On December 19, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon, Charles W. Colson, and unknown person(s) talked on the telephone from 3:10 pm to 3:36 pm. The White House Telephone taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 016-120 of the White House Tapes.
Transcript (AI-Generated)This transcript was generated automatically by AI and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite this transcript as authoritative. Consult the Finding Aid above for verified information.
Hello.
Mr. President, Mr. Colson.
Hello.
Good afternoon, Mr. President.
I thought you'd be at the football game.
No, I'm just staying home doing a little reading.
Oh, my God.
Well, that's a good thing in a Sunday.
Yeah.
Well, I just got back from New York.
I've got to leave the studying for my time people in about an hour.
Ah, good for the connection with the man of the year.
Yeah.
Well, I think that will set the time well for Thanksgiving.
Oh, yes.
Well, they'll be a good impact.
I hope so.
You sure dropped a few bombshells in the last 24 hours.
Just a second.
Well, the really big thing, of course, it is not understood by people, but it's a really massive achievement is what Connolly did with that group of 10, you know.
he he shoved that thing i really didn't think he'd make it this trip i thought he'd take another meeting but he just beat him and cajoled him and finally got an agreement and then that's
on the canadian just let them out they well they just they're gonna float and uh right we've had some pretty strong harsh words with them this morning privately and publicly and i say publicly in this i understand uh very hard and uh if they float then uh that's then we have to just make our trade deal separately is that it right that's correct well so uh
Now the Swedes, they're backing out.
God damn it.
They're no good anyway.
Well, they've met, you know, and they talk about, they've talked to Denmark and they've talked to Norway, and they've all been having cabins all night.
And they say, well, all they can stand is 7 to 7.5 percent devaluation.
I said, well, we're not going to do that.
We're going to do 8.57.
So they say, well, they may have to devalue a point or two.
So I don't think that'll make any difference.
That isn't going to change our deal that much.
No, it won't change ours if it doesn't change the European community, you see.
Every one of these damn things relates to the other.
It's like a house of cards.
So all I'm saying is that it's now 3 o'clock.
It'll be a miracle if we can get this thing by 4, although we're now circulating...
A memorandum of agreement.
If we can get these damn phone calls through around here, maybe we can wrap this thing up.
We'll try.
We'll get word to you immediately when we can, because I think it would be awfully important if we can do this.
Yes.
It would be better to get it done now, really.
Well, we're just moving ahead.
And then get out the trade thing later, particularly since you've got the Japanese.
What the hell?
We're...
That's a move on the trade.
I don't know.
We're playing a hard line on it, so we haven't moved off anything.
Right.
But all I'm saying is we may run out of time, but we'll try to do it.
Yes, sir.
Just the earliest possible moment.
As I said, I have to leave here at about 540.
Yes, sir.
But I'll stay right to the last minute.
All right.
Well, that's fine, and I'll report back to you just as soon as I can.
Okay.
Thank you.
Could you try Mrs. Bartley now, please?
Yes, sir.
Hello.
I have Mrs. Hartley on.
Hello, Mr. President.
Hello.
Al Haig was telling me that you were finishing 30 years of work for the government today, and I just wanted to know how much we appreciated it.
That's right, sir, and thank you very much.
We appreciate it.
You've been really a tower of strength for us over there, and that...
I must say, that's a real hot box where you work, isn't it?
Well, I've enjoyed every minute of it.
Yeah, yeah, right down in the salt mine.
Well, we do appreciate it, and what you do for Al and Henry and the rest has been a very great assistance.
We hope that it will soon be recognized every place.
Thank you very much, sir.
Thank you, and have a good day.
Bye.
Bye.
Secretary Connolly, please.
Thank you, sir.
I think we've got it wrapped up.
We were just trying to put the final touches on the communique, so nothing embarrassing.
We still do not have the tables that we need, but I think you can come over.
I tell you what I've done.
I've delayed my New York departure.
I was able to do some finagling with the...
motorcade up there.
I delayed it 20 minutes, so if I could come now.
How long does it take to get from here?
About 10 minutes.
And then if I could get away from there by 10 minutes until 6.
6 is about as late as that.
You can certainly do that.
We're in executive session.
May I suggest to you that you come right now, that you come right on in.
And congratulate everybody.
Congratulate them and meet them.
And then if you wish, I would strongly recommend that you
We'll escort the whole group of the press.
Escort the group to the press.
And then who, I'll say a word.
Just brag on them.
Oh, I am.
What they've done, that this was the most, not only the most historic, the most difficult, the most far-reaching.
And the only time it's ever been done in the history of nations, where we sat down and arranged this complicated, a realignment of rates.
Yeah, right.
Never been anything like it.
Good.
All right, I'm on the way.
All right, sir.
Thank you.
Colson, please.
Hello?
Hello?
I thought you'd be at the football game.
No, I'm just staying home doing a little reading.
Oh, my God.
Well, I just got back from New York.
I've got to be studying for my time people in about an hour.
Yeah.
Well, I think that will, at any time, well, thank you.
Oh, yes.
Well, they'll be a good impact.
I hope so.
You sure dropped a few bombshells in the last 24 hours.
Just a second.
Well, the really big thing, of course, it is not understood by people, but it's a really massive achievement is what Connolly did with that group of 10, you know.
He shoved that thing.
I really didn't think he'd make it this trip.
I thought he'd take another meeting, but he just beat him and cajoled him and finally got an agreement.
And then that's how I delayed my trip to New York by 20 minutes and went over.
It was beautiful.
I thought it was a way to do it.
It was his suggestion, and I said, by golly, we'll do it.
Well, I think it played very well.
And I think if we had talked today with Gregor about talking to the congressional leaders, I don't know if I thought
I think what we really need to do now is to reduce this to something that the average person will understand.
Everybody knows he's got to monitor himself.
And the press has played it very favorably to him.
I think everybody knows he's a victim.
And now we've got to explain to him really what it means.
Peterson would be very good in that, in talking about it in terms of jobs.
What we did with him on Friday was very interesting.
Right.
running out of jobs, not no rise in the cost of living.
That's exactly right.
I mean, I think the, of course, with the extraordinary effect of the Japanese, I find it almost hard to believe that it could be that good, because it's kind of, you know, we'll help with the tax, but we ought to deal with the royalty impact of it.
But I think he's had a hell of a week recently.
That picture of you with that Cuban gale was one of the warmest, most precious stories that we've had in a long time.
A little bit like the picture with that fly-in piece against the campus of the Eagles.
And that's played very heavily recently in the state of Ohio.
I think, Mr. President, we may have the salon at a PBS.
I hope so.
Friday night, I've got a call.
CBS, as a matter of fact, we've got to say in terms of our own situation, has been very good this last week on many things, you know.
It does, that's right.
They're going to do the Christmas show of theirs.
Of course, they get the Rather show, so we're being very good to them, too.
Well, they're bending over backwards on the Christmas show.
They're going to come out to hell on that day.
They've released a whole sequence of stills from it, which is, I understand, time is a very long.
They're running a major newspaper, I think,
of course it's their advantage because they want to have their show in competition with the uh nbc's you know on the 21st
We've been on and run segments under the day sharing with Dr. Nettis.
But it's interesting how the cycles go.
You know, for about three weeks after the tour ended, we just got unshirted hell from CPS.
Their coverage was absolutely disgraceful.
And in the last week, it has completely switched to him.
And I personally think that because of that, we know that he made it.
He made his grand stand and lost.
Over the long pull of the next 10 months, he's been awfully important to me.
He really has.
I could tell you some stories that I've gotten out of inside of TPS.
Right, right.
I didn't see what stock on Friday was.
What did it come out?
What does it stand at?
What?
Yeah, but it won't come out for a while, I guess.
It does indicate something.
I was reading the, of course, McCracken's reports, and I must say, when he gives you the stuff on the retail sales and all the rest, it still comes out pretty goddamned modest, doesn't it?
He just can't really bring it up.
But maybe that's the way it is.
Who knows?
Well, I've got the church in front of me that's been paralleling this year as well, too.
Yeah.
That must mean something.
I don't know what it would take to...
Right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Schultz was greatly concerned on the money supply thing.
He got another...
that for a while there seemed to be something, and then he didn't follow it up.
I saw his daughter, yeah.
But I hope that it gets around some.
I don't know what we can do.
I mean, Arthur responds in strange ways to these pressures.
But I think now that Conley's up there in the National Monetary League, he's really got to work with us all over again.
And I'll do it again, too.
But, you know, I guess you just can't do it every day.
I don't know if Jules is going to be in tomorrow, I don't know if Jules can, but he's going to go to him and kind of lay it out.
And then I think if there is an opportunity for a discussion of this with the Quadrant Union, Arthur has to put himself on record with John Williams.
Jules can be in May, he's not just May 10th, I don't know what does he think.
You know, the trouble with the Friedman letter, and he's getting others like him, he's got a speech from an athlete in Chicago, Vancouver, who I have to respect highly.
And this is Michael, he's the chief economist in the United States.
And it just says that the economy responded extremely well to it.
Well, the difficulty, too, is that Arthur constantly gets back to throwing off on the phase two, that we're not being tough enough on labor, on that old song, or that we're being too tough on prices.
But anyway, we'll work
Well, the only thing he will respond to is that he may, six months from now, be blamed by you if the economy isn't doing what it should be doing.
And that's why he won't respond to Friedman and others.
That drives him harder into the corner.
But I think if he feels that he bears that kind of heavy responsibility to you and others...
You know, I was, in reading, I was rather interested in Broder's and Johnson's new article in the Post today.
It was certainly a foot down the road.
They put in about one sentence with regard to the fact, well, there have been perhaps new initiatives that have had an effect on the channel.
And speaking in the country is very negative on the president.
So forth and so on.
How do you analyze that?
Well, they've been running that series all week.
Oh, I know.
And it's exactly, they did a parallel one last week.
I have not concurred with them, but I read last year thoroughly.
Last year was a hell of a lot more negative.
In fact, they make the point that the country is more up-to-date than it is in Europe.
But their thesis is they're trying to prove it.
And they, you know, I said, well, if I'm to die, I'm going to prove it to the country if I want it to be a thesis here.
You don't think they're... No, I think they're proving their...
They're trying to prove their own point.
I don't, I don't put that much stuff because of who's doing it.
I guess, as both of them tend to be.
And, uh, establishments do agree.
They've been approved to be an establishment.
Well, they, uh, it'd be interesting to see your, see the analysis you do and how others do that.
I think there's, uh, a very serious...
They, uh, of course, they, they are, uh, as Ziegler was pointing out,
lowly hung up on the idea of alienation.
I don't know.
It's a strange thing.
The rotor is not particularly antagonistic.
It's just basically on this tip.
Do you agree with that?
No, that's exactly it.
And as I say, if you read what they wrote a year ago, you'd come away with it.
A year ago, it was more global than it is today.
I think they just went out to prove their own conviction.
I think they went out into the field to have interviews to prove their own pre-conviction.
And I think they have felt that this is a condition and they go out to prove it.
And as I say, you could go out and talk to their heads as well.
The Charles Kuralt series is exactly the opposite of that.
So I think you can pick a, you can decide in advance what you want to portray the blue of the country as.
Let's do that.
I think the blue of the country today is a hell of a lot better than the blue of the country.
Well, anyway, the main thing is what happens on the economy and some of these other things.
If they move up, the average person isn't going to be worried about the generation of gas and all that.
Oh, another thing that's very interesting in their series, well, are two things.
The other thing is that they're hanging up on the war, which is, they say, well, if the
the war is still the big issue and that they don't give the president any credit.
I'm not so sure of that thesis.
Harris doesn't come up with that at this time.
He doesn't say it's a big issue, but he says that the overwhelming sentiment is against the war.
We all know that.
What is his line?
He said that the economy is the prime issue.
He had 40% of the people consider that issue number one, down to 70% of Vietnam considered it high as an important issue.
But then he has the Democrats.
The public believes that the Democrats are better able to handle economic issues than the Republicans are.
And then he goes on to say that the Democrats also, the public believes they're better able to handle the war issue.
Hmm.
In spite of the, maybe we have to take some offensive on the war issue, in spite of that and the China and Russia mission and all the rest.
Or is it the war issue in terms of Vietnam, he asked.
It's the war issue.
You know, I don't think the public is going to be, you know, I think you have proven that you're, to me, it's been, you know, conclusive that the public is going to be, you know, affordable.
Well,
interesting thing.
We'll see.
Some of these events of the last two weeks should give us a little bit of a lift, I think.
Oh, I do.
I'm personally convinced that right now we'll be in a hell of a lot stronger shape than we've been any time this year.
I really think we should.
It should, if these things mean anything, because attitude seems to be better, the economy's a bit better.
I don't think India-Pakistan affected people one way or another, pretty much.
Well, I think, as a matter of fact, the president, I think, I think he's got to get a career job on Friday instead of following these reporters.
Yeah.
To come to a personal involvement.
I think it may turn out to have been a part of anything.
Well, in the end, yeah.
Well, the Joe Crest of this world will, as he will today, will build it and build everything up.
But...
The main thing is to get it out of the way.
I think that came through well.
The big thing is that if you worry about the economy, that's the only negative in the picture.
And I think if that happens, I think it is happening.
And these statistics continue well.
I don't know where they were going to go.
They haven't got one.
I've been doing some work with one fellow.
We do have one trusted man.
I backed away.
Yeah, I know.
I don't know what it is.
But the point is that if he feels that way that strongly, then it isn't worth doing.
Well, I almost got it before this.
It still isn't settled.
George may still come around.
And if he does, fine.
If he doesn't, I have had a fellow in doing his work with him, and I've discovered really
Very conclusively, the way in which those figures have worked against him.
This man is limited in what he can do because he's the number three man in the unit, but he's doing something.
He's agreed to change a couple of procedures.
Well, he'll work on this money supply next week.
That's the most important thing.
Well, I think that is the single most important thing.
I guess the one thing that we don't have settled is the burden of what he is going to do.
I happen to believe in the freedom theory.
I think if you put some of that money into it, that will make it to give the economy a shot at the point that people are going.
That's right.
Okay.
We'll see what happens next week.