American political scientist and historian who was a leading authority on public administration.

White graduated from Dartmouth College and received his Ph.D from the University of Chicago in 1921. He served on the University of Chicago (Chicago, University of) faculty from 1920 to 1956 and was chairman of the political science department in 1940–48. He wrote the first textbook on public administration, Introduction to the Study of Public Administration (1926), and a definitive four-volume history of American administration: The Federalists (1948), The Jeffersonians (1951), The Jacksonians (1954), and The Republican Era, 1869–1901 (1958). The last of these was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for history in 1959. In addition to his teaching and writing, he served on numerous administrative boards and commissions. He was one of the founders of the Public Administration Review, serving as its editor-in-chief in 1940–41.