In a 2009 speech, President Obama stated that he has "directed the Office of Management and Budget, the Domestic Policy Council, the National Economic Council and the Office of Urban Affairs to conduct the first comprehensive interagency review in 30 years of how the federal government approaches and funds urban and metropolitan areas so that we can start having a concentrated, focused, strategic approach to federal efforts to revitalize our metropolitan areas." This paper summarizes a rapid scan of available literature to describe what actually happened 30 years ago as the Carter administration conducted that earlier review and policy formulation process.