President and Cabinet

By tradition the Cabinet (the President’s Cabinet) is composed of the President and the heads (Secretaries) of the Government departments. It consists of: 1) Secretary of State, 2) Secretary of the Treasury, 3) Secretary of Defence, 4) Attorney-General (Department of Justice), 5) Postmaster-General, 6) Secretary of the Interior, 7) Secretary of Agriculture, 8) Secretary of Commerce, 9) Secretary of Labour, 10) Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, 11) Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, 12) Secretary of Transportation.

Each of the above Cabinet officers holds office during the pleasure of the President; the Postmaster-General alonemust be reappointéd and confirmed at the beginning of a President’s second term, the others merely continuing in office.

The President may invite others to meet with the Cabinet. Thus the Vice-President attends by invitation and presides when the President requests it. The President also invites the Ambassador to the United Nations.

When the President addresses Congress in person, as when reading the State of the Union Message* at the opening of 3 session, he speaks in the Hall of Representatives at the Capitol, before a joint session of the Senate and the House. He speaks from the middle dais of three. At the desk above hin sit the Speaker of the House and the presiding officer of the  Senate, the Vice-President. This is the only occasion when the Vice-President is seated higher than the President.

The State of the Union message is the traditional annual address of the President in which beside other business he deals with the economic state of the country and lays down the principal line of future development. In some cases one State of the Union Message is replaced by a series of messages.