Letter to the President-Elect Forwarding Draft Order "Establishing Special Personnel Procedures in the Interest of the National Defense"

Dear General Eisenhower:

I am forwarding herewith the draft of an Executive Order "Establishing Special Personnel Procedures in the Interest of the National Defense" which has recently been developed and has come to me for approval. I am deferring issuance of the Order inasmuch as the effective date would be considerably after the 20th of January, 1953, and inasmuch as it has been said that if the Order is issued at this time, political implications will be read into it with the possibility of injury to the loyal hard-working civil servants affected by it. Nevertheless, I consider that the proposal merits early and careful consideration.

Under present law, there is a restriction on the size of the permanent civil service so that nearly all appointments are made on an indefinite basis. However, the Civil Service Commission has continued its examining program and employees are appointed to this indefinite status from competitive civil service registers in the same manner as appointments were formerly made to the permanent service. The proposed Order would establish a civil service reserve composed of persons appointed from competitive civil service registers and would afford an orderly method for absorption of such appointees into the career civil service over a period of time as vacancies in the permanent service occur without the costly and time-consuming process of re-examination.

The proposed Order is the result of many months' study by experts in the Civil Service Commission and the Bureau of the Budget. It has had the consideration of Mr. Sherman Adams of your staff, and I believe it is of such importance that I am calling it to your attention as being in the best interests of the Federal civil service.

Very sincerely yours,

HARRY S. TRUMAN

[Honorable Dwight D. Eisenhower, The Commodore Hotel, New York, N.Y.]