Happy Centennial, Foreign Service

May 2024 marks the 100th anniversary of the modern United States Foreign Service. It doesn’t mark the beginning of American diplomacy, which traces back to the beginning of our young union, but rather the passage of the Rogers Act of 1924. The Rogers Act, also known as the Foreign Service Act of 1924, joined the diplomatic and consular services of the United States. (Personnel of the former staffed embassies and legations around the world; the latter primarily promoted trade relations overseas and assisted distressed U.S. sailors – a precursor to today’s American Citizens Services consular work.)

The two services had evolved separately under former Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, and in merging them the provisions of the Rogers Act created a more merit-based Foreign Service. The new structure provided more reliable pay, a guaranteed rotation process to keep officers from “going native” in their countries of assignment (complete with mandated stateside home leave between foreign tours), and updated policies around officer selection, promotion, and retirement.

Why was the Rogers Act so important?

From 1789 all the way up until 1924, Foreign Service appointments overseas were funded by small Congressional appropriations insufficient to cover their actual costs. Diplomats themselves had to subsidize their service, and they didn’t even have pensions. Translation: Only the richest and best-connected – who didn’t actually need to work to earn their living or support a family – needed apply. And I use the word “apply” loosely. Diplomats pre-Rogers Act were essentially appointees. They didn’t necessarily have to undergo an entrance exam, or demonstrate the skills and ability to perform the job. I’m not saying they were all terrible – I don’t know because I wasn’t there. I’m sure there were some very smart and capable people. However, the process was flawed – unfair to those on the outside and frankly, it sounds a little unfair to the less well-off who managed to serve, too.

Although the Foreign Service required additional reforms after the Rogers Act to become what it is today, the Rogers Act laid important groundwork for a Foreign Service that better represented the United States than how it started.

This matters because we know an organization which reflects the diversity of our nation attracts top talent and can better connect with our foreign partners. Inclusivity more accurately aligns with U.S. values. Teams with diverse views are better able to have robust policy discussions incorporating a wide range of perspectives, which results in better-informed decisions. Every American deserves a chance to know what the State Department is, and develop an academic and professional trajectory toward a career in diplomacy if they wish.

---

---

It’s hard for me to imagine a Foreign Service composed entirely of privileged political (all white, male) appointees. But before the Rogers Act and the more competitive entrance examination process it ushered in, it was very much so. Although it has changed over time, the years between 1924 and 2024 have been a slow evolution. Just like before WWI, conditions in the Foreign Service often mirror and reflect broader societal norms.

I’ve read stories time and again from FSOs of color who resigned amidst disappointing stories of poor treatment in our workplaces, including in Ciudad Juárez, an assignment I curtailed due to my own treatment as an immunocompromised person during the pandemic. These aren’t old stories from my parents’ generation – they’re recent stories.

See Harry Kopp’s fascinating Diversity and Inclusion in the U.S. Foreign Service: A Primer in the July/August 2021 online issue of the Foreign Service Journal. Mr. Kopp says the institution reflected the nation’s values “at the time,” and that must be true. As we know better, we need to do better. Much better.

In 1936, there were 701 Foreign Service Officers. All of them were white. 700 were male. The first female FSO to make a career out of the job was Frances E. Willis, who entered the Foreign Service in 1927. She combatted sexism as she rose through the ranks to become the first female U.S. ambassador to Switzerland in 1953 – a country that, at that time, did not yet allow women to vote.

Of course, women have fought hard for their rightful place in the service. Up until the early 1970s, female officers were expected to resign from the Foreign Service upon their marriage. That unwritten rule carried on, ridiculously, until women started saying NO. Also up until the 1970s, performance appraisals for male officers included an assessment of their wives’ involvement in representational activities and “general comportment.”

---

Would you pass the Foreign Service Officer Test in 1925?

Sample Examination Questions (excerpt):

1. Give the name of the victorious nation in each of the following named historic sieges and battles, and state the war in which each occurred.

a) Caporetto b) Jutland c) Mukden

d) Gallipoli e) Sedan

2. Give the name of the first provisional president of the Chinese Republic, 1911.

3. Give the name of the general noted for his defense of Verdun, 1917.

4. Give the name of the Greek minister who aided the Anglo-French mission at Salonica (Thessaloniki), 1917.

5. Name the last king of Portugal.

6. Name the inventor of the wireless system of telegraphy.

7. Name the person financing the expedition leading to the discovery of Tut-Ankh-Amen.

8. At 6 cents per gallon, how many dollars’ duty should be paid on 50 hectoliters of whale oil? (1 hectoliter = 22 gallons)

9. If the rate of exchange between England and Sweden is 18 kroner for £1 and between England and France is 110 francs for 32 shillings, what would be the value of 144 kroner in francs?

---

I recently attended a centennial celebration at the National Museum of American Diplomacy (NMAD). (Note the State Department provides the venue, staffing, and management of NMAD collections, but exhibits and programming take place through sponsorships.)

The speaker probably spent 50 minutes of an hourlong presentation critiquing the Rogers Act and policy leading up to it, using words like “nativist” and “elitist.”

I sat there, bemused and ultimately a bit irritated. She wasn’t necessarily wrong, but wasn’t she going to say anything about the next 99 years? The museum does great work, but this seemed like a missed opportunity. A lady timidly raised her hand during the Q&A that followed and asked if there were going to be any NMAD events to “celebrate” the Foreign Service in its centennial month. The speaker replied, “Well, this.”

Not wanting to raise my hand and make myself the focal point of the event, I refrained from mentioning many modernization initiatives the Department has undertaken in recent years to make our ranks more inclusive, more accessible, more representative.

She could have mentioned the Department in the last couple of years alone took a number of steps to remove gaps between Specialist and Generalist training that made Specialists feel “less than.” For example, merging A-100 cohorts and retitling them with a month/year naming convention vs. separate class numbers, and blending and streamlining the separate tracks’ “dimensions of the total candidate” qualifiers. The Department also took the FSOA all-virtual in the hopes prospective candidates’ remote attendance would remove barriers to access for those who could not afford the trip to Washington, DC. They even changed the “O” from “oral” to “officer” because “not everyone communicates orally,” an attempt to better include our deaf and hearing-impaired colleagues. And these are just a few things off the top of my head.

But I don’t work on HR-related projects and I didn’t have any official talking points. Also – the speaker was an employee of the Department and worked for the museum! It was their message. Despite my own issues at times with this career and lifestyle and yes – sometimes the way we do things – I did feel a little defensive of us that day.

And I walked away from the event with some worry the general public audience members would leave thinking the Foreign Service had never evolved past 100 years ago, and we were all a bunch of paper pushers who couldn’t wait to make a racist visa adjudication, or misapply the law in some 1920s way. It disappointed me a little. But it isn’t true. We as an organization have to get better at telling our own story to the American people.

Is there still more to do? Absolutely. The Department is moving away from the pale, male, Yale reputation of yesteryear. Yet it still loses female officers and officers of color at higher rates, who traditionally face greater systemic challenges in succeeding in this particular workplace.

The May 2024 issue of the Foreign Service Journal notes that “more than 13,900 Foreign Service members are currently posted at 279 diplomatic missions around the world” and “that more than 321 have died in the line of duty.”

This is the Foreign Service today. As we look back a century to understand the foundations our organization was built upon, we can see where we expect to grow in coming years and what we’ve done well. We can applaud the service and sacrifice made by thousands of Americans diplomats – including the hundreds of those killed in service whose names adorn the lobby walls of Main State – and say we are #FSProud.

In my own celebration of 100 years, I offer a piece NMAD previously published, Who Is a Diplomat? and an editorial in the Des Moines Register entitled ‘Never so glad to see the American flag’: Foreign Service risk it all for their country by retired diplomat Kenneth M. Quinn. Quinn served for 32 years in the Foreign Service and reminds us of the risks and rewards of this career.

Today, on the 12th anniversary of the day I passed the FSOA, and earlier this month just having marked the 10th anniversary of the day I “got the call” to join A-100, I can say I’m still proud to do this job. I hope 100 years from now the Foreign Service is filled with even brighter and more capable diplomats ready to take on the challenges of tomorrow.