Kitchen Cabinet

For cabinets used in kitchens, see kitchen cabinet. For the Australian television show, see Kitchen Cabinet (television show).

The Kitchen Cabinet was a term used by political opponents of President of the United States Andrew Jackson to describe his ginger group, the collection of unofficial advisers he consulted in parallel to the United States Cabinet (the "parlor cabinet") following his purge of the cabinet at the end of the Eaton affair and his break with Vice President John C. Calhoun in 1831.

Secretary of State Martin Van Buren was a widower, and since he had no wife to become involved in the Eaton controversy he managed to avoid becoming entangled himself. In 1831 he resigned his cabinet post, as did Secretary of War John Eaton, in order to give Jackson a reason to re-order his cabinet and dismiss Calhoun allies. Jackson then dismissed Calhounites Samuel D. Ingham, John Branch, and John M. Berrien. Van Buren, whom Jackson had already indicated he wanted to run for Vice President in 1832, remained in Washington as a member of the Kitchen Cabinet until he was appointed as Minister to Great Britain. Eaton was subsequently appointed Governor of Florida Territory.

Jackson's Kitchen Cabinet included his longtime political allies Martin Van Buren, Francis Preston Blair, Amos Kendall, William B. Lewis, Andrew Jackson Donelson, John Overton, Duff Green, Isaac Hill, and his new Attorney General Roger B. Taney. As newspapermen, Blair and Kendall were given particular notice by rival papers.

Blair was Kendall's successor as editor of the Jacksonian Argus of Western America, the prominent pro-New Court newspaper of Kentucky. Jackson brought Blair to Washington, D.C. to counter Calhounite Duff Green, editor of The United States Telegraph, with a new paper, the Globe. Lewis had been quartermaster under Jackson during the War of 1812; Andrew Donelson was Jackson's adoptive son and private secretary; and Overton was Andrew Jackson's friend and business partner since the 1790s.

Coinage

The first known appearance of the term is in correspondence by Bank of the United States head Nicholas Biddle, who wrote of the presidential advisors that "the kitchen . . . predominate[s] over the Parlor." The first appearance in publication was March 13, 1832 by Mississippi Senator George Poindexter, in an article in the Calhounite Telegraph defending his vote against Van Buren as minister to Great Britain:

The President's press, edited under his own eye, by a 'pair of deserters from the Clay party' [Kendall and Blair] and a few others, familiarly known by the appellation of the 'Kitchen Cabinet,' is made the common reservoir of all the petty slanders which find a place in the most degraded prints of the Union.

Popular use

In colloquial use, "kitchen cabinet" refers to any group of trusted friends and associates, particularly in reference to a President's or presidential candidate's closest unofficial advisers. Clark Clifford was considered a member of the kitchen cabinet for John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson before he was appointed Secretary of Defense. Robert Kennedy was uniquely considered to be a kitchen cabinet member as well as a Cabinet member while he was his brother's Attorney General.

Ronald Reagan had a kitchen cabinet of allies and friends from California who advised him during his terms. This group of ten to twelve businessmen were all strong proponents of the free enterprise system. His California backers included: Alfred Bloomingdale, Earl Brian, Justin Whitlock Dart, William French Smith, Charles Wick, William A. Wilson, auto dealer Holmes Tuttle, beer baron Joseph Coors, steel magnate and philanthropist Earle Jorgensen, and about four to six others. Coors was the major funder and most active participant. He also funded many think tanks and policy institutes at about this time, including the Heritage Foundation.

In Britain

The term was introduced to British policies to describe British Prime Minister Harold Wilson's inner circle during his terms of office (1964-1970 and 1974-1976); prior to Tony Blair, Wilson was the longest serving Labour Party Prime Minister. Members included Marcia Williams, George Wigg, Joe Haines, and Bernard Donoughue. The term has been used subsequently, especially under Tony Blair, for the sidelining of traditional democratic cabinet structures to rely far more on a close group of non-elected advisors and allies. Examples of this practice include Blair's reliance on advisor Andrew Adonis before his appointment to the cabinet. Traditionally, the role of creation of education policy would have rested on the Secretary of State for Education and Skills when formulating policy.

In Australia

Former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's reliance on a Kitchen Cabinet (Treasurer Wayne Swan, Rudd's successor Julia Gillard and Finance Minister Lindsay Tanner) was a factor in his removal as PM.

Starting February 2012, Kitchen Cabinet is a TV entertainment series hosted by political commentator Annabel Crabb, in which she interviews notable Australian politicians while preparing and sharing meals with them.

In India

In India, the quasi-governmental body formerly headed by Sonia Gandhi, called the National Advisory Council, was often referred to as a "Kitchen Cabinet" by the media and general public, although the government at that time was headed by Manmohan Singh as Prime Minister.

In Canada

Main article: Patriation § The_Kitchen_Accord

In Israel

Main article: Kitchen Cabinet of Israel

See also

• Black Cabinet
• Brain Trust
• Medicine ball cabinet

Further reading

• Latner, Richard B. "The Kitchen Cabinet and Andrew Jackson's Advisory System". The Journal of American History, Vol. 65, No. 2 (Sep., 1978), pp. 367–388
• Longaker, Richard P. "Was Jackson's Kitchen Cabinet a Cabinet?" The Mississippi Valley Historical Review, Vol. 44, No. 1 (Jun., 1957), pp. 94–108

External links

•