Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 5 › Conversation 005-081
Nixon phone call with Colson on Pentagon Papers and New York Times
Tuesday, June 15, 1971 · 6:21 PM–6:27 PM ET · White House Telephone · 6 min
AI Summary
President Nixon and Charles W. Colson discussed strategies to generate public and political backlash against the New York Times following its publication of the Pentagon Papers. Nixon directed Colson to mobilize support from constituent groups like veterans and labor unions, while encouraging congressional allies to publicly condemn the leaks as a threat to national security and government integrity. The conversation focused on framing the issue not as a debate over the public's right to know, but as a dangerous act of disloyalty that compromised classified contingency plans and empowered the nation's enemies.
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Mr. President, I have Mr. Colson for you.
Yes, sir, Mr. President.
I was thinking on this New York Times thing.
Maybe you could generate some support from some of our constituent groups on this.
Like, for example, I think veterans and...
Yes, sir.
And a fellow like Meany ought to pop up on this one, you know.
I mean, and also, I think that on the congressional side, that what is really needed, here's a great opportunity for a young congressman or a rigorous congressman and or senator or so to really go all out on a thing like this, you know.
Now, they have the privilege of the, you know, what they have is, of course,
they can say anything they please on the floor, and even though the case is going to be in the courts, we're going to be stuck with it.
But on the other hand, we can't say much.
But I think it's very important to build a backfire on these people.
Understand, I personally think that if we cast this in the right direction, Chuck, this could backfire on the Times.
Oh, I think absolutely.
They're playing to their own constituency.
Now,
We've got to get across several points.
One, it's the Kennedy-Johnson papers, basically.
That's what we're talking about, the Kennedy-Johnson papers, and that gets it out of our way.
Second, it's a family quarrel.
We're not going to comment on it.
But what we have is the larger responsibility...
to maintain the integrity of government.
Wholly unrelated to these papers.
And wholly unrelated to the integrity of government, like as Roger said in his press conferences, he had inquiries from foreign governments today as to whether their papers were classified.
And that this also involves, it really does involve this.
I mean, it really involves the ability to conduct government.
How the hell can a president or a secretary of defense or anybody do anything?
That's right.
And how can you make a contingency plan if it's going to be taken out in the trunk and given to a goddamn newspaper?
Well, I don't think there's any question, Mr. President.
My own feeling is that it will backfire against the New York Times, and we can help generate this.
As a matter of fact, we have a meeting going on at the moment that I came out of to talk to you.
All right, fine.
Well, then go ahead and meet.
No, no.
The purpose of it is to generate some editorials in the other newspapers that are highly critical, like the Chicago Tribune.
ought to give us a good play.
The New York Daily News should.
Sure.
Well, Hearst Papers refused to print it.
That's right.
And they subscribed.
They ought to take it on.
But the papers, the newspaper establishment ought to come.
They've got to say whether they're going to approve this kind of thing.
Also, I think a network ought to step up for this one.
Strangely enough, one of the most outspoken fellows in the meeting that we've just been holding on this very subject is Ray Price, who thinks that the New York Times is totally irresponsible.
He's a decent man.
That's the reason.
He's a man of integrity.
That's right.
We can certainly get the veterans groups.
You know, I think some of them should...
They ought to cast this...
Listen, the main thing is to cast it in terms of doing something disloyal to the country.
That's right.
This risks our men, you know, just all that sort of thing.
Secret things that aid and comfort to the enemy.
I mean, after all...
I think the Times' position is indefensible.
I think that it's distinguishable from any other case.
in that here we went to them and said, you can't publish that.
It's a violation of security.
And they said, the hell with you.
We're going ahead and publish anyway.
So we would have been very, very remiss in our duties had we not taken whatever legal means were available to prevent it.
I think you'll find a great deal of popular support for it.
If we can generate.
Now, they're running the line, Chuck, of right to know.
Raise that with Price.
Ask him, how do you answer right to know?
That's, of course, a goddamn code word, right to know.
The public has no right to know secret documents.
I don't want to know.
No, of course not.
And you can make the point that right to know...
does not include things which will compromise the security of the nation.
And freedom of the press is not the freedom to destroy the integrity of the government.
In these kinds of issues, Mr. President, you never get into the argument of degree.
You're either a little bit pregnant or you're not.
That's right.
And if it were the battle plan for the withdrawal of troops next week that could subject boys to attack...
Well, there'd be no argument about it.
Now, the integrity of the system as a whole is at stake.
Right.
You simply cannot allow a newspaper to publish classified data.
If they justify this, then in any future case, then the publisher of a paper will put himself, that was really what Alger Hiss did, you see.
That's right.
He put himself on a higher pedestal and said, well, the Russians are entitled to know this.
And he passed the information.
And the New York Times, it was among the papers that supported him in that.
That's right.
Now, the point is that
Here, what the Times has done is placed itself above the law.
They say the law provides this, but we consider this an immoral war.
It's our responsibility to print it.
Now, God damn it, you can't have that thing in a free country.
That's irrelevant.
And the right to know issue doesn't really come in there.
Well, pour it on.
We'll pour it on.
We're coming up with... Get some congressmen stirred up.
We'll get the Congress and some editorials and our groups.
Yes, sir.
NARA Description
On June 15, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon and Charles W. Colson talked on the telephone from 6:21 pm to 6:27 pm. The White House Telephone taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 005-081 of the White House Tapes.
Nixon Library Finding Aid
Conversation No. 5-81
Date: June 15, 1971
Time: 6:21 pm - 6:27 pm
Location: White House Telephone
The President talked with Charles W. Colson.
[See Conversation No. 261-4]
White House operator
New York Times and Pentagon Papers
-Support for administration
-Veterans
-George Meany
-Congress
-Lyndon B. Johnson, John F. Kennedy, papers
-Integrity of government
-William P. Rogers’ press conference, June 15
-Contingency planning
-Chicago Tribune
-New York Daily News
-Hearst newspapers
-Television networks
-Raymond K. Price, Jr.'s views
-Actions
-Treason
-Violation of security
-Public's right to know versus national security
-Freedom of the press
-Alger Hiss
-Congressional oppositionAlso recorded on June 15, 1971
- 261-004 6:21 PM · 4 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Charles W. Colson met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building from 6:21 pm to 6:27 pm.
- 005-082 6:28 PM · 22 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at 6:28 pm.
- 261-005 6:28 PM · 23 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at 6:28 pm.
- 005-083 6:29 PM · 12 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at 6:29 pm.
- 005-084 6:29 PM · 5 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 6:29 pm and 6:34 pm.
- 261-006 6:29 PM · 28 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at 6:29 pm.
- 005-085 6:34 PM · 7 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at 6:34 pm.
- 261-007 6:34 PM · 7 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator met in the President's office in the Old Executive Office Building at 6:34 pm.
Cite this conversation
Conversation 005-081, June 15, 1971. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/005-081 (accessed October 5, 2026).