Nixon White House Tapes — Conversation 491-031
Date: Wednesday, May 5, 1971 at 12:23 PM
Participants: Nixon, Richard M. (President); Tower, John G.; Lee, Robert D. ("Bob"); Lee, Jill; Blasé , A. J. ("Bob"); Moore, Richard A.; Bull, Stephen B.; Atkins, Oliver F. ("Ollie")
Recording device: Oval Office
Source: https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/491-031

This transcript was generated automatically by AI (WhisperX) and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite it as authoritative.

[0:00] Mr. President, Senator Powell.
[0:20] Good decision, Mr. Speaker.
[0:20] Much to me, Mr. and Ms. Roberts, that you've done so many good things.
[0:22] Congratulations, Mr. Speaker.
[0:23] The goodwill industry is meant to be here.
[0:24] They're all working here.
[0:25] I'm sorry to tell you, Mr. President, but every morning, every week, the first protection is knocked out.
[0:28] That's a good morning.
[0:37] It's very small.
[1:00] It's very small.
[1:31] Yes.
[1:58] Yes.
[2:15] Thank you.
[2:45] Yeah.
[2:53] We might give you a little something, but it's like a presidential tie-dye.
[2:54] Thank you, sir.
[2:55] Thank you.
[2:55] Thank you.
[3:02] Well, it's fine work, and I just hope that, I know you're going to have some success in the exam, except for the others, is what is important.
[3:20] We really had a wonderful day.
[3:37] I don't think this would be very helpful.
[4:02] I'm very sure that we, uh, I think we might even come up with this test, but I'm a rogue.
[4:04] We, we do have a bridge.
[4:05] Until then, we'd be ready to go out.
[4:08] I was going to say, we had to make some very tough decisions on this thing.
[4:26] They made a recommendation, and I approved it, basically, that the Army wouldn't bust these guys some morning.
[4:29] You know, I would have let them go the week before with the records.
[4:32] I didn't want to have this country
[4:33] And they couldn't have, you know, a bonus march, legally recalls.
[4:47] So I said, don't touch it.
[4:49] Leave them alone.
[4:52] We literally played that line on these people.
[4:53] But I thought that this bunch, because they were going to engage in violence and so forth, maybe it was to bust them.
[4:59] So we moved in on that thing and busted them.
[4:59] So we moved in on that thing and busted them.
[5:02] And then yesterday, the whole program of the mass arrests, this is the only thing to do.
[5:14] These people never gave me a chance to get the hell off the street.
[5:18] They were told, where are you?
[5:19] Are you being arrested?
[5:19] And when they did, they arrested me.
[5:20] Now that sets an example for the colleges.
[5:21] It sets an example for universities.
[5:22] It sets an example for our police forces.
[5:25] Nobody was hurt.
[5:26] They didn't beat anybody up.
[5:27] You know what I mean?
[5:28] I guess one guy hurt me.
[5:28] when automobile driver ran over a guy who sat and laid down in front of his car.
[5:36] What do you think?
[5:37] Yeah, I think so too.
[5:37] But what's the feeling of your colleagues up there?
[5:39] I think even the Doves, you know, O. Muskie and Teddy and the rest of them down at the scooter ramp, those demonstrators don't look so good today.
[5:45] They were embarrassed by it, actually.
[5:47] hear them disassociating themselves from it.
[5:53] Don't let them get it.
[5:54] But we're not going to let them.
[5:57] We're not going to let them do it, but just keep charging them.
[6:03] They endorse it.
[6:04] And none of them keep denying it.
[6:06] The more they deny it, the more they lose.
[6:08] You see, they play both ways, right?
[6:09] They lose both their friends.
[6:10] That's how it is.
[6:10] We should deal with it.
[6:11] We play that thing harder.
[6:11] Harder than I can.
[6:12] Let these liberals race a little harder.
[6:13] Right.
[6:13] I couldn't fault anything that was done over the last three decades.
[6:15] A country would not have wanted to relate to the Americans.
[6:17] Right.
[6:17] Then you have a man who teased my group and all that.
[6:20] Oh, yes, sir.
[6:22] I've never seen somebody this much.
[6:24] Have you?
[6:24] I caught him.
[6:25] I caught him yesterday.
[6:26] Have you all been there?
[6:27] and uh ready days jesus christ i mean these are all wall breakers and uh i think that may come to work a little longer i think it's going to yeah i believe that you want to go to of course well i have to do some questions i might get an invitation after a while i've got it yet but i understand i need to get one
[6:55] I'm not going from here.
[6:58] I'll tell you why.
[6:59] I didn't want to be in a position to haul it down the hall of the... Friends of Johnson's.
[7:06] So I'm going to be in Florida, go over there, and come back.
[7:09] That's not what we have to do.
[7:10] We all want to get here.
[7:11] It's all right.
[7:12] But you ought to try it.
[7:13] It's right.
[7:14] The thing that worries me would be that my prospective opponent might be here and I would not have an invitation and, you know, that sort of thing.
[7:21] It's good talking to you.
[7:22] Yes, uh, Johnny Dexter's taking care of that.
[7:28] Better take care of it.
[7:34] Your governor- Oh, better take care of it.
[7:38] But we understand we're on the list to get one that we're supposed to.
[7:49] Yeah, you see the bars, is there?
[7:50] I heard it.
[7:52] If I'm here, I'm not sure they'll be here anymore.
[8:06] He goes all in.
[8:18] I think we're going to have to do more.
[8:23] I've got my staff working on it, and I'm going to make some recommendations to the heart, and I think he ought to go all out on this.
[8:33] Everything that he's able to do, because good Lord, Mr. President, this could cost us the state politically.
[8:42] And, uh,
[8:43] Therefore, if we call down there and ask for something, I hope it'll be forthcoming, because it's about the city.
[8:49] When will those people?
[8:51] The question is, I think we've got to go to Congress, though, now.
[8:55] We want to get a bill in, and we're going to try to get that acted on.
[8:58] Then we can say to the Democrat Congress, try to get their feet on a real relief bill.
[9:02] But I think...
[9:04] All right.
[9:06] Let me tell you, we ought to go to Linda Walker.
[9:10] I don't think so.
[9:11] You've got full support here, and I've told her.
[9:15] And, uh, and commonly it's what you do.
[9:16] It's hard as hell.
[9:17] We'll do anything you want.
[9:18] I'm good, but you've got to... Because I'm getting hurt right now.
[9:21] Well, who are you talking to on it?
[9:23] Well, we have been talking to Hart.
[9:27] All right.
[9:27] Tell you what I want you to do.
[9:28] You better talk to, uh...
[9:33] No.
[9:38] You see, I supported the administration on not preparing to make a disaster.
[9:54] Anything we can do within present legal limits, I hope, will be done.
[10:00] Well, if they think it has anything else to do with it.
[10:04] Okay.
[10:04] Well, I mean, it's hard to just won't get too queasy about really pushing what it can do right through the limit.
[10:13] Everything it comes to let it do, I'd say.
[10:15] All right.
[10:26] What does it do?
[10:38] It provides for some of the things that are in the major disaster, under the major disaster bill, but not all of them.
[10:46] Loan forgiveness, for example, small loans, and a little more fee, pay relief, that kind of thing.
[10:56] And long-term loans.
[11:01] as a credit cash flow is invested, and also would provide for heating businesses that are not maybe directly engaged in agriculture, but who are affected by it.
[11:09] For example, a retail merchant suffers because nobody comes to his store and buys anything in this situation.
[11:18] In other words, give SBA a little bit more flexibility in dealing with some of the businesses that are affected.
[11:23] See, if a hurricane comes in and blows his store down, his business is interrupted.
[11:27] He gets to it, but if the farmer, because he can't
[11:30] What I would like to do when I go from here is to say that I'm disgusted with this, and you need to express your concern about it.
[11:56] You can say that on the Senate floor when I introduce my bill, but without saying that you endorse the bill or anything, but you have expressed your concern about the draft.
[12:07] You can say that I can express my concern, that I ask for any recommendations that you have for any further action to be taken, that I have instructed the domestic council staff to work with you in any way
[12:23] Thank you for one other little favor, and if it's something you can't do, fine.
[12:51] We would take a, uh, we can have an extradition now of, uh, the points that we want.
[13:07] I'll have you say it in the street.
[13:07] I'm May the 27th.
[13:08] I'm having my decade of service dinner in Dallas, honoring me for 10 years.
[13:09] I'm inviting you to meet me at the beach.
[13:10] You can do a 30-40 second movie film clip that we could do.
[13:11] Thanks.
[13:12] I'd like your appreciation for my decade of service.
[13:13] Is that doable or is that...
[13:15] It's fine.
[13:16] It's no problem.
[13:16] Thank you.
[13:17] I'll write it to you.
[13:22] Something you could do, you could add to it, or we could...
[13:25] I think sometimes the best thing to do is to take a radio and put a voice right on, you know, here's a message, rather than reading a message.
[13:33] I'll send a message, but I'll read the message and then just say, here's a message from the United States.
[13:38] It's now been possible with all the...
[13:41] a little film on my leg, on my activity.
[14:01] If it's doable.
[14:10] As far as I have a handful of dried dust in my hand.
[14:19] All right.
[14:20] We've got both sides.
[14:21] Texas papers.
[14:22] Why don't you give me one step this side and the other side.
[14:31] Well, you see, already, even if it rains buckets full now, a lot of the crops, all that kind of thing, a lot of these gasses will hurt right down to the foundation, even color in the foundation hurts.
[14:50] So this is really very, very serious business these gasses.
[14:55] And that's it.
[15:00] Yes, Texas and Oklahoma, the hardest hit, New Mexico's hit to a reasonable extent as well.
[15:08] And these are three states that you should carry next time, and therefore we want to make sure that they feel the administration's done everything that's feasible.
[15:21] I'll give it a shot.
[15:22] You...
[15:27] but we can't screw around we're gonna have to push it more because the trip down there
[15:52] The Democrats are sort of turning and saying, well, he came down and looked, and he's still not done enough, you see.
[15:59] We have to work on that.
[16:01] And I can say, Dan, that you have instructed your domestic counsel to work with the domestic counsel who are in front of you, who have approaches, who are anti-purchases.
[16:11] Other actions, murder actions, can be taken to deal with this situation.
[16:25] Within the law, I mean.
[16:27] Okay?
[16:27] Okay.
[16:27] All right.
[16:28] Thank you, Mr. President.
[16:30] Good luck to you.
[16:30] Out of the way.
[16:30] Last stop.
[16:31] The other way.
[16:31] This way.
[16:32] She's a pretty girl, this one.