Carter signs Civil Service Reform Act, creating OPM and codifying merit protections

President Jimmy Carter signed the Civil Service Reform Act on October 13, 1978 — the first major overhaul of the federal civil service since the Pendleton Act of 1883. The law abolished the Civil Service Commission and replaced it with the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB), and the Federal Labor Relations Authority. Carter created the Senior Executive Service as a cadre of 9,200 senior managers protected from political intimidation, and the law codified whistleblower protections and prohibited personnel practices including nepotism and discrimination. The MSPB's role as the appeals body for fired federal workers would become a key target of the Trump administration's Schedule F effort four decades later.