198 Politics and the administration
the head of the department has little discretion over the way in which his
department uses its funds. The committees of Congress, particularly their
chairmen, tend to develop direct relationships with the bureau chiefs, and
the latter may use the political leverage given by the support of influential
Congressmen and Senators against the authority of their superiors in the
administration. Thus the political problems involved in the implementation
of policy may well prevent the exercise of effective control by the president
or cabinet members over the detailed operation of their own administra-
tive machine. The fragmenting effect of politics on the administration has
considerable impact upon the departments, at its core, where presidential
control is theoretically at its greatest. The diffusion of authority and power
goes much further than this, however, for in a number of vitally important
fields of government action Congress has deliberately decreased the power of
the president by setting up agencies which are very much more free of direct
supervision, the independent regulatory commissions.
The independent regulatory commissions
The regulatory commissions have been described as a ‘headless fourth branch’
of the United States government. These powerful and important bodies are
in the executive branch, but not of it. They carry out functions laid down in
statute, but have a very complex set of formal and informal relationships
with president and Congress of a quite different kind from the normal execu-
tive departments. The commissions perform a wide range of regulatory func-
tions over major areas of industrial and commercial life. The first regulatory
commission, the Interstate Commerce Commission, was established in 1887
to regulate the railways, but in the wake of the deregulation movement it was
abolished in 1995. However, many important regulatory commissions con-
tinue to operate. The Federal Maritime Commission controls the practices of
the shipping industry. The Federal Communications Commission regulates
interstate and international communication by radio, television, wire, satel-
lite and cable. The Federal Trade Commission has a general oversight of
business practices including unfair and restrictive practices, control of adver-
tising and labelling of goods, and a number of other aspects of business regu-
lation. The National Labor Relations Board regulates collective bargaining,
supervising the activities of trade unions, preventing unfair labour practices,
conducting secret ballots among employees to determine who shall repre-
sent them, and dealing with jurisdictional disputes between unions. Public
utilities are regulated by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and the whole field of banking and finance
is dealt with by the Federal Reserve System and the Securities and Exchange
Commission. The Food and Drug Administration regulates drugs and medi-
cal matters as well as food safety.
Congress has placed this enormous amount of regulatory power over the
economic life of the country in the hands of a number of commissions whose