On August 2, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon, George P. Shultz, Stephen B. Bull, John B. Connally, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, White House operator, Carl T. Curtis, Barry M. Goldwater, John D. Ehrlichman, Edward L. Morgan, George D. Aiken, Manolo Sanchez, J. Caleb Boggs, and Clark MacGregor met in the Oval Office of the White House from 9:58 am to 2:05 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 553-006 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 Do not cite this transcript as authoritative.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.
Thank you.
If you could get out and tell Warren what to say.
Or do you think this was one of the friends you ought to do the press with?
I think if we have both rail and steel to talk about, that's the big thing.
And I think Jim ought to come over.
I think a point to be made on the rail is that we're darn sorry for a lot of people that hurt.
the way they did?
And is it about time Congress faced up to this and did the fundamental thing?
And we can say we're glad to go, we're delighted to go.
Where's Congress?
Where's Congress?
That's all I ask.
That's all I ask.
When he comes, have him come in, because we're all three going to meet.
Well, I think we ought to, I want to make a very hard statement on that, that the Congress, the Congress, we are adjourning again.
I mean, the Congress...
So this settlement of this strike, this is called terrible hardship to great numbers of people.
And it should, in those circumstances, give us any comfort about the... Come in.
Come in.
Good morning.
How are you?
I was talking about strikes here.
I thought you were going to get killed.
Good morning.
How are you?
Good morning.
Good morning, Mr. Secretary.
How are you?
Good morning.
Good morning.
Why don't we give him a hand and give him the honor to go through the strikes in 30 seconds.
We have a steel settlement, as you know.
It's in the aluminum can range, which was inevitable.
Todd, what is the situation that what we really came down to, in my opinion, was the best that the companies could do?
You didn't know over the weekend.
We were bargaining all night long, Friday night, Saturday night.
So our guys did a pretty good job, I think.
Go ahead.
We did have one point in time when the companies
said we're about a percent and a half apart.
And do you want a settlement or what?
Obviously using the situation to sort of bargain with us to get us off their backs when they raise prices.
And we more or less opted the present.
We talked about it at great length that we did want to have a settlement and that they were
And that was largely, as the president reasoned about it, that they were going to wind up with that settlement.
And there wasn't enough in it for the suggestion of leaving the companies.
They didn't do too much.
the question as it came back to us after that conversation wasn't phrased the same way the second time around it was more in terms of we had said after the meeting here that we were looking for a constructive settlement and so they said well are you going to denounce this as an unconstructive settlement and we said no
We would not denounce it as an unconstructive trial, but that was... Now, they did have... Now, they did have a better posture for us than the women.
They did have... Well, I think we have to repeat with women ourselves, and we have to realize that, oh, we can't do this.
It's like one of those things where, whether it's unconstructive or constructive, that there was no way the companies, by going through a strike, would have been any better.
You got one and a half percent apart, and now you're going to strike another.
They've established, they've heard of, and they've bargained about it pretty seriously during negotiations.
As I understand this in the structure of it, they don't think this is just a top-level group that's going to talk about productivity.
but they see a structure going down into the plants.
And they talk about all sorts of things.
An example that comes to mind is absenteeism.
Now, absenteeism in these big industries is a hell of a big problem right now.
GM is facing it very strongly.
And in a continuous process industry, when you have a certain setup and you expect people to come and then somebody doesn't show up,
very disruptive, or if a lot of people don't show up, it's very disruptive.
So that's the kind of thing that, at the plant level, people can work on and it will make a difference.
And there are a lot of other things like that.
So the fact that this has been projected down into the plant, I think, is a good sign.
Now, we can't play that too heavily ourselves.
Otherwise, I think we may make it look as though the party's through us this stop.
And we are trying to play it.
But I think we can give it a nudge, particularly if we have the other part of this government that we have a rail settlement in the sense that the contract is now agreed on completely.
What they're now working on is a back-to-work agreement, which is complicated because of the way the strike was done.
We hope we'll have that within a matter of
half an hour.
In fact, I left word in my office that Hudson called to have the call transferred down here because I knew you'd want to know that better.
At 11 o'clock, we have the two days.
On one hand, we thought we ought to make a strong statement that we are very upset about all the hardship caused by the rail strike and that the Congress ought to get busy on this basic legislation.
On the other hand, both
In the rail, we did break through and got the interdivisional run, which was the central productivity issue.
So in both these settlements, there has been at least some attention given to the problem of productivity.
And maybe we can sort of springboard off that a little bit and talk about getting on the rail thing.
I would say that Hodgson should take a very strong jaw-boning attitude with regard to
and let it roll off on the humans.
The humans are the ones that are responsible here.
It's not a national piece of work moving that whole bunch of pirates.
But you should take the attitude that this is an unconscionable work stoppage that caused great problems, economic problems for
for hundreds of thousands of people across the country.
And that this nation simply can't afford this kind of stop and go on a nation's railroads.
And that there is an answer to it.
The answer is administration.
And we've selected a Congress a year and a half ago, whatever it was a year ago.
And the Congress is still silent.
behind and done without it.
It's imperative.
Now, the fact that this strike is settled should not obscure the fact that grave suffering was caused by this strike, unnecessary suffering.
And it does not obscure the necessity.
It points out even more of a necessity for Congress now to, on an urgent basis, to enact the legislation which would
Her dad is on strikes in Egypt.
We called on the Congress to act on this session.
I think some strong language there is necessary.
Don't you think everybody's put on a much larger respect?
Son of a bitch and just a few little sneaky people involved.
And talk about what happened.
Most of the railroads continue to run.
They ran under their own rules instead of the contract rules.
The productivity, the efficiency went up by about 20%.
These railroad games are the worst.
They get people riding these trains.
You know, the last thing that they were, uh... Well, the wage increases for the guys, those guys that carry radios, they carry them too.
They have now people working on that.
They carry these goddamn radios, you know, that's something new.
So they want to get them a wage increase because they carry a radio.
Rather than taking me to the signals or a line.
Goddamn, it's terrible.
And on the railroads, I was, I told the only method I could imagine was to take it, I mean, let it go.
Except that the one thing you cannot do is to have a railroad strap.
It just causes terrible repercussions around the country.
You can't do it.
We're not really doing this thing hard.
I think that the line, I was going to have Hodgson come over and say, you've got to hand it to these people in negotiations.
It's a hell of a tough job.
They ended up night after night, all night long.
Worse than the war.
And they got through, but I am quite a bit pissed that
We didn't have to take the unions on.
That's all there is to it.
We may have taken them on before, but what a decision.
This, the seal, well, when they come right down to it, to me, when they asked me about it late last night, and that's the key thing, whatever we did, we would attempt this settlement.
And, of course, the seal companies were putting the gun to our heads by saying, well, if you attack it, then, of course, we'll go out.
Because they have a very interesting attitude, which is sort of out of the pen and sand, too.
The inventories are so big at the present time that they would only run at about 30%.
So consequently, you're not going to lose much.
Well, I would have said in one minute, go ahead and take the strike.
Because what the hell would you take the strike on?
We'd pick it up later.
If they were able to say, all right, if you take the strike, are you going to be able to get a better deal?
And they said, no.
They said, no, we can't get a better deal.
So then it seems to me that right now, psychologically, as I look at the country and the rest, now psychologically, I think a strike would have a very depressing attitude effect on the country.
And I think ending the rarefaction and the steel strike, and with no significant ones coming up, except Longchamp, of course, which is far off on the West Coast,
But I think ending the two can have a more positive effect, even though it does have, of course, repercussions in the inflation.
What's your opinion?
I agree with that.
You'd sell them?
No question.
You know, some of our people, I think, I would sell them.
Okay.
I've got it.
I'm over here, old George, with two seconds.
I just asked John how many he had done, and he said a lot.
I would sell them.
Even though you know you don't need to see it in production, even though they've stacked up an inventory, it would lose a lot of time.
Psychologically, we can't stand to see it strike more than two weeks later.
Right now, the little psychological limits, it sure will.
Yeah.
Well, Jim will come over for the 11 o'clock, and I will talk through this.
I've had regular administration.
Well, they've done a good job, I'll say that.
They've done a marvelous job.
I think, Mr. President, on the individuals involved, Hudson, in the railroad bargaining, there's a poor fellow named Jack Hilson, the one that took after him there.
He's taken an awful beating.
Who is he with us?
He's the railroad negotiator for the roads.
He's a man.
He's a man.
And he's done a stalwart job.
All right.
As it worked out, three union presidents, three company carrier presidents did the final bargain.
And the guy who really came through and was strong and did a good job has been the adjutant.
You put down the names of all the people you want, and I'll make some great calls for them.
They deserve it.
And now, is there any way that either of you calls have enough influence on Hartford Ridge?
You might suddenly suggest, please, Hartford, don't whack this thing.
He whacks it, he whacks it.
Why don't I call it, by the way?
I'll pull it right away before the announcement, so he has the inside dope, and then I can cut it.
The key point was, don't say the thing, the key point was, they're one and a half percent apart.
The critical question was asked, I mean, if you took a strike, could you do any better?
The management said no.
Now that's really what came down to me.
They didn't, they, they,
So you get that way.
I've been doing on these damn strikes.
George is an expert.
When you get when you're one and a half percent of what you did, the unions have taken strides and agreed or been less.
It tends to go the other way, but it gets complicated.
Let me, do you need to call Arthur at all?
I don't know what conversation you've had with him.
Oh, I have, but I just, I've been trying to get Arthur's wildness.
Huh?
I've had some wildness.
Since always.
Oh, yeah, he's just very upset.
I was going to say that he, he got him, uh,
I wouldn't, actually, I wouldn't go out of my way to upset about it.
It's not happening.
All the rumors were floating around.
He got upset himself at my office the morning after the hearing.
But John, that's it.
That's what you should remember.
We have appointed him.
And this is one of the things he recommended.
We've got a committee studying finance.
Yes, sir.
All right.
Do you remember when we met?
I told him.
Do you remember what I told him?
That the Federal Reserve... Do you remember what I said to him?
The Federal Reserve is not being out of the deal.
No, they can talk about it.
When we met in the movie, I frankly said...
I remember hearing that.
Yes, I can.
Well, my point is that so they say, where did this come from?
What must come from that?
Where did this come from then?
Arthur was out at the Grove with Peter Flanagan talking
He was getting clapped on the back, and the outrage was being expressed that any of this should have happened.
In general, he was getting the best of it out there by a long shot.
But nevertheless, he knows.
He's never let us worry about something like that.
He is, yes, sir.
Very, sir.
But why isn't it a good idea to
to give him this and tie a little of the protopid in it.
He's big for protopid.
Well, no reason at all.
I just did it.
Well, I'd be standing by the way.
I mean, just don't, I guess it's a matter of informing him.
Yeah, that's my one.
Just don't, don't, don't let him think of it.
Just say, Archer, I thought you'd like to know about this.
And, uh, uh, Yeah, definitely.
You're just calling it, you're calling it, too, that we've got a rail settlement, period.
We've got this, but we're making a very strong statement to the Congress.
That's all I can say on that.
On the steel thing, the steel settlement is this.
We may not have that line.
This is one and a half percent business and so on.
As the question came back to us, it didn't come in that form, and it may be that
that this is not going to play that way.
And I don't think we have anything to gain by it.
So I think we might let that alone and see whether or not it does just go by.
Well, I might say one group, Mr. President, that at least Kurt says, and from my conversations, I think it's true.
I think Abel is very grateful for
for what you did and what the administration did.
Because I think he sees the situation just the way you said, that this was going to be the settlement, whatever happened.
And that he didn't want a strike.
And he sees that we helped prevent it.
And I think that means something to him.
He's been quite good.
In fact, Kurt was much more impressed with the leadership in the past hours than he was with the company.
He tended to be sort of crybabies about it.
Isn't this terrible?
We have to get this settlement.
Acted as though somehow there was some big alternative.
In 59, they were the same way that, well, we need to do this and so forth.
And you're forcing them a goddamn way when they've done something.
They've had 12 years since then to work with the unions, and they haven't done anything to pick up their productivity.
I'm not sure that Big Steel has that management that's all that good today.
I don't think it's too damn good.
Since the days of Ferris and the rest, I mean, they're just a bunch of managers now.
Well, they have a kind of bully boy attitude.
There was a long period when they were king of the roost, and they just ruled everybody.
Sure.
They could change.
They're not able to push anybody around anymore, and they're out in world markets and so on, but yet they have this attitude, but they don't have the clout to go with it.
Coming back to our record before you leave, I think, as I gather, John, your feeling is that the present time has just let it cool for a while.
Yes, sir.
Now that you've stirred him up, let him cool.
No, don't make overtures.
He's on the defensive of the law.
I don't want this Bohemian Grove thing.
The law should pick him up.
He knows that's not where his problem is.
He's smart enough to know that Bohemian Grove people are exactly right.
And then, of course, as you've well said,
But he's not going to get it in this office, never, not until he starts shaping up.
That's just cold, dirty, cold, dirty.
This income policy business, I tried the beginnings of a different line on that when you and I briefed the senators the other day and saying that there are a lot of things in the wage price area we're building in.
And there's this, and there's this, and there's this.
We do have a program.
I wonder, how do we react to that?
I think it's good.
I think it's so complicated, it's going to be hard to sell it.
We're going to have to give it a name.
Well, we not only have to give it a name, but what we have to do is to give it some public place.
Now, like, for example, take on this field thing.
Meeting publicly with those guys is a risk.
to settle the goddamn strike.
Station at the railroad.
Everybody knows a guy came in in the morning and we, you know, wave our arms around and do it.
Now, that isn't what I usually do, but I think at this point, particularly when we're 13 months away from an election and you can't get caught, I never believed doing a lot of posturing around if it's going to be proved, clearly demonstrated that you failed.
But on the other hand, at this point, I think some more visibility in this field, frankly, to Georgia, aren't pushing
jaw-bowling, calling in the major maker industries where they're not competitive, giving the union hell or whatever the case might be.
I think at this point that's what the people want to hear.
They just want to hear it indicates that we care about the problem and we're doing something.
I talked to Jack Knight out there, you know, who's pretty intelligent and probably the toughest fellow in the world in dealing with his own unions.
He said, I can't see why we can't have an incomes policy.
I said, well, what would you do, Jeremy?
He said, well, I know it can't be for all of them, not like an OPA.
He said, but why don't you just pick about a dozen top industries and then have a policy for them?
When I'm here for Crack Six as a man, as smart as hell, how could you really do that?
You're going to pick out steel, automobiles, I don't know.
I guess you could pick a dozen, couldn't we?
But how do you do it?
I mean, but on the other hand, there may be a way to get at that thing, which I'm sure you can make, which you also do, and I think you ought to get started.
You ought to work on it.
There ought to be ways where we can pick a dozen, looking at it, looking at it,
Looking at the sick industries in this country, the ones that particularly are producing, that are becoming non-competitive, and also looking at the, as we already looked at construction, those areas where wage price push may be too high or will be anticipated.
It seems to me that on a rifle-shot basis, symbolically, you could get them in and do those, and then, basically, then you do have an incomes policy.
You see what I mean?
Just do some stuff for symbolism, not for protecting the whole thing.
And where we can have a result that we can at least have some prospective result that may be good, and I think in both the steel and the rail thing, those were both
matters where you did have some impact that can be seen.
And it worked out.
There are some cases where you can scream and yell and the cows come home and you won't make any dent at all.
Let me say that you've got to, George, you've got to grandstand more.
That's what has to happen.
I don't do it on occasion.
John, you can do some, you see.
You can haul in and do some grandstanding.
I've done hauling in the bank.
Yeah.
Well, we can.
Well, we have been all time.
We should publish that.
I wonder if maybe we should start publicizing the bill on that score.
And for example, George, we could publicize here at the White House.
You can have some people in there.
You know, it's, you would finally get to know anybody.
Somebody representing the president can, I mean, Johnson had a fall.
They used to have somebody in the fish room.
It was in the fish room out of Roosevelt.
His name was Johnson, as a matter of recognition.
somebody that used to haul these guys in all the time.
Rumsfeld had some ideas about it.
He said it was enormously effective, but not effective at doing anything, but effective at reassuring people that we were trying to do something.
I don't even remember the girl, but Rumsfeld seems to recall something that they had.
It has some great inequities to it, to the extent that the people you call in are the ones that you have some, you know, ability to affect.
airlines, railroads, steel, and so on.
And they sort of get a working over that they probably don't deserve as much as or certainly no more than lots of other people just because they're there.
Yeah.
And that's it.
It does have headquarters.
But that's life, isn't it?
Yeah, that's life.
So the oil people, and there are a lot of symbolic industries, let's face it.
Steel, oil, railroads, automobiles, and frankly, now construction.
There are a lot of others that just go and do what they damn please.
Nobody pays much attention.
What were the changes to the railroads you had been using?
Well, now they've got a big breakthrough.
They did get this interdivisional run question worked out.
As I understand it, that is this 100-mile limitation.
That's been a stealthy thing, that you could only have a crew go 100 miles.
And they broke through that.
Now they have to give a whole host of protection to the people who would be affected and would have to move their residences and so forth.
That are expensive, but nevertheless, it is a... That's where you're going.
This is worth doing.
They did accomplish something.
That's the beginning.
That's the first time they've been able to do that.
Well, okay, Ernie, go talk to Hutch and get him in position to press freedom.
I told Warren to bring up the comment that Hutch made the statement.
All right.
They, Bob and others were saying I should do it, but I have the feeling it's better, this is a labor thing, let Jim do it.
Well, yeah, I think, actually, as Ben said, as Secretary, I think,
You don't want to leave the impression that you're real happy with one of these wage settlements, because after all, this steel settlement's a hell of an expensive inflationary settlement.
That's right.
You don't want to renounce it.
I think having it come from Hartson is better, because he's assumed to be and expected to be an advocate of labor.
And therefore, it would not be expected to be speaking to the issue of whether something is inflationary.
I'd be conscious of that.
I remember as you, the budget man, coming in and sitting on the thing would be perhaps putting too much of the imprint of, say, pleasure in the settlement.
We don't want to indicate this budget, but there are ways of saying, well, this is, we're glad there's not going to be any strife.
That's reasonable, but we don't want to work stuff.
Okay, we have word, and you may have two, Time is apparently going to do a cover story on the economy in their next issue.
And they've asked me to come down and meet with their board of their editors and talk about it.
And I think I asked over at your office about that and Bigford's office about that, whether to go or not.
Do you have any feelings about that?
If they're going to do it, I'll go.
Yes, sir.
If it's time, you can do it.
They've decided to do it, apparently.
Well, let's get our side in it, because they'll sure as hell have Arthur gone.
And they ask you, John.
No, they will.
All right, well, I have to do that if I can.
They've asked you to come here, or to come to the yard, or something like that.
Yeah, I'd go.
I'd go in any event.
That's a good thing to do.
You can go talk about that, talk about the budget, you know, get our plug in every right time we can.
It's all absolutely worth while.
Because it affects not only time, it affects life.
It's fortunate.
It's a very powerful group.
You've been up there with him.
He's done.
So that's probably when we left.
About two weeks ago.
It's a powerful group.
I'd go.
At some point in the next day or so, John, I'd like to talk about this international monetary business.
I think we have to.
I think we have to.
I think George said, I was just going to suggest to the President this morning, probably the next step is for the President to call Arthur and me, and let us sit down, and then probably have a quaternary at the international event with Peterson and maybe both of them.
But how do you have a quaternary at that?
So if the news gets out of the meeting, we can just direct the Quadrant meeting and do that maybe tomorrow and the next day.
Well, I think the question of whether to do these big steps is something that ought to be really examined carefully.
Well, I think it has to be sold, but I have some thoughts on where to put it.
It's the international thing.
We've got a chance to take it over some more.
Oh, yes.
I thought it was a great deal as far as their meeting, Pete and Paul Volcker and George.
Are they handling that right as we go?
I think so.
Keep their mouths shut.
Yes, yes.
They've had a hard time seeing George.
completely informed, simply because he's got some family students, and he comes in, he'll be there 30 minutes, then he's gone, and you know, in and out, and he never gets, they don't give him a real feel for it.
I don't think there's any question, except possibly in George's mind, and some people are super blind, George is right in the face of George's basic economic philosophy.
There are
It seems to me there are two essential problems involved here.
One is the international problem.
Now, they obviously impinge on each other.
But one is the international problem.
Two is the domestic problem.
Now, each of those have a number of facets.
But in the international theology, the problem is, one, the convertibility of dollars to gold.
And we're going to have to stop that at some point.
And everybody, I say everybody, most people tend to think that $10 billion in gold is the point below which we should not go.
You can stop convertibility very easy, as I say, by just saying so.
The next thing is that you probably ought to float.
This means changing the exchange rates with the other currencies of the world.
just like Germany's doing with us now.
We have a floating currency like Canada's doing with us now.
That, you can take those steps without rebounding the gold.
Now, Arthur's going to be deducting the price of gold.
This doesn't really solve anything.
But that's a trading position that we can keep.
But out of this, these two steps would be taken very centrally.
Whatever we do in the international field,
ought to be coupled, it seems to me, with action on the domestic front so that they tend to shield each other.
Now, part of the problem on the domestic front in the economic field, number one, it is inflation.
Number two is this whole question of whether or not you're going to have an income policy.
Number three, it is a question of whether or not we have a bad situation with respect to balance of payments, and we do.
a voice question of how we can reconstitute our trade to be more competitive around the world.
Now, all of these things have great political value to me at home.
So, at this point in time, and I'm not trying to sell this, I'm merely trying to paint a picture of what can be done with no political downside, it seems to me, at all, and a great deal of upside.
If you announce that you're spending gold, that you're floating it, then you couple with that language about you're going to look for a reserve currency, you're going to help to reestablish the firm order, the international field, and so forth.
But then you say, recognize that we have problems at home, and then coupled with that, you're going to put a ceiling on the spending of Congress.
And we've been faking it.
Let's assume that the moment you want to give up, just for now, I'm going to forego.
I'm going to ask the Congress to withdraw.
My recommendation is on general record, sir.
That would save us $5 billion.
I'm going to ask that we forego H.R.
1.
I'm just picking, for example, to get a figure.
That would give you $4 billion.
That's $9 billion.
You say, I'm going to reduce spending to $10 billion below what I recommended.
So this gives you a strong position of fiscal responsibility.
Then you say, I'm going to impose a 10% border tax on all imports into this country until such time as we re-initiate our currency parity rates with other countries around the world, because we are not competitive.
I'm going to recommend to the Congress to reinstate the investment tax credit at 7%.
That'll cost you $3 billion.
But a 10% border tax would pick you up about $4.
It ought to pick you up about $4 billion.
But it requires congressional action.
Well, it does require congressional action.
Oh, that's correct.
Some of it will.
But that's all right.
I just wanted to raise one yesterday.
That's correct.
That one will require both of those jobs.
That's the tax credit and the border tax.
But you're also going to cut spending $10 billion so you can give up a little bit.
Now, if you even want to go further, you can cut the exile tax on auto payment.
Now, that'll cost you a net of around $1 billion, $2 billion, $3 billion, gross of $1.9 billion.
But this affects a major industry in this country.
It's non-competitive now with imports.
And if you knock off that excess tax on automobiles, it just means about a $200 automobile sale for the 10 billion people that are going to buy automobiles this next period.
And it's a hell of a good way to reduce taxes without having to cross the board to all these things.
Again, for the poor, so-called, I know.
So there are a series of steps that you can take.
Now, and coupled with this, I think if you do all this, then you've got to put on a 90 to 120-day freeze, not wage and price control, a free business.
Prices and wages and everything for 90 to 120 days until we can have time to renegotiate and the international deal, the time we can see what impact these things are going to have.
This is a broad sweep of events.
It touches everything.
It touches the international field.
It touches all your domestic people.
It touches the spending level in the Congress.
Re-institute your investment tax credit.
It would impose a 10% quarter tax.
It would freeze wages and prices.
But I believe it ought to stimulate the talent in your economy.
It ought to stimulate domestic production.
It ought to show you the people that you have a full awareness of, the problems with which you're confronting, both in the domestic and the international field.
And it shows, secondly, most importantly, that you've got the courage to face up to them, that you take a position before you're forced to take a position.
This is the only problem we have in the international field.
I think we're going to get by.
I think we'll get by in September.
uh we may get by beyond that although there is considerable there is considerable feeling and i have and most of you have to suspect this is almost interesting but i talked to the vice president about chemicals he's just met three weeks ago vice president of finance who's smart as hell who came in the day before yesterday with the uh girth center of our experience strongly recommended
that we ought to get, we ought to get very much stuff in our meetings.
They said, whether you're meetings.
Well, yes.
And around the world.
I said, now, this vice president says he speaks by his language.
He's excited.
He said, they forget about that.
He speaks in the truth, very much in his accent.
But he said, there's no question about these finance ministers.
You're coming over here.
So they're trying to get together.
You are right now.
Come with a common front issue.
And what is their, what is the big of that meeting?
It's the last week of September.
They have a World Bank meeting with the International Monetary Fund.
That's all here.
That's all here in Washington.
And I've just sent you a memorandum suggesting you speak to them.
But he says they're going to try to come with a common front against the United States and a common front against the dollar.
He says that they're planning on, with the press here, knowing the profundities of the press and criticizing the press and what it does, they're going to try to leave the impression of all of their problems
are because of the dollar and because of policies in the United States that we don't recognize what our problems are and so forth and so on, even though they're in places higher than us.
They're going to try to put all the hopes on us and all that.
But irrespective of that, I think you go from now until November of 72, it's too dangerous a course.
I don't think we can pull this international fence.
We'll lose this week.
billion dollars in reserves this week.
And this is a costly road.
And there's no way you can stop it before it takes you going.
There's no way.
And a year from now, we will probably be down $3 billion lower in our reserves than we are today.
So I don't think you can expect to hold the position.
through the elections next year.
That being true, I don't think you ought to ever be forcing the opposition.
I think you ought to always lead.
You're trying to be a dead end.
I would say that, uh,
HR1 wouldn't bother me.
That doesn't bother me.
General revenue sharing, frankly, I don't think.
It doesn't bother me, except for the fact that we have an enormous number of people.
I'm speaking on co-politics, which, of course, is what we've done with you.
of charging around for it.
And I wonder if there's a way we could finesse that.
I don't know.
Oh, sure.
We don't need to do that.
But H.R.
1, I think, has a good ring to it for this reason.
I'm just using the word H.R.
1.
Why H.R.
1?
Well, the point is you've got enough money.
I'd like to let Wilbur roll, General Revenue Check, but we can't.
The thing that I'm concerned about is that if you start talking about substantial budget cuts, that they will turn on me.
on defense on our end and we can't do that because that just that'll also hurt the economy and also it's just wrong with the country but let's but let's just uh just thinking about hr1 just first i think as i'm sure you do that welfare needs to be reformed second
I believe that this is a good method, in other words, to provide basically a halfway house so that individuals will take even jobs that don't pay up to the welfare or the poverty minimum in order to get off welfare.
Third, I am not sure of it, and I can't be sure of it.
Fourth, at this particular point,
I think an experiment costing that much money could well be put aside and then go after it at a later time.
So what I'm really saying is that on the HR1, I don't think there's a hell of a lot of politics left for continuing to fight for the goddamn thing.
And what we do is to simply say that at this time we're going to change our position to make it one of an experiment, you know, rather than put it out there at $4 billion.
increase on spending.
I don't know.
I think, well, one thing that I think you could do, I think you could go with a personnel cut.
Well, that's all.
Now, that would not be, say, a $2,500 or $1,500.
I remember the thing I talked about earlier.
in personnel, so that'll save money right across the board.
That would be symbolic.
Basically, it's symbolism here.
You know what I'm trying to say.
We're not going to authorize or sign any additional salary increases for public employees.
You look at the arson they did during the next fiscal year.
Number two, I'm asking all the departments to cut 10%, 10%.
Number three, 10% is the amount.
that's right number three for the next fiscal year we're going to not push off the rest of this year just for this calendar year i'm going to ask that they not act on hr1 yeah uh and you just do it for the next five months if you want to revive it in january you can't you know what the situation is
But at least you said that one's not too weak.
We're not saying it's a symbol.
What we can do is to say defer H.R.
1's deferred date until 73, in other words, rather than getting away for it, I ask them to defer H.R.
1's date until 73.
That's what we're talking about.
We're talking about a symbol that's somewhere around 5 billion.
That's the way to handle H.R.
1, I guess.
It's not rather than second.
I think maybe we just might go second when we say defer it until 73.
Such and such a date.
And we only deferred this L.A. increases to such and such a date.
We only look at the general revenue share and think we need to defer that.
I don't know.
That's a tough one.
I guess thinking of the lobby that we have now created for it, we've created a goddamn monster.
You see, we've got the governors, we've got senators, not governors, governors, mayors.
How about making a loan?
I think we've got five billion dollars.
Soon we defer.
that'll cost you an additional four billion, as I recall.
He'd pick up another billion.
in these 10% cuts or at least more than that.
Maybe there's some construction projects that can be deferred.
I prefer not to do those.
That's right.
That's jobs.
That's jobs.
That's right.
So I think all you need is about $5 billion.
All you need to just say, we're not going to need any more military or civilian payment increases.
And I'm not going to pay any increases.
We can do them.
I think we're going to go on the payment increase deal.
We're not going to go over the comparability deal.
But the government workers are getting mad.
They're getting mad.
It's one of those problems, isn't it?
You just, but it's that type of, yeah, that type of thing.
Frankly, I think we went on the income-staying policy.
That, of course, is a tough one.
I just don't know how.
I mean, I've been around this term, and every time anybody ever submits anything, I start to put it down on paper.
What would an incomes policy be?
They never come up with anything that you can really fight.
Well, all of it breeds.
That's why the wage price breeds is better.
The only problem I have with that is that the problem I have with it is that I think that our original...
the assumption that we talked about earlier, to throw that on on a later date and let it stay on and take it off, say, three or four months before the election.
I think putting it on too early is risky.
Your suggestion about putting it, if you put it on in September and you laid it off in January, February, well,
Goes up.
Mike, you better put it back.
And try to put it back when you take it off.
I wouldn't know the wage price for it, because then you do have the... Or it just won't work.
Then you do have the... Or it'll work, but it'll work.
I mean, it'll work.
It has to work with a few damn things, but it's just... No, it's not.
You don't want that.
But look at these goddamn... Look at these... You know, when you talk about a board, they'll have the same problem generally.
They'll negotiate.
Sometimes they'll argue and haggle around a little bit.
What should the wages be?
What should the prices be?
You just tell somebody to decide it.
That's right.
It's not going to work for longer than I start saying it worked.
It worked, yes, for about six months.
But if you freeze it, you know, if you freeze it for nine days, lift it, and if it gets out of hand, you freeze it again.
I don't know, but we have to time it in terms of the election next year.
I think what you're appealing about September is that you don't think that's too early.
No, I don't.
And I don't think so.
I think if you had September, October, November, December, if you froze it to the first year, that gave you four months.
Now, what that also does, it quietens this country down.
And you put it on that basis, you'll see.
Now, we're taking some very drastic action.
We're floating the dollar.
We're, for the first time, we're not going to convert dollars to gold.
Now, this is not going to affect the average fellow, but it's damn sure going to affect your financial markets.
I don't know if it's going to do it adversely.
It would be a hell of a shock to them.
But by putting the wage price reasonable, this tends to hold everybody in place.
This tends to say to the financial community, to everybody else in this country, he damn sure means business.
This is the impact.
It's a psychological thing.
It's psychological.
Now, he'll give you a rest.
He'll give you a rest of the 90 days to look at it.
And you, in effect, delegate to the Office of Emergency Planning, the authority that's motioned.
That's probably the logical place to do it at the moment, although it doesn't have a logical man ahead of it.
But this is the type of thing that I'm thinking about, and I don't see any downside to it.
When you put on a future import tax, this has to help American labor.
How do you help American business if they're going to applaud it?
If you recommend the reinstatement of the investment tax credit, now they can pass.
I think they'll pass it now.
I think it will, but the rest of them are committed to the point where they've got to shove it through.
And I think they've got to build up such a hell of a man for it.
How about the other one?
I think you can pass 10% of it.
Pretty hard to not take that as.
I think they were correct.
What does this do?
What's the downside?
None.
None at all.
You've got $40 million of imports assumed, just assumed, if you get a 10% of it, that's $4 billion a year in collections.
That's more than it pays for your 7% investment tax credit.
And the American business report gives an appreciation for it.
But that's all right.
It's given a 7% investment tax credit.
That drops.
There's no downside on that.
This ought to create new jobs.
if you can decrease your spending just with conversation.
We're going to set an example.
We're not going to get any more payable.
We're going to cut this spending by at least $5 billion, and I've told the department to cut their personnel by 10% here in the next fiscal year.
So you're taking a series of actions, no one of which they can point to and say, he did this for political purposes.
No one of which they can point to and say, well, his economic policies failed.
You see, by taking the international as well as the domestic action at the same time, one tends to cloak the other.
You take the domestic action as a support for your international action, and it hits.
It is, because if we immediately go into negotiations on what the rate ought to be between the dollar and the yen, we can say to the Japanese, what can't we do if we get a fair exchange rate?
We may lift the 10% import tax.
And we say that to Europe, we say that to the rest of the country.
Say, yes, we've got this temporary 10% tax on the yen.
We will keep it until we have a fair deal.
The tax is being imposed in a way that it could be lifted by discretion.
Why make it temporary?
Oh, you weren't sure that it had to be lifted at your discretion?
You know, we'd have to do, we'd have to, let me ask instead of timing things.
I was intrigued by the idea, your idea of, you know, we talked about doing an audience for the Congress of Strong, but
Another way to do that would be to wait until right after Labor Day when the Congress is back.
And that would be about two weeks before your initial meeting.
And then having in mind that we do have here
for any artists or the amount of congressional action that you have to do this on the basis of having the bipartisan leaders in.
Yes.
Well, I'm just thinking a lot of it.
You see,
Then you'd have to have them in and say, all right, now, this is what we're going to do.
And I'm going to ask for this.
This is the message I'm going to send to the Congress and so forth.
And then the message goes out and so forth and so on.
Now, the other way you could do it would be a technical standpoint.
See, the Congress leaves this week.
We can't get this done.
We don't want to do this.
We've got to think this through very carefully.
The other way we could do is to then
We've got lots of time.
We've got the whole month of August here.
We can do what we want.
just to be doing what they're doing.
Run those through your mind, see what you think.
Just thinking out loud.
Because you can't do it in bits and pieces.
Just think out loud about it.
You really ought to keep doing it in bits and pieces.
That's my point.
But then, with all the congressional action required, is there not a strong case made for waiting until the Congress gets back and smashes it on?
Yes.
Otherwise, the bastards would be all out in the country.
You know what I mean?
One will snipe here, and another will snipe here, and they'll say, hold on.
I don't know.
That's right.
Well, I agree.
But don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't, don't.
and that i can make a terrible case for doing it this week because it feels something yes sir i can make a strong case for that now though the only reason i don't think it's going to fail this week is because i'm not sure we've got it we've got everybody satisfied i'm not sure that you're i know you're not satisfied you're about to be oh well i uh but uh i can get it satisfied if we get it i can make a strong case for it this week now the only the only advantage of doing it while congress is in recess
If indeed these are popular actions, they would answer everybody in our whole district.
But the trouble is that their instinctive reaction is going to be a negative one among the Democrats at least ever.
And they'll be sniping and you'll catch them where they don't have the facts and they'll be afraid to say a thing.
If they say a thing, it'd be critical.
If they are in recess, you don't dare take this kind of an action requiring as much congressional authorization and adoption without calling the leadership of the Congress back in here, it seems to me, and at least briefing them.
This is the leadership of both the parties, as well as the principal committee, gentlemen, that are going to be handling this legislation.
I think it would be almost criminal to do it.
You'd have to have the ways, the means, appropriations, finance, of course.
That's a waste of money.
That's it.
That's it.
And then it's one of the issues that will happen.
They have to come back, and they're going to be scattered all over the world.
Yeah, they will be scattered in August.
That's for the interest of all of us, planning trips and all this and that and the other things.
Of course, it is an essential to call them back, even when they're in recess.
But I don't think, you know, it would be a hell of a problem to get them back.
Go ahead, let me take your hand.
True.
So you took me in.
Well, how big is Emily in this movie?
I don't think we have.
No, no, I don't think we have.
I'm not sure.
I think Pete is probably very well convinced.
I think McCracken is.
I don't think George is.
I certainly don't think Arthur is, but we haven't talked to him enough.
Now, we can do it.
I really think if we don't get it, there are two things that are going to happen in the next two weeks.
Number one, we're going to, we have to report this financing.
So the statistics have come out that we've lost about a billion dollars of assets this week.
That will create a hell of a ripple.
There's no way to cover it.
We have to report it.
Secondly, we have to put out by about the 15th of August the official balance of papers for the second quarter, getting the first half.
But everybody's pretty well discounted that.
I don't know why that should cause it.
Yeah, that's been checked.
We might be ready to get the balance of papers for a week.
Right.
So I don't know.
Those are the only two things that I can think of.
Now, I just heard this thing.
It said Friday.
There's a report over here Saturday morning that the French were going to hold dogs if they, in fact, weren't going to ask them to go.
So this is, if he means this, and I'm sure he does, this is where it really... Let me ask you this.
If there are any places, John, where you need to stroke here with the French, the British, or the Germans...
where they're involved.
Or for that matter, the goddamn Japanese.
I don't know whether they're involved or not.
No, well, they're involved with Henry.
All right.
But if you will, in this case, if you will just give Henry a reason.
Now, we have actually channels that say this and begin to be quite blunt about this.
The reason I say don't call Bill is that the State Department represents the goddamn foreign countries.
Is it?
We have special, I have a special relationship with Pompidou, and a special one with Bronk, and a special one with Keith, where Henry calls what is basically his office of number there and says, now, God damn it, do this or that or the other thing.
Now, we haven't used it.
I mean, we use it on, well, we use it, for example, in the Jordanian crisis, and we're using it to set up the Berlin thing.
It's coming extremely well.
But wherever you feel that, I want you, without you really talking to me, you just get Henry on the call and say, look, call Pompidou, and they'll do it.
And I think we should use that if we want, but it has to be a hell of a big play.
Yes, and you see, we don't have to.
They'll make us pay later for something else.
That's right.
Plus, I don't feel free to do it.
I don't want you in a position of a trap.
I see.
Correct.
See, notice, if they're getting ready to ask for gold, then we say, don't you ask for gold.
And this year in September, we lower the gold.
Yeah, we used to pay it more.
Yeah, I see.
Well, I just want you to know that in this thing, we have not, you know, we're at times, but it's there and to be used at appropriate times on a political basis.
Like, for example, if you can talk to, you naturally can talk to the finance minister's
And are here to talk to the so-called central bankers.
But if the decision is a political decision, as it will be, and as it will be in Germany, then we'll have to talk to them.
And we will.
Now, when we'll need this kind of help is when we need to go start in September.
When we start blackouts, we'll get it.
Now, we're going to play a kind of game, and we're going to play it.
Because there's not a single one of those finance ministers that can say yes or no anymore, I believe.
without checking with their principal?
Are you going to check with them?
Well, you could say, you don't say yes to them much easier than you think of them.
Their economies are tied so close to politics.
They are not free economies.
Ours is.
That's right.
And you have more power than they have, actually.
I mean, you have more, let me say, you could feel free to talk much more than they can.
But you know what my thinking is, and you can clarify it.
Hell, they can't even move now, that's right, without calling check with Willie Brown or with the committee.
They really can't even talk to you today.
They don't have a problem with that, too.
Well, what I think, what we ought to say, let's do a little, let's go set.
I think what you ought to do today is, today is your minimum year schedule.
We'll talk to you about it again.
Artists, you'll play the artist, and me together.
You know, the reason I say this is twofold.
First, Arthur thinks we're the only ones that really have a hand involved in these problems.
Number two, he...
You should never know that they've been in meetings at all.
That's why I have not been in any of these meetings.
Because I can truthfully say, very good, very good.
I said, I haven't been in any meetings.
I said, how?
I said, I thought it was the organization.
And I said, Paul's been talking to people now.
I don't know what all they've done, but Paul, what is he talking about the organization?
I said, I don't know.
I said, Arthur, he's very concerned.
And he talked about that 30 minutes when I was representing him on Friday morning.
My God, he's been living.
Childhood people have been talking about reorganizing for years.
So he just says, oh, he really is.
He said, when I finally left, he said, now, John, you've got to help me.
He said, you've got to help me with the president.
He said, now, we just can't let this go on.
And I said, I had previously told him.
I said, now, he's been asking for this.
I said, I don't want to help.
I laughed.
He said, well, it's not a laughing matter.
I said, well, hell, it is.
They come and ask me about it, and I said, why?
I wouldn't respond to it.
I said, our people keep rushing in.
I said, poker and walking, all of them, what the score was.
I said, hell, I'm walking.
They said, look, we're getting called.
I said, why?
I said, why?
They said, what are you all worried about?
Well, he said, it's not a lack of matter.
I said, don't put your sons and bitches over there and everyone to do the mystery.
He ought to do it.
He said, don't.
Boy, he didn't mean it.
That's what he said.
But he just said, he said, I've got to talk to the command.
He said, I've got this personal right to her time's office.
He said, I'm going to find out who it is.
And he said, everybody.
And then he, well, he was, you know, aggressive, combative to begin with.
But then he backed off.
When I finally let him, he said, have you got help?
He said, we just can't have this.
I've got to have some help with the president.
I swear I think he know I'm helping.
So...
And that's what he is, and I just don't think he's worried.
He's worried, and I just don't think he ought to let him in too quick.
No, sir, don't let him out of the room.
I wonder if we ought to have that meeting quite quickly.
You, I'll tell you what, let me suggest this, rather than meeting him today or tomorrow, why don't you call him, you call him, not me, and say that you were, and we were going over a great number of things here today,
and you were talking to the president about the international monetary thing, and he had asked, the president had asked, he doesn't want us to get beyond, he doesn't want us to get down in the bowels of the bureaucracy because everybody's been talking about it.
He has asked that you and me talk about it first.
Would you, or would that be, no, thanks, that's fine.
And get recommendations, and at least be, that they come in and talk to him, and then prior,
that he wants to have a quadriad meeting on the thing.
How does that sound?
Now, let me say, why don't we plan that for, I think, a very good time, just to put it in terms of timing.
Let's say, having about Thursday.
Now, we get our anchor in.
But then, if we do that, we then ought to have a quadriad meeting on...
Also, Thursey had him in and then had the property added.
How does that sound?
I don't know if that's right.
I think you really ought to have him in before we have the property added.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's it.
That's it.
Mr. Thursey sent it out.
Wednesday's a bad day for me due to the fact that I have to do a, I've got to get a little personal.
Well, Mark, I think you should move it to Texas.
I mean, I don't want to, I don't want to touch on it.
Yeah.
No, I could, Mark.
If you think Tuesday's better, how do you tell?
The only reason Tuesday would be better is to be further down the road in the event something happens.
I don't think anything's going to happen to precipitate a crisis in the international field when you say that.
I think it's a gamble, but I want you to know that it is a gamble.
We'll wait until September.
It's a gamble for two reasons.
Number one, because
a foreign government can trigger an event.
Secondly, the longer we go, the greater the danger of a leak.
And this is, this would cannot, if a leak occurred, we'd probably have to move anything.
Now, those are one of two.
That's why
He says it so correctly, the leak on the Federal Reserve.
It probably did.
This is why.
This is why.
I'm not sure if we ought to move.
If we're thinking in September, then I'm not sure we ought to move at all this week.
He waited.
I'm worried about that.
I think we can get along just fine.
I also have a feeling that it's going to take another month, five weeks of brutal punishment from the press.
And we're getting it.
We're getting it.
Some of our friends have it around.
It's fun getting out there.
That's right.
But there are even more friends that are a little more.
That's right.
And our friends who want more.
Who want more.
You can't find a businessman that doesn't want to invest in tax credit.
They're all still singing that song.
They all think they're not tax creditors.
They want the... Actually, the enterprise tax.
They all want some.
But that's all right.
Well, that's, you know.
But I think the meeting from the press and so forth, the domestic meeting, we probably can take
I think, I'm not sure.
Well, we have, of course we have.
Well, you can't, but I'm not saying you ought to now.
It's important, very important.
There's a promise present beyond which you can't let a deterioration, let a deterioration occur because it becomes embedded in the public mind to the point where it's damn hard to erase it.
And that's another reason why I think if we, if we could satisfy your mind this week,
Of course, then you don't take as many risks.
The longer you wait, the more risks you take.
And you have to always keep in mind that, in one sense, you're vulnerable to foreign nations' actions because they hold $30 billion.
We've got $10 billion to pay them.
They can trigger it.
a year of action on convertibility in any hour because they can just start a run on the bank, so to speak, and you can't pay them.
You can pay them 30 cents on the dollar.
So at that point, at that moment, regardless of what else occurs or what else is happening, you've got to close the goal.
Or you wipe yourself out and just say, well, we'll pay it off first come, first served.
Well, that's wrong.
Then you really do your friends great distress.
You hurt yourself.
uh, internationally.
We can't let somebody precipitate the thing.
Now, one of the problems we have now is the only goddamn people that are being helped.
Assume that gold is a valuable commodity.
The people that are getting into the Swiss and the Dutch and the Belgians, those local housing bastards, but the Germans are not.
They're not asking for it.
The British are not asking for it.
The French are not asking for it.
Now, they're going to get some, but it's normal.
Of course, they're going to get $200,000 this week.
But it's a very legitimate, longstanding thing.
So part of what I'm saying is that we don't want to trigger it because we have those who go to this the most, and you abuse your friends the most and the international people.
Now, I'm not really worried about any of them when it comes right down.
What I am worried about is the domestic impact of any such action being goaded into it.
And you don't want to be goaded into it.
You want to be ahead of them.
You want to be thinking.
You want to be planning.
And you'll take this whole country by surprise.
It'll be a bigger coup if you follow anything like it.
I take every one of these steps.
But if you follow anything like this, of course,
It's going to be as big a coup as you try to think.
No question about it.
And there's not anything wrong with it.
Now, it's a question.
You can argue, as some will argue, whether or not you're afraid of wasting prices, whether or not this is the time.
I held it.
Anytime you move on this ball to front with this many actions, sure, there's a risk of gambling some of it.
But I think it's a good gamble.
I think you can
You can freeze wages for 90, 100, 20 days.
I'd offer it.
I really think you ought to, because by the way, this is impressive.
Freezing, yes.
Assuming you take all these other steps.
Because this is a major, this is a major step you're taking.
Beyond any question.
And we can be ready this week now.
There are other ways to get to it.
We can take a completely different course.
We're going to defend the dollar.
Which, of course, we've taken up to now.
That's correct.
We can defend the dollar.
But to legitimately and creditably defend the dollar, you're going to have to take all these actions.
All the domestic money.
Now, you won't have to close gold.
You're going to have to put an import duty or something to stimulate this economy.
That's not what they tell everybody.
It delights me.
I'm glad that they've got themselves .
It would be great.
And I doubt the return of the investment tax credit.
This teaches every frame you've got, every business frame you've got, every economist they've got on their damn payroll.
It's got to help labor.
Labor can't complain about it.
You say you do it on the basis of jobs, of economic expansion.
If you, if you stop, but literally, I don't know if that makes sense to the, I'm just thinking on whether you're going to be honest.
You put the, you put on the important thing.
That answers, for the moment, the quota problem.
That's correct.
Does it or doesn't it?
Yes, it does.
It doesn't, it doesn't.
On the other hand, it's a hell of a lot of people who say, well, at least we're keeping those goddamn foreign labor out of here.
That's correct.
Second, with regard to the investment tax credit, it becomes, it's a great thing for business, probably for jobs, and it becomes,
less difficult politically.
Two reasons.
One, Mills and his colleagues have already recommended it.
Two, that you're going to get the money out of the important thing.
So it isn't going to cost us any money.
Three, the same, of course, as we said, the excise thing.
The excise thing, of course, means jobs without question, because it makes a lot of our cheaper cars competitive.
And that runs cars.
That's right.
$200 is probably the difference.
That's right.
The $200 excise thing.
So I think on those steps, good.
The steps that I think require, that are more difficult than I'm wondering if they could be done at a later time.
The way that Bryce Brees appeals to me enormously in terms of a dramatic step, I have a feeling that just a gut reaction, that that is one that we should
Let's suppose that a few of you would go back and think it through, think one thing through, maybe two steps to do the import and the excise tax, the investment tax, and so forth.
You're also going to hand the budget, hand the budget, hand the budget, and no increase for government works or something.
The wage price frees.
I have a feeling it should be done in November, as we originally talked, or December or something like that, so that it runs through the next year.
But you won't hold it that long.
Well, I'd like to have it run right through the spring and let them up so that between, from May on,
See, like what I meant, it's from May on, it's off.
Let the damn thing go.
I don't know.
I, I, I, but let, have your fellows talk.
Well, have your fellows bet it out in bold ways.
Put it on now.
OEP, one person.
I don't know if they, they don't have to get a man in there.
I had a person who changed that computer sign.
They did it in that assignment.
I could get him the OEP job.
You have the power.
The Congress should give it to you.
You can go get anybody you want to.
Yeah.
Just heard of me.
How about getting a treasurer?
We could.
You've got to work with a lot of people who scare a lot of people.
Well, you know they didn't want to.
Normally, you know, you couldn't put it with Congress or Labor, obviously, because they, you know, the one that represents business and the other, Labor.
Treasury is a department that is not, uh, or you could put it, as you say, in the office of emergency preparedness, except really they don't really have any competence in this field.
You know, most people don't have any knowledge.
No, they really don't.
I don't know how the damn thing could be enforced.
But it's really a question of putting it out and it's a true job everybody violates it.
Yes.
But for a short period of time, you can expect a tremendous voluntary restraint.
A lot of people want a big little offer.
That's right.
And I think over a short period, you can have a tremendous voluntary restraint.
So therefore, you're feeling the beat.
Remember, you were saying we go to November and December rather than now.
Are you thinking of the better times now?
Well, that's my alternative.
Yes, my alternative would be that you pose it for me.
Well, I'll say 90 days.
Let's say September or October, November.
Then you let me know.
You better keep it through Christmas.
Maybe through Christmas.
Maybe the first year.
I would not argue with that.
You wouldn't want prices to go skyrocketing in Christmas.
That's right.
Then you got to that incident that would give a hell of a boost to the Christmas market, too.
You see, people could advertise, and everybody would say, well, the freeze rose off on January 1st, so we better buy now.
That's right.
I mean, these are really, you know, they're eating off.
That might be an option.
Then in January 1st, you dip it, and you say, now, I've flipped it.
I think we've got things under control, depending on what happens.
By that time, we should have the...
new exchange rates negotiated around the world.
Also, we might have a few other things.
We might have our new tax code.
Sure.
You may be ready to cover a whole new problem, which I hope you will.
You've got to come up with that, John.
Then you live it.
And let's say to the American people, I'm living it now.
If there's any of you saying, frankly, I would reimpose it.
Don't say one will reimpose it and see if you can't carry it through the world until November.
If you can't, hell, I wouldn't either.
It's just a matter of imposing to 60 to 80 before the election.
Depends on what happens.
You may want to impose it just before the election instead of lifting it just before the election.
It must be said for that, Mr. Rich, that lifting depends on what the American people want at that particular moment in time.
But you're in the driver's seat.
You can lift it.
You can not lift it.
You can do whatever you want to.
Let me say this.
since we are not going to uh since we are not going to submit this we cannot submit it to the congress this week it's going to be two you would agree we can't get it ready to go by thursday but we can see the congress will be gone after thursday that's what they're thinking now since that is the case of our getting the congress to hell out of here and hope we can get lucky
I'd love to keep coming.
It will be close as hell.
And as soon as they've got a chance to approach it,
No, no, we've got to agree to vote this afternoon.
Oh, they're voting?
We've got to vote on the House bill this afternoon, 310.
In the Senate?
Yes.
If you, there are three people, or two at least, if you're in the mood to call anybody, we don't have to.
Carl Curtis is going to be critical to us.
Cook is going to be critical to us.
Goddamn Cook, son of a bitch.
Well, he may not want to call.
See, Curtis is going to do what Curtis does.
And he's got no reason to be against it, he says, just to, you know, settle something.
Well, I called him.
Has he come out against it already?
No.
But he's inclined to be no.
What time did they vote?
At 3 o'clock.
And because he's running this year, the Russians are going to vote with him, but it's just too long.
All right.
All right.
All right.
Now, me, I called me Saturday afternoon, and, uh,
He's got, he's working.
He's trying to get Jackson, Magnuson, Metcalfe, Montoya, Moss, and Muskie.
I don't know what lucky they are, but I hear...
Boy, they're a bunch of damn, what's the matter, destructive bastards.
They killed SST.
All they want to kill is... What the hell do they want from the United States to make, John?
What do they want us to make?
I don't know.
Paul Fannin is one.
Paul is a piece.
Mary is a piece.
Go water.
And I said, Paul, why don't you come down?
He called me about a night over the hour.
He used the medical science section.
And I said, Paul, why don't you come down here at 3 o'clock and talk to me about it?
He came and kind of lay it.
He said, I don't know what you're doing.
And I said, well, that's fine.
I ain't no teacher.
That's what I'm doing.
I said, what's in the name of God that you want to vote against Lockheed just to build up a building?
I said, y'all were going to have that thought before you came to a goddamn thing.
I said, next time it's going to be something you're interested in, my friend.
And I said, you let him kill it.
He said, no, you're going to let him kill Lockheed, and he's going to do it with your vote.
We said, let me talk to Barry.
And then Barry and I both would come see me.
And I said, well, you all just come on down here.
We talked about the Smith thing at 3 o'clock.
Henry Bell, I got to go up and see him because he voted against us.
And he told me it's because Dan Houghton, Christ gave Mike Rinaldi a couple thousand dollars.
Well, hell, Mike Rinaldi was head of aviation when he was in the Senate.
And I'm sure that Dan was under pressure from his airlines to come and give a little money.
But anyway, I thought, I'm going to count it.
Henry Bell, Jesus Christ.
And Curtis Stone, go on.
No, I don't want to kill her.
Would it be worth it?
I don't know.
I don't know.
Don't talk to anybody you don't want to.
Well, I can hear the fingerprints on these people.
I don't know.
I have no hands, but I just, I don't care.
I don't think they used to use this.
I don't think they have.
I don't think so.
You know, they all, I wouldn't talk about it.
These are honorable people.
Henry Anderson, Carl Curtis, and Curtis Don, Goldwater.
Dan, Dan, Mr. Brennan.
No, Mr. Brennan didn't do anything.
He'd written some letters yesterday.
He said, I could vote for the generic bill.
I could vote for a broader bill.
But he said, now we've just got this Lockheed thing.
He said, I've got some letters of them.
And I said, well...
Just come on down there and go vote against us.
I said, we've got 44 votes.
Yeah, you have 44.
Yeah, we've got 44 firmer.
If we can knock off some of these fellas.
If we can get Curtis and Russell, that'll give us 46.
And then if we can get a few of them to not vote, I thought, that's pretty good shit.
Well, you want Goldwater?
They'll come down and see you.
Yeah, that's right.
You know, they just take a walk.
If they can't go with us, they're going to have to hurt us.
And I'm going to talk to Andrew Nelson, because he's got some things he wants from us.
He's a great guy.
My God, I love Chief.
That's the way it goes.
That's the way it goes.
No, I'll tell you what.
You can tell him.
Chief, we're talking to the president.
He's just been very, very close to the California situation.
And they really feel there that after losing SST, if they lose this, that this could really run a serious risk of losing, making it impossible to carry California in 72.
And that's the same thing with Carver.
It's impossible to carry California in 72, and this is what's involved.
And the same is true of Goldwater.
I mean, it's the jobs thing.
It's the... Well, I'll say this is, and I don't know if we don't hear this,
Let me see, maybe I can get .
But Carl Curtis, if you could just call, I'll call Curtis himself, because he is a senior guy, down east guy, and he has not committed, do you think?
All right, I'll call him and tell him he's not committed.
Now, how do we leave this, well, what I did here to finish, but it seems to me that since we are not going to do anything with the Congress before the weekend, you're ready for Thursday,
What we do, because there are a whole bunch of leakers and everything, let us take this week to think about this thing.
Get it all on the road.
Now I need you to see that we set up a quadriad.
You and I meet with Arthur.
Arthur, before the quadriad.
Now, and, uh, uh,
Let's put it this way.
I think the decision is so important that we want to get it very thoroughly thought through.
Now, I don't think we rule out, I don't think, I don't think we have to necessarily rule out the meeting in August.
Your concern about not moving now is that we'll get such a meeting in August, right?
Or the plant trigger crisis.
Either one.
But I don't care how big the offer is.
We're going to take the lead.
So your view would be to move now and avoid the meeting?
Well, that's when it's going to happen.
So maybe the Congress is gone.
All you need to do is to say, frankly, we'll be gone.
Call them back in.
I don't mean the whole Congress.
But you know, you individually could call leaders and say, come in for this meeting.
That could be quite romantic, too.
You could do that next week.
Let me put it this way.
Looking at the congressional side, I don't think you could do it this week.
They're too busy.
They're too tied up.
It'll look like a Frank did kind of a thing.
You could do it next week.
So I don't think we will not rule out doing something now in August.
We can still do it, but we do it next week, and then we just call the leaders in for a meeting and lay it out.
You don't have to have the Congress sitting down there.
You don't have to have the leaders sitting down here.
So my opinion, thinking about the plan, is that we have two options.
One, to go next week.
Now, with regard to our own, now, with regard to we do, right?
What you said is we decided to wait until September.
You don't want to have any meetings now, do you?
No, I really don't.
Because the whole damn thing will be pissed off.
This is the reason we got to the city.
We wouldn't have our time.
That's the number of times people are going to say, well, I've got some money.
We're sure as hell going to try and get everything that comes from that.
Now, with regard to our agreement,
how do we leave that do we want to uh what i had in mind let's speak with you and that's me we
I want to get George.
George has got to understand this thing.
and they should issue one copy of the .
But I think we should be able to meet with partners, essential sources, whatever.
Even though we're not gonna move now?
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
What I think we should do this time is that you and I again
We'll meet on Thursday and see what we plan to do.
And then we will then do some more things about whether we go next week or go in September.
Right?
I always was thinking about that.
Is there anybody else that you want to have a talk with?
Yes, I want to talk to George.
Yes, I'll talk to him.
I'll talk to Pete.
Don't stress.
I don't want anybody to talk to me.
I don't want him to talk to Flannagan, for example.
I don't want him to talk to his son.
Now that I don't trust both sides, it's not, but the moment you go way beyond these people, you know, the elite, you know, without law and order, then that's why, that's one of the problems here.
We can't stand this out.
I know what you're saying.
We can't stand it out.
And folks, if you talk to him, must be told that under no circumstances he's talking about it.
Now that means you can't talk to Bill Friedland or, you know, anybody else.
You're correct.
Right.
So I think that you and I will get together.
Does that sound all right?
You and I, I think, ought to have another talk.
Yes, sir.
We decided an hour to burn.
Yes, sir.
Is it Thursday?
Yeah, now, we said Thursday.
Now, we've got a captain meeting at 10 o'clock.
And he goes right after that.
He does mean that morning thing of, no, after the captain meets you at 10 o'clock now.
Right.
The committee on Spanish speaking, what the hell is that?
Kevin, we've been trying to launch for a year and a half.
The committee on Spanish speaking people.
Everything will have to be 10 o'clock in the afternoon.
So, why don't you set the time.
We've got a lot of time.
We're out of time for John and me.
We will need an hour.
Just the two of us again.
Don't you think so?
Yes, sir, I would do.
I don't think we should have anybody else in.
But you check your sources and get your feelings out.
But you can, but I would link to, I'll tell you, I think that's important to attach.
Sounds very good to me.
Well, I don't know.
But I'm ready to do it.
But you see, that puts us in stronger mortgage action.
And he says, well, let's do it.
And I said, well, let's do it, sir.
And then we'll agree to take it all.
Basically.
We're really just threatening anybody, you understand?
I try.
Because we're asking the Congress, you know, the goddamn Congress may not act.
It may not.
But we've got to hang it over.
That's correct.
You see, the point about voter bills is that we're really not threatening them.
Voters, because we say, well, the Congress may act, but they know we're not for it.
But if we say we're for an import tax and this and that, yeah, the export-retake thing didn't work out.
I know that Peterson was arguing about it.
You're not recommending that.
No.
No, I'm not.
Two reasons.
First, it's difficult.
You know, there's many types of reasons.
Second...
It really violates the gas.
No, it doesn't work when it does not.
Third, no.
Third, if you make that up, final question, tax credit would be, is that in a sense the same thing?
Well, it's even better.
Well, because it covers everything.
It covers everything.
You're using less of a tax credit.
My God, if they get that, they can't ask for an export rebate advantage.
Now, we go ahead with it.
Why are they so interested in investment tax?
They're going to get about $3 million.
Oh, it's symbolic to them.
It gives them a faster charge of office.
Let me tell you what I feel.
In our tax reform, the most important thing is the rebate.
if we can possibly do it if we can have the value added and substituting that the property tax slicing the property tax and second
Uh, then that's the brief, if you push it.
And I think by your idea, a two-year debriefing.
That'll let them get these guys out that they're gone.
And that's the whole question.
And that's the way to do it.
We can solve the basis of jobs.
Well, you see, the other thing, the investment tax credit does, it helps us.
It means cash to companies.
Whether they buy equipment or not, people can't afford it, but at least it means cash to them.
That means they're not out to pay a market card or some money, which they've been doing for billions of dollars.
Unprecedented.
But even a $3 billion is just as much as it really does.
That's what I did.
It's a symbolic thing.
I have not talked to a single businessman, banker, or the like that I don't believe brought it up in the last four months.
Now, you do not, I mean, the other thing that I want to, whether you, let me say that I think there's no problem, I mean, there's no problem politically or otherwise, and no problem philosophically for me on the income, on the income, the 10%, boy, I'm for that.
The investment tax credit, I'm for it.
And removing the excise tax, I'm for it.
All those three, I think, are job-related things.
The other thing is in terms of I'm for delaying each hour one for a year.
So that takes us horribly and I'm still in on whatever it is or whatever it's going to cost.
I'm for, the other one is, well it's not that, it's not what I was looking for.
But the only remaining package that causes me the greatest problem is
is the way we price greed, Mr. Rainey, because we are certain what the other heads will do.
We are not sure what this will do.
It's such an unknown factor.
It sounds damn good.
So I want you to really think of that one.
I don't think you'll find George as opposed to that one.
I think he might go for a snap freeze coming on top of the steel sign.
Fair enough.
Yes, sir.
All right, you and I will meet Thursday, March 15th.
Thank you.
Do you want to go up Thursday?
Yeah.
Do you want to set a date for the Billy Graham?
Oh, yeah.
Billy Graham just finished a big crew stage at the Open.
Isn't that fantastic?
He had 40,000 tonight out there.
Including tens of thousands of students.
That's right.
Last night he had 59,000.
Set an all-time record for the Open Stadium.
59,000.
And, uh, yeah.
And these kids and professors and everybody, Berkeley, North California is really a successful little country.
And it's where all this stuff started.
Mark Rudd and all those people started there.
You know, the 400 word stock in 1964 before there was ever a damn war.
Here at the Grand, there's a total turnaround.
Even the papers are phrasing it.
The San Francisco Chronicle ran an editorial on the Chronicle that never even did lettering on this issue, saying that Northern California would never be the same again, socially or politically.
What I was going to say is that I talked to him on the phone yesterday, and he said I'd go to Europe in a couple weeks, but I invited him to come back with his wife,
And he knew that Nellie and Pat Mack, he's never been on the Sequoia, you know, Johnson had it down.
But I thought we'd take him down the river on the Sequoia and let him go through the loop where they have that...
People are terribly impressed, you know, with all the things down there that you've been to.
And Mount Vernon.
Yeah, and Mount Vernon.
Yeah, and early then.
You have to be down there before sundown.
All right, fine.
We leave early.
We go down before sundown.
And if we want, if the time is effective, we can help out the vaccine.
So what do you mean?
So you don't, so you're not on there all the time.
Go down, it's about an hour and a half down.
Yeah, it's a good hour and a half.
Well, then, I think that's long enough.
Okay.
an hour and a half, two hours, or both.
What you can do is chop her down, boil the sequoia down there, and loop by Mount Vernon so you get to the daylight and then cruise out for dinner afterwards.
I think that part of the thrill of it is coming up on Mount Vernon and everybody that's in that can see it.
So you can get a feel of it otherwise.
It is, in a way.
Well, you could do that.
You could chop her down and come back.
Or you can chop her down in the shore of Mount Vernon, or the boat, somewhere above Mount Vernon here, or a little below.
How about below, and then cruise out?
I would chop her down below Mount Vernon, and then get on the boat, and then have a two-hour cruise.
Don't you think so?
Or can you just drive that boat so you know what it is?
It's pleasant for a couple of hours, and then you let it bail off.
I think so.
Well, the two hours of this, of course, are all right.
And then you catch the saloon before you, if you haven't, and then you go down, and then you have a chat.
Sounds like a good time.
So you need to work on that this week.
You have your calendars set up.
That's actually nice.
But I want you to work to see what's great.
It's fine.
I'll just say Tuesday night.
Okay.
Sometimes, I think it's Tuesday.
Sometimes in August, I'm going to, as long as it's convenient for you, I'm going to take it off.
A little time, too.
Yeah.
I think it's off.
Yeah.
It's going to take off.
I've got to put it on an RV, too.
I read about it.
It says you never stop.
Yeah, I never stop.
You never take a lesson.
I love this article.
Yeah, I haven't read it.
It's very good.
It's very good.
Newsweek.
Yeah.
It came out all right.
Also, it's a good picture.
Yeah.
It's a great picture.
Good.
Good.
It's a good ending to the article.
So, ladies and gentlemen, we're going to do this one.
That's all right.
That's all right.
Pacing with his wife is a very good thing.
Like I said, he's .
He was the president of that Texas .
He was here before I was.
You were the president the year after.
We wrote down .
I used to come home every night in a different direction talking to him.
He said he used to come back to our room from a different direction every morning.
Every morning.
That's what happened before he met with you.
Maybe Monday would be better for him.
Why don't you go on Monday then if you want to get off the...
If you do want to, it's okay.
I think Monday would be fine.
I mean, I might as well find General Craig and get Monday off.
Because then you've got the lead crew.
No takeoff.
It's a matter of fact.
I'm going to take off two weeks.
Ten days.
Well, that's why I was getting squeezed out.
I didn't have very good time.
You ought to get a tell-all on the 21st through the end of the month.
Through later.
too late, which is two weeks.
Well, that's not a week.
We can wait.
We can wait a whole week.
And technically, if things change, I'm not going anywhere.
We can do something next week.
Well, I'll be here all next week.
So it may be that the month of August is a good month to get the hell out of here.
I mean, it's only the time that I'd be gone.
Jews should go out and believe me.
Don't harsher.
And also, it shows that if you go away, that we have a little confidence in things.
That's all right.
That's correct.
Now, if you have a problem with doing something after Congress goes, and if you work
No, no.
You've got to file a review of senators today, and you can't file them.
Congress isn't here.
Why don't we pull this?
You would have moved until after 8 o'clock.
Well, wait a minute.
We can move after they're gone.
Well, but then if you announce an import tax after Congress is out, you can't.
roll back the effective date.
Therefore, you will stimulate exports to a monumental extent during the interim period.
If you do it while Congress is in session, you can set that as the effective date.
Well, we're going to do it this week or in September.
But the point is, though, you mean that the Congress has to enact it?
No, sir.
But you have to file it.
The proposal would encourage you to make the date of the tax effective on the date of filing, but you can't make the date of the tax retroactive.
Well, no, but my point is,
The point is, the Congress always provides a recess at the President-elect's last name, so they don't need to be sitting on their ass down there.
On this kind of thing, as I understand it, you can.
This is a better check.
I think they provide.
I think they provide.
If they don't, they can have their rules always provide that they can receive messages during this period of time.
I think, now, after adjournment, I think you're right.
I think there's no question on adjournment, but the opinion we've gotten was that you have a problem on a recess, too.
Well, let's find out if that's the case.
That may change our situation with regard to this week.
For you, Lee, so I want you to, uh, well, at the present time, you're not actually, you can get started.
Postpone to do it this week or do it, uh,
If you do it this way, all you can do is inform them.
We can't have the legislation wrong.
All you can do is announce what you're going to do and make effective dates and so forth.
But I think it's impossible for us to staff all the legislation out to crumple the 10% import tax quota, repeal the excise tax on automobiles, and grant the 7% investment tax credit.
You know, I just don't think we can physically get it done this week and not bring in a lot more people.
So I think what you're going to have to do is announce them all and then say, when the Congress reconvenes, these messages will be there in the interim.
You're taking further action if you want to take.
But if you're not as real, you say you're going to stimulate experts.
If you're not, you're going to have attacks on the future.
Obviously, they're going to pour the stuff in.
Unless the tax is made effective.
Unless the tax is made effective as of the day of the announcement.
We've got to have a local basis for reading.
We've got to be checked out to see what we can do about it.
Are we sure we can't get a dollar in this week?
I'm just thinking whether we really have an option.
That's my question.
Yes, I think you have an option.
I don't think you're going to have a question like you said.
I know what we're going to do is going to contribute to one of the two things that I've already pointed out to you.
One is the loss of assets this week, which will be in the range of $850 million.
We're going to draw a billion dollars from that.
The loss won't be quite that much.
The only other thing is about Spain, which has already been kicked around.
I don't know of any other problems that might trigger any type of a crisis.
Now, the French have been collecting a lot of money.
They've collected over a billion dollars the last two weeks.
But you start to think that if they're fighting, then they're going to hold on.
Now, if they mean that,
and we think they do, then that's no problem.
The belts from the Ducks, they might come in for another $200, $250 million range, but we can handle that.
When we get by this $1 million this week, if we are substantially through until mid-September, we've got no problems, barring some unforeseen and unanticipated incidents.
So I think we can ride this through September.
But I think we ought to be prepared.
That's all I'm saying.
We ought to be prepared not to get caught short in the event something unforeseen does occur.
That you ought to have pretty well in your mind what you want to do.
So that if it is triggered, or you think you ought to lead it, lead some of that, well, you can do it on your own.
We say, I have faith in you, sir.
I have faith in you.
That's all I want to happen.
That's all I want to happen.
Are you, are we sure that it's that difficult?
What I mean is, looking at it the other way, are we sure that it's that difficult that we can't do it this week?
No, I'm not at all sure.
Could we pull this stuff together?
Is that all that?
Let's look at the wage price freeze and import tax.
I wonder if that's all that.
Maybe sometimes these things look a lot more difficult than they are.
They are.
Those are very simple.
But how do you deal with excise tax, reinstate the investment tax, that price that's already written?
Well, I've got that written.
I've got the excise tax.
You've got the legislation and all these fields.
We've never done any of the tax on the import things that...
But I don't think it has to be stepped up so long as you announce it.
That's the point.
The difficulty of God talking to Arthur about it, we must not talk to him until we decide we're going to do it.
I know it, because he will talk, and I know it.
So, therefore,
I think you and I had better let me take a couple of days to think about it.
You take a couple of days to think about it.
And we'll meet Thursday.
But when we meet Thursday, let's have in mind the fact that we may still do it Friday.
That's fine.
In other words, if we feel strongly, then should we?
Also, we can sit a couple of days, so that'll tell us something, too.
Sure.
The congressman slaps the throes of its agony getting out of here.
And I have to say, it's three minutes to outline this, Bob.
Once we have this chosen.
Yeah.
The only other point is, this is what I anticipate, closing the door.
This is what I anticipate, closing.
That's all you do internationally.
Then we talk about a ceiling on spending.
Four or five, if you want to be cut out to the 10% reduction in personnel.
The 10% import tax.
repeat of the excess tax law, the practice of the advocacy of the 7% investment tax rate, and the $1,920.63 wage loss works.
That's a great statement.
And a suspension of the federal 80%.
Correct.
Suspension of the federal pay increase, and of course the indication of the legal blue card.
Right.
Pay increase, no pay, no federal pay increases.
Correct.
But the wage price increase, of course, takes care of it for the moment, but in the meantime, we'll say there was a suspension of the pay increase for next year.
The point is, the point is, Bob, in consideration of this, that a lot of the blood aches, and overall blood aches, no one can accuse them of, remember, one being political, number two being religious,
plan, they one folks the other.
Beautiful.
And yet they're radical.
They're led by steps with their two basic values.
He doesn't get blown over by events.
He shows above all else, number one, he has awareness of what's happening.
He must become an international, monetary leader who loves the international economy.
And number two, he's got the courage to step up, anticipate, and do it in an orderly and statesmanlike fashion.
That's the thing.
That's the thing.
We have one little problem.
That's always quite the case with the wage price freeze.
What does that do to the steel guys?
They will agree to the wage increase.
It would not affect them, I would say.
They said, I don't say it would not affect them, but they haven't announced the price increase yet.
It would affect the wage, you know.
If you see that it's the price increase, they ought to see it.
That's the confidence.
I would love to keep that wage increase going.
Or maybe they'll announce the price increase.
That's another idea.
The steel company might announce price increase tomorrow.
I'm curious about what you want to do.
What do you do?
You float the dollar, and in fact, they'll play this, and you've got to use the dollar, or they could break on that.
That's right.
Then you go down and suppress it, and you've got to use the dollar.
No.
You can't use it.
You can't use it.
You can't use it.
You can't use it.
We fostered that with the opposition.
The opposition fostered it.
That's correct.
That's exactly right.
But what you do, you take these other steps to strengthen the balance.
That's the whole point.
Now we're dedicated.
Our answer is Canada's floating against us now.
Germany's floating against us now.
And we're going to get more of this.
It's going to float anyway.
Sure.
Major gets major purposes.
This is the only way we can meet foreign competition.
We can't force it.
That's the only way we can get it.
But we can vote against it and protect our American economy and our American workers and our American children.
It might not be effective, but it might not.
But it will, I think, but just again, then you really have inflation.
Oh, no, I don't think you do.
I think it's going to change.
I think we're going to argue.
And I think that every accomplishment coming, I think every right will approve of the second.
You're talking about inflation?
Did you decide what you wanted to do?
The suggestion was made here in our staff meeting that obviously we've got to hang it on Congress' heart that they cost 16,000 jobs or whatever.
The question was whether it wasn't better to have Volpe go out and take that on, rather than you, because it hurts us less to damage Volpe with the Congress than it does to damage you with the Congress, where you've got to move on some other things.
On the other hand, maybe you've ended the thing that you want to take on.
It's a question.
In other words, it's a question of who gets a partner in Congress.
Somebody's really got to smash Congress.
And I think it's a question of whether it's not better to extend voting for that than wait and wait.
No, I think I'm going to need to go out.
I'll tell you to take it right here.
I'll get them.
I'll get them.
I'll get them.
I'll get them.
I'll get them.
I'll get them.
I'll get them.
I'll get them.
I'll get them.
I'll get them.
Make sure you all have a good evening.
Talk to, uh, all right, talk to me at this moment first.
If you could talk to George a little earlier.
I'm very proud of him.
And, uh, don't, uh, Thursday, we still decide to go now.
We didn't go then, or in September, too.
It's not a good plan.
I love the action part of it.
Uh, I'm worried about how many people will come again to the committee.
He didn't call me up.
Okay.
Come on, get in there.
So I think that's quite understood.
Yeah, but as George Feltz suggests, in a meeting in Texas, we should say we don't give a damn about the AGW plan.
And that's not what we're appealing for.
See, that's the real question, whether AGW is going to, whether our position is going to look like we're pushing for the AGW plan, or whether we're saying we should care less about that, and whether or not we're pushing for the AGW plan.
That's the question, whether that signal is clear.
So it was goddamn clear to me what I said.
And then John had a meeting with Richardson again at lunch today.
And, uh, well, maybe the, uh, such a history of the British.
All right.
1231 o'clock.
Okay.
Congressman Curtis, Senator Curtis.
There's, uh, some concern on this whole thing that you ought to be aware of.
The Wall Street Journal, Wall Street Insiders, uh, this top-down motorowner, whatever his name is, the hot shot of the Japanese economy program, has, uh,
said to one of our people that he understands that Eddie Bernstein, who is the guy that runs around town here finding out what's going on and then reports it to the insiders up there, is saying that Conley is sending signals up that there's a tremendous crisis in the winds on the Indian Ocean.
It's not the Lord of the Past.
You know, what do you people understand?
I'll tell you where I'm with George, where I'm not with George.
Where I'm not with him is with his continued and total lack of interest in doing anything to combat the foreign force.
George is a free trader.
He just hates to give up on any idea.
Well, Bob, we cannot continue in that position.
It's politically impossible.
We're going to fight like hell.
Peterson came here with that viewpoint.
He's changed.
Totally.
George is going balls out of the other way.
George will not change.
I think that's his basic point.
So there's the point of the wage price freeze, and I say that's tough.
I think George is going to say that.
I don't know what he is.
The one that bothers George the most is closing Goldman.
And his line on it is that it probably, by no means certainly, but probably will put you in the position of having to campaign as the president of the VW of the dollar.
And maybe we can get along without that.
He puts that as being a tough thing for you to have to do.
Right.
Well, not in the first sense, because I think these people are more interested in saving the dollar than anything else.
Maybe we could do these other things and do that at a later time.
Schultz also came back from Louisiana.
He was down there probably in his county segregation saying that it was interesting.
Totally convinced that the most serious problem we've got is busing.
That we have just got to oppose busing.
Well, we've got to do a trial, of course, and an extreme anti-busting statement would be bad, but because you've got some going and it's working, what is the present situation with regard to a constitutional amendment, really?
Are they throwing it out?
I don't know if Jonathan knows about that.
The standards for a constitutional amendment?
I think he probably would, because his point is...
that it's not just the whites by any means, it's the blacks just as opposed to busing.
In Louisiana, they were saying, for God's sake, leave us alone.
We've got New Orleans, it's 70% black.
They said, if you come in with a racial quota thing in these schools, it'll ruin our entire school.
It says, we have to bus to balance our schools in New Orleans who were wiped out.
I think we'll just have to fire all the black principals, which is what they're doing, those busing places.
No, they put all the black principals out of work.
I think he can get some responsible blacks to come out the other way.
Because they're scared about busting that loop.
The local blacks, not the militants.
This is George stealing a lease, and boy, he really comes on strong against the extreme bussing business.
Get down there and see those people trying to figure out what to do about it.
Yeah, well, I know.
Maybe we can convince Garland and other moms.
Did you want to meet with the conservative group that led the U.S. Pilgrims to assemble?
No, that was just for a brief history.
They wanted history, right.
It happened to look that way.
That's what I was going to do.
I was going to do the same thing as the other group.
As a matter of fact, I might put my head in, but don't count on it, you know, because it may be very busy with other things.
I just want to reach the ability to submit these things, and maybe even add three or four names.
Sorry about the funny people in the face.
It's going to come together later.
He was really excited.
He told me the number after he went forward, how many students had come forward.
Berkeley students.
And also the number of buses he said they had every night.
There was more.
There was only 209 buses at the last number of buses.
You know, part of it is celebrity, right?
Yeah, but part of it is, you know, he determined this goddamn thing.
Because if the kids are looking for ideal, I mean, we were saying, where are they going to go next?
They could go this way.
Yeah.
An awful lot of them.
They could get up to there.
They could go to Christ.
They could just have a drama and have a case of no actions.
There's another one.
A lot of that stuff they're after is available in his country.
Senator Goldwater, please.
How are you?
Good to see you.
I hate to take you out on a meeting, and I never want to put any pressure on a good friend.
But I just want you to know one thing, a Lockheed thing.
I've just come in to raid his people over the weekend.
They repeat it after this.
It's being knocked out, and it moves this.
It's just...
just about being critical in terms of our situation in 72.
California, as you know, next to the state of Washington, has the highest unemployment.
And it's mainly due to airframes and that sort of thing.
Now, some of this turning around may feel good in a lot of things, but without getting into the technical of a national arrest for you, you're really very expert.
I just wanted you to know that the legal consequences here are really very, very serious.
And I wish you'd consider that as you think that would be mine.
Maybe say we're more interested in actually the purpose of the Senate than anything like that.
But I don't believe that's going to be the problem.
I did feel that this California thing is really a very difficult one for us.
And Reagan just feels he can be really uptight about the thing.
Sometimes our people don't have you on the list, but you're always with us.
And I understand that.
Yeah, sure, sure.
I appreciate that.
Now, let me tell you, not at this point, but in about
a month or so, and this is just between the two of us, I'd like you to come down and we'll have a little talk about HR-1.
I'd like to see what kind of thinking you imagine you've got, John, and just because let's handle it.
I want to get your opinion on it because I just don't like to be, now this is, I don't want you to bet on any of the other, but I don't want to be in a position of having to fight with our Republicans, you know what I mean?
And I know we've done a lot of thinking about it, aren't we?
We'll have a chat about that.
And then you can pass it on to the others later.
I think if the two of us talk, then it doesn't give God.
All right.
All right.
The first time you've ever had a call, by the way.
All right.
Sit down.
We'll see what I can do about it.
I would have bet him that it would, because I don't think Carl would bet on anything.
If you call Carl Pierce, he's going to vote against you.
One of the reasons that he wouldn't vote against me is that I never called him to.
It cheats the currency.
I can't do it once a year or so.
Hello.
Hi, I'm Larry.
How are you?
Two days.
One on the morgue.
I'm going to go to California.
I spent the last two weeks of August.
But this time I've told them that I'm going to go without scheduling so that I can take a little time off.
I was thinking if you were going to be out there, we might try that golf or some kind of thing.
Would you like to do that?
Great, great.
I didn't want to play golf anyway.
Well, I'll do whatever else you do.
Do you have a boat?
But will you be there at that time?
Good.
Well, I have to leave to come to the milk producers in Chicago on September 2nd.
But I'll be there, and you will be in the usual place a little bit.
Well, we'll try to get together.
Because I'm not done with any business, though.
We're not going to talk any business.
Yeah, OK.
The second thing is this.
Which, you know, you're aware, I talked to Rob Raven, you know, about this Lockheed thing.
And I know how you feel.
And here's basically the political problem.
The political problem is it hasn't gotten sunk on SST.
To lose this one would have a very depressing effect.
You see, as you know, Southern California is on a planet.
And even in Orange County, it's 9%.
And it's a real hell of a problem for us.
It sure is.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Right.
Yeah.
Well, the thing is, you know, this bill now is limited to the Milwaukee.
And I would want to just talk about, you know, the problem.
It isn't a question of it.
As I said, it's our friends, but it's really more, you know, Ronald's often close to that political situation than he is.
Oh, your son's going to win, come on.
There you go.
But could we get, is there any way maybe you might drop down and chat with me about 3 o'clock?
I mean, or do you think you'd have to be there?
You're too competitive.
How about Paul Fant?
Could he do this?
I know that he, I think he feels that way, because you are, I think, too, sir.
Right?
That's right.
Well, anyway, I want to say that I am very grateful to the ladies who have been to the Republican committee, and according to those, we've got a hell of a reception out there.
The way you talk to them are concerning, right?
Now, the main thing that you can reassure them on, which I'm sure you're aware of, after all, is that the man that led any convoy in the Laos and swapped for ABM is not going to get taken in by any body on the other side.
That's what it is.
And we're playing with a very old station.
It involves... ...relation in that.
Right.
Right, right.
Well, we will at a certain time.
I can tell who that is.
Yeah, I want one.
What they don't understand, basically, is you've got the Japanese and the ones, you've got the Soviet Union on the other side of it.
Why is it we're bringing another player to the game?
That's what really is involved.
I think it's the best move to do, Larry, because we're fighting to keep Taiwan in.
We can't.
We're going to get rolled on the other end, but because we keep Taiwan in, D.K.
isn't going to like it.
They'll squeal at this, but we expect that.
Well, they're great people.
And for the whole bunch.
Well, we're doing our best for him.
And I appreciate your support.
But anyway, on this, I just want to let you know that if you see Paul, I want to give him the heat on him.
OK?
Yeah.
Oh, he's just a matter of principle.
He's told too many people.
There's a little one minute.
Of course, he sees what you're doing, and he wasn't Chinese, and he knows what's occurring in the Soviet Union, and that's what we're here to see.
He's a little bit smarter than some of the conservative journalists and some of the people who are writing.
And as you notice, the male is a little more, and at the present time, it's obviously a lot of stirred up men.
It's more on the against than for, and the reason that it's against is that
Basically, they feel strongly it's an issue of the communist issue.
They feel so strongly that they're blind to the great tactical situation.
The bastards never, the conservatives are, you know, where the hell were they when we were fighting ADM?
Where was he when I was fighting the Cambodian thing?
Tell me, where the hell were they?
Laos, huh?
They were squealing about the economy or squealing about SSB or no, or HR1.
HR1.
Yep.
I think your idea of our taking the helicopter down is excellent.
I don't want to be a .
I don't want to be a .
But couldn't we go down?
Far enough.
Instead of landing in Mount Vernon, go to a landing pass in Mount Vernon.
That's right.
Get aboard there and cruise up by Mount Vernon.
That would be the start of your trip, really, would be that first thing would be the honors of Mount Vernon, and then you'd go down and then... That's right.
So, basically, it would be a two-and-a-half-hour trip, so tell them to figure it out.
You could just... Then you'd want to sit up topside for... Yeah.
That's right.
Or you can sit there, because they can sit there, and then you don't have to go across them.
Well, I'm sorry.
I'm sorry.
I have what I want to.
I'm sorry.
I mean, it would have been a bonus.
They wouldn't expect you to be.
I think people really enjoy sitting, especially on that part of the river.
It would be much nicer than up here.
That's another of my views on helicopters.
If this works, I may use the helicopter device again.
Because going down this way...
and filthy and you sit up there and dirty people are around.
The best thing to do is to get on, lay down on the river and come up the river.
And that's the view.
And then you have dinner.
And it's just dark by the time you come here and it's pretty beautiful in that dark coming in here.
And you get the lights on the shore, the castle and all that.
You get the bird fountain that's lighted and all that.
It's much nicer coming in.
And then you sit outside and just kind of watch the scenery for a while down there instead of people around you.
Okay, back to this leak up in the Wall Street shoe line back down here.
That's probably not a man, Volker, that's my guess.
Volker is a, I think he's a compulsive, he's the guy that Schultz has fixed his pipe up on the gold window.
Schultz says you have no basis for this.
Volker says you just have to take it on my authority.
But Schultz says we can't expect the president to take an action like this on your authority.
There's a guy you've got to go to the case for.
winter wisdom maybe it's it looks like we can do that later if you have a crisis then close the cold weather see it's a good thing you haven't reached out and had something reserved yeah but maybe you need to do all that stuff you said the loose recording was positive sorry i mean it's number two man the question mark is the thing up here and they uh stir up the electronics oh it does it stirs up
That's where we got their funds.
As you would know, they would have to do.
They don't have any.
They concluded that, well, that Sparrow Avenue will graciously fade away sometime before the 72th Amendment should be replaced by John Connolly and the pocketing of 26 Texas electoral votes.
You know, it's interesting how people are building up the Rockefeller for number two right now.
I don't know what the hell is in it for us there.
You've got a Conley quote.
He says, I have an insatiable curiosity about just about anything.
I don't have an education to understand a whole lot about some interests like astronomy, but I do know a little about many.
I'm just interested in everything.
Then he said, including the vice presidency.
Conley laughs and then says, now you just picked out the one thing in which I have no interest whatsoever.
Conley does, wow, that's amazing.
But it's got all kinds of good stuff.
He rates Ace high.
He's intelligent.
He's tough and very boyish, like a very strong man.
He's successful in living life.
He's obviously mastered the material.
That's this Swedish, this top Amsterdam, Rotterdam bank guy said, you know, he's obviously mastered the material, perhaps.
And it just goes on and on.
He operates cautiously, but with ever-growing effectiveness.
When he says something, he says it forcefully.
He skillfully avoids any impression he's trying to come up with.
Moreover, his charm is thoughtful.
It's the one he has in his life.
Lieutenant, here is with Mr. Hickson, the fiscal director of the personal testing body.
Both men believed deeply that order, hard work, self-discipline, and moderation are the only true values that must be restored.
They both had a constant respect for politics as an art form that demonstrated their talent for it.
And matching Mr. Nix's admiration of him, Conley's told friends, he feels the President has the qualities of a great leader.
I've heard him say many times, he had more self-discipline mentally and emotionally and physically than any man he's ever met.
Kept his critics off balance with his memory for facts and figures.
Man argues back to determination to speak, knowledgeable discussion of arcane subjects.
Good humor, but he does have a temper.
He detests personal disloyalty or slovenly work.
This is common.
Believes strongly in appearance and looking the role of a leader and looking right for a job and having the right setting.
Confusing his staff with his own brand of activism.
Let's think, let's plan, let's propose, and let's make them react to us.
The traitor is all solemnly in his camp.
Far better salesman than Schultz or McCracken.
Credibility not tarnished by repeated past predictions.
Completely won over President Nixon, who was attracted to him by the forceful, effective way he functioned as a member of the Action Committee.
Good.
High standing with the President and with initially skeptical Republicans on the Hill is due to a formidable brain and willingness to spend up to 18 hours a day doing his economic homework and a series of virtuoso performances before Congressional committees.
That's a real, real clue to you.
Nobody could accuse him of taking it easy in Washington each day as he rises at 6.30 and works into the night.
This just ain't good stuff.
That's personal history.
I'm going to turn this over to Jake.
Go ahead.
It's good to have one positive article on an administration personality.
That's the other thing.
Yeah.
What about the retraction?
Is that it yet?
No.
All right, let's hear it go in.
It's getting rough.
They had a ton of ambassadors' letters in front of the Washington Post, and I think they'll run it here.
And I've done some checking on the scouting business, and it doesn't hold up.
Vic Gold has misled the vice president.
Vic Gold's probably a bad actor.
Well, he's trying to cover his own skin, for one thing.
And the other, he's trying to cover the vice president's.
Part of this fall and the carton he's done is that he has said suit the pens and the press has reported it.
What the hell are we going to do?
You can't blame the press for reporting that black quote.
He said it and it was a dumb thing to say.
So there it is.
She'll also want to speak to you on the phone.
So y'all's place is
And the groves keep planting them.
So did the small thinkers.
So we're glad that you didn't come to interrupt their plot on their games.
The big thinkers, we're glad that you didn't come.
And the groves had no blacks and that kind of thing.
They were scared of no blacks.
I noticed that.
Hello?
Yeah, hello.
Yeah.
Oh, I see.
Well, why don't you add the essential productivity condition, whatever it is.
Could you put something on that?
All right, okay.
I didn't want to say in the long term, but without me saying that, I didn't want to say in the long term, but without me saying that, I just want to say,
I don't think he's concerned about the crack.
I have no concern about the crack.
I don't think it's dead hard to handle.
It's a real big monster.
Good.
Good.
Who was here?
Were you in the tower meeting?
I guess none of us were.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You've got to repeat over and over again.
We do not endorse.
This appeal does not in any way use those words in any way to be taken as an endorsement of the H-E-W plan or any other plan.
It simply says that this plan is a part of .
Do you have any other ideas as to how it could be handled?
I don't know what inspired that story, but I think it's awfully important what's appealed.
You don't have to appeal the whole case.
You can appeal just certain.
Your grounds of appeal can go to just certain parts of the ruling.
And then my proposal would be that Ed and George go down to Austin
and have a press conference tomorrow when they file the appeal, if they do, and say what it is that we intend by this, and spell this all out.
One, two, three for the Austin papers.
No, no, he's going on vacation today and you won't see him for a month.
They can do it on the basis that this is a cabinet committee and they look into school desegregation and it's germane to their duties.
I think everybody is coming to the conclusion that there has to be an appeal.
that we don't have the choice of tower doors advancing and just letting the thing lie there.
Because that would be a signal all over the South to doggy.
Now I don't know, do you have any other idea?
You have to if you...
I've spent the weekend trying to figure a way out of the deal.
I think the judge there is doing a nice political job of setting up a trap.
Because he finds the fact that the dual school system kind of...
Then after he finds that, he's on with this once-every-evening-day-next-master plan.
If we don't appeal that, we've hurt an awful lot of people in the South who have done what they're supposed to do.
I wouldn't be surprised if we will have more people in the commandant's office than just in the city of Austin.
If we don't appeal the narrow issue of whether that eliminate our school system.
John, I want to come to another point that's related to that discussion.
Have you given any further thought to the Constitution?
Yes, sir.
Is it possible?
It is possible.
I think there's a better alternative, which is that there will be this emergency school aid bill coming through.
When it gets to the floor, there will be a House amendment proposed that none of the billion and a half may be spent for transportation.
And then I think we could come out four square for that amendment.
No, no, I won't give you that at all.
I would, at this point, and I'm here to say this, the press conference is here to say that when that bill comes to the floor, we are recommending that amendment, that none of it will be used for the purpose of busting.
Let's hit it right now.
Why wait until then?
Is there any reason to do it?
Otherwise, it appears like we've come up, and we're always sunning around after the house, after they have.
We're saying that I have the money.
Now, let's get it.
Now, I'm interested to know.
He knows.
We've already told him.
That's what we're going to do.
That's what we're going to do.
We put it in the terms, and I put it to you, that we would support a floor hunt.
I believe.
Okay, God damn it.
I'm against busing.
And I will be probably pushing.
We're going to do it.
And let's just announce it right now.
What do you think?
that sportswear against busing as you are.
I've got one problem with saying that.
And if you start on the one end and say we're against the dual school system, which we have, and you put yourself in a case where a court says there's no other way to eliminate it, you just say you're against busing there in that court situation, you're for the dual school system.
But Ed, we don't have that dilemma.
This is all new money.
This is a billion and a half of new money up here.
And if there is any reason why we can't say, none of that federal money will be spent for busing.
Now, that means if there's going to be busing, the court can't resort to the federal money.
He's got to look at that school district as they are, with their own local resources.
And maybe he'll decide busing isn't feasible.
Well, suppose he does.
Well, he orders busing there.
They can't do any federal money to buy buses.
They're trying to shaker around, trying to qualify a program for federal money and buy buses out of the other pot, which is why we've been let out.
What I'm afraid of is that we get ourselves in a position that we're saying, well, we're against busing on the one hand.
We won't give any money for buses.
If the court orders it and that school district is hurting, we'll just leave them high and dry in the sun.
We don't care about that.
That's not our problem.
In other words, if I read the climate, and I think George Schultz spelled it out pretty well for us at the staff meeting this morning, the climate down there is neither the blacks nor the whites want busing.
They don't want their kids to travel.
None of them like it.
And if we frustrate a decree,
Seems to me we're winners.
Well, I mean, there's no money.
Yeah, right.
I see that what AGW would like to do is have the discretion, and they'd like to get everybody a little bit pregnant.
They'd like to have two or three percent to play with.
And there is no way to draw that line.
So we said to the AP government, no bucks, no dollars for busing.
And they said, well, gee, how about these hardship cases?
But you know very well if you provide something in there for hardship cases, everything becomes a hardship case.
Can I come back?
I prefer this to begin with.
Because we've got to take the email.
We've got to be, the main thing is the issue.
And symbolically, we've got to be against busing.
And that's another way to be against it.
I mean, we'll see what the karma is.
And let these goddamn people, the muskies and Humphreys and the rest, let them vote for money for busing.
Let's put a right to them.
This is a chance.
I'd like to end the issue in any way.
But why isn't the constitutional amendment feasible?
I mean, it speaks as it is to...
Too much.
It's a blunt answer.
And the other one, it seems to me, is heaven sent.
It just has come around at the right time.
But all it does, it tells the people of the South and the rest of the country, we're going to bust it.
The Constitutional Amendment does something about it.
I wonder, well, I don't know.
Maybe the Constitutional Amendment is so excellent,
I don't know.
Who are we going to lose?
Who are we going to lose?
You see, from a political standpoint, I know it's right to be against it.
I know there should be a constitution.
I don't know.
What's the problem?
It lingers.
I think that's the problem.
This other thing, the vote on the billion and a half comes up.
It gets a lot of visibility.
If we stake out the territory, and then there's a vote, and then that's the end of that episode, we can always point back to it.
That's our position.
But we don't have to live with it every day of our lives.
The constitutional amendment is going to hang around until 30-odd states ratify it.
And another power we have to make the issue between now and 72 is that we're against busing.
Well, I think you get very high visibility by your position on the billion and a half, which is really the only place that busing is coming up as a very strong issue right now in terms of federal dollars and federal plans.
The other busing issues, as I get it, in California and other places are essentially local issues that are not associated with this administration and the allocation of federal dollars.
So you take a very clear, high-visibility position on it, and then you stake it out.
Everybody knows where you are.
It'll be a controversy.
There'll be a big fight.
The other one just sort of goes along that.
If I'm not mistaken, there is a constitutional amendment pending.
There's one up there.
It's not the most supportive.
First of all, it should be written, of course, in terms only of elementary schools, right?
That's where it's the real problem.
That's where it's the problem.
First of all, our biggest problem is defining
word everywhere so you know that nobody agrees with what they're talking about when you talk about bussing in other words nobody's against bussing elementary school kids to get into school they've got all the worldwide errors that's why they get to school every five years they get buses to get them to school if you're talking about bussing bussing the duration of balance but those aren't the kinds of bussing issues that are that we're facing right now they're not necessarily involved with racially balancing schools at all
You're involved with that problem of a school district that has an all-black school that was a dual school across town from another school.
The school district can't afford to build a new school.
So the court or anybody says, you've got to eliminate that dual school, that black school.
The only way they can eliminate it is to send kids from one school to the other and vice versa.
The court really didn't say how long they had to bust them.
They could use
What does that school district do to get the kids to school?
The minute they put them on a bus, that's where the problem starts to take them across town.
But what do we send to the people as to how they come to grips with the problem in those kinds of cases?
Well, isn't that for racial balance?
Sure.
Well, why is it for racial balance?
Well, you have sent our black kids to a white school and white kids to a black school.
It's to achieve the racial balance objective.
Well, of course it is.
There are four definitions of racial balance floating around.
Remember, the Northerners in New York didn't think racial balance is somehow 70-30, did they think?
That's what all the school districts are, which they are.
Other people think racial balance is 50-50.
What the courts thought about racial balance, remember, was balancing the proportion of whites and blacks equivalent to what they were in the district.
In this case, when you've got an all-black school remaining and other white schools or integrated schools, and the court finds that, in fact, that is run as a separate black school,
It's part of the dual school system.
If you want to eliminate that school, then the question becomes, how do you do that?
And in that instance, if you tell them you can't move the kids to another school, in many districts they can walk to another school, and that's what they do.
But if the only school you can move them to requires busing, then the final place you come out is, if you aren't going to do that, we'll let you run a dual school.
And it'll become...
I think that that's what we're saying.
Okay.
So what we're saying is that no federal dollars should go into transportation of those kids.
If there's a walk-in, fine, let them walk because that's a neighborhood school.
If there isn't a walk-in, then as far as we're concerned, it shouldn't happen because we're breaking up a neighborhood pattern, which is contrary to the president's position.
There is, it seems to me, a possibility that we could breed more litigation than we've got now.
For instance, in Louisiana, the blacks are agreeing not to file SWAN motions.
I wonder if it would follow this, that we'll have an awful lot of private black litigation taking us up and beating us on that question.
How can they beat us?
They can't force us to pay money.
No, they can't force us to pay money.
But they can now start taking up all black school districts where there are black schools in them.
win on the dual school issue and say it's got to be eliminated, what side of that case are we going to be on?
I'm not saying it's not an option.
We can go up and lose them all.
And maybe we're at the point now, from a busing standpoint politically, that we ought to shift.
But I would think we want to think that through carefully if we're going to make that shift.
Or we could come to the end of August with just chaos in some places.
What do you think?
before just automatically shifting over and saying we're, we're four squared against busting.
We don't have an answer for you.
If you've got to eliminate an all-black school and can't do it any other way, even though the court said you had to do it, we're against it.
We're going to shift our posture on this thing now.
Well, okay, it's a practical matter that Congress will probably appropriate the money.
for transportation would probably get rolled up.
On this amendment?
I would think so.
Well, we're going to be confronted with an awful lot of dilemmas of this kind that are going to be persuasive with the Congress.
Because you've got federal judges all over there, all over the South, saying you've got to do it.
And the way you can do it is by busing.
And the Swan case says that that's permissible for him to decree.
So there are all those decrees, and somebody's going to have to pay for this.
You're going to get a lot of Southern school superintendents coming in saying to the Congress, you know, leaning on their congressmen.
And so I think it's my hunch would be that they'll knock that out.
We've had that, you know, anti-busing amendment before that's been knocked out.
The Whitman thing has lost.
So I'm just, that'd be my .
Yep.
I think we're talking here about a matter of degree.
I think the constitutional amendment is probably two-step.
You think it is?
Yes, sir.
I think the amendment to the billion and a half is just about right.
It feels good to me, anyway.
Well, now let's think of the time.
Maybe this is the best time to have that.
I think you're going down to Austin.
That's a good idea.
So you agree with that?
Well, thank you.
And it seems to me that the strategy has been, it seems to me, to get through the summer quietly is best because we've done better in terms, I think, of visibility this summer than last summer, even though we've had more problems with ATW this summer.
I'm a little cocky.
They are.
Do we want that escalated press conference of us flying to Austin and pressing how can they flew into Austin all of a sudden?
and gives a waffling effect.
You're supposed to give me the background, you can send the press here and be normal and justice so that the writers know this limited grounds appeal we're taking as opposed to a press conference.
But we're in Texas.
We're not hurting in Washington when the press go here.
That's the point.
That's the whole point.
I think you can do it on that basis if you don't have a committee.
How about going in instead of the press conference going in?
You could go in the background in Texas.
That's a different order of magnitude, basically, but getting it in Texas.
Calling the press conference is one thing, but you could go in here and say you need to express your background.
I think maybe the background is a better thing than a press conference, because basically, appeal is a legal thing.
I mean, that's it.
And then you just coming out and then making a lot of public statements about it.
But I think the background around that may be a level play.
That could be what you did, Sean.
I think it's awfully important to go to that ground and do it.
Yeah, it has to be on the Texas.
It has to be on the Texas.
I need to do it on the background.
I'd love to see one of them on television that night saying what you once said.
I wonder if Margaret is the best one to be on television.
Margaret Schultz.
I'm inclined to think so.
George is a pretty hard line on this.
And uh, yeah, and also he does come, he does have a hell of a title.
Is he the chairman of the committee?
Yeah.
He's the chairman of the Mortgage Aid Staff Committee.
So that's a, that's a logical bear.
I see the problem that you have, but I think right now it's, we better escalate the rhetoric on our own side.
I think he's done extremely well in getting through the summer up to this point.
I know August is going to be hard, harder than hockey, but uh,
Let's do that, I think.
Because they've got to know what it is.
I particularly want you to background and say, now, this appeal does not in any way endorse.
God damn it, that's got to be in the language of that appeal, too.
It's not in any way endorsed.
It needs to be a plan or any other plan.
Right?
George wants to...
repudiate the AGW plan.
In his background, he used to do that.
I mean, his press conference.
I wanted to do that.
He said, we do not believe, I believe the agent.
I think there are better ways to handle this than the AGW plan.
And the thing to do is to try to find those ways.
We feel the H.E.W.
plan is not a good plan.
I want him to repudiate the H.E.W.
plan.
And the appeal, the appeal you had to do it in the morning, subtle way, but God damn it.
And his press conference had you talk to him.
I want him to repudiate the H.E.W.
plan.
The H.E.W.
is a good energy to have.
I think it is.
You may get a chance this week to hit it yourself.
You may be getting asked about the Austin case as a result of their going down there tomorrow.
And that would give you the bounce off that.
Instead of answering the question by Austin, you could have hit the other thing.
Chris's head is why it comes up then.
What more of these boys are excluded, what's he going to do?
They've got to get it out a lot of times, don't they?
But they're getting a billion and a half they didn't have before.
And they don't have any maintenance of effort requirement.
So they don't have to keep spending their local money the way they've been spending it.
This frees up the supply of their houses.
That's right.
It's up to those local school boards to make that decision.
You see, really, in a sense, if they get money, they'll still release money.
They'll release money for the other purposes.
It's really a little bit, basically, out of it.
More than that, it removes the decision to the local level, where it belongs.
It's the local tax office.
Well, if you don't mind, you and Schultz were down there.
I think you've got to get it right, smack that out there, because they've been playing politics with it.
Let's play politics with it.
Take H&M in the ass.
And it may cause some problems in other places.
With regard to this other documentary, you just think the constitutional amendment is too bad.
Well, I don't know.
It's a judgment call.
My feeling is it's pretty strong.
Yes, sir.
Well, then, in other words, if we're being perfectly honest with ourselves, we're saying that we can't do nothing about us.
Except as a nation.
I think, so we're allowing, we're allowing the imposition of the country in a terrible system.
Well, it's going to happen all over the country.
When you come right down to it, it's going to come.
It's going to happen anyway.
You take Pasadena or Los Angeles as an example.
No federal involvement there at all.
It's strictly local taxes and a local decision and a local problem.
And that kind of thing is going to result, regardless of what we do, in the federal constitution or at the federal level.
That isn't going to stay, though.
They can't bust LA.
Well...
Somewhere the people are going to rise up, baby.
It's a wrong solution.
That's what I thought.
I think it's so wrong, I'm not sure that the constitutional amendment is a blood instrument.
I think it's just so terribly wrong.
I think the Supreme Court decision is wrong.
tragic that's what george gets almost emotional how does it treat you when they all cite washington dc as being the prime example of the worst possible thing that could happen to a school system that's right integrated by force busting and then what you do is you move the whites out and you not only ruin the school system you ruin the whole goddamn city you get resegregation at that point resegregation to leave the city black well i don't but don't don't
Let's think about it in another word.
What we're telling you, what I said, let me hit the other side of it.
What do the fellows like Bridgeson and Darman and so forth say?
Are they the world is funny?
They can't be funny.
They must be the terrible consulates.
Elliot, it's very hard to pin down on this.
What else would work for him?
I don't know what government thinks.
I'll tell you, we had a session up in my office last week, though, on this, and there are AGW people who just feel for Square that this is the right way to do this.
Yeah, well, I know they're all in the paper.
We hear about them.
That's why you're going to have to press them.
Those batteries have been in the paper killing us all the time.
I'm so enthusiastic about the fact that we're going to go all out for buses.
I was so rough on them last week that this story Sunday probably was a little retaliation.
We just laid it out chapter and verse and said there wasn't going to be any busing, and that's all there was to it, period.
And then kind of went around the room, made sure everybody understood it.
And I think maybe we got a little dose as a result of that.
You've got to go over in your meeting, but you've got the word.
And Brian Elliott, he's a good soldier.
He's just got to understand this.
They ought to go in the next one.
Now, you asked also, you asked about a constitutional amendment on aid to parochial schools, and that's here.
And I'll leave this with you to look at it if you'd like to.
Okay.
That's, that's, that's... We'll have the two of them.
The thing that I marveled at on the Buston thing, it may be we have something so fundamental here that it may be having to be attacked, attacked by a constitutional amendment.
Well...
It may be.
I don't know.
I agree.
It's, to me, it just doesn't seem to be
something that is worthy of attention in the Constitution because it deals with such a narrow issue and yet it's a very broad issue.
I'm just trying to follow it out step by step politically.
We announce support for the, let's say we announce support for the Baker-Brock Amendment or we offer our own.
What happens next?
And then after that, then after that.
Looking down the road, it seems to me it's so
Unpredictable.
Here's another thing.
We can behold an unconstitutional amendment to the campaign.
Sure.
In other words, when you don't have to prove anything, you can just say, well, you're so bad at this thing.
I'm sure that in about September, the second half of the Constitutional Amendment, the government's busting them.
And just let all hell break loose on September.
But I think you could well throw in some pepper in my filling already.
about a month before.
That gives us a chance to take some more readings.
We've seen some shifts, I think, in attitude, particularly among the blacks.
The Republican Party platform can do that very strongly.
That's right.
The Republican Party platform should have that.
I think we should go over the Constitution.
I can't think.
At the present time, the tactic will be ordered.
I want the amendment to be proposed by the administration after it can be introduced.
Where is it now?
What place is it in the committee?
Probably in Judiciary.
Well, then have it proposed after five talks in the House.
And how is that in the Senate?
We got any friends?
Well, arrest him.
Baker?
Well, yeah, let Baker.
Why don't we let him go on that this week?
Well, he's already in.
He's got one in.
Yes, sir.
Oh, I'm sorry.
That'll have to come in the house on the floor.
Oh, because it's on the floor now?
Right.
Well, we don't know.
I have to get a rule, and it's between the committee and the floor right now.
What I'm getting at is why don't we, rather than that, I don't want to...
I don't think that should be handled, basically, in a press conference to say, well, I'm going to have a few of them.
This legislation is robust.
I'm sure it's, I think it's better to take that position after.
I think we should get a second story on it.
Do you have a letter from the President to us, the Congressman, asking you to introduce him beyond the administration?
I think that should come.
After you come back from Austin, I think this week, why don't we this week, let's get everything out so that there's a balance of, I don't know, does that bother you?
Or does that screw you up in your other negotiations in the month of August?
Well, I don't, I'm not sure.
I don't think that anything's going to happen between now and the recess.
Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Everybody's passing their polygraphs with flying colors.
We've still got, we've got a new, we've got a new guy in defense that they're working on now, but completely struck out on these other guys.
All three state guys plus the one good prospect we had at defense had passed their tests.
Well,
it seems to me that it was somebody in one of these verification panel meetings.
Well, we're getting a list.
Because there's a paragraph in Beecher's story that isn't accounted for by any document.
Well, that means an average.
Mitchell.
Mitchell's the one actually who spotted this in the story.
And so it would have to be... Well, that was John's first reaction.
So I'm getting a list of everybody who was in that meeting.
John and I talked about this Friday.
And we'll get a list and we'll just start down the list.
See who's been talking to whom.
I'm getting a daily report on this stuff on...
Uh, the Ellsberg case and all the rest of it.
And I will not send it on to you unless there's something in it that's never different.
Oh, the purpose of that is to allow you to probe.
To probe?
Yeah.
Just to get it developed, right?
I've got your Bureau of Labor Statistics list.
What is it?
13 out of 35.
I mean, there's another way of tabulating this.
How many?
You look at the chart.
Chart?
What, an organization chart?
Yeah.
It's not an organization chart.
They're at the top, yeah.
Well, not at the top.
They're in these places.
Correct.
Unlock it.
All right.
The county has passed now, which says if you will call Senator Hayden, he will vote for all key bills.
I'm sure she calls you up.
Senator Hayden, please.
Yeah, about seven.
I'm sure she's going to pull up and spot you.
This is good.
You know it.
Get in there.
He said that the general reaction at the Grove was, he says, the underlying belief there is that the economy's getting better.
And you can see that.
Maybe he looked at people, but no, he moved his way around.
But he said there's concern on wages.
He says there always is with businessmen.
He keeps saying you can't just let the wages keep going up.
He says there's very definitely general support of the president.
The carping is at the administration, and there is some on, you know, antitrust or SEC.
Hi, George.
I didn't bother you about that.
It's not in the field.
You were talking about foreign policy.
But I've just been getting some reports from California and on our situation there.
And we, this Washington, I know it's a very technical thing, but having UC Southern California enormous
If we lose this one after the SSP thing, it's going to have a terrible impact.
I just talked to Reagan on the phone over the last weekend.
I just passed it on to you.
I'm not trying to hire Chris Chappell to do that, but I would appreciate it if you'd consider it.
It would give us a little help.
It would have an enormous effect.
But as a matter of fact, we could go over across the board and then go to the House and cut it down.
But on the other hand, at this point, we have a very serious problem in terms of this specific thing.
And I certainly would support it across the board at a later point if we could get our friend Potsmire to go along.
Yeah, yes.
Well, I just wanted to let you know my deep, personal understanding.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's because of the state and Southern California.
It's really been a wrap there.
And I'll try to find something.
And I know up in your way, Vermont, and so forth, we've had an example for that part of the country.
Yeah.
That's it.
Well, you let me know whenever we can do something.
And incidentally, I'm very grateful for your statements on China.
They were just great.
I miss the reading.
Oh, did he get it over to you?
I asked him.
He told me he was going to call you this morning.
Yeah.
Don't you think that's the right approach?
Yeah, we've got to oppose the expulsion of Taiwan.
All right.
All right.
All right.
All right.
All right.
Well, a lot of people watch you out there, and I would, as I said, I sure would appreciate it if you could help us on this one.
Yeah.
Yeah.
All right.
OK.
I'm not going to say he's a clown.
I'm going to say that I'm not part of the division.
I'm going to try to do what he said and add it up his way and get it out of him.
Jesus Christ.
I never see him.
He won't scream.
He's basically not a candidate.
He just won't get it.
Bogs are better for him.
Yeah, Cunningham, President Cunningham already mentioned that to you.
No, he didn't mention Boggs, because he says Aiken is in addition to his recommendation that he call Boggs and Curtis.
That's why he calls Curtis.
Call Goldwater.
McGregor is raising Roth and Curtis.
Huh?
McGregor is raising Roth and Curtis.
Cost of that, I don't want to check with him.
Turn to Curtis.
Regarding the throat, they had no sweat with regard to not coming.
No.
What he meant was the big guys appreciated your sensitivity on it and the little guys didn't want to be interrupted in the play.
just as well, it was a good decision.
But we came out of it better than we would have let him go on, I think.
He said they weren't going as much as they usually do or help.
They were positive.
Gets the feeling there's a good feeling.
The answer, when they need something to do, they're aware of it one hell of a time.
I can't speak about those calls for right now.
I'm sorry.
I'm not a call officer.
I'm just wrong.
I don't know what happened.
I don't think they're coming, please.
Okay.
Okay.
Secretary, the president has called Aiken and Goldwater and Curtis.
Question, did you want to be called Boggs?
Not there right now.
Curtis' question will probably be all right on that one.
Goldwater definitely said no, and Aiken made it.
Pretty clear he'd say no.
He said he'd stay out of the debate, but he couldn't vote for it because there's nothing in it for New England.
I mean, he's still, I suppose, but you've got to rest it.
Good.
All right.
Now, someone at McGregor's office, I guess, suggested he should call Roth.
Do you want him to call Roth?
Okay.
He's got an elephant on the other line.
He says he's got Ross today, he's got an elephant on the other line.
He does not think he should call Ross.
They're working on him in a different direction.
He does think you can make a difference with bugs if you let him call him.
He said they could mislead him.
He told them.
They gave him a clear indication.
The president asked him to go in his car.
Okay.
If it's personal, she's supposed to go to you.
If it's substantive, it's supposed to go over to Henry.
I mean, I don't know.
Unfortunately, in this case, we have to keep working relationships.
Senator Boggs of Delaware, please.
Boggs of Delaware, Caleb Boggs.
This sort of thing is very tough.
It's something I can do well.
I can collect tons with all these people.
It's a bad thing for the president.
They just think it's bad.
We did it far too much.
We went hog wild the first year, you know, because of prices.
If I had to call him, he'd be like, Dan, I heard you on every vote that y'all had, break him down, break him.
And as a result, at a time, we had great support.
I mean, we didn't, we pissed it away, Mike.
I don't think, you know what I mean?
I think we would do better to be able to talk more to you.
You agree or not?
I'm sure we had a special event where you had to get more public support.
Now, I think there's more public support.
Well, there's more.
We saw, as we saw over the weekend, there's a lot more than we think.
I mean, there's more than the Congress thinks.
Well, but the individual congressman still keeps saying there's a lot.
When they get back to their districts, too, there's more than you get the impression of here in Washington.
Yeah.
The retail sales figures this week are, as I'm saying now, they're going to be yesterday, tomorrow, and tomorrow.
On the lead thing, I certainly bring me up to that figure of two that I set up.
That's right on a meeting that we have right here in this room.
And Harper's the only one that was there.
It was
He wouldn't leave, would he?
I would think Harper would be the least likely.
Did Weinberger?
Weinberger could have said something back at the budget here.
See, he tells me he has to go back, because he has to go back.
So we've got to work it back to 250.
Tomlin could say something to somebody.
I wouldn't think Kersholtz would.
No.
I don't think any of those people directly would put it out.
It's somebody under one of those people who got the word with one of those people.
The two likely places would be budget and treasury.
How the hell do you track that one down?
I don't know.
That's the kind of piece.
We don't know how to handle it.
He's trying to get me back up, and Colin knows that I'm right here calling him on the phone.
Well, then, it's a way.
It's kind of .
He's calling a dozen people over here.
Hello.
Yeah.
Fine.
Fine.
Anytime.
I just wonder how good a thing it is up there on the hill to have all those presidential phone calls coming in, too, before every phone.
Maybe it is good.
Well, anyway, show the other.
Get the word out.
Oh, yeah, by that, we can't seem to get through any more of the trip.
Well, let's...
Looking at the next weekend.
Well, except they'd like to get it done.
And the best thing we can come up with, and maybe it's good, though, is a visit to a nursing home, of which there are five very good ones in New Hampshire, to express your continuing interest.
And tied to it, we can announce a program to upgrade nursing homes.
We'll have something to announce.
So it would be such that there's a good one in Nashua.
You can land at Manchester Airport and drive to Nashua, which doesn't take you through Manchester.
In other words, Nashua is the other way from the airport.
And visit the nursing home, make your announcement, go back to the airport and have a little reception at the airport.
of the folks' civic reception type thing, or some place that we met.
I wonder where Joe Loeb's Anaheim Village in the China thing, a chance for him to stir up a lot of people.
Yes, there is.
And especially if he's there.
He may not be there.
He's out of luck.
I don't know whether he's there or not.
He'll have a paper stirrer.
His paper, of course, can stir things up.
There's another very good nursing home in Dover where you have that sensational rally in 68 that you could also go to by landing at Pease Air Force Base, which is over by Portsmouth, and then drive to Dover, which is not far away.
It's quite close.
Is it that or is she going to do the thing and not have a reception, not have any public?
I don't want to have a reception.
I don't want to be there and I don't want to be the Republicans.
That's the thing.
I don't want a Republican thing here at all.
I mean, I might have a few people.
It's very clear that we should not go to Portsmouth.
The Navy Yard is just a goddamn mess.
There's nothing in it.
It's only life, and we've kept it alive.
The other possibility that was suggested was a meeting with public and Roman Catholic school leaders, because New Hampshire has been a model of easing the burden on non-public schools.
But politically, that's a disaster, because it's not a Catholic state.
It's a loser.
who would not have been in the Republican primary, certainly.
The Catholics are Democrats.
One thing that's interesting about the school thing is the way the show is coming around on busing.
Here's a liberal, real...
But he's learning something.
But he's learning the facts about it instead of the goddamn liberal crap that they pour out about how you gotta bus these kids across.
He's now finding out what a disaster it is for a mother to walk out onto the street and put her little black kid on a bus at 7.30 in the morning to drive an hour
Crosstown to be kicked and spit at by one of the kids, and Bucks in person.
We're full of whales.
Good second.
Crikey.
Don't be a liar about the problem, it's basically a good thing to be here.
It's crazy.
Eric, as the guy said, politically it's a mess because that mother, every morning when she goes out, is reminded of it.
This is something that you get done and it goes away.
We're certainly, when we come out with this amendment, we're going to get the maximum visibility on this island.
I think it's better not to do it out of Austin.
Austin is much better for, John's right and Martin's wrong, it's much better for them to go to Austin to do this thing.
You don't want to breathe here.
Nobody here gives a damn about the Austin busting.
It's the people of Austin that care.
They ought to be on TV in Austin.
Hello?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Hello, Caleb?
Say, I'm sorry to get you out of your meeting, and I don't want to hurt our personal friend, but if you know, I've just been talking to Ron Reagan, and he's...
Of course, he's very close to the problem, but he says that after the SST losing him, he loses Lockheed, and he says it's going to have a psychological impact at some point.
We've got about 9.5% unemployment.
It's unbelievable.
And I just wanted to let you know, I didn't see your way clear to turn it back a little.
I appreciate it.
Everything, everything I have.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, maybe we'll see what we can do there.
Yeah, yeah.
I understand.
It's all we can ask.
We'll have to get it in.
Okay.
Bye.
Bye.
Thanks.
Check your car, please.
It's a draw.
He's awful unresponsive.
These guys at least don't have a call.
I agree with him on this one.
He does.
He has them.
I've never made a man.
But, uh, I don't know.
Maybe that's what you have to do.
I'm not going to do it.
I'm not going to do it.
The real problem, though, we don't have any leader.
Scotchie remains on calls.
You know?
I'm sorry.
You know what I'm saying?
Look.
This is nice.
That's what they used to do here, isn't it?
No one made money off of that.
Did no one make money off of that?
No.
I was wondering if there isn't, that's it.
Just drive along through the countryside there.
We do that Saturday morning and we'll have tonight.
Or did you want to go out Friday?
You could have a Friday evening.
That's not a problem.
That's a Friday evening.
It's a good time, you know.
Well, I don't know what we want there.
Let's see.
Where are we now?
What date are we talking about?
Maybe a Friday or Saturday.
We should get you out to the island by 4 o'clock or so Saturday at the latest because the Apollo splashdown is ending.
You ought to let go of your watch.
You don't have to.
I've got Jerry over and I'm watching eagerly at everything.
I don't know why.
I must not have an inquisitive mind.
We just finished the lift-up.
The reason is that...
I must say, I'm like, great, you've seen one red road, you've seen them all.
What the hell was there to see?
I haven't seen one minute of this.
He'd open it all the time, all the time, and they'd have these flights all the time.
I haven't seen one lift on it.
Like all of you.
I never look at the content of things.
Not to see.
You watch when there was something.
It's not when the first day on the moon, you watch that, it's all over the map.
Everybody thought we watched some of that, right?
But I haven't seen any of those.
The lights are lit.
Offs are all the same.
That's right.
You count down.
One, two, nine, ten, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one.
What else can you say?
Yet they had a million people down there to see it.
Well, it is kind of exciting.
Of course, the one you went to was crappy.
You couldn't see anything.
Bob, what do you think we should do then?
Maybe go to Central on Friday afternoon.
No, I'll go Saturday morning.
For the reason that you don't want a big flood on this anyway.
No.
And you'll get below Saturday morning through New Hampshire first.
Stop on the way in.
That's a good issue.
Yeah.
I stopped there on the way to Pembroke.
Be here about 9 o'clock, stop on the way at just 10.
Could you do that?
Could you do that?
I was going to hit Pembroke at noon or 1 o'clock.
Could you hit Pembroke there?
I said, I'll do that.
I called his judge office.
Don't bother.
He said it's a matter of principle.
Jesus Christ, it's the principle of God.
So he said he had talked so much about it.
He'd already made too many speeches.
He said it's almost time.
It's over.
It's over.
It's over.
Curtis, I meant his possibility.
Good.
Curtis, I meant his possibility.
I gathered that and talked to him.
And he said, you know, this is the first time he's ever had to call me.
And that's why it meant something.
You know, I haven't called him in a certain time.
I never put it off to him before.
And I haven't, but maybe he usually would this time.
The only thing he's really opposed to us on is that damn family assistance.
Which I'm not afraid of.
He's with you on that.
Yeah.
That's all right.
No, it's all right.
I just talked to Henry.
I had a long talk.
I don't know.
No, well, he's got principles, but mainly it's like Don Buggy's principles.
Oh, they really, hell, G.E.
is even tougher.
That's what it is.
Woo!
Boy!
Agent said there were four G.E.
plans within his district and his state.
G.E.
's fighting these business people, I'm sick of the bastards.
Oh, they're after this.
Goldwater said, or Agent said he would take a bill over the broader bill.
I said, all right, we take this now, we'll give you a broader bill later.
But I don't know whether you want to take another crack at him on that.
Well, no, I think that's probably all we can do with him.
This may put us within striking distance.
I shook Bellman up and told him what you said to tell him.
I said, now, Henry, you just talk about McDonald's all you damn please, but now, the president just said to tell you that this is an awful mean difference between Kerry and the leaders of California.
I just said, now, I haven't talked politics to a single human being except you.
I said, now, let's just, by God, just put it on the basis that you and I don't understand.
I said, now, you're mad because Hawkins
He gave $2,000.
Oh, he gave more than that.
And I said, no, he didn't.
He gave $2,000 to Mike Monroney.
And I said, I'll just tell you this.
I'll personally get you twice that much.
And he laughed.
And I said, no, by God, I mean, I'll get you $4,000.
And then I said, but that isn't the point.
And I said, now, and then I went on and made the pitch and told him what you said.
He said, well, let me think about it.
But yeah, I talked to him 20 minutes ago.
He was armed.
He was armed with a lot of facts that McDonnell Douglas had given him.
Now, without Roman arresting him.
That's the right appeal, though.
Yeah, just to... Yeah, he is.
The last word we had on Roth.
was that Clark McGregor was going to try to get Roth not to vote on the grounds that he had a conflict of interest.
McGregor sent a note in saying that maybe he and Platt and I should meet with you for a few minutes to discuss calls to Curtis and Roth.
And he's done Curtis, but then Roth is still in.
Maybe we ought to check with McGregor if he's out.
Because I have not talked about Roth in two hours, so I don't know what's happened on that one.
Okay, thank you.
as far as I can tell now we're either 46 or 47 firm votes now Jackson's not going to be here Benson's not going to vote Lamont won't vote Labor I talked to Maggie and we're Magnuson and we're supposed to get some input from Labor there as well as on Muskie and the Moss and Metcalfe
And I don't want laborers, I don't want they're going to be able to come up with, but they had a bunch of, they've got Hughes, Jackson, Magnuson.
Where are you?
Okay, what is, the president now has covered all the calls except Roth, and he was just talking to Secretary Connolly.
What is the situation on Roth?
He's in the office, he won't come back.
Ross is the difference with Boggs.
If Ross won't vote, or if Ross will vote, Boggs will vote for it.
Well, that'd be great.
You know, just get him away from that.
That'd be a change.
Just get a little double at Boggs.
Well, yes, they came down three blocks.
I don't know whether they want to be that cowardly, but a lot of guys, I never felt it was cowardly not to be there.
Well, I made no apology for it.
Besides, some other things I thought were more important than my saying.
Wasn't that big an issue?
Aye.
Mr. President, Mr. Secretary, Mr. Floyd, on Fox, Fox, the cold turkey, the turkey, the question.
Rob, what is it?
Mr. President, you have, or soon will have, under consideration, in connection with the Oil Policy Council's recommendation, a proposal favorable to the petrochemical interests.
Bill Roth is the leading senator for that.
He wants you to permit the petrochemicals to
I think you can take some steps that will be favorable to petrochemicals people.
I think the question is how much of a step.
What do you feel about this?
Not in detail.
Generally speaking, the oil and gas people are operating on the other side of the cliffhanger.
the one who's been carrying the largest sphere for the oil and gas people and has gotten a number of senators to sign a letter to you, which came to us last Friday on the other side.
Peter Flanagan is of the opinion that many of the senators who are opposed to a recommendation that the majority of the executive department's favor are doing so on the basis of incomplete information and that
What it is proposed for you to do for the benefit of the petrochemicals will not be as damaging to the oil and gas people as they seem to think.
Bill Roth, this is a matter of great interest to Bill, and he's very sensitive on this point.
And I would think an indication on your part that you are seriously considering the recommendations made to you to the benefit of the petrochemical industry would might well be persuasive in his thoughts on that.
What about the plan that he wasn't going to vote on the grounds that he was the general counsel for Hercules?
We tried to do the same thing.
We weren't successful with Pete and therefore President, unfortunately.
How about getting Robin and Fogg to come down at 3 o'clock and talk to me about it today?
I'm sure they would, sir.
I'm sure that... For about a half an hour.
We're trying to do the same thing with Bob Griffin.
Jerry Ford has got an urgent call for Griffin and is going to have to visit with him.
It's not about Michigan.
It's just the time of the vote.
So we're going to get Bob Griffin away.
Yes, they would like to talk with you about it.
No, I'm not going to talk to him unless he's a bully.
I understand.
I would like you to talk to Peter Flanagan briefly, sir, before you took that step.
not knowledgeable about the precise details, and I have worked with Peter to advise him on the congressional relatives.
Well, why, how does reversing sound?
Say again?
How does reversing sound?
You said you voted in slot two.
There ain't no point in you talking about that.
Well, I've indicated that to Ross.
That's not persuasive.
It's a very delicate balance right now, and I would hope he would not put himself in this favorable present.
He doesn't give me a commitment.
Well, okay.
I think instead of calling for the two of them to go before him.
I mean, but what I'm thinking about is, if you talk to him about taking a walk, will the...
I have not specifically talked to him.
I talked to Cale Boggs about taking a walk.
I haven't talked to him about Roth.
I've tried to get Roth on the phone.
He's on the floor of the Senate now.
They sure are.
What do you think, John?
Let's get another reading on where we are.
We can't kill all the gas people.
I don't mind.
I want to kill them and not win the vote.
Well, that's the whole point.
That's the whole thing.
I don't know enough about it, really, about where...
I know about a lot of the issues, Bob.
I don't know enough about...
Does he know enough about politics?
That's the question, isn't it?
Where are the oil and gas people?
How strong are they?
Do you know how big it is to them and how big it is to the others?
That's what everybody comes down to.
I mean, that's the only thing.
What I'm interested in is the merits.
Hell, I don't know what the merits are.
So if people want to talk about the merits, I'm trying to figure out, does he know about the politics of this thing?
Yes, sir.
Right.
I mean, it was about 31 senators that have dealt with that.
About 31 senators.
The fight is.
But we do have, as part of our
We've done enough damage to the oil and gas people already, in my opinion.
There are some options open to you.
Each would be beneficial to the petrochemicals.
Some would not be as beneficial, obviously, as others.
And Peter Flanagan believes that one option would give something to the petrochemicals, would not be damaging to the oil and gas people.
All right.
I'll approve that.
I mean, Peter, he's looked over this thing.
Yes, sir.
How does that sound to you?
One option would be...
It's a modest option.
It's a modest option.
25% option.
I don't know nothing about it, Mr. President.
I wouldn't want to...
I'd want to take another reading before... You have on the...
It isn't just the Delaware people.
You have the Michigan people.
Oh, yeah.
The Michigan people are very strong in here.
The alchemicals are very strong for some relief.
And they've got a lot of merit on their side.
But I...
Wouldn't change it.
No, United Automobile Workers are against us.
He doesn't vote for you.
He never gets it.
He doesn't mean good.
He's just no good.
Bad socialist son of a bitch.
Well, I don't know.
You may have to have it.
We were wondering, what's your latest count?
44 for us, 46 against us.
No, the count's been changed since then.
I know we're 46 solid now.
I say I know.
Jim and Gene Conner are up there.
We may be a little better than that, but if we are, we're just one better.
It's close as hell, I'll tell you that.
Well, I think we can consider it a modest option.
Oh, I think we could.
I think we've got to do it for Clark's sake.
I don't think I want to get to, I think we've just got to say that, uh, that the, uh, Drollis is a recognition and a great, great friend from the other side, and that, uh, and I think you're, you're right.
Well, thank you.
Thank you.
We'll take a look at this modest option if he wants to do it.
And it would be good.
Well, we're not going to look at it at all, believe me, if he doesn't do it.
It's just cold as that.
It's gone that we haven't had it under consideration.
And I'd put it so he doesn't get out of state.
But it would mean a great deal to us that we have papers on our desk.
How was that?
I mean, I know that's as much as they can ask.
That's right.
And then they want to come down and talk to me as long as they can.
You know?
Richard?
Okay.
Good luck.
Come on.
Yeah.
Thank you, sir.
John.
Thank you, sir.
I was wondering, in your schedule,
Okay, Schultz, you know that USC will raise their prices.
That's the prediction.
It's not suspicious.
Well, you can't say it's not suspicious.
They have to be.
Yeah, they do.
If you get nine times the wage increase, you've got to get the price increase.
Yeah.
Uh, it occurred to me that if you did have a time in my mind, if you didn't know what you're after, then I'd say, tell us today, and then we talk a little bit more this afternoon.
All right.
That's fine.
I've seen mention of three o'clock, and I've got a lot of things to go over.
Sorry.
I can be available around and say, what's your schedule announced today?
I can cancel.
I can cancel.
I can cancel.
4.30?
4.30.
Kathy Crosby's in.
She's supposed to come by at 5 o'clock, but hell, I don't have to see her.
I mean, I know she is, but I don't have to see her.
No, no, no.
What I'm getting at is that I thought that if you would go to the...
You see, there's one argument.
There's one argument.
We're going to go the way of Christ for each line.
We're going to do it right off the steel.
And it might be that you'd like to, in any case, if you could, any time, say, after, well, I could do that.
If you could see Crosby, I mean, I'm not going to judge, but I'm supposed to know.
I can see whether the wage price freeze thing is something to be wondered.
That's the only part of the option.
Except the only other that makes sense, mainly because I don't know one hell of a lot about it, which also I think could be held preserved, is the gold window thing.
I'm just thinking of the fact
of politically of the opposition being able to say, ah, somewhere in the inside of the figures that we are just inflating the currency or something, that certainly fails.
Now, so you might think in terms of our options of doing the things that make the dollar stronger now, then those things do not have the necessary effect of closing the gold unrelated to it.
Rather than
doing that far on that one.
Let me put it this way.
I am not to be as persuaded by the monetary arguments as I am by the domestic arguments.
So therefore, I'm kind of thinking that we do, that we should consider all those things that affect us domestically, which would also have a good effect on the international culture.
And as a last resort, moving the international, except for the floating, the floating thing, I think it's so goddamn huge that nobody's going to understand.
But the gold thing, the gold is a thing, so it sounds like a, well, it is, yes, it is.
closing the goal with when it sounds as if the dollars are on the hill that's to the that's to the average person maybe he doesn't well i i can see your anxiety i don't i don't think it would be uh so encouraging i just had an hour with mctennessy martin oh yeah who came in on a completely different subject uh he's reforming the stock exchange
So he came in, and we quickly got off of that, and I just started talking about this.
He thinks that unless we move fairly drastically, he says, number one, that there continues to be an erosion of confidence, that there's going to be any real change.
Number two, he says that there is
there's an erosion of confidence in me as an individual on the grounds that he's now beginning to pick up some criticism.
Well, hell, he's not in there to do anything.
He's just in there trying to be vice president or something.
Number three, he says we can't go beyond a limited time.
I said, what do you mean limited?
He said three or four months.
on the gold thing.
He said, you've got to make some changes.
He said, now, the statement that Judge Sergeant Stang made was, in effect, they weren't going to ask for gold because you didn't want to bring the whole system down.
He said, now, that's a hell of a poor excuse.
But he said, that's the way Stang viewed it.
And he said, I don't think you've got over three or four months where you're going to have to take a very aggressive stand.
He said, I think you have to do it either at the time of the IMF or immediately thereafter, no later than that.
He said this, and I'm talking about the whole gold thing.
So he was a demand, rather.
He thinks he could get by around next month.
Yeah, this is about what he's saying.
But he thinks we can't go, as I had suspected, we can't go even, he thinks, to the first of the year.
And I don't think that this might be the case.
I'm trying to think, actually, John, the best, the first of the year, I think our best time is September the 15th, right after Labor Day.
September the 10th, possibly.
That's the best time, right?
If we had our choice, our Congress would be better to hit them then and so forth.
On the other hand, if we want to consider a wage price freeze and so forth, you've got a very good payoff-like reason for it with these field people coming down if they have it this way.
You can do the domestic things without doing the international things, but I don't see much
I don't see much to be gained by that.
I think you tend to cover it.
No, no, no, by the international things.
No, by the domestic things.
I mean, I include in that the imported quarters.
I'm saying all of that.
That's everything.
I'm saying.
And you can do those without, number one, without the brutal convertibility and without floating.
But it seems to me if you do all of the domestic things, and then you later have to come along
and close the gold window and float.
Then you don't have anything domestically to offset it.
And it seems to me if you do the whole thing now, it shows that you're moving both on the domestic as well as the international front.
And I think it tends to create a great deal more confidence in what you've done.
What really hurts us, it seems to me, is that all of the bad news is concentrated in New York, in the financial circles.
in these fellows who constantly deal in the international market.
And I don't care what Germany or Belgium thinks, but nevertheless, what Walter Wriston thinks, what the bankers think, the international bankers who are constantly in that money market, this does have an effect.
And it has an effect here at home because that's where these damn writers are getting it.
This is where they're hearing this laughing.
They feed it out constantly.
This is what the impact that it has on you.
It's more factual than real.
But you can defer the international thing.
But I would not do something.
Maybe.
Okay.
Well, let's say this.
If you can... Would you have any time to see Schultz?
Sure.
I'll see him right after I see him.
Fine.
You see him.
And then, if you like, as a matter of fact, the next one is my problem.
As soon as you've finished with him, with Schultz,
uh just uh come on uh obviously they're here come on let's come right over here and break it that way you'll get back keep your point that's fine
Hey, Tom.
Looks to me like we'll lose a lot of people there.
Sorry.
Tom, doesn't that sound... Well, I'm afraid two or three people will line up.
And we're out again.
Let's see if one of them is ready.
I wonder if we're ready.
For a ride.
Maybe we should...
There's a little time to set it up.
There's a little time to set it up.
We have some other possibilities that we could want to really bang into things.
You've got New York on Tuesday.
How do you come back when you've got New York, too?
You should get a telephone for that.
Is that the end of W?
No.
On Thursday.
What were your other possibilities for getting out?
Well, we're going to have a reception anyway, so...
There was an idea of doing something between spending the night in New York, Tuesday night, and then doing something on Wednesday, going out somewhere, and then on down to Dallas.
In other words, hitting the road on Tuesday to New York, and then there was something out in the Midwest on Wednesday, and then to Dallas Thursday morning, and then on to California.
I think you'd want to be away the weekend on the 14th, but it wouldn't matter.
Other than you would consider your domain, what are we here?
11, 12.
The school may be back then.
I don't think it is.
We don't know for sure, of course, but it would have just been out of education.
Well,
Let's see, this weekend.
What would you plan to do on this weekend?
I think so.
I don't think you do.
I do want to see it, get the feel of it.
But you get there Saturday, you know, early afternoon.
Yeah.
And then drive it back, right?
If that, spend Saturday night, spend Saturday night and Sunday and come back Sunday night.
Or Monday morning if you want to.
It might be worth going, spending and coming back Monday morning so that it looks like you're going to spend two nights sharing.
One night out there doesn't look quite.
That works all right.
Let's do that.
Let's leave it on.
Let's leave it on.
You want to get back?
We may have to have some reconsideration on our press conference.
Nobody knows.
The press isn't gonna get into that.
The press is not gonna get into that.
No, I'm not thinking that.
What we may have to do here, if we're going to move in something like this, I don't want to press coverage.
There's an answer.
The President's certainly going to ask about the Steele settlement.
He's going to ask about a hell of a lot of other things of that sort.
Well, and you can turn those.
It seems to be an occupational trait of the chimp that that...
to interfere with what we have to do to run the shop properly.
It's better to have them.
If they're gonna settle for this in the end anyway, you better get over it now.
That's true, the overriding argument.
If by sitting it out for a two-month strike you can get a better settlement, that's one thing that you can't ask.
Joel says, well, are you going to get a better settlement?
Nope.
Say no.
One and a half months.
If they were a 3%, 4% difference, that's something to fight about.
So they're going to fight about one and a half percent for three or four months, and then what are they going to do?
Three quarters of a percent.
Maybe they'd settle it in between.
Well, that's a hell of a goddamn thing to have a strike about, isn't it?
I don't have too much confidence in Volker.
He kind of has a pretty good, you know, very focused, kind of alarmist.
He said, as Connelly calls, I'll be, I've already seen much of what he will be.
And you've got several subjects to raise, don't you?
Think of anything else you can.
And he doesn't call me to raise him.
Why do I have to trade with him?
We've never raised him, have we?
Now, I did a kind of check to see if he'd call her, and he hadn't.
I think we better.
I'm really reluctant to.
I'm just going to let it ride.
I could just, in passing, no.
You could just say that if we had a chance to look at that treasure.
I don't think we want to.
We don't care that much about it.
It doesn't matter.
I think it's better to let it sit.
She's on salvo.
She's available.
He's going to do it.
I thought maybe he'd respond.
That's why I said I think Kevin, Spanish speaking,
Until he makes up his mind, he wants to have a trigger.
He knows it's there, and it just, I think he's kind of, you know, he's just letting us sort it out to see, sure, what we did.
Well, he's struggling.
He feels it.
feels that he didn't.
Actually Walker is the fellow that screwed it up though.
And there's no question in my mind, I think he did it very deliberately.
He's trying to say, well, it was stolen from my house, but it's not doing it.
Walker didn't, Walker was just misled and caught me on it.
But as far as we're concerned, I don't know.
I don't even have a chimpanzee's creature, as far as I'm concerned.
That's what they want.
It doesn't make any difference, but it is an opportunity to get a message from him.
Get a damn good shot.
It's nice the billows too, isn't it?
Yeah, hell of a good thing to have a Mexican name in all those billows, huh?
Great.
It's a nice little job, isn't it?
I could make a preset or something.
Yeah?
I remember one of the few events...
Well, I'll tell you, this congressional election is a tough one.
These guys are looking at their own little districts.
People can get at them, but that's what happens when Donald Douglas gets after one.
Somebody made a contribution to his opponent.
$2,000.
I mean, suppose I ran that.
The situation in this office in terms of who did what they were doing, I mean,
And we don't punish enough.
God, they're all so small, aren't they, these guys?
They're very good at it.
He's fighting it hard, isn't he?
Yeah, I'll get Dean on the road tonight, so come on.
That's as long as I assume you want to read a speech, don't you?
Yeah, a thousand words.
That's my standard.
A thousand words for each.
That way, when I'm in a speech, read the channels.
Right before the cruise ship.
Say, one thing I want to keep clear on this thing out here,
I want to be sure that we don't get Pat to feel that she's not in on that thing.
She hasn't.
She was saying that we could live here today.
Well, I better keep this.
This has got to be a part of it.
I don't know whether somebody has talked to her about it or what.
But she knows that you have a development plan.
To develop it, I said.
park and to keep the museum out.
Then we're going to get the museum out.
If somebody paid for a museum.
Oh, yeah.
See, what she's talking about is she's seen the stuff in the paper.
We did it every time, and we'd already had the... We don't control the mall, so we can only do so much.
They want to put a museum there.
Well, they want to extend the Smithsonian, and they want to extend this Hirshhorn Museum, and what they were going to do is put a gash across the mall under, you know, cut a trench and put a sculpture
thinking that it would have been all modern sculpture.
Oh, no, never, never.
We got that turned off.
The city turned it off, I think.
It would have controlled it.
The Smithsonian has a collection of merry-go-round horses, old wooden merry-go-round horses, and they wanted to use a section of them all to display that new collection or something.
In fact, I'm very upset about that.
That's me admitting that it had already been turned off anyway for the time being.
Well, she probably has the slightest idea of what would be in her mind, and we took it with her.
I wondered if you could play a little magic on your character.
How about getting Conker back?
You get him in, and they're talking about, this is what I want, and she needs to sell it on a deal with me.
This is this great idea, and it's fantastic, too.
And you go, OK.
I guess that I did.
Yeah, I don't know what she admitted.
We don't really have anything on what we want yet.
Oh, yeah, it's all done.
Oh, is it?
Sure, that follow-up, you know, that Moynihan brought in.
Yeah, his name.
Oh, no, they have a plan.
It's going to be like they're planning a...
It's a Timberland type thing, you know, with children's, they're gonna have a children's playground and places for underground parking lot for about four cars.
They're planning to close off this whole street, both sides, and have a tram turn along on that downed Constitution and up the other side around that whole area should be replaced.
And not just this side, but the whole damn thing.
And they're going to have a restaurant where people can get a bite to eat, you know, all that sort of thing.
So he does really have a whole plan?
Oh, yes.
He's got an enormous plan that they're working on now.
She doesn't know about that.
I guess nobody heard about it.
Well, she knew there was a plan.
Preserve, that's a park.
I don't think this is inconsistent with that.
It is an all-encompassing park.
But a usable park, not just a piece of grass.
You know, a demonstration.
curious thing about this whole conference back here.
There's a hell of a lot more companies in this country than this damn businessman realized.
I think they're behind that.
I think they're behind the comments.
We've got to meet you more than to make it appear that there is.
Yeah, sure.
Easy.
Easy.
The rest of
I just wonder if we make that much better than on that.
So we're on Saturday night TV with a little bit of practice.
Sure.
Get around.
One thing you've got to figure is, too, is it going to be in New York?
When I go up there, I do not want to announce that I'm going to the theater or any of that sort of thing.
I don't think it's the kind of thing that I'm going to do.
It's a lot.
Because there, as someone made the arrangements on that, I told you how to check with the, at Rose, the nutritionist, and they'll get out and buy the tickets and everything.
The crowds that you pick up then, Bob, are much better.
You know, they're slowly spot-changing.
If I wear them out, then they can announce it.
And then you have all the bug-seeker chap-ables and nutting and servings and all the other goddamn signs and crazy stuff.
No, I didn't wear those.
Fair enough.
Just wait for the last minute.
I don't think you have a...
This situation with the Garden Chalice, I think you can consider there what you want to do.
You know, you've got a bunch of burdens there, too.
What do you think?
I mean, that might be...
How do we handle it?
Of course, I guess, I guess we've got to handle it.
I think we've got to molest them every morning.
We've got to get our people out.
Yeah, that's the point.
We handle it right out.
How do we handle it?
Do you plan to motorcade?
In Dallas?
Yeah.
Because of Kennedy?
I just probably think we'll drive in.
We'll, we'll, we'll, uh, we won't parade.
We'll try to motorcade, but I don't know.
I think we'll announce it early.
Sure.
We should have put it up now, but it's so, it's so far, I have to follow the consciousness of it.
We've got it.
That was a sign we've got to get well.
Change, uh, just there's three more blocks.
Anything else?
Yeah, I'm going to put you to do some grind in.
I'm worried about, uh, can I just pop up a dime?
And they, uh, share it, huh?
Good.
Okay, I'll see you at three o'clock.
Okay.