Reagan Team Picks More Harvard Brains

As President-elect Ronald Reagan finally began to fill his administration with Harvard graduates in five of his eight announced Cabinet-level posts--University faculty members aiding the transition operation continued to write memos and mull over job offers.

Initial reports from several Reagan transition teams fell due this week, including the State Department task force, where Richard E. Pipes, Baird Professor of History, is monitoring developments on the Polish front and other areas of U.S.-Soviet and East-West relations.

Transition sources say Pipes, a hardliner who opposes SALT II and supports a sharp increase in military spending, communicates daily with Richard V. Allen, Reagan's top foreign policy adviser, and has established himself as the new administration's pre-eminent Soviet specialist.

As transition director of the Bureau of European Affairs--State's office for European and Soviet matters--Pipes will have considerable authority to "de-Shulmanize the State Department," in the words of one senior defense transition planner, and effect far-reaching changes in policy and personnel.

The caustic reference was to Marshall D. Shulman, considered a moderate on Soviet issues while serving in the Carter administration as a special adviser to the secretary of state on Soviet affairs, one position Pipes is frequently mentioned for.

The fortunes of Christopher C. DeMuth '68, lecturer in Public Policy and a member of Reagan's Environmental Protection Agency team, also seem to be on the rise. Richard Fairbanks, Reagan's director of transition for 13 government agencies, including the EPA, said DeMuth is a leading candidate for EPA administrator.

Working on the change-over at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. itself, meanwhile, is Richard G. Darman '64, lecturer in Public Policy and Management at the Kennedy School. He has been named one of two executive directors of the Reagan White House Executive Office team, which is working on the structure and organization of the new White House.

James A. Baker III, Reagan's chief-of-staff to be and head of the thus-far unannounced committee, worked with Darman in the Commerce Department during the Ford administration and this week called him "perhaps the brightest, most articulate and knowledgeable student of government policy that I know."

On Thursday, Reagan ended some of the suspense building around his protracted search for a Cabinet and announced eight appointments. They included: Donald T. Reagan '40, secretary of the treasury; Caspar W. Weinberger '38, secretary of defense; William French Smith, Harvard Law '42, attorney general; Andrew (Drew) L. Lewis Jr., Harvard Business '55, secretary of transportation; and Rep. David A. Stockman (R-Mich.), director of the Office of Management and Budget, Harvard Divinity '68-70.

Not to be left out, Vice President-elect George Bush selected Charles G. (Chase) Untermeyer '68, a Texas state representative and a fellow at the Institute of Politics, as his executive assistant.

"Actually, we'll have a quota of three Yales to every Harvard in this administration," one senior Reagan aide--a former Eli--joked a few weeks ago. So far, that doesn't seem to be the case.