AKitchen Cabinet is a group of unofficial or private advisers to a political leader.[1] The term was originally used by political opponents ofPresident of the United StatesAndrew Jackson to describe hisginger group, the collection of unofficial advisors he consulted in parallel to theUnited States Cabinet (the "parlor cabinet") following his purge of the cabinet at the end of theEaton affair and his break withVice PresidentJohn C. Calhoun in 1831.[2][3]
TheOxford English Dictionary says that the term is "In early use depreciative, with the implication that the group wields undue influence". Its illustrative quotations show the term in use in American sources from 1832, in a British source referring to American politics in 1952, in relation to British politics in 1969, and in an American source discussing Israeli politics in 2006.[4]
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Personal 7th President of the United States
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Secretary of StateMartin Van Buren was a widower, and since he had no wife to become involved in the Eaton controversy, he managed to avoid becoming entangled himself. In 1831 he resigned his cabinet post, as did Secretary of WarJohn Eaton, in order to give Jackson a reason to re-order his cabinet and dismiss Calhoun allies. Jackson then dismissed CalhounitesSamuel D. Ingham,John Branch, andJohn M. Berrien. Van Buren, whom Jackson had already indicated he wanted to run for vice president in 1832, remained in Washington as a member of the Kitchen Cabinet until he was appointed asMinister to Great Britain. Eaton was subsequently appointedGovernor ofFlorida Territory.
Jackson's Kitchen Cabinet included his longtime political alliesMartin Van Buren,Francis Preston Blair,Amos Kendall,William B. Lewis,Andrew Jackson Donelson,John Overton,Isaac Hill, andRoger B. Taney. As newspapermen, Blair and Kendall were given particular notice by rival papers.[3][5][6]
Blair was Kendall's successor as editor of the JacksonianArgus of Western America, the prominent pro-New Court newspaper ofKentucky. Jackson brought Blair to Washington, D.C. to counter CalhouniteDuff Green, editor ofThe United States Telegraph, with a new paper, theGlobe. Lewis had been quartermaster under Jackson during theWar of 1812; Andrew Donelson was Jackson's adoptive son and private secretary; and Overton was Andrew Jackson's friend and business partner since the 1790s.[5][7]
The first known appearance of the term is in correspondence byBank of the United States headNicholas Biddle, who wrote of the presidential advisors that "the kitchen ... predominate[s] over the Parlor."[citation needed]
U.S. SenatorGeorge Poindexter, who had previously been cordial with Jackson, began criticizing his choice of advisors in August 1831, writing that Jackson "lends his ear too readily to individuals near his person, who are incompetent to advise him, and unworthy of public confidence."[8]: 55 The first appearance of "Kitchen Cabinet" in publication was by Poindexter in an article in the CalhouniteTelegraph of March 13, 1832, defending his vote against Van Buren as minister to Great Britain:
The President's press, edited under his own eye, by a 'pair of deserters from the Clay party' [Kendall and Blair] and a few others, familiarly known by the appellation of the 'Kitchen Cabinet,' is made the common reservoir of all the petty slanders which find a place in the most degraded prints of the Union.[3]
Jackson's originally kitchen cabinet was not ateam of rivals or a loosely organizedbrain trust but a cohort of loyalists and "patronage dispensers" who, according to historianDaniel Walker Howe, "performed only such functions as the president directed...an informal, flexible group of advisors with no power base other than his favor suited his executive style, allowing him to keep power in his own hands, and, as historian Richard Latner has pointed out, 'to dominate his surroundings.'"[9] According to historianLouis Harlan, Jackson did not trust "professional, compromising politicians, and always surrounded himself with amateur politicians of the subservient, personally loyal variety."[10] The domestic implication of the name "kitchen cabinet" may be related to the fact that many of his advisors, for instanceWilliam B. Lewis andJohn H. Eaton, had either long-standing personal ties to Jackson.[citation needed]
Former Prime MinisterKevin Rudd's reliance on a kitchen cabinet (TreasurerWayne Swan, Rudd's successorJulia Gillard and Finance MinisterLindsay Tanner) was a factor in his removal as Prime Minister.[citation needed] Starting February 2012,Kitchen Cabinet is a TV entertainment series hosted by political commentatorAnnabel Crabb, in which she interviews notable Australian politicians while preparing and sharing meals with them.[11]
During the negotiations preceding the 1982patriation of theConstitution of Canada, the crucial agreement to create thenotwithstanding clause was reached during a meeting between one federal and two provincial justice ministers in the actual kitchen of theGovernment Conference Centre inOttawa. That agreement became known as theKitchen Accord and its authors,Jean Chrétien from the federal government,Roy Romanow fromSaskatchewan, andRoy McMurtry fromOntario, became known as the Kitchen Cabinet.
InIndia, the quasi-governmental body formerly headed bySonia Gandhi, called theNational Advisory Council, was often referred to as a "Kitchen Cabinet" by the media and general public, although the government at that time was headed byManmohan Singh as prime minister.[12]
InIsrael, the term "kitchen cabinet" is commonly used to translate theHebrew termהמטבחון (HaMitbahon orHaMitbachon), which more literally translates to "thekitchenette". The term refers to a subset of theSecurity Cabinet of Israel comprising thePrime Minister's most trusted advisors and derives from former Prime MinisterGolda Meir's habit of hosting meetings of her inner circle of ministers at home over cake she had baked personally. While subsequent Prime Ministers have not generally maintained the tradition of literally cooking for their ministers, the sense of an intimate group of trusted advisors has remained current since Meir's premiership.
The term was introduced to British politics to describeBritish Prime MinisterHarold Wilson's inner circle during his terms of office (1964-1970 and 1974–1976); prior toTony Blair, Wilson was the longest-servingLabour Party Prime Minister. Members includedMarcia Williams,George Wigg,Joe Haines, andBernard Donoughue. The term has been used subsequently, especially under Tony Blair, for the sidelining of traditional democraticcabinet structures to rely far more on a close group of non-elected advisors and allies. Examples of this practice include Blair's reliance on advisorAndrew Adonis before his appointment to the cabinet.
In colloquial U.S. usage, "kitchen cabinet" refers to any group of trusted friends and associates, particularly in reference to a president's or presidential candidate's closest unofficial advisers.
Lisa Yoon extends use of the term "Kitchen Cabinet" to "a network of trusted advisers" who influence the decisions ofcorporate presidents and potentates.[15]
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