence Avenue, much legislative initiative had been purloined from him. Already, other liberal Democrats had laid the groundwork for the two most important pieces of HEW legislation that would concern him in his 18-month tenure-aid to education and medicare. As it turned out, much of the ill-starred medicare bill was actually written by Congress, with little help from Ribicoff. All he could do was get behind the measures and push them as Administration bills. Yet when the bills ran into trouble, many Democrats pointed...
...replaced Abraham Ribicoff at HEW turned out to be a surprise: Cleveland Mayor Anthony Celebrezze, 51, the first Italian-American ever appointed to the Cabinet. While the Washington press corps fruitlessly speculated about other possibilities, the White House was trying desperately to reach Celebrezze at his vacation retreat in Canada, did not get him until the day before the appointment was announced in Hyannisport. Said Celebrezze after his appointment: "Where is there a better place that a poor boy from the slums could...
...among the nation's elected mayors in that his city has fewer employees than when he took office. This fast-rising career has not only equipped him with experience but with an attitude that should serve him well through the many frustrations that he surely will face at HEW. He once said: "It's frustrating to know, after being in office a few years, that you can't achieve perfect government in spite of constant effort...