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The tradition of offering Cabinet posts to big donors dates back to 1920, when the handlers of GOP presidential candidate Warren G. Harding cajoled Oklahoma oilman Jake Hamon into giving his campaign $250,000 with the understanding that, once elected, Harding would appoint Hamon to be Secretary of the Interior. Or at least, that’s the deal that Hamon thought he was going to get. Instead, Harding tapped Republican Senator Albert B. Fall of New Mexico, a man under the influence of another big contributor, California-based oilman Edward Doheny. (Fall obliged his benefactor by giving him a lucrative, no-bid lease on oil-rich federal lands in California in exchange for a bribe, a transaction that eventually landed Fall in prison and was at the center of what became known as the Teapot Dome scandal.) More recently, during President George W. Bush’s first term, his Cabinet included three secretaries — Don Evans at Commerce, Tom Ridge at Homeland Security, and Elaine Chao at Labor — who were members of Bush’s Pioneers club, a distinction given to those who raised at least $100,000 to elect him.
SOURCES: M.R. Werner, Privileged Characters (New York: R.M. McBride & Company), 1935; Sanford J. Mock, “Financial History,” Museum of American Finance; Wayne Slater, “The Tailors of Bush’s Fundraising Cushion,” Dallas Morning News, March 7, 2004.
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