Nixon, Bobst & Ehrlichman on Cancer research and National Institutes of Health

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Now, I'll be sure to get them.

very effective defense of our withdrawal program with Vietnam veterans this past week from the accounts, from all accounts who were slated

Closet.

I'm very grateful for the strong support we've given to our revenue sharing program.

I realize that your statements have been particularly helpful to me because, not only because you represent, not only because you are the

In fact, because you are, you represent one of the nation's greatest cities.

People of nation's greatest cities.

But also, because of the

We are making progress in the Congress.

Sorry.

I think what's gonna happen is they start...

It's hard to be against that.

But on the other hand, you see a lot of the bearded weirdos.

What do you think?

What's your reaction?

Oh, I know.

I know the drivers and cab drivers and everyone.

Well, you just walk around.

Tourists who planned and wanted to come to Washington at the time.

And then also,

television is really doing itself a disservice in my thinking.

I think people are getting sick to death seeing nothing on television but those songs.

Really?

Because they're all available.

I heard one week they ran into that fellow, Larry Harry, so much.

He was very, very good, they say.

Very articulate.

He was a full-blown.

Well, you know what?

He wasn't living.

You're gonna be run by a bunch of goddamn rabble.

Don't you agree?

I certainly do.

Is it off here, then?

I think he is, so... Because Adam was talking and he wanted to get Trish.

She hadn't called me, so I thought I'd talk with her.

He asked me whether Trish would buy a nice pin like he got Julie, if you remember.

It was a beautiful diamond pin.

Trish said one, that she wanted some money.

Oh, God, he can't get around it.

Uh, she wants, she says to buy that furniture.

Well, if I have a furniture to buy her something, he must give her something.

No, I don't want her asking.

Not mine.

Oh, Pat, the church told me to save that check for the check.

But, gee, if he gives her that side check, then it's a...

He paid a lot for Julie's pin, I know.

Oh, yes.

or, you know, some small thing.

She didn't want him to pick it up.

No, no, no.

Let her pick it.

There are ways that you can do it.

It really can't be.

I hope you're right, though.

I've got to sit around here.

They'll see through this horrible attitude of the television.

The way they get tired is they get tired of campaigns, which are not...

They do get tired of seeing the runoff rallies.

They want people to be there to help refer them, but it's nice to turn that on.

They're tired when they go home.

Yeah, like when I spoke to the Chamber of Commerce, they were pleased because I told them things were going to be better.

Also, they were pleased because I said these damn welfare people, they didn't work here to make any welfare.

That's right.

These kids who were sitting around in the parks and looking like bums...

Well, they wouldn't have had to bet off his parents or the Communist Party or somebody who weren't giving them money to keep them going.

They had to get out of America.

They just wouldn't be able to do all that.

And I already agreed to fight for college.

Yeah, that's right.

That's very interesting.

You have some interesting rhetoric about it from people.

Of course.

Beautiful.

Even in his past, his crime.

One thing that was kind of interesting was the very interesting play that the little, well, there's a little dead boy in the other one.

He's a cute little guy.

They didn't use the best picture, but when he was smiling, it was very cute.

There's a lot of comment about that.

That was very good.

With the little dog.

And...

Terry, it's your horse, isn't it?

Terry, it's your horse, yeah.

He told me that he was asking me a little bit about what you were like, and then he said... Was he your own man?

Yes.

Well, I think he saw the little boy, and he saw also the little girl, you know, yesterday, the little cystic fibrosis child.

And he said this little child was, he said he remarked how great he was as a boy, and then he said the little girl was so frightened, you know, so passionate.

Well, this is, you know, I said, nobody, a lot of people never believe me when I say that the president's basically shy.

He put himself in that child's place.

He knew how she felt.

And he said, well, he really did, because he said it was just marvelous.

Before long, she was just relaxed and had a good picture.

Later on, I went to see me, and she was a cute little person.

Yes, music mentioned, and that's why you said that.

But the little boy wasn't real.

Please be seated.

I will thank you very much.

That's it.

I don't want to argue any harder because I'm in the wrong room.

We use the other room for the booze.

Well, I had a long meeting before we met with you with my domestic counsel.

And I told them, I don't know if they told you, I got some tea.

They said, this is T. Monson, who is one of the greats.

Well, you've been very kind.

I told you more about this cancer than anybody else.

And this is probably true.

Well, yes, it's true.

And there are a couple of things that I don't know whether they got around to telling you.

One, that you're a server on that committee, if you will.

We're setting up a...

was one that you liked.

Did they mention a man that they were taking on for this program?

What's his name?

No, to run the cancer thing.

He's a guy that you... What the heck is his name?

He's...

Now, there is a man, apparently, that you've known very well, that they are the best man to run.

I told them to run the thing.

You didn't get a chance to.

You don't know who we're talking about yet.

They didn't mention any names.

See, I came here because the leaders in this town,

one article to 150 newspapers, and the returns of yesterday, the first day, were 200,000 telegrams to the Senate.

I don't know what you mean just to be right.

Zero.

how I fit in.

I had put Huff in the room to resign.

She's president.

I had developed that company.

Actually, I did first for her.

Now, then it became known to Albert Lasker and Eric Johnson.

You remember the Eric Johnson?

Very personable pal.

Oh, sweet guy.

And they worked on me to become the head of New

bonds, which I still have.

My service is then going back from the beginning of the war to the present time.

And I... That's right, I respect you.

That's right.

The bonds, they were one way.

God knows it's a good thing I put into it.

So, what club was that we met at that time?

It was a spring league club.

Was that a spring league?

Yeah.

So, I finally decided,

Can't breathe.

Now, this is a new cause.

Don't sit back.

once in the inflation in New York.

Today, in New Jersey, there's 30,000 of the type of the top of the inflation in New Jersey.

Within a couple of weeks, I'm chairman of the executive committee.

and the tobacco company threw me main thing, although he hates my guts, because I threw him out.

Murphy was another, he was the head of the Rockefeller

There's only one room in Empire State.

So out of that, with 40-year-old women, as the Army throughout the United States, 40,000, not 40, and a commander, a woman, in the headquarters, we have today 2,500,000 workers educated, trained, going from house to house each year

doing what I told them to do, talk about cancer, give your knowledge to people, what they should do to send danger signals before you ask them for money.

I said, what do you

I collected $5 million in 1945, hitting the campaign.

I have them on outside aid.

And outside aid the next year, $7,500.

Then I eliminated that and ran it with the committee of our own.

And still, step by step, after 10 years on the committee, campaign and giving

They're letting now about $70 million a year.

And I think I told you that I made 12 speeches in Europe.

Yeah, I told you that, yeah.

And I came back and I decided these people, they want to do something, they will have to do it.

that I put up myself, and we've got over 25 scientists and people involved with cancer.

And we got to an annual meeting, and before we got through, we were seated and having the board of directors go bigger.

They had to discipline me for three years, you see.

So we had the affiliation.

We have 78 countries and about 140 societies that are affiliated with America getting to

and receiving lives all over the world.

I've spoken in Tokyo, in Bigaroo, in Athens, in Rio, in Venezuela, Mexico, I mean, in Kansas City.

Now, I said to these gentlemen upstairs,

and then you get something done.

I'll give you two examples.

This is back in the 20s, just then.

What's the name of that doctor?

California, he, I forget, we have a drink somewhere or whatnot.

But he has to correspond with me.

And Mike DeBakey, who is also a close friend of mine.

High one day, 1930.

as they found out with the cost, the sum of small and little parties and say, how much taxes have been paid on cigarettes during these years.

And they need to have it.

My attention has been paid to this subject before, but no one has done anything about it.

But it's my intention today to have this meeting approve of a plan which should prove

to defend me.

And he said, Mr. Bush is not out of order.

I have already written on this stuff and I have data.

I told them, I said, we are collecting money from the public of the United States, and we owe them every good information we can give them that's going to keep them from getting cancer.

And certainly this is one.

And I think very strongly that it's going to be proven that there's a relationship.

So I appointed a committee, and then assigned to the committee, and then an implementation

non-smokers, and we had three control groups.

Those they would have to cancel at work.

And those, we had two men from Yale, statisticians.

We hired one of the students with the drank song.

And even after the first year,

communication.

Third year, without doubt, everybody's sufficient.

All the information the department has, everything throughout the world has come from my working group, and we're still doing it.

Now, this thing in itself would, in my opinion, be one of the great accomplishments of the American Catholic Society.

It would never have come to me through the

It is a sort of individualistic project.

But I have a room.

And I determined to sit there and do it.

And I made it come into being.

Now, they are totally 55,000.

If you smoke a pack a day, your checks will cancel longer, 14 times.

A non-smoker.

You smoke two packs, it goes up to about 20, and so on.

However, we also

So we kept track of coronaries.

And today, what hard societies usually are, are finding coronary, back in the day, you would have about two to three times the chance of a coronary against a lung smoker.

If you smoke with that today, you can go up to 10, 12, 14 times.

because science worked almost as one when they hit it properly, you know.

And so, now let me go to another thing, which I think is extremely important.

I have kept very close control of the research.

No research had been ever done in cancer until I started it in 1945.

I mean, on any scale.

Individual institutions must

We thought we did

either I'd come to Washington or I'd come to New York.

And I found after a year or so that this is not working at all.

Their interest was lax, and it was a secondary thing.

So we took it onto ourselves to handle gut-competent people, and we fell out of it.

We could, uh, we could, uh, how many of them are those?

There are, there are 12.

There are 12 teams, huh?

Uh, why don't we just delete them all?

I said, let me tell you what has happened.

You, your dean, has taken everything that might be related to cancer, as you're doing now, and have been doing right along, and have put it in a bundle, and he has asked for $175,000 for something not new, but something he's been doing.

How can we find the cause of cancer, of a cure, by going along the lines you're doing?

every dollar that the American Cancer Society gave for research probably

Your men who go out in the field and to determine the quality of the research and so on, they haven't the knowledge.

And they're not dedicated.

They're almost flippant in their replies to you when you ask them as I ask them.

What competence?

What do you mean by competence?

What competence in that research organization?

I don't know.

Well, that's on the panel.

We don't know what you mean.

Who has it?

What does he know about cancer?

with no particular outstanding accomplishment in NIH with the, they have spent now well over a billion, I don't know, a billion, I have no more, I can't be certain.

Nothing that they can point to.

which they've done well, and in medical education, which they have done well, but they've been using cancer money for these two things and not for research in cancer.

I would say 75% has been for the time to get up there to the top.

I had an entire meeting in Washington because it took up too much time, a couple of days.

But in New York, I have.

And here's the way that it should be run.

First of all, it should be open to the public.

It should be visible, what is being done.

The public should know, basically, by the tremendous

I heard it.

It was resounding.

Because it means something to everybody.

There's no controversy about it.

It's the one thing that's not controversial at all.

They don't send it to intelligence.

and they're not too old, and who are dedicated, and call their shots.

I'm not the father.

I'm the father who put it into real action.

Do you know, do you, have you ever sat down and talked to this fellow captain to judge him to see what he's like?

I know what happened.

I know, let me ask you to do that.

I want to take a look at it.

We'll have a look at it.

That's what I'm just bringing.

I'm going to hang here for a minute.

Have a seat upstairs.

He was here yesterday.

He wants his job after retirement.

I don't know why.

Oh, he doesn't have it.

But, uh, the manager, he always has a deal with the manager.

He just makes a hell of a lot of planning.

It takes a business man.

It's a little dustiness to lay out a plan.

You should be laid out exactly as I laid out our plans.

And we've done very well.

I was 61 years of age when I found out.

This is going to move you about a billion-fold, a hundred-and-a-half-fold or 50-million-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-thousand-th

That's a new kind of, uh, that's a paperweight.

We're in a presidential paperweight with the seat of a million and a half million people.

And here's, here's the, uh, here's the timeline.

Now you've got everything you can get in them.

Good Lord.

Come on, here's the keychain.

Uh, come in a minute, John, because, you know, John, John, let me, let me just talk to you about the fact that these people I got to see in a couple minutes here.

I've got a different case in New York.

This will take a minute.

I just want to get a couple of points across.

John, consider that I do feel strongly about it.

First, that I hang out with Dr. Cross earlier.

First, I do not have the confidence in NIH to define assets.

I think you can show any significant breakthrough they've made.

I'd like to see it.

Now, I don't think they've made many.

Now, the second point, but anyway, I want to take a look at that before we go too far on that.

The second point is...

Ah, well, I think

the point is that, and I'm not sure we should understand, but also we've got to look at the track record of other money that has been poured in there.

What the hell becomes of it?

How much of it goes to who we have?

How much of it goes to the organization running?

I really do want to harder to take an attitude.

I heard that column here.

It will not work.

That I know.

I know.

I know what else happened previously.

And I just want you to just, I think if you take a look at these and put them online, it will be worth it.

I mean, Albert can see this all the time.

Unless, you know, he's going back to California.

What is he, a doctor?

He's a, he's a,

Yeah.

Well, wait a minute.

What do you think we're gonna do?

about, uh, research and smoking.

Well, it's almost like I'm destroying it.

You know, in that case, it's kind of something out of the chin of your face, right?

It's more a relation to the, uh, the cigarettes that crack up.

Well, I don't think it's, uh, in order to create impressions, uh, something can be done when there's an individual, when an organization can respond to the individual.

That's right.

And we do it like this.

Right.

Well, we like your, your outlook, too.

Yeah.

Do you want to stop by C. Rose?

Oh, you saw her, right?

I didn't know you were doing a track like that, Spock.

Isn't that a bit...

I don't know.

You saw her, right?

I didn't know you were doing a track like that, Spock.

Isn't that a bit...

I don't know.

You saw her, right?

Nixon, Bobst & Ehrlichman on Cancer research and National Institutes of Health

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Nixon Library Finding Aid

Also recorded on April 27, 1971

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