Minutes and Documents of the Cabinet Meetings of President Eisenhower, 1953-1961
Throughout his presidency Dwight D. Eisenhower relied on his cabinet as a vital component of his policy-making machinery. This collection includes minutes of cabinet meetings, official correspondence and memoranda, discussion papers, department reports, action status reports (analyses of the implementation of cabinet decisions), records of actions (summaries of decisions approved by Eisenhower at each meeting), and related papers. It documents Eisenhower’s political leadership, daily working procedures, organizational strategies, and methods of reaching important policy decisions. Some issues discussed in cabinet meetings included: agriculture, budget and the economy, civil rights, congressional relations and investigations of executive departments, emergency defence planning, government organization and administrative procedures, social security, and many other topics. Among the events covered are the Korean truce negotiations, the Cold War, and the revolution in Cuba (10 reels).
FINDING AID: Minutes and Documents of the Cabinet Meetings of President Eisenhower, 1953-1961
President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Office Files, 1953-1961
Known within the Eisenhower Library as the Ann Whitman Files, these files are the confidential papers which were kept under the president’s immediate control for ready reference. Included are personal correspondence, diaries, telegrams, memoranda, reports, speech and topical files, press conference transcripts, and press releases. The Office Files are divided into two categories:
– Eisenhower Administration Series is devoted largely but not exclusively to domestic and national security affairs. It includes correspondence sent and received by the president, memoranda, and reports of cabinet officials. Subjects include agricultural matters, nuclear weapons and energy (32 reels).
FINDING AID: Eisenhower Administration Series
– International Series contains materials relating to international relations and the cold war, including Eisenhower’s correspondence with world leaders and records from the many important multinational conferences of Eisenhower’s presidency (32 reels).
FINDING AID: International Series
The Papers of Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1941-1950
This collection consists of eleven printed volumes. Volumes 1-5 (The War Years) shed light on Eisenhower’s decisions as a general and the impact they had on military, diplomatic and political developments in World War II. Volume 6 (Occupation) concentrates on the immediate aftermath of the war and provides information on General Eisenhower’s ideas and activities during these critical months. Volumes 7-9 document his years as Chief of Staff (1945-1948) and contribute to an understanding of his reactions to the major transitions in international relations and most of the political and military problems that were to be the central concern of his presidency. Volumes 10 and 11 (Columbia University) open a window on two phases of Eisenhower’s career that have remained relatively obscure. Diary entries and other papers of his chairmanship of the Joint Chiefs of Staff contain information on his role in the early years of the Cold War. Documents with regard to his position as president of Columbia University shed light on his ideas on higher education in relation to a university’s position in American society and deepen our understanding of his presidency.
Eisenhower Administration Oral Histories Collection (Part of Columbia University Oral Histories Collection)
This microfiche collection contains forty interviews on Eisenhower. Among the people interviewed are Charles Bohlen (ambassador in the Soviet Union), Lyman L. Lemnitzer (general at the NATO), Clare Boothe Luce (Republican member of Congress)
McCarthy Era Blacklisting of School Teachers, College Professors and other Public Employees : The FBI Responsibilities Program File and the Dissemination of Information Policy File
Under the FBI Responsibilities Program more than 800 American citizens, including more than 400 school teachers and college professors. The greater part of the file consist of policy and action documents. Policy documents record FBI officials’ views on tactics and strategies, while action documents usually consist of communications between FBI headquarters and the various field offices. This category records the purge efforts in minute detail, from initial targeting of suspects to the actual “leak” of information. In addition the files contain newspaper clippings, periodic summaries, and memoranda regarding contacts with officials of the Truman and Eisenhower administrations. These files shed light on the FBI’s contribution to the origins and resilience of McCarthyism (8 reels).
FINDING AID: McCarthy Era Blacklisting of School Teachers, College Professors and other Public Employees
The Diaries of Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1953-1961
These diaries and supporting documents from the Eisenhower Library in Abilene, Kansas shed light on virtually every issue that concerned Eisenhower during his presidency. They also reveal much about his political philosophy, as well as his private views on such matters as McCarthyism, Indochina, civil rights, and disarmament. The Diaries contains several categories of material including 5,000 pages of diary entries and dictated correspondence, 3,000 pages of detailed memos of telephone conversations, among others with John Foster Dulles, Undersecretary of State Walter Bedell Smith (particularly on the topic of Indochina), Attorney General Herbert Brownell, and Secretary of the Treasury George Humphrey. The largest body of material in this series comprises official White House staff memoranda, reports, and notes of meetings. A major segment consists of memoranda of Eisenhower’s conversations in the White House. Many such “memcons” cover defense and space programs, strategic planning, foreign policy, budgetary problems, and government organization. Other memoranda cover meetings between the President and minority groups, state governors, veterans organizations, and Republican party leaders. Approximately 9,000 pages fall into this staff memoranda category. The collection contains several additional groups of records, among them summaries of the activities and programs of various executive branch agencies prepared by the White House Staff Research Group on a daily basis and intelligence briefings (28 reels).
FINDING AID: The Diaries of Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1953-1961
President Eisenhower’s Meetings with Legislative Leaders, 1953-1961
During the course of his presidency, Dwight D. Eisenhower regularly held meetings with legislative leaders as a means of communicating with Congress and consolidating Republican congressional support for administration legislative proposals. Attending these meetings were congressional leaders from the Republican Party (periodically joined by their colleagues from the Democratic Party), the President, vice president, members of the White House staff, cabinet officers, and officials from various executive departments (2 reels)
FINDING AID: President Eisenhower’s Meetings with Legislative Leaders, 1953-1961
Civil Rights During the Eisenhower Administration Part 1: White House Central Files Series A: School Desegregation
This collection emphasizes the desegregation of public schools, especially in the South after the Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education decision of May 17, 1954. The majority of documents consist of letters to the president or other officials with responsibility for directing or implementing civil rights policies, and answers to these letters. The correspondents range from U.S. senators to governors or other officials in southern states to civil rights leaders and anti-integration spokespersons to hundreds of U.S. citizens, interest groups, and local associations. These documents vividly portray strong sentiment against and in favor of desegregation in schools, public facilities, housing, and the workplace that prevailed during the Eisenhower years. An interesting feature of the collection is its inclusion of a great many letters from students, both children and teenagers, from across the country. These young writers convey their concerns about segregation and its impact on black and white children and families, as well as on the nation as a whole (14 reels).
FINDING AID: Civil Rights During the Eisenhower Administration, Part 1: White House Central Files, Series A: School Desegregation
Documentary History of the Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidency
Selected from the Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, this printed collection provides scholars with an unprecedented look at President Eisenhower’s policies and programs. It consists primarily of documents from the Presidents Secretary’s Files, the White House Central Files, and numerous manuscript collections for officials in the Eisenhower administration and individuals who were associates of Eisenhower during his career. Arranged thematically in 25 volumes.
The Dwight D. Eisenhower National Security Files: Subject Files, 1953-1961
The National Security Files (1953-1961) from the Dwight D. Eisenhower administration provide an excellent overview of the U.S. government’s world-view during the Cold War. The competition and tension between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. casts a long shadow over the collection and forms a subtext to each letter, report, meeting transcription, and paper. This microfilm collection is divided into four series that are organized alphabetically: NSC Status of Projects, NSC Subjects, Operations Coordinating Board Subjects, and Special Assistants Subjects. This collection scrutinizes U.S. – U.S.S.R. relations in every field and provide insight into the external development of the U.S. as a world power as well as the internal development of government agencies such as NASA. It records trips by government officials , interagency opinions on policy, and science and technological advances in fields such as seismology.
FINDING AID: Eisenhower National Security Files – Subject Index