The Foreign Service Journal, January 2010

four years later by setting up semi-independent boards of ex- aminers for both services, establishing the system of efficiency reports, and making career diplomats eligible to be ministers and ambassadors. In fact, he appointed 18 of them to such posts. The Father of the Foreign Service For many years, a major moving force behind these series of reforms was Wilbur J. Carr (1870-1942). His efforts would pave the way for passage in 1924 of the Rogers Act, uniting and professionalizing the Diplomatic Service and the Con- sular Service, creating the United States Foreign Service. For this reason, Carr has often been called “the father of the For- eign Service.” A farm boy from Ohio who had attended a commercial college in Kentucky, Carr began his career in the State De- partment as a consular clerk in 1892, became director of the Consular Service in 1909, and was later assistant secretary for consular affairs, from 1924 to 1937. He would serve as minister to Prague before retiring from the Foreign Service in 1939. When Carr went abroad for the first time to the U.S. embassy in London in 1916, he was surprised and shocked at how many officers in the Diplomatic Service had come down with “localitis,” aping their foreign colleagues and openly displaying airs of superiority to officers in the Consular Service. Mu- tual distrust and professional jealousy were rampant. The administrators at overseas posts and within the State De- partment generally came from the Con- sular Service, which had more experience in dealing with people, budgets and the practicalities of running operations — all skills held in low regard by the Diplomatic Service’s “policymakers.” One diplomat scathingly put down his “nonsubstantive” colleagues, referring to “administrative types who inflate themselves with all sorts of rich and resonant titles like ‘Ca- reer Evaluators’ and ‘General Services Specialists’ and even ‘Ministers of Embassy for Administrative Affairs.’ These glo- rified janitors, supply clerks and pants-pressers yearn to get their fingers in the foreign affairs pie; and when they do, the diplomatic furniture often gets marked with gummy thumbprints.” While the relatively small Diplomatic Service was mostly staffed by wealthy graduates from a limited number of elite schools, and was frequently likened to a “chummy club,” the Consular Service was plagued with political appointees. Al- though he was a superb diplomat and a lifelong advocate of a professional Foreign Service open to all those qualified on the basis of merit, Ambassador Hugh Gibson (1863-1954) is reported to have said that the best picture of a sweating man was a consul at a diplomatic dinner. It is also worth recalling that consular officers — not to mention those who did not happen to be from the right prep schools and universities, or were female or Jewish — did not qualify for admission into the diplomatic Olympus. But the Rogers Act would take care of the Diplomatic Service’s cav- alier attitude, at least in theory, and Consul General Robert Piet Kisner became its first beneficiary when, in November 1926, he was appointed as Minister to Athens. The Foreign Service Entry Exam Entry into the career service, both for secretaries in the Diplomatic Service and officers in the Consular Service, was by rank on a roster based on grades obtained in written and oral examinations. The exams were dif- ferent for the two specialties, so there were two boards of examiners, each of which certified the names of those eli- gible for appointment to the respective ranks. The Secretary of State then sub- mitted the list to the president for ap- pointment as the needs of the Service required. The examination for the Diplomatic Service was graded on a scale of 100; a minimum of 80 was required to pass and have one’s name placed on the eli- gible roster. (The written and oral exams each counted for 50 percent of the grade.) The names of those eligible for appointment remained on the ros- ter for two years. Essays on the written exam covered the subjects of inter- national law; diplomatic usage; modern languages; modern history (since 1850); American history, government and in- stitutions; and natural, industrial and commercial resources and activities of the United States. The Consular Service test covered the subjects of inter- national, maritime and commercial law; political and com- mercial geography; arithmetic; modern languages; the resources and commerce of the United States; political econ- omy; American history, government and institutions; and modern history (since 1850). The Consular Service included in its ranks those who are now economic/commercial officers, and they had their own modified exam. Candidates for the “Corps of Consuls for Economic Investigational Work” — i.e., economic/commer- cial officers — took an exam covering economics, research and investigation methods for promotion of commerce and The 1924 Rogers Act would take care of the Diplomatic Service’s cavalier attitude — at least in theory. J A N U A R Y 2 0 1 0 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 33