Waiting for Dead Men's Shoes: Origins and Development of the U.S. Navy's Officer Personnel System, 1793-1941 - Book Review

Naval War College Review, Summer, 2002 by James Barber

Chisholm, Donald. Waiting for Dead Men's Shoes: Origins and Development of the U.S. Navy's Officer Personnel System, 1793-1941. Palo Alto, Calif.: Stanford Univ. Press, 2001. 883pp. $125

Donald Chisholm has provided us with an important book. It is the first comprehensive history of the development of the U.S. Navy's officer personnel system. Others have provided portions of the picture; Christopher McKee's A Gentlemanly and Honorable Profession: The Creation of the U.S. Naval Officer Corps, 1794-1815 is an excellent treatment of the early years. But the Royal Navy, from which many American practices derive, is more thoroughly covered. Extensive coverage of the Royal Navy is to be found in Michael Lewis's British Ships and British Seamen (1940); The Navy of Britain: A Historical Portrait (1948); A Social History of the Navy, 1793-1815 (1960); and The Navy in Transition, 1814-1864: A Social History (1965). William Laird Clowe's magisterial seven-volume The Royal Navy: A History from the Earliest Times to the Present (1897), although dated, remains impressive. Yet no one has provided for the U.S. Navy books of such depth and coverage until now, with Chisholm's1 impressive work.

Chisholm's intent goes well beyond a historical recounting of events. His stated aim is "to explore how institutions are created and elaborated, to assess the usefulness of the problem-solving conception of decision for so doing, and to relate the previously untold story of the origins and development of the U.S. Navy's officer personnel system." Chisholm believes that the problems faced by the Navy's officer personnel system parallel in many ways those faced by other large-scale organizations. He is at least as interested in process as he is in outcome, and he draws with impressive scholarship upon multiple disciplines, including not only history but political science, sociology, strategic management, foreign policy, and public administration. Although Chisholm's vehicle is the detailed study of naval officer personnel management, he uses that as a means of studying organizational management in a broader context. In this he is successful. Extensively researched in primary sources and thoroughly documented, h is book is a major contribution to organizational theory.

The author's intended audience is the community of naval officers--past, present, and future--congressional scholars, and students of American political development. However, an even wider audience will appreciate this study for its insights into institutional problem solving, modification, and growth. However, even a comprehensive study such as this must set its limits. To make things manageable, Chisholm chose to omit the staff corps and Marine Corps, the development of the reserves, the creation and modifications of the Naval Academy curriculum, and the enlisted personnel system.

It took almost 150 years to construct the naval personnel system that existed at the beginning of World War II. Chisholm makes clear that this system did not come about because of any grand design but as the result of an infinite series of incremental decisions made to solve problems as they arose. The three main motivations behind these decisions were, Chisholm argues, efficiency, equity, and economy. "Efficiency" in this sense refers to the most economical use of resources, more closely resembling what might be called "effectiveness." "Equity" is concerned with protecting the rights of officers. "Economy" ensures the least possible cost at all times. First one, then another of these goals prevailed as the Navy interacted with the administration and Congress during its periodic expansions and contractions. The interaction between the Navy and Congress in addressing naval personnel problems represents a major portion of the historical action recounted here. Of particular value is the report on congressional n aval debates, offering not only the bills that passed but the full flavor of the debates, including the attempts (both successful and not) to amend them and the arguments presented. This gives us an idea of not only what happened but also of what might have been.

The title of the book is taken from the memoirs of Rear Admiral Yates Stirling, Jr.: "With all its faults, and there are many, the Navy has accepted selection because it brings officers to high ranks young enough to be at their best. Promotion by seniority, waiting for dead men's shoes, is a sad blow to efficiency, for it stifles initiative and offers no incentive." Yet for well over a century, promotion by seniority prevailed. It took until what later came to be called the Line Personnel Act of 1916 for the Navy to adopt "selection up" as the means for determining who was to be promoted. Chisholm characterizes this decision as "the pivotal point in the navy's history." The commanders and captains selected in the twenty years following the passage of the act were to become the flag officers who led the Navy in its greatest test, and finest hours, during World War II.