United States Secretary of the Navy

Not to be confused with Chief of Naval Operations.

The Secretary of the Navy (SECNAV) is a statutory officer (10 U.S.C. § 8013) and the head (chief executive officer) of the Department of the Navy, a military department within the United States Department of Defense. On March 25, 2025, John Phelan was confirmed as Secretary of the Navy.^[1]

United States Secretary of the Navy
Seal of the Department of the Navy
Flag of the secretary
Incumbent John Phelan since 25 March 2025
Department of the Navy
Style	Mister Secretary The Honorable (formally)
Abbreviation	SECNAV
Reports to	Secretary of Defense Deputy Secretary of Defense
Appointer	The President, with Senate advice and consent
Constituting instrument	10 U.S.C. § 8013
Formation	18 June 1798; 226 years ago (18 June 1798)
First holder	Benjamin Stoddert
Succession	3rd in SecDef succession
Deputy	The Under Secretary (Principal Civilian Deputy) Chief of Naval Operations (Navy Advisor and Deputy) The Commandant (Marine Corps Advisor and Deputy)
Salary	Executive Schedule, level II
Website	www.secnav.navy.mil

By law, the Secretary of the Navy must be a civilian at least five years removed from active military service. The secretary is appointed by the president and requires confirmation by the Senate.

History

The position of Secretary of the Navy was created in 1798. It was a member of the president's Cabinet until 1949, when the Secretary of the Navy (and the secretaries of the Army and Air Force) were by amendments to the National Security Act of 1947 made subordinate to the secretary of defense.^[2]

From 2001 to 2019, proposals to rename the Department of the Navy to the Department of the Navy and Marine Corps, which would have also renamed the Secretary of the Navy to the Secretary of the Navy and Marine Corps, were introduced with wide support in the United States Congress, but failed due to the opposition of Senator and retired U.S. Navy officer John McCain.^[3]

Responsibilities

The Department of the Navy (DoN) consists of two uniformed services: the United States Navy and the United States Marine Corps.^[4] The Secretary of the Navy is responsible for, and has statutory authority (10 U.S.C. § 8013) to "conduct all the affairs of the Department of the Navy", i.e. as its chief executive officer, subject to the limits of the law, and the directions of the president and the secretary of defense. In effect, all authority within the Navy and Marine Corps, unless specifically exempted by law, is derivative of the authority vested in the Secretary of the Navy.

Specifically enumerated responsibilities of the SECNAV in the aforementioned section are: recruiting, organizing, supplying, equipping, training, mobilizing, and demobilizing. The secretary also oversees the construction, outfitting, and repair of naval ships, equipment, and facilities. SECNAV is responsible for the formulation and implementation of policies and programs that are consistent with the national security policies and objectives established by the president or the secretary of defense.^[5][6]

The Secretary of the Navy is a member of the Defense Acquisition Board (DAB), chaired by the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics. Furthermore, the secretary has several statutory responsibilities under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) with respect to the administration of the military justice system for the Navy & the Marine Corps, including the authority to convene general courts-martial and to commute sentences.

The principal military advisers to the SECNAV are the two service chiefs of the naval services: for matters regarding the Navy the chief of naval operations (CNO), and for matters regarding the Marine Corps the commandant of the Marine Corps (CMC). The CNO and the Commandant act as the principal executive agents of the SECNAV within their respective services to implement the orders of the secretary.

Navy Regulations

The United States Navy Regulations is the principal regulatory document of the Department of the Navy, and all changes to it must be approved by the Secretary of the Navy.

U.S. Coast Guard

Whenever the United States Coast Guard operates as a service within the Department of the Navy, the Secretary of the Navy has the same powers and duties with respect to the Coast Guard as the secretary of homeland security when the Coast Guard is not operating as a service in the Department of the Navy.^[7]

The Navy Secretariat

The Office of the Secretary of the Navy, also known within DoD as the Navy Secretariat or simply just as the Secretariat in a DoN setting, is the immediate headquarters staff that supports the secretary in discharging his duties. The principal officials of the Secretariat include the Under Secretary of the Navy (the secretary's principal civilian deputy), the assistant secretaries of the Navy (ASN), the general counsel of the Navy, the judge advocate general of the Navy (JAG), the Naval inspector general (NIG), the chief of Legislative Affairs, and the chief of naval research. The Office of the Secretary of the Navy has sole responsibility within the Department of the Navy for acquisition, auditing, financial and information management, legislative affairs, and public affairs.^[8]

Pursuant to SecNavInst 5090.5F, the Department of the Navy Environmental Programs Manual, the Secretary of the Navy and chief of naval operations recognize a number of commands annually for achievements in such areas as environmental quality, environmental cleanup, natural resources conservation, cultural resources management, pollution prevention, and recycling.^[9]

The chief of naval operations and the commandant of the Marine Corps have their own separate staffs, the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations (also known by its acronym OPNAV) and Headquarters Marine Corps.

Secretaries of the Navy

  Denotes acting secretaries

^[10]

Continental Congress

Position	Portrait	Name	Term of office
Chairman of the Marine Committee		John Adams	13 October 1775 – 1779
Member of the Marine Committee		John Langdon	13 October 1775–?
Member of the Marine Committee		Silas Deane	13 October 1775–?
Member of the Marine Committee		Joseph Hewes	1775[11]
Continental Navy Board (under Marine Committee)			6 November 1776 – 28 October 1779
Chairman of the Continental Board of Admiralty		Francis Lewis	December 1779 – 1780
Secretary of Marine		Alexander McDougall	7 February 1781 – 29 August 1781
Agent of Marine (devolved onto Superintendent of Finance)		Robert Morris	29 August 1781 – 1784[12]

(Post of Secretary of Marine created but remained vacant)

Executive Department, 1798–1949

  Denotes an Acting United States Secretary of the Navy

No.	Portrait	Name	State	Start	End	President(s)
1		Benjamin Stoddert	Maryland	18 June 1798	31 March 1801		John Adams (1797–1801)
							Thomas Jefferson (1801–1809)
2		Robert Smith	Maryland	27 July 1801	4 March 1809
3		Paul Hamilton	South Carolina	15 May 1809	31 December 1812		James Madison (1809–1817)
4		William Jones	Pennsylvania	19 January 1813	1 December 1814
5		Benjamin Crowninshield	Massachusetts	16 January 1815	30 September 1818
							James Monroe (1817–1825)
6		Smith Thompson	New York	1 January 1819	31 August 1823
7		Samuel L. Southard	New Jersey	16 September 1823	4 March 1829
							John Quincy Adams (1825–1829)
8		John Branch	North Carolina	9 March 1829	12 May 1831		Andrew Jackson (1829–1837)
9		Levi Woodbury	New Hampshire	23 May 1831	30 June 1834
10		Mahlon Dickerson	New Jersey	1 July 1834	30 June 1838
							Martin Van Buren (1837–1841)
11		James K. Paulding	New York	1 July 1838	4 March 1841
12		George E. Badger	North Carolina	6 March 1841	11 September 1841		William Henry Harrison (1841)
							John Tyler (1841–1845)
13		Abel P. Upshur	Virginia	11 October 1841	23 July 1843
14		David Henshaw	Massachusetts	24 July 1843	18 February 1844
15		Thomas W. Gilmer	Virginia	19 February 1844	28 February 1844
16		John Y. Mason	Virginia	26 March 1844	4 March 1845
17		George Bancroft	Massachusetts	11 March 1845	9 September 1846		James K. Polk (1845–1849)
18		John Y. Mason	Virginia	10 September 1846	4 March 1849
19		William B. Preston	Virginia	8 March 1849	22 July 1850		Zachary Taylor (1849–1850)
20		William Graham	North Carolina	2 August 1850	25 July 1852		Millard Fillmore (1850–1853)
21		John P. Kennedy	Maryland	26 July 1852	4 March 1853
22		James C. Dobbin	North Carolina	8 March 1853	4 March 1857		Franklin Pierce (1853–1857)
23		Isaac Toucey	Connecticut	7 March 1857	4 March 1861		James Buchanan (1857–1861)
24		Gideon Welles	Connecticut	7 March 1861	4 March 1869		Abraham Lincoln (1861–1865)
							Andrew Johnson (1865–1869)
25		Adolph E. Borie	Pennsylvania	9 March 1869	25 June 1869		Ulysses S. Grant (1869–1877)
26		George M. Robeson	New Jersey	26 June 1869	4 March 1877
Acting		William Faxon		4 March 1877	13 March 1877		Rutherford B. Hayes (1877–1881)
27		Richard W. Thompson	Indiana	13 March 1877	20 December 1880
28		Nathan Goff Jr.	West Virginia	7 January 1881	4 March 1881
29		William H. Hunt	Louisiana	7 March 1881	16 April 1882		James A. Garfield (1881)
							Chester A. Arthur (1881–1885)
30		William E. Chandler	New Hampshire	16 April 1882	4 March 1885
31		William C. Whitney	New York	7 March 1885	4 March 1889		Grover Cleveland (1885–1889)
32		Benjamin F. Tracy	New York	6 March 1889	4 March 1893		Benjamin Harrison (1889–1893)
33		Hilary A. Herbert	Alabama	7 March 1893	4 March 1897		Grover Cleveland (1893–1897)
34		John Davis Long	Massachusetts	6 March 1897	30 April 1902		William McKinley (1897–1901)
							Theodore Roosevelt (1901–1909)
35		William Moody	Massachusetts	1 May 1902	30 June 1904
36		Paul Morton	Illinois	1 July 1904	30 June 1905
37		Charles Bonaparte	Maryland	1 July 1905	16 December 1906
38		Victor H. Metcalf	California	17 December 1906	30 November 1908
39		Truman Handy Newberry	Michigan	1 December 1908	4 March 1909
40		George von Lengerke Meyer	Massachusetts	6 March 1909	4 March 1913		William Howard Taft (1909–1913)
41		Josephus Daniels	North Carolina	5 March 1913	4 March 1921		Woodrow Wilson (1913–1921)
42		Edwin Denby	Michigan	6 March 1921	10 March 1924		Warren G. Harding (1921–1923)
							Calvin Coolidge (1923–1929)
Acting		Theodore Roosevelt Jr.		10 March 1924	19 March 1924
43		Curtis D. Wilbur	California	19 March 1924	4 March 1929
44		Charles Francis Adams III	Massachusetts	5 March 1929	4 March 1933		Herbert Hoover (1929–1933)
45		Claude A. Swanson	Virginia	4 March 1933	7 July 1939		Franklin D. Roosevelt (1933–1945)
46		Charles Edison	New Jersey	7 July 1939	2 January 1940
				2 January 1940	24 June 1940
Acting		Lewis Compton		24 June 1940	11 July 1940
47		Frank Knox	Illinois	11 July 1940	28 April 1944
Acting		Ralph Austin Bard		28 April 1944	19 May 1944
48		James Forrestal	New York	19 May 1944	17 September 1947
							Harry S. Truman (1945–1953)
49		John Sullivan	New Hampshire	18 September 1947	24 May 1949
50		Francis P. Matthews	Nebraska	25 May 1949	10 August 1949

Military Department (Department of Defense), 1949–present

  Denotes an Acting United States Secretary of the Navy

No.	Portrait	Name	Term of office			President(s)
			Start	End	Duration
50		Francis P. Matthews	10 August 1949	31 July 1951	797		Harry S. Truman (1945–1953)
51		Dan A. Kimball	31 July 1951	20 January 1953	539
52		Robert Anderson	4 February 1953	3 March 1954	392		Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953–1961)
53		Charles Thomas	3 May 1954	1 April 1957	1064
54		Thomas S. Gates Jr.	1 April 1957	8 June 1959	798
55		William B. Franke	8 June 1959	19 January 1961	591
56		John Connally	25 January 1961	20 December 1961	329		John F. Kennedy (1961–1963)
57		Fred Korth	4 January 1962	1 November 1963	666
Acting		Paul B. Fay	2 November 1963	28 November 1963	26
							Lyndon B. Johnson (1963–1969)
58		Paul Nitze	29 November 1963	30 June 1967	1309
Acting		Charles F. Baird	1 July 1967	31 August 1967	61
59		Paul Ignatius	1 September 1967	24 January 1969	511
							Richard Nixon (1969–1974)
60		John Chafee	31 January 1969	4 May 1972	1189
61		John Warner	4 May 1972	8 April 1974	704
62		J. William Middendorf	8 April 1974	20 January 1977	1018
							Gerald Ford (1974–1977)
63		W. Graham Claytor Jr.	14 February 1977	24 August 1979	921		Jimmy Carter (1977–1981)
64		Edward Hidalgo	24 October 1979	20 January 1981	454
65		John Lehman	5 February 1981	10 April 1987	2255		Ronald Reagan (1981–1989)
66		Jim Webb	1 May 1987	23 February 1988	298
67		William L. Ball	28 March 1988	15 May 1989	413
							George H. W. Bush (1989–1993)
68		Henry L. Garrett III	15 May 1989	26 June 1992	1138
Acting		Daniel Howard	26 June 1992	7 July 1992	11
69		Sean O'Keefe	7 July 1992	2 October 1992	87
			2 October 1992	20 January 1993	110
Acting		Frank Kelso	20 January 1993	21 July 1993	182		Bill Clinton (1993–2001)
70		John H. Dalton	22 July 1993	16 November 1998	1943
71		Richard Danzig	16 November 1998	20 January 2001	796
Acting		Robert B. Pirie Jr.	20 January 2001	24 May 2001	124		George W. Bush (2001–2009)
72		Gordon R. England	24 May 2001	30 January 2003	616
Acting		Susan Livingstone	30 January 2003	7 February 2003	8
Acting		Hansford T. Johnson	7 February 2003	30 September 2003	235
73		Gordon R. England	1 October 2003	29 December 2005[13]	820
Acting		Dionel M. Aviles	29 December 2005[13]	3 January 2006[13]	5
74		Donald C. Winter	3 January 2006[13]	13 March 2009[14]	1165
							Barack Obama (2009–2017)
Acting		B. J. Penn	13 March 2009[14]	19 May 2009[15]	67
75		Ray Mabus	19 May 2009[14]	20 January 2017	2803
Acting		Sean Stackley	20 January 2017	3 August 2017	195		Donald Trump (2017–2021)
76		Richard V. Spencer	3 August 2017	15 July 2019	711
Acting		Thomas Modly	15 July 2019	31 July 2019	16
76		Richard V. Spencer	31 July 2019	24 November 2019	116
Acting		Thomas Modly	24 November 2019	7 April 2020	135
Acting		James E. McPherson	7 April 2020	29 May 2020	52
77		Kenneth Braithwaite	29 May 2020[16]	20 January 2021	236
Acting		Thomas Harker	20 January 2021	9 August 2021	201		Joe Biden (2021–2025)
78		Carlos Del Toro	9 August 2021	20 January 2025	1260
Acting		Terence Emmert	20 January 2025	25 March 2025	64		Donald Trump (2025–present)
79		John Phelan	25 March 2025	Incumbent	48

See also

• Military awards of the United States Department of the Navy
• Secretary of the Navy Council of Review Boards
• Stephen Mallory, the only Secretary of the Navy of the Confederate States of America