United States Secretary of State

• 1. Introduction

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  The United States Secretary of State earns $250,600 a year to hold one of the most consequential jobs in American government. At any given moment, this single official may be conducting treaty negotiations, representing the country at international summits, and signing the passports of ordinary Americans traveling abroad. When a president or vice president resigns, the resignation paperwork is delivered directly to this office. And six people who held this job later moved into the White House.

  The position dates to 1789, yet its roots go back even further, to a moment before the Constitution itself existed. How did an office that started as something called the secretary of foreign affairs evolve into the nerve center of American diplomacy? And why do so many presidential campaigns run through this post?

• 2. Before the Constitution

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  In 1781, the Congress of the Confederation created the Department of Foreign Affairs and named an office called the secretary of foreign affairs to run it. The United States was not yet governed by the Constitution; the Articles of Confederation held the young country together, and foreign affairs demanded someone to manage them.

  When the Constitution was ratified and the 1st United States Congress convened, lawmakers rebuilt the department from scratch. They renamed it the Department of State and created the new office of secretary of state to lead it. Thomas Jefferson became the first person to hold that title, and he shaped what the role would mean. Jefferson later left to become the third president of the United States, a path that several of his successors would eventually follow.

• 3. The Powers of the Office

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  Henry Kissinger received two resignation letters that changed American history. When Vice President Spiro Agnew resigned and when President Richard Nixon resigned, federal law required those instruments to be delivered to the sitting secretary of state. That domestic detail reveals how far the secretary's reach extends beyond foreign policy.

  On the international side, the secretary of state supervises the Foreign Service and the Civil Service, works alongside the U.S. Agency for International Development, and carries out the president's foreign policies through every one of those channels. The secretary can negotiate, interpret, and terminate treaties. The office also appoints and dismisses diplomats and ambassadors, advising the president throughout that process.

  Most of the historical domestic functions of the Department of State were gradually transferred to other agencies by the late 19th century. What remains includes custody of the Great Seal, protocol duties for the White House, and drafting certain presidential proclamations. The secretary also handles the extradition of fugitives to foreign countries, negotiating those arrangements with individual states.

• 4. Rank and Succession

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  In the presidential line of succession, the secretary of state stands fourth. The vice president comes first, then the speaker of the House of Representatives, then the president pro tempore of the Senate, and only then the secretary of state. Even so, among cabinet secretaries the office ranks first; no other cabinet member stands higher.

  The secretary of state, together with the secretary of the treasury, the secretary of defense, and the attorney general, is considered one of the four most crucial members of the cabinet. The position is designated Level I in the Executive Schedule, which is the category that carries the salary of $250,600. The secretary is confirmed by the full Senate following a hearing before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, the same body that scrutinizes every major diplomatic appointment.

• 5. The Presidential Ladder

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  Six secretaries of state went on to win the presidency: Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, John Quincy Adams, Martin Van Buren, and James Buchanan. That list covers more than half a century of American political history, and it made the State Department look like a natural launching pad for the nation's highest office.

  The pattern did not hold. A long roster of secretaries ran for president and lost, among them Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, William Seward, William Jennings Bryan, Charles Evans Hughes, John Kerry, and Hillary Clinton. Marco Rubio, who served as secretary of state after holding other offices, also appears on that list. The accumulated weight of these failed campaigns gave the office a different reputation: a place where presidential ambitions often go to stall rather than accelerate.

  In 2014, Congress added a new responsibility to the role when it passed the Sean and David Goldman International Child Abduction Prevention and Return Act. That law required the secretary to take specific steps to facilitate the return of abducted children from nations party to the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, a reminder that Congress can reshape the office's duties at any time.