Conversation 036-031

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Did somebody, did you ring me?

Yes, sir, just a moment.

Mr. Ziegler was calling you, sir.

Yeah.

Did you want to take it?

Yeah, I'll take it.

All right.

Mr. President?

Yeah.

I just wanted to double-check with you.

I've mentioned that Haig arrived back at 1 o'clock and is meeting with Kissinger and will be meeting with you this afternoon.

I'm going to say that he's meeting with you prior to the 3 o'clock reception and then we'll be meeting with you after that reception and before the 6 o'clock reception to indicate conferring with him this afternoon.

And then I'm going to mention that you will meet with Kissinger at 8 a.m. tomorrow morning before he departs at 9.30.

Yeah.

Is that agreeable?

yeah that's that's perfectly right i'll make it all right i've been in touch with haig throughout of course well we've made that point yes sir god i've been in touch and there isn't anything he isn't getting reports i've read his lady's cable already it's not necessary but on the other hand i will uh place a call to him right but from that's going that's right you just say from a public you could say that yes i'm meeting with him this afternoon and also after the reception and so forth

I'll just use my judgment on that.

All right, fine.

Thank you.

Then, sir?

Yeah?

Just one final point, if I take a moment.

I wanted to get it absolutely straight on the adding of the last paragraph in your inaugural address.

I've indicated that you worked late after returning from the concert and... Yeah, for its final form.

Right.

But what really, what actually happened was that...

When did you give it out to the wire services?

The speech?

Yeah.

At...

uh nine o'clock at seven o'clock in the morning we had it no no no no no that night i thought you gave it out we had it ready for you at seven well we gave it to we gave it to two of the wires the night before yes sir yeah i had what seven or what i think it was 7 30 the night before that we gave well now that's what they had you remember right fine you tell them that uh that actually

that I began some uh... that I uh... when I gave it to you at that time I said I'll give you this to the wire services but that I uh... reserved the right to add anything that I may want to uh... that I actually began uh... began uh... work on the uh... on this paragraph that occurred to me and I began writing on it and so forth around five in the afternoon and that I finalized it uh... uh...

in the evening before going to the inaugural galas.

In other words, I worked on it right up to the time we went to the inaugural concerts.

And then when I came back from the concerts, I worked on it again and made another modification.

But that's the way it was.

And it was in my copy, consequently my writing copy.

As a matter of fact, my writing copy was that Rose had prepared, which arrived here around 7 o'clock, had a version of it in it, the first version, but I modified that in delivery.

So you can say that I worked...

So basically you can say that I finished the text of the address at 6 o'clock, finally, that was given to the press.

Mm-hmm.

i told you you remember you were sure i said now i'm working i said i want to modify this i may want to add something i'm not sure i had already been thinking uh i'd already been working on adding adding something the idea occurred to me at about five o'clock in the afternoon and i just sort of started to work with it but i didn't have it in my mind yet right then between six and the time of the inaugural address i i uh i uh got the uh

and I went through the usual drafts and drafts and drafts and finally got it finished and what I considered, what it would inform that I had typed and it was typed before the inaugural address in that form.

Then after I returned I worked on it late in the evening and made a few, another small change but anyway then it was a small, it was a change.

Late in the evening after you returned from the concert?

After I returned from the concert, yes, sir.

I finished it in final form, although I, in other words, I did the preliminary work between 5 and 8, basically, or something, or after we had, you see, I had, as you know, I had to give the copy to the people to type up for the press, and I turned that over around 5 o'clock or so.

They went ahead with that, and I continued to work between then.

and 8 o'clock before going to concerts, and by that time had a copy type, because everybody knows that the girl had something that a copy was type, a preliminary copy for me.

After the concerts, I worked some more on it and finished it.

Yes, sir.

So that's the way it was.

Everyone was very moved by that ending paragraph, and that's why they were wondering this.

You mean the part that was not in the text?

Yes, sir.

Because the ending paragraph was there.

I mean the part not in the text, yes, sir.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, anyway, that was the way it worked.

And we had, there was one line that was left out.

I mentioned it today.

That was what I was trying to reach you about.

But anyway, it wasn't necessary.

I got your comment.

the press copy, and I found they'd left it out of that.

Then the copies, and every copy that we had made, come in, come in, and every copy we had made where we had the words, we will defend our treaty commitments, and then we also had the word after that, we will defend our interests, and some way Rose or somebody just left the damn thing out, and I don't see how it got left out of the copy that it went, but

When I saw it was not in my reading copy, I tried to reach for it, but she couldn't remember whether it had been in or out, and I don't know whether it may have been Price's office.

But Price says it was not intended to be left out, so somebody dropped one sentence out there.

The defending of our interests only means something to highly sophisticated people, but it is important because it does involve the

places like Israel where we do not have treaties.

On the other hand we will resist and also defend whether you don't have treaties if your interests are violated you go in and defend them but nevertheless that sentence was left out to our regret.

Nobody has yet raised the question but we will

by any chance the subject ever should rise, you can say, yes, that's in the text and it was inadvertently left out by the stenographer.

That's what it was.

Or by the proofreader.

I wouldn't say the stenographer.

I don't think anyone would raise that.

I think, well, you know, it's a very, very important line, however, for anybody that knows anything about foreign poetry.

Very, very important line.

Okay.

The, uh, the, uh,

I think the press, as might be expected, really didn't even comprehend the full implications of the speech.

I mean, we just can't expect them to.

I told Price, because we did an awful lot of work on that side, that this is probably one of the better ones that has been done because of its,

it's conciseness it's uh it's relating uh it's basic having one central theme it's relating the foreign to the domestic and the rest but you look at the press and those assholes I mean they uh they don't ever see anything they're it just shows you that it really doesn't make a hell of a lot of difference what kind of a speech we put out I mean it's we could get up there and uh you know just give a few platitudes and uh because the problem we have is that you never get any credit for a good one so

you really shouldn't worry about whether they're bad.

That's my opinion.

Well, I don't have that total reaction from the press.

Well, that's what it was, Ron.

I mean, I checked the core from, I mean, you know, the people that worked among them and so forth, and usually the whole hum stuff, and that's right, except for one or two friends.

Well, the reaction I have gotten from the speech is one that is very good.

That was a tremendous speech, and people, I think, recognize the significance of, you know, many of the statements in it, the Division of Responsibilities, for example.

You know, that is a very potent, you know, point.

Well, it is.

And it is, in a sense, though, the historic significance is the application of what is called the Nixon Doctrine at home, is what it brought.

Such lines as that

which are that instead of asking what will government do for me, what can I do for myself, that's a very different thing from what Kennedy was saying, totally different.

And also the whole situation that government must learn to take less from people so that people can do more for themselves.

And we should judge, we should determine

how much we help others by how much they're willing to help themselves.

Now that's at home and abroad.

Now these are things, those are the important things which most of the press missed totally.

They didn't comprehend it, but they may have done it deliberately, deliberately missed it because they realized it was significant.

The comments that I've heard, you know,

I'm not complaining about it.

It's just a matter of resigning ourselves to what we have to face.

Well, I think, yes, sir, I understand that point.

But again, I repeat, the comments that I heard, not only from the press corps, but yesterday evening, was very, very positive.

And people realized what they were hearing.

Well, maybe the main thing is that people perhaps pick it up.

Maybe a few of them can.

With regard to this business of the edition and so forth, who are you having to give that to?

You mean to, like, the magazines or something?

Who's interested in that?

No, no.

They just want to know from a historic standpoint.

The number of presses have asked me.

They always wonder how a line was added.

That's right.

I started working on it in the afternoon, about 5 o'clock, 5 o'clock.

And then we, but of course...

that we went, but we had to go out with the press copy earlier, and I said, well, I haven't finished it yet, and I wasn't sure I was going to use it.

So I left it out of the press until I had finalized it.

Then I really determined for sure I was going to use it after I returned from the concert, read it again, and felt that it fit the occasion.

That's really what it is.

That's when I determined that it would fit.

No one is even bothered by the fact that it wasn't in the press copy.

That's a natural thing.

I always wonder how

how things are written.

Right?

Okay, Rob.

Thank you.

Okay, sir.