The Federal Civil Defense Administration (FCDA) was organized by Democratic president Harry S. Truman (1884–1972) on December 1, 1950, and became an official government agency on January 12, 1951. The agency distributed posters, programs, and information about communism and the threat of communist attacks.
In 1979, President Carter signed Executive Order 12179 merging the successor to the Federal Civil Defense Administration — the Defense Civil Preparedness Agency (DCPA) — into today's Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). In 2003, FEMA was merged into the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
Famous quotes containing the words federal, civil and/or defense:
“The proposed Constitution ... is, in strictness, neither a national nor a federal constitution; but a composition of both.”
—James Madison (1751–1836)
“Standards of conduct appropriate to civil society or the workings of a democracy cannot be purely and simply applied to the Church.”
—Joseph Ratzinger (b. 1927)
“The sick man is taken away by the institution that takes charge not of the individual, but of his illness, an isolated object transformed or eliminated by technicians devoted to the defense of health the way others are attached to the defense of law and order or tidiness.”
—Michel de Certeau (1925–1986)