Title: A Brief History of Administrative Government | Center for Effective Government
Headings: 
A Brief History of Administrative Government
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Content: The first agencies of the federal government were the Departments of War, State, Navy, and Treasury. There was also an Office of the Attorney General. The growth of the country and the expansion of governmental responsibilities led to the creation of the Department of the Interior in 1849, the Department of Justice in 1870, and the Post Office Department in 1872. Agencies began to adopt formal operating standards and publish rules in response to public criticism of abuses of power under the spoils system. In 1868, for instance, the Treasury Department began publishing its customs decisions, followed in 1869 by the Patent Office. The period between 1865 and 1900 saw the birth of independent regulatory commissions. Congress created these agencies to set rates and bring order into industry competition. The first of these so-called economic regulatory agencies was the Interstate Commerce Commission. It was established in 1887 in response to charges that farmers and merchants were being forced to pay exorbitant railroad rates to ship their products to market. Reformers believed independent regulatory commissions would bring greater, expertise, specialization and continuity to bear on economic problems than Congress could, and would operate in a dispassionate, nonpolitical environment.