Nixon White House Tapes ›Tape 453 › Conversation 453-004

Nixon, Romas & McQuaig on Young Republicans and Revenue sharing

Friday, February 19, 1971 · 4:06 PM–4:11 PM ET · Oval Office ·7 min

ParticipantsNixon, Richard M. (President);  Romas, Ronald C.;  McQuaig, Linda;  Wilson, Glenn;  Morris, Jay;  Abate, Joseph;  Odle, Robert C., Jr.;  White House photographerConversation453-004 onTape 453 (tape position 00:44:05–00:52:07)StartFriday, February 19, 1971 at 4:06 PMEndFriday, February 19, 1971 at 4:11 PMRecording deviceOval OfficeSourceNixon Library record for 453-004 ↗

AI Summary

President Nixon met with a group of Young Republicans to discuss the progress of their national meeting and emphasize the importance of promoting administration policies. He instructed his staff to provide the group with detailed materials and arguments regarding revenue sharing and government reorganization, specifically highlighting why the alternative approach proposed by Wilbur Mills was flawed. The meeting also included a casual exchange of presidential gifts and a brief tour of the Oval Office, during which Nixon discussed the historical significance of the room's artwork and furnishings.

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Transcript (AI-generated)

This transcript was generated automatically by AI (WhisperX) and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Names and numbers are often wrong; speakers are not identified. Do not cite it as authoritative — verify against the audio and the finding aid.

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Mr. President, Mr. Chairman.
Yes, I know, how are you?
Nice to see you.
Nice to see you.
And Jay Morris, the chairman of this year's school.
And Joe Obate, who is the college representative.
All right, I'll tighten up.
He better be good.
One of the great things.
When you see the pictures, I'll be terrible.
Well, you're having a good meeting.
Very good, yeah.
Oh, gosh.
They come in from all over the country.
All 50 states.
That's great.
Including Alaska and the like.
and even mississippi with no republican officials since there's two delegates up here well that's great that's great i hope the spirit is good
So far.
National Chairman Senator Dole started it off.
Yeah.
And Dalton Rose, and we had Senator .
Good, good.
Senator Del.
Senator Del.
Yeah.
Senator Brown, Donald Rumsfeld.
They've all appeared.
Rumsfeld will be the one.
Yeah, these have all appeared so far.
Yes, sir.
Senator Brock will be here tomorrow night.
Senator Bell hit that very hard today.
He did a very good job.
I know that works good, but I think that I would like to have Roy go over with the chart that he used for the congressional breakfast.
John Irvin, head of the domestic council.
You see, I had breakfast for all the Democrats and all the Republicans.
Thank God you eat breakfast.
But anyway.
This, and you can all make notes on it, we'll give you the charts too, is fascinating.
It shows you all the interests of the opponents of Revenue and Share.
This is Revenue and Share.
That's some flavor of it.
This is down our alley.
But you've got to have the arguments.
Why the Mills approach won't work.
Why this helps, which it does.
The hard-line mistakes.
It really does.
But if he could give us an advantage, I think it would be great.
And if I did reorganize the consolidation of the cabinet... Not specifically, no, sir.
Well, ask John to get revenue sharing and the cabinet consolidation bold if he could.
Would you have one for him?
Oh, yes.
What would you need to keep an eye on?
What would you need to keep an eye on?
Well, you work on this.
You must have this.
This is terribly important that you get this, not just the sales pitch, but you know why.
And he gives you all the arguments.
Why do you have how much money?
what states would suffer by the other programs.
If you go back, you really haven't had any of this stuff.
You just don't want to hear the straight record.
I think you've got to have the arguments.
The arguments that we'll give you, and also the best literature we've got.
That's stuff that really sets it out in one, two orders.
Now, let's see, what are we giving you today?
Oh, yeah, we're going to give you tie hands if you'd like.
That's a presidential tie.
I'm not sure.
I'm not one of those women's lawyers.
Thank God.
My daughter, David, David Eisenhower.
and say, stop it, too.
He says, I said, I hope they stop at none.
That's what you would say.
Tell everybody to go over there.
You all were in the room before?
You were, that's right.
Yeah, well, I'll tell you one more thing.
President Siegel is at the top, you see.
And this drug, and this was next to Manny Pate, and we came in, duplicates the seal.
That's the famous feature of this drug.
That's one of the great paintings of Washington that is very little known.
It's painted not by one of the Peale sons, but by a father.
And it's an unusual kind.
There's the White House in 1827, or 1837, a great department.
When the river used to be, at least they thought, closer than that, closer than that.
It's not photographed, but it was sort of a British thought going to buy it, I would say.
And the...
The other thing is that you all have historical significance.
We always put state gifts over here.
See what we've got over here this time.
This is from the President of the Council of Ministers.
See whenever they give us something, we give them.
All right.
Thank you, Senator.
I have to go with, or I don't know.
I'm going to take this.
I'm going to go upstairs while they move.
But you can't do that.
I don't know.
I don't know.
I don't know.

NARA Description

On February 19, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon, Ronald C. Romas, Linda McQuaig, Glenn Wilson, Jay Morris, Joseph Abate, Robert C. Odle, Jr., and White House photographer met in the Oval Office of the White House from 4:06 pm to 4:11 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 453-004 of the White House Tapes.

Nixon Library Finding Aid

Conversation No. 453-4

Date: February 19, 1971
Time: 4:06 pm - 4:11 pm
Location: Oval Office

The President met with Ronald C. Romas, Linda McQuaig, Glenn Wilson, Jay Morris, Joseph
Abate, and Robert C. Odle, Jr.; the White House photographer was present during the meeting

     Introductions

     Photos
          -Oliver F. (“Ollie”) Atkins

     Young Republicans meeting
         -Participants
                                               6

                            NIXON PRESIDENTIAL MATERIALS STAFF

                                        Tape Subject Log
                                           (rev. 9/08)



           -Speakers
                -Robert J. Dole
                -Strom Thurmond
                -J. Glenn Beall, Jr.
                -William E. Brock, III
                -Donald H. Rumsfeld
                -Donald E. Johnson
           -Revenue sharing and government reorganization
                -Beall and Thurmond
                -John D. Ehrlichman
                      -Efforts
                -Importance
                      -Wilbur D. Mills’ view
                      -Administration policies

     Presentation of gifts by the President
          -Anecdote

     Description of Oval Office
          -Presidential Seal
          -Portrait of George Washington
          -Head of State gifts
                -Protocol

The President, et al. left at 4:11 pm

Also recorded on February 19, 1971

  • 453-001 3:15 PM · 38 min — President Richard M. Nixon, John D. Ehrlichman, George P. Shultz, John C. Whitaker and Stephen B. Bull and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 3:15 pm and 3:59 pm.
  • 453-002 3:59 PM · 58 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 3:59 pm and 4:00 pm.
  • 453-003 4:00 PM · 5 min — President Richard M. Nixon, Melia Black, Pamela Southall, Orville Black, Hilary Black, Rosemary Manarin, Betty Fountain, and White House photographer met in the Oval Office of the White House from 4:00 pm to 4:05 pm.
  • 453-005 4:11 PM · 5 min — United States Secret Service agents met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 4:11 pm and 4:52 pm.
  • 454-001 4:11 PM · 5 min — President Richard M. Nixon, Alexander P. Butterfield, Manolo Sanchez, Ronald L. Ziegler, White House operator, Rose Mary Woods, and John D. Ehrlichman met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 4:11 pm and 4:59 pm.
  • 454-002 4:54 PM · 1 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 4:54 pm and 4:59 pm.
  • 454-003 4:59 PM · 8 min — President Richard M. Nixon, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, John D. Ehrlichman, and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House from 4:59 pm to 5:08 pm.
  • 454-004 5:08 PM · 1 hr 39 min — President Richard M. Nixon, George P. Shultz, Paul W. McCracken, Arthur F. Burns, John B. Connally, Ronald L. Ziegler, Rose Mary Woods, the White House photographer, and members of the press met in the Oval Office of the White House from 5:08 pm to 6:34 pm.

All 30 conversations from February 19, 1971 →

Cite this conversation

Conversation 453-004, February 19, 1971. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/453-004 (accessed September 18, 2026).