The Right Move

But that doesn't mean that his proposal is any less significant. One may quibble with the details, but the purpose is right. Bush captured the spirit of the idea in one clear sentence: "Employees of this new agency will come to work every morning knowing their most important job is to protect their fellow citizens."

Major reorganizations of the federal government do not happen often-probably not often enough. The "probably" in that sentence is there to acknowledge that reorganization isn't always such a great idea. The past 25 years have seen what one might call Cabinet Creep, as the number of major federal departments has grown from 11 to 14. Two of the new ones were purely political creations: Education in 1979 and Veterans Affairs in 1989, both done principally to satisfy the demands of powerful constituency groups. But the third creation, of the Energy Department in 1977, was done in response to crisis, and it filled a real need to strengthen the federal role in ensuring a reliable energy supply. The new proposal for a Department of Homeland Security has a similar rationale: The need is pressing, and the federal government must step up to the plate.

It's a little hyperbolic to suggest, as the White House has, that this plan is comparable to the national security reorganization of the late 1940s, which created the unified Department of Defense, the CIA and other institutions that endure to this day. This is not of that scope, and it does not fully address one of the key problems government has, that of sharing of sensitive intelligence. Whether the new information analysis bureaucracy Bush proposes as another filter for information from the FBI, CIA and other agencies will work is anybody's guess.

It's probably not true, as the White House has claimed, that the purposes of the new department can be accomplished without spending anything more than already budgeted. The proposal would "not 'grow' government," said the official release. As White House press secretary Ari Fleischer put it, "If you take 100 workers from Department X and put those 100 workers in Department Y, you still have 100 workers."

It would be nice to think that extra resources needed for the department's threat analysis unit and other needs could be funded by eliminating redundancies and improving operational efficiency, as the White House claims. But as Government Executive has documented in story after story, many agencies, long starved for resources, need much more than this would allow. The INS needs more agents, for example, to patrol the borders, and the Coast Guard, now boasting one of the very oldest of the world's 41 major fleets, needs a lot of capital investment.

But these are quibbles, and Congress will get its chance to improve the plan. In the end, we should congratulate Bush for recognizing that a clear mission focuses the minds of those who must pursue it.