SECTION FOUR:

THE EVOLUTION OF PRESIDENTIAL SECURITY
CREATION OF THE WHITE HOUSE COMPLEX

The "White House Complex" is composed of four principal structures: the Executive Mansion, where the First Family resides; the Old Executive Office Building, the location of the executive offices of the President and the Vice-President; the West Wing, the location of the official office of the President; and the East Wing, the official reception entrance to the State Rooms of the Executive Mansion.

When George Washington was elected the first President of the United States in 1789, there was neither a permanent capital city nor a permanent official residence for the Chief Executive. The seat of government first rested in Philadelphia and later, New York City. Congress then enacted the Residence Act of 1790, granting President Washington the authority to locate the permanent "federal capital" wherever he pleased. President Washington delegated to Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson the responsibility for carrying out the project. Both men were Virginians who had long favored establishing the nation’s capital in the South. They set their sights on a 10-square-mile

district overlooking the Potomac River for the federal enclave. The central feature of the federal city would be the executive residence of the president.

When the cornerstone of the Executive Mansion was laid in 1792, it was done against the backdrop of extensive political wrangling. Although Washington and Jefferson shared a view of where the capital should be located, they had very different opinions of central executive authority and the appropriate character of the nascent Presidency. The plan for the District of Columbia originally proposed by Pierre L’Enfant, and approved in principle by President Washington, called for a 'Presidential palace" five times the size of the structure we now know as the White House. L'Enfant's plan, suitable for "ages to come," embodied the Federalist Party’s exalted, monarchial notion of the Presidency. Federalist Party Leaders argued that Americans wanted their President to establish a high tone, essentially as an elected king set apart from the people. Washington himself thought that, u President, it was his responsibility "to conform to the public desire and expectation with respect to the style proper for the Chief Magistrate to live in." (Seale, Vol. I, p. 5). This logic required that the Chief Magistrate live in a palace.

The Republican opposition, led by Jefferson, despised the royalist pretense that they believed L’Enfant’s proposed "Presidential palace"

embodied. Reacting to what they perceived to be the potential for abusive executive authority, the Republicans systematically discredited L'Enfant's plan as one of grandeur unbefitting a democracy. Jefferson even argued, albeit unsuccessfully, that the "President's house," as it was increasingly called, should be constructed of brick rather than stone. He urged that the new capital should evoke simplicity rather than the aristocratic airs commonplace in the kingdoms of Europe.

To resolve the impasse, Jefferson proposed to President Washington that the executive residence be built according to the best plan submitted in a national competition. Washington agreed, and eventually settled on a design created by the architect James Hoban. The structure referred to here as the Executive Mansion or the "White House," was completed in eight years. In 1800, John Adams became the first President to occupy it.

A second structure, formerly known as the State, War & Navy Building, was added to the White House Complex in 1873-74. The State, War & Navy Department occupied the office space concurrently until it moved to its present locations immediately following World Was II. Since that time, the State, War & Navy Building, now known Is the Old Executive Office

Building, has contained the Executive Office of the Presiden, the Executive Office of the Vice-President, and the White House Office.

The construction of the West and East Wings were not nearly so marked by controversy as the building of the Executive Mansion itself. Until the West Wing was constructed in 1902, the president and his aides historically shared offices in designated areas of the Executive Mansion. As the authority and prestige of the Presidency grew, so did the space occupied by the Executive Office of the President, which encroached upon the First Family’s living quarters. In 1901, Theodore Roosevelt became President upon the assassination of William McKinley, and the largest First Family ever moved into the Executive Mansion with him. Immediately dissatisfied with the cramped living quarters, President Roosevelt determined that the Executive Mansion required drastic remodeling. Renovations ensued, and the West Wing, then known as the "Temporary Executive Office," was constructed to house the Executive Office of the President. As the name suggests, the architects never intended the structure to become permanent. Moreover, it was intended originally to accommodate only the President's personal staff. It was not until 1909 that the President’s official workplace was moved to the West Wing.

The East Wing is the most recently built administrative structure within the White House Complex. The building was constructed as part of the World War II mobilization effort. President Franklin Roosevelt believed that his staff would increase dramatically because of the administrative demands of the war. To meet the need for additional office space, he considered erecting several temporary buildings on the south grounds. Upon further reflection, Roosevelt opted instead to construct a permanent structure similar to the West Wing, but on the east side of the Executive Residence. The East Wing was occupled in 1942, though construction was not fully competed until 1945, During World War II, Roosevelt directed military operations from the East ring and provided permanent office space there to the recently enlarged White House Police. Later, a reception area was added to the East Wing. Today, the East Wing serves as the reception entrance for tours and social events at the Executive Mansion.

THE TRADITION OF PUBLIC ACCESS
TO THE EXECUTIVE MANSION

To some degree, the Executive Mansion has always been both the residence and office of the President and a national treasure - the "People's House." Even before President John Adams, its first resident, was able to occupy the unfinished Mansion, the public wandered in and out with

impunity; eventually, the marshal of Washington ordered it closed to all who did not possess written passes. Since that time, presidents have grappled with the question of the extent to which the public should be given access to the Executive Mansion. A rough pattern developed, beginning in the first quarter of the nineteenth century, of gradually increasing restrictions on public access to the White House Complex, due largely to concerns for the personal security of the President and his family.

Just as the Jeffersonian Republicans considered L'Enfant's notion of a "Presidential palace" anti-democratic, so too did they reject any effort to deny public access to the Executive Mansion. Indeed, it was President Jefferson himself who began the liberal practice of throwing open the doors of the Mansion each day so that visitors might freely browse the State Rooms. The rarely rule was simply that the Mansion was closed to the public only during early morning hours and when the President was either asleep or out of town. President Jefferson even wet so far as to display in the State Rooms plants, animals, And Other specimens obtained by Lewis and Clark during their expedition through the Louisiana Purchase territory. Jefferson's intent was clear: he opened the Executive Mansion to callers in order to lessen the grandeur of the vaunted Federalist "palace." Commenting on the practice, the novelist James Fenimore Cooper wrote that:

I have known a cartman to leave his horse in the street and go to a reception room to shake hands with the President. He offended the good taste of all present, because it was not thought decent that a laborer should come in dirty dress on such an occasion; but while he made a trifling mistake in this particular he proved how well he understood the difference between government and society. He knew that a levee was a sort of homage paid to political equality in the person of the first magistrate, but he would not have presumed to enter the house of the same person as a private individual without being invited. (Seale, Vol. 1, p. 159).

Through the first quarter of the twentieth century, Jefferson's successors and their wives continued to greet visitors briefly in the East Room each day at lunchtime. The outpouring of enthusiastic, popular sentiment at the inaugurations of Andrew Jackson in 1828 and William Henry Harrison in 1840 remains noteworthy both for the raucous; behavior of the many visitors to the District of Columbia for those events and for the unfettered White House access that was granted to those crowds. While the original political motivation for the practice has perhaps dissipeared, the State Rooms of the Executive Mansion have remained open to public view since Jefferson's time, except during the Spanish American War and the two World Wars. Presently, more than 1.5 minion visitors tour the Mansion each year.

Throughout most of the history of the White House, the public was given even freer access to the grounds than to the Mansion itself. By most accounts, the grounds were originally as open as a pubic market. In the early

years of the nineteenth century, the White House grounds were considered a prime attraction for sightseers. Until the construction of the Washington Monument and the mound on which it rests, there is a fairly unobstructed view of the Potomac River from the ridge where the Executive Mansion sat. Many sought the enjoyment of this vantage point and the beauty of the Executive Mansion’s renowned landscaping. Access to the grounds was regulated only by a succession of walls and fences that had been constructed through the years, beginning in Jefferson's time. These structures forced visitors to use the adjacent public thoroughfares when waking the entire length of the grounds, Eventually, guards were retained (later replaced by the Uniformed Division of the Secret Service and its forerunners) to regulate the flow of visitors to the grounds. As William Seale written, in the Antebellum era:

[t]he iron gates to the White House grounds opened at eight in the morning and closed at sundown. Almost anyone was likely to wander [the well-manicured gardens], along the paths. Naturally eager to see the President and his household visitors stared up at the second-floor windows, and sometimes they ventured where they should not. Without the garden on the east, secluded in its trees, the President would have had no private access to the out-of-doors. A sentry box ... stood at the gate separating the garden from the rest of the south grounds. The public was prohibited from entering there, [And] the household went to and from the garden unseen. (Seale, Vol. I, pp. 324 325).

It was not until World Was II that free public access to the White House grouds during daylight hours was finally ended. The was brought

changes so dramatic that security measures would never again be as relaxed. Since that time, visitors have been required to report to gates around the perimeter of the White House Complex instead of simply being allowed to walk to the front door of the Executive Mansion. Only those with official appointments have been permitted inside, and only after careful scrutiny. As a Presidential insider of the World Was II era wistfully remarked concerning the new arrangements, "No more Congressional constituents, no more government clerks hurrying through the grounds ... no more Sunday tourists feeding the squirrels, taking snapshots and hanging around the portico hoping someone interesting would come out." (Goodwin, p. 298).

Notwithstanding the trend toward restricting public access to the grounds, the Executive Mansion is among the world's only chief executive residences to operate an open museum. At the same time that it serves as the home and office of the President, its State Rooms are opened each day to visitors from throughout the country and the world.

THE EVOLUTION OF
SECURITY FEATURES AT
THE WHITE HOUSE COMPLEX

Those responsible for providing security a the Executive Mansion have always had to strike a balance between functional needs and the preservation of

the White House's image as an enduring symbol of democracy Most Presidents have embraced President Jefferson's first principle that the Executive Mansion should be open and easily accessible. Such an atmosphere is difficult to achieve with guards and locked gates. Nevertheless, President Jefferson himself ordered the construction of a high stone wall to replace the temporary rail fence around the perimeter of the White House grounds. At least some of this wall was erected, including a section on the North border of the grounds that completely blocked the view of the Mansion from the city commons, known as Lafayette Park. President Monroe, who wanted Americans to look freely upon the "President's house," replaced the stone wall with a curving iron fence. Monroe's democratic impulses did not, however, prevent him from installing gates equipped with heavy locks. Eventually, the 8-foot-high section of stone wall that stood along the south border of the grounds was also replaced with an iron fence, and fences were constructed on the east and west sides as well.

Along with a number of guardhouses, the iron fence surrounding the grounds remained the White House's only visible structural concession to security needs for most of its history. Nevertheless, more recent Presidents have also been forced to address the often competing concerns of architectural integrity, public access, and physical security. In the days immediately

following the attack on Pearl Harbor, for example, the Secret Service presented President Roosevelt with a lengthy set of recommendations to enhance security at the White House Complex. The Secret Service proposed covering the skylights with sand and tin, camouflaging the structure, painting the colonnade windows black, and setting up machine-gun emplacements on the roof. The President rejected most. of the suggestions "with not a little annoyance" but agreed to a number of less obtrusive ones. [12] (Goodwin, p. 299).

A visitor to the White House Complex today cannot help but notice several visible measures that have been installed since World War II to enhance the physical security of the White House. For example, following the terrorist assault on the Marine barracks and the American Embassy in Beruit, Lebanon, reinforced bollards were installed at the Complex's perimeter. In addition, perimeter fencing and gates were reinforced. Other guardhouses have been erected at various points on the grounds, and both East and West Executive Avenues have been closed to vehicular and, at times, pedestrian traffic. Secret

[12 In light of President Roosevelt's position, then Secret Service Chief Frank J. Wilson arranged for a regular Army unit to install and operate anti-aircraft guns on top of the Main Treasury Building "so as to be in a position to intercept enemy airplanes attempting to bomb or strafe the White House." (Wilson, p. 145). These troops, who had been detailed from Fort Myers, also were responsible for establishing a security perimeter in the are immediately outside the White House fence.]

Service Uniformed Division officers are near at hand, as are Park Police officers and other security personnel. As has always been the case, these precautions have been taken to ensure that the President enjoys the highest level of security that is consistent with democratic principles.

PROTECTION OF THE
WHITE HOUSE COMPLEX
AND THE PRESIDENT
IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

Just as a "Presidential palace" with restricted public access was considered anti-democratic, at one time the idea of stationing guards in and around the White House Complex was considered wholly inappropriate to the nation's character. During the nineteenth century, only wartime Presidents would dare risk doing so, and then only if the District of Columbia itself were threatened. A children’s primer that was popular during the Civil War illustrated the then-widely accepted distinction between the security that is provided for a monarch and the security given to a President:

How are emperors and kings protected?
By great troops of guards; so that it is difficult to approach them.

How is the president guarded?
He needs no guards at all; he may be visited by any persons like a private citizen. (Mitchell, p. 14).

For a century after President John Adams first moved into the Executive Mansion, the protection of the mansion and its residents remained a relatively minor concern, except during wartime. Various combinations of policemen, guards, and soldiers furnished security for the President's home. here was no sign, however, of the extensive and organized security arrangements that would develop in the twentieth century.

Perhaps the earlier indication of concern for the security of the Executive Mansion was contained in Thomas Jefferson's plans for the grounds. These plans, drawn in 1803 or 1804, included a series of gate lodges for guards. It is unclear whether they actually were built.

The circumstances of the War of 1812 forced President James Madison to mobilize the first serious effort to protect the Executive Mansion. On hearing that 4,000 British regulars were marching toward Washington, President Madison stationed troops on the White House ground. A company of 100 volunteers camped on the North Lawn of the Mansion and positioned a cannon at the North Gate. These volunteer soldiers retreated before the British entered Washington, however. The British thus faced no resistance as they set fire to the Executive Mansion and reduced it to a smoldering shell.

Although James Monroe did not confront invading armies during his Presidency, he was apparently concerned about assassins and other troublemakers, for he employed guards at the Executive Mansion. These guards were civilians in civilian dress, recruited for Monroe by the marshal of the District of Columbia. During special days when the public was invited to the White House, the number of guards increased. In addition, a doorkeeper was always on duty in the entrance hall. The doorkeeper kept firearms close at hand in a room off the hall. He had the authority to admit or refuse nearly anyone who appeared.

Although the doorkeeper was a permanent fixture, the guards were not. Monroe's successor, John Quincy Adams, did not hire guards, and Andrew Jackson did not favor the practice, either. Nevertheless, after a man named Richard Lawrence tried to shoot Jackson at the Capitol in 835 ·(the attempt failed because both of Lawrence’s pistols misfired), a wooden "watch box" for a sentry was built on the south grounds, ar the gate to the President's garden. During Martin Van Buren’s administration, the federal government paid the salaries of both a day guard, who often occupied the watch box, and 1 night watchman. When he hosted public receptions at the Executive Mansion, Van Buren stationed policemen at all the gates to keep out visitors from the lower classes.

During John Tyler's politically tumultuous Presidency, an enraged mob burned Tyler in effigy outside the White House gates, and an intoxicated painter threw rocks at him while he waked on the south grounds. Tyler, concerned for his safety, decided to establish a permanent company of guards for the Executive Mansion. In 1842, he presented Congress with a bill establishing a "police force for the protection of pubic and private properly in the city of Washington." Senator John Crittenden of Kentucky objected to the fact that the bill gave the President the power to appoint these police. According to the record of the Senate debates:

. . it seemed to [Crittenden] that, by subjecting this matter to the control of the President of the United States, it might be metamorphosed into a political guard for the Executive . . . . [Crittenden] thought that it would not be entirely safe to organize such a corps. It was a little sort of standing guard, which might eventually become formidable army. The seeds sown by this bill would soon germinate, and their full development might overshadow the liberties of the people. (Congressional Globe 27th Cong., 2d sess., 854 (1842.))

To address these concerns, the Senate amended Tyler's security bill to vest the appointment power in the Mayor of Washington instead of the President. The amended bill passed, and Tyler signed it into law. The act created a new entity called the "auxiliry guard." It consisted of a captain and fifteen other men. Its official fudction was "the protection of public and Private property aginst incendiaries, and . . . the enforcement of the police regulations of the city of Washington." The auxiliary guard was made subject

to rules and regulations prescribed by a board consisting of the Mayor of Washington, D.C., the Corporation Counsel of Washington, D.C., and the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia, with the approbation of the President of the United States." (5 Stat. 511 (August 23, 1842)).

Four men from this newly created force - the captain and three guards - were assigned to the Executive Mansion. In The President 's House, William Seale describes their role at the Mansion.

From the start the "Doormen," as they were called to avoid the militaristic tone of "guard" or "sentry" or "patrol" became integral to the functioning of the President's House, taking on extra duties that helped make the mansion run more smoothly. They carried confidential messges and met official and household guests at the stage line or train; they received all callers in the entrance hall and often announced them to the President or his wife. With the responsibilities - which were varied and not really spelled out - went certain privileges of investigation and arrest nor shared by other law enforcement officers. At the receptions they and temporary deputies mingled with the crowds, never hesitating to remove a man or woman who seemed suspicious. 'Their toughness and apparent aggressiveness often sparked complaint, but never reprimand. (See, Vol. I, p. 24).

Franklin Pierce, the President from 1853 to 1857, raised security to a new level when he became the first chief executive to retain a full-time bodyguard. Whereas the doormen remained on the White House grounds, the bodyguard (also a federal employee) ccompmied Pierce wherever he went. Each time the President left the Executive Manlsion, the bodyguard was by his

side. When the President was in the Mansion, the bodyguard remained within calling distance. Pierce thus introduced the two-level security arrangement that characterizes Presidential protection today. An outer perimeter of police type guards secured the Executive Mansion itself, while an inner perimeter - the bodyguard - protected the person of rhe President.

By 1860, the bitter atmosphere arising from the discord between the northern and southern states had greatly increased the danger of political violence. As soon as Abraham Lincoln was chosen to be the Republican candidate for President that year, he began to receive numerous death threats. During the campaign, he was constantly surrounded by a phalanx of bodyguards. In at least one instance, one of these bodyguards was Alan Pinkerton, the founder of the celebrated detective agency.

Lincoln’s security detail grew after he assumed the Presidency. He chafed under this protection and worried that it made him appear unmanly, but he ultimately conceded its necessity. Numerous Metropolitan Police were detailed to the Executive Mansion to serve as guards. Because Lincoln did not want the Executive Mansion to take on the characteristics of an armed camp, the guards inside the Mansion (the doormen) dressed in civilian clothes and

concealed their firearms. Uniformed, armed sentries were posted at the gates to the grounds and at the doors to the Executive Mansion itself.

During the Civil War, the military helped protect the Mansion. When the conflict started, soldiers actually camped inside the Executive Mansion until Washington was adequately fortified. Even after the city was deemed secure, military units were often assigned to serve as guards there.

Troops also frequently accompanied Lincoln during his travels. Indeed, throughout the Civil War, no member of Lincoln's family left the White House grounds unescorted. Thus, they were the first White House occupants to receive extensive personal protection. During the Civil War, an armed, plainclothes member of the Metropolitan Police regularly accompanied Mrs. Lincoln on her outings. Moreover, the White House doormen never lost sight of the Lincoln’s son Td, who was considered a target for kidnappers. By 1864, four Metropolitan policemen were assigned to serve as President Lincoln's personal bodyguards. One of these men, responsible for protecting Lincoln at Ford Theater on the evening of April 14, 1865, was having a drink It a nearby saloon when John Wilkes Booth fatally wounded the President with a shot to the head.

Despite the Lincoln assassination, Presidential security was diminished in the years after the war. The four-man detail drawn from the Metropolitan Police was reduced to three men and restricted to providing protection at the Executive Mansion. These guards, still referred to as doormen, received no special training. Unlike Lincoln, the post-war Presidents were often left entirely unprotected outside the Mansion. In 1881, Charles Guiteau exploited this vulnerability by fatally shooting James Garfield as he waked, unguarded, through the Baltimore and Potomac River Station in Washington.

Even the second assassination of a President within sixteen years did not lead to an immediate escalation in security. When Garfield's successors stepped outside the gates of the then-lightly guarded Executive Mansion, they usually had no protection at all. Occasionally, private detectives were retained to serve as Presidential bodyguards, but Congress enacted legislation that made such appropriations illegal. (27 Stat. 591 (1893)).

By the mid-1890s, the rising number of threats directed at President Grover Cleveland finally prompted a significant strengthening of Presidential security. Cleveland's wife persuaded him to increase the number of policemen serving at the Mansion from three (the size of the detail since the end of the Civil War) to twenty-seven. Although they were organized in 1865; it s not

until 1894 that a small number of Secret Service agents (then known as "operatives") were assigned to the White House, forming an "inner perimeter of bodyguards to supplement the enhanced "outer perimeter" of protection provided by the police. With the addition of the Secret Service, White House security assumed the shape that it has maintained to the present day.

Background Report Continued Next Page

Background Contents

Pennsylvania Ave. Closure || Peace Park

SECTION FOUR:

THE EVOLUTION OF PRESIDENTIAL SECURITY CREATION OF THE WHITE HOUSE COMPLEX

THE EVOLUTION OF PRESIDENTIAL SECURITY
CREATION OF THE WHITE HOUSE COMPLEX