Conversation 002-040

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Hello.

Yes, sir.

John, are you home or at the office?

I'm still at the office.

Oh, that's too bad.

Too bad.

With regard to this matter, Bob just raised it with me just before I came over at the House with regard to what we do on the things tomorrow.

My own feeling is that we should not anticipate the trouble and move for legislation before...

something happens I'd like to I'd like to get it snarled up a bit and then move strongly now that's that's just my hunch but the thing is that last week the thing having not been handled too well I my judgment may not be very good I didn't really handle it last week as you know I I didn't know that I just assumed Mitchell and all the rest were doing it and it wasn't too well

What's your hunch?

What do you think?

I must say that the reaction of Russell Long was so violent about this thing today that I think just let these guys take a little gigging.

They showed up as a very raunchy outfit on the television tonight.

How did it come off?

Well, not very well.

The television, of course, was trying just a second.

Thank you.

I was going to say, I bet Bob a dollar the television wouldn't show the Rachi ones.

Well, they showed some of them, but they softened it a good deal.

They didn't describe the profanity in the gallery and any of that sort of thing.

Well, there you are, yeah.

But did show them in the halls and all that sort of thing up there.

So they came off rather well on television.

I think they came off better than they should have, considering what they pulled.

The...

We just had a meeting on this, as you may know, down Bob's office.

I think the general conclusion that we've all come to is that we should not seek an injunction or anything of that kind at all.

That we should not call out troops.

No, God, no.

And that we would leave... Don't let us have martial war about the war.

Hell no.

We just leave this to Jerry Wilson and the police department to conduct their affairs in the normal way.

And he feels that he can handle this with uniformed officers within reasonable limits.

They arrest people that obstruct traffic, don't they?

That's right.

And they get off with a $10 fine or something of that kind.

Now, if there's violence or anything of that sort, then you respond.

And the chances are that the Congress would respond at that point with a stiffer law.

Well, let me say this.

There's no damn congressman's center gonna vote against it.

That's right.

Except Birch Bayh, maybe.

Oh, I see.

These fellas will get off with a misdemeanor.

It's anywhere from $10 to $25 for obstructing traffic.

And that's not much of a deterrent.

Matter of fact, their directions to their protesters say that they should not post bail and that they should try and clog up the jail facilities.

So this gets to be a little contest as to how many jails we can find within 50 miles.

But we can find plenty of them.

And my feeling is that Jerry Wilson ought to be told that this is a police problem, we have a lot of confidence in him, and that he just, you know.

We'll back him up.

Sure, and that he would handle this as he would any similar difficulty.

Yeah, but let's face it, it isn't as bad as Berkeley has had or San Francisco has had yet.

I think that you can expect that these people will be in very massive numbers and that probably this police department will be swamped.

They will not be able to handle the numbers.

What do you mean, massive numbers?

Oh, I think in any one of these 20 intersections, you'll have anywhere from 700 to 1,000, 1,500, something of that kind.

Who's organizing them?

It's a highly structured operation, and it's quite beautifully organized, actually, by Rennie Davis and a whole group of more or less professional organizers that have been at this for a long time.

Why did Humphrey take...

what it seemed to me rather a soft line in trying to clear the galleries in if it was Rennie Davis and that group.

I don't know.

He later went out on the lawn and talked with them and they made a fool of him.

How'd they do that?

That wasn't on television.

Yeah, it was.

He was standing talking to them and some fella came up and made a V sign over his head and he looked like a rabbit, you know.

And they continued to do that and they were all laughing at him behind him and of course he couldn't see it while he was playing to the camera.

You know, it's rather ironic that Buckley should be the one in the chair when they cleared the galleries.

Of all people.

Of course, the Senate is now out until Thursday.

They've adjourned until Thursday.

And the expectation is that they'll bear down pretty hard on the House tomorrow.

Well, the House's rules are tougher.

Yeah.

Aren't they?

Well, I think they are.

I think the Speaker will not brook any nonsense, you know.

Throw them the hell out of it.

Yeah.

But that just may precipitate this thing so that by the time the Senate comes back Thursday or Friday, the thing will be up to a point, you know, and the Congress will do something.

Do you anticipate this sort of thing all week, John?

Yes.

Because I'm trying to listen to the press conference.

Yes, I think so.

I think so.

I think I've got to go forward with the press conference.

I agree.

As a matter of fact, I think it would be very opportune, because you get some questions about this, and I think you get a chance to whack it.

Whack it hard and not praise the other one.

That's right.

I think this kind of demonstration is unconscionable, and we're not going to be affected by it.

The question in my mind is whether you can afford to be away on Monday.

Because that's the first day of the obstructions, when they plan to block the bridges and so forth.

I think I should come back.

I'm inclined to think you should.

I think you should be here, and that seemed to be the consensus at the meeting just now.

I'm all for it.

The, uh, Dick Moore... Oh, could I come back, uh... Sunday night, something of that kind, early Monday morning, maybe.

But I don't have to be here all day Monday, do I?

Uh, the blockage would be from 7 a.m. till noon.

Then I should come back Sunday night.

Well, I think if you were simply to announce your itinerary about now so that it was obvious that you were planning to come back Monday all the time, then it wouldn't matter too much what time you got in on Monday.

Yeah.

I'll be back Monday, right.

That lets me...

I'd like to have a couple of days off in California, Saturday and Sunday.

And then get on the plane Monday morning and get back here and get back about 3 or 4 in the afternoon.

And by the time you get here, why, the thing will have had its first spasm.

Good.

I'll do it.

I'll be back.

And we can then take a...

I just soon be back here.

I'd like to be in the fight.

Well, I think symbolically, particularly if you have to go to the Congress for relief, you ought to be here.

Good.

I'm delighted.

I couldn't agree more with it.

Did you talk to Connolly by any chance?

Yes, I did.

And he knew about Borch's opposition, and he had already begun to build a backfire on it.

Good.

Because Borch needed some help from the Ex-Im Bank for some country to buy his generators.

And Connolly has to sign off on it.

Good for him.

So he's already at work, and he may be able to damp it off.

But he's for going ahead with what we're doing.

He feels we have to.

He doesn't feel we have any alternative.

Well, let's do it, John.

Sail right on.

Yeah, I indicated to him that my call was in no way a second guess on that.

No, no, no.

It was simply to advise him of what the problems were.

That's right, and that I had no second guesses, too.

Yeah, well, I didn't even intimate that you did, you know.

You were simply informing him that Bartsch had called you.

That's right.

No.

That's right.

And he was hard-line and firm.

Yep.

Good.

Yep.

He just doesn't see any way around it.

Let me ask you this.

The Cabinet meeting tomorrow, what is scheduled?

Well, we're going to have Elliot Richardson for 10 minutes presenting the White House Conference on Youth report.

And then the balance is Jim Hodgson talking about the various steps we're taking on unemployment and manpower training.

and he's got quite a good uh quite an interesting and and somewhat hopeful presentation and uh factually very helpful in understanding what the problem is what about uh having somebody go on

at the end about this demonstration thing?

Or are the cabinets likely to have silly ideas?

I'm afraid so.

And I think perhaps the only thing would be if you would tie it up at the end by simply saying that you don't feel it's appropriate for anybody to speak out on this, that we ought to maintain a position of rectitude on it and so on and just lie low.

I'll tell you what I'd like to do.

I'll throw it to you.

You make the statement.

All right.

Tell them that you have studied it through at my request, as you know, counsel and all that, and that we feel it's very important now that everybody say nothing and let it be handled at this level.

All right.

And clear it with John Mitchell so he backs you up.

All right.

I sure will.

Good.

That's good.

Okay, John.

That's fine.

This is fine.

We'll go back Sunday.

Very good.