A cabinet is a group of important people who run a country or state. They make big decisions and work with the other parts of the government to carry them out. They’re called ministers or secretaries, and they are part of the executive branch, which is the branch that carries out laws.
In the United States, the cabinet is a group of Senate-confirmed federal department heads (including the President), who share executive authority with the Vice President. The President delegates much of his/her work to the Cabinet. Cabinet members are not in the line of succession to the presidency, but they can be removed by a impeachment process.
The cabinet system originated in Great Britain in the 17th and 18th centuries. It grew from the Privy Council, which became too unwieldy to debate matters of government in depth. The English monarchs Charles II (reigned 1660–85) and Anne (1702–14) started meeting a select committee of leading ministers. This group was known as the Cabinet and gradually came to be the dominant machinery of executive government.
The Constitution does not specifically establish a cabinet, but it does authorize the President to “require the opinion, in writing, of the principal officers of each of the executive departments upon any subject relating to the duties of their respective offices”. In the US, the Cabinet consists of the heads of the 13 executive departments (excluding the Office of Management and Budget). The term is also used to describe a similar body in other countries.
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