A Republican and a former Wall Street banker, C. Douglas Dillon (b.1910) was the "unrepentant Republican in the midst of Kennedy's Democratic cabinet" and the most influential member of President Kennedy's economic policy making team. He had previously served as Undersecretary of State for Economic Affairs under President Eisenhower, where he established the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
Respected for his keen mind, which quickly discerned trouble spots in the economy, Dillon stressed that the United States had not been growing fast enough and that the nation's most pressing problem was the trade deficit. Secretary Dillon devoted himself to alleviating the intractable trade deficit by controlling inflation and encouraging exports. He also concentrated on promoting the Kennedy tax program, which consisted of sweeping tax cuts intended to encourage economic growth. He was instrumental in convincing President Johnson, after Kennedy's death, to push the taxcut through the Senate, and it was passed by Congress, with some alterations, in 1964. Dillon resigned the next year to return to private finance.
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