Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 563 › Conversation 563-003
Nixon, Billings & Buchanan on White House interns and Public service
Friday, August 13, 1971 · 11:57 AM–12:15 PM ET · Oval Office · 19 min
AI Summary
President Nixon met with a group of White House interns to thank them for their service and discuss the value of their contributions to the administration. Drawing on his own experiences as a law student working on a constitutional law book, he encouraged the students to find meaning in mundane tasks and perform them with excellence. The meeting concluded with Nixon providing mementos to the interns and expressing hope that their time in Washington would inspire them to pursue public service and balanced leadership.
- White House interns
- Public service
- Leadership
- Career development
- Nixon's personal history
Audio
Transcript (AI-generated)
This transcript is incomplete. The transcription skipped stretches of speech — roughly 10 minutes of this recording (about 51% of it) is represented by only a few words. Listen to the audio rather than relying on the text below; a corrected transcript is queued.
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Mission, go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's it.
Go to citizens, 200 to 42.
Oh, yeah, that's
This is Pat Clifford, from Mt.
Holyoke, class of 1973.
He was born and raised in Massachusetts.
Where did you live?
At Ray Rocks, your high school.
Oh, we have a lot to do.
Tom Davis, recently.
I've had an honor to honor him.
He should have been the one I signed up for.
I heard he didn't sign up for that.
This is Andre Perkins.
He's from Mt.
Dale, also.
He's worked for John Dean for some time now.
Oh, yeah.
How did she get transferred?
No, I don't know.
What was your name?
Oh yes, I see, I see.
We are very proud of you.
Mr. President, this is Scott Gleason.
He's a UVA class of 72.
Is that your mom, isn't it?
Yes, Virginia.
Virginia.
Oh, you're very close.
No, you're the University of Virginia.
Oh, yeah, University of Virginia.
That's very good.
I think her client's on us.
This is .
You're going back to .
You've got .
That's the only part of it.
That's the only part of it.
That's the only part of it.
That's the only part of it.
That's the only part of it.
That's the only part of it.
That's the only part of it.
That's the only part of it.
That's the only part of it.
University of California, Santa Barbara.
We figured out who sent it.
This is one of the boats we're probably still not aware of, and we're working with Connie Stewart.
Well, and well.
Very nice to meet you.
That's her mother's job.
This is Kelly Madison.
Just graduated from Duke.
She's from Austin, Texas.
Chris Morsel from Los Angeles.
He's a CLA.
He's been working with John.
He lost a coach out there.
My name's Deidre.
I'm a team.
Bill, something smart.
Is it Bill?
Nelson Brown, class of 71.
He's been working for the domestic council.
Nick Brody, did you invent Nick Brody?
I'm sure he's... Nick Brody, uh, my house staff, who's been, uh, protocol.
He's, uh, I think the only one who's a Brown graduate.
He's, uh, the son of each of us.
Colt.
Mr. Nelson.
Right.
Well, you, uh, I'm sure he's Nick Brody.
I'm sure he's Nick Brody.
He's always telling me he's the best one on the island.
This is Mike.
This is Mike.
How could you do all that?
Did you all pay your N.A.N.?
No, I didn't pay anything.
that each other's earnings aren't cheap.
That's pretty much the way it is.
That's pretty much the way it is.
That's pretty much the way it is.
That's pretty much the way it is.
That's pretty much the way it is.
That's pretty much the way it is.
That's pretty much the way it is.
That's pretty much the way it is.
That's pretty much the way it is.
That's pretty much the way it is.
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.
You're going back to that, though, aren't you?
Well, I think so.
It was impressive.
Impressive, I'd say.
All right.
All right.
All right.
What?
What?
Thank you all.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much.
You got ice in there, Dave?
Always on vacation.
Good, good.
I will see you out there.
Good, good.
It's a little bit of a Sunday, but we've got a lot to do here.
Ah, good.
But the water will be cool enough.
Excuse me.
It certainly is cool enough.
I'm sweating.
And how are you?
I was thinking of two moves.
I'll let you use the ice tray.
The breastfeeding and the ice tray, I'll let you use it.
And, uh, Jack Hunter, he's, I mean, I've seen the man in the White House dressing up, you know, watching the star, you know.
It's our first year out there.
He went down to Mexico, you know.
He, uh, probably got robbed at that age.
He paid $100,000.
He bought a third one.
It was supposed to be, uh, an X-ray of his, uh, uh, old, some sort of, uh, arrow, some sort of stuff.
I had, uh, you know, if it cost that much, it must be worth it.
And, you know, just,
I, uh, I just regret that all the time you've been here, I've had so little time to see you in person.
I just look at these dead ones now.
I, uh, I remember the 19th of Congress in 1947.
You probably don't think so.
That's the great problem of servicing a big institution or a big corporation, a government like this that does what you would work on.
You would work on a paper or this event and never see it for the light of day.
You would express your point of view to someone and it's not done and so on.
But the
I think this is almost a cliche, but I think that you take away with you not what historic contribution you made to the administration of the future of the country,
Just the fact that you did, the fact that you were here, I think that, I think it was that I was, I was mentioning that, which is almost, it seems to me, almost irrelevant to the work you did.
Between my second and third years of duty, of course this is in the middle of depression, we had a job that was worthwhile.
My professor in Torts, Douglas Maggs,
was getting out a book in the Constitutional Law.
Well, in those days, of course, the parties, the public, and so forth, all they do is just, the books, they sell them to the students, you know, the teachers.
But there's this book, he had a mimeograph.
He got this whole Constitutional law, and he had that mimeograph.
I remember I worked with Sommer for two months,
It's running handily in your application.
You put all the pages on it.
So I work about eight hours a day, and I used to do some work in the library, and I was in charge of the articles before I did.
But the point is that I describe that sometimes to my daughters, how much you possibly do.
It wasn't terribly boring in the interest, of course.
But in a sense, I didn't really feel it at the time.
Of course, I had to do it for a reason, survival, and, you know, to accomplish something else.
But sometimes I think that if we all learn far more from doing something that we
difficult, something boring, something meaningless, and probably by doing it well, you're sitting on the pinnacle of saying, well, I made a big decision.
I got the ear of the man, and all that sort of thing.
What I really say is this.
She brought her viewpoints, different viewpoints, to the office where she worked.
And also, being the beauty of science and so forth, there are people who, you know, they get kind of bored in there.
Sure, it's common jobs, it's very necessary.
And I hope that for you it's been an experience that's been fun.
You know, I just want to leave with you is that if you look back at your experiences, if you guys came down to Washington and had stars in my office, I thought I was going to be an intelligent president.
I didn't tell anybody all season.
And I'm disappointed.
If on those occasions I'm the only one who's invested in that...
He didn't remember that.
I remember it was worthwhile.
I did a good job.
He sold the book.
I bought one myself.
But most important, it gave a clue.
It taught me a lesson that many organizations, and they think it's important, that it is necessary for individuals to
do whatever science they have to make a contribution, not whine about it, not whine about it, always try to never be satisfied with doing something meaningful, either do something for your brain,
on the other hand, not to get into what is sort of the current crash of, among particularly those of us who have been exposed to what is supposed to be the best education system in the world, that we have an education, that the only if we are, that we do certain things of great magnitude, is it worthwhile that we educate this nation.
really and truly a change in people's lives.
But he didn't prove his worth when he does the things that may not seem to be important.
That the things that however are necessary to do, and whatever he does, does it well.
And he thereby sets an example for others, and he impairs the way for his doing.
Maybe he did a big job well, and when he gets it,
So with that, I want to thank you.
We don't have that much to give you for all your work.
I know you're paid very little out here.
You get a complex of men.
I don't know if any of them have a complex.
Probably.
Yes, they do.
And this is the right thing.
As you see, it's here in the top as well.
And for the girls, I'm not sure this works either.
But this is a little more compact.
So now it's more expensive than the compacts.
Now, even though they're not expensive, they're very important gifts, and so I hope to take these away as a memento to allow
I bet you will take away from this pleasant memories of your stay here.
Some of you will, in some way or other, maybe be in government, not full-time.
I think I couldn't say it too strongly, but I know that perhaps there must be a million students after you study political science, probably a hundred jobs.
Any one of the millions is worthy of their talents.
But that's still worth studying.
And I guess I think it's so important to have people who are intelligent, people who are balanced, people who drive like Jesus and so forth.
Provide leadership to this country and help us, whoever succeeds in this.
place in your system to try some of the, not just the, not just the frustrated being against, which is so easy, but the being against in order that you can be for.
Thank you, and, uh, seeing you publish it, it's not like they're leaving.
It's not going to be a win on that point of TV, you know.
We have a floor.
Okay, these cameras on here.
Okay.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
NARA Description
On August 13, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon, Diana Billings, Robert Buchanan, Christopher Chapin, Patricia Clifford, Thomas Davis, Arthur Ferguson, Marsha Gilman, Scoll Gleason, Douglas Hallett, Harding Jones, Dale Kinsella, Jeanne Luboja, Loretta Lungren, Chris Marshall, William Olson, Michael Schatzlein, Linda Scheuplein, Robert Sutcliffe, Blair Wilson, Frederic V. Malek, Stephen B. Bull, Herbert G. Klein, and White House photographer met in the Oval Office of the White House from 11:57 am to 12:15 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 563-003 of the White House Tapes.
Nixon Library Finding Aid
Conversation No. 563-3
Date: August 13, 1971
Time: 11:57 am - 12:15 pm
Location: Oval Office
The President met with Diana Billings, Robert Buchanan, Christopher Chapin, Patricia Clifford,
Thomas Davis, Arthur Fergenson, Marsha Gilman, Scoll Gleason, Douglas Hallett, Harding
Jones, Dale Kinsella, Jeanne Luboja, Loretta Lungren, Dolly Madison, Chris Marshall, William
Olson, Michael Schatzlein, Linda Scheuplein, Robert Sutcliffe, Blair Wilson, Frederic V. Malek,
Stephen B. Bull, and Herbert G. Klein; the White House press photographers were present at the
beginning of the meeting.
[The recording began while the meeting was in progress]
General conversation
-Richard A. Moore
-Harry S. Dent
-Malek
-Raymond K. Price, Jr.
-Dent
-Klein
-Charles W. Colson
-Edwin L. Harper
-Constance M. (“Connie”) Stuart
-Robert H. Finch
-Nick Ruwe
-Peter M. Flanigan
-Clement E. Conger
-Beirut, Lebanon
-William E. Timmons
[Photograph session]
Jack Horner
-Gift of ashtray to President
President's schedule
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Interns
-Value of work
Douglas Maggs, professor at Duke Law School
-Book on constitutional law
-Mimeographing
-President's role
-Julie Nixon Eisenhower and Tricia Nixon Cox
-Value of work
Interns
-Value of work
-President’s forthcoming trip to People’s Republic of China [PRC]
Presentation of gifts by President
Political science
-Value
Billings, et al. left at 12:15 pm.Also recorded on August 13, 1971
- 563-004 12:16 PM · 57 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Ronald L. Ziegler met in the Oval Office of the White House from 12:16 pm to 12:18 pm.
- 563-005 12:19 PM · 9 min — President Richard M. Nixon, Stephen B. Bull, Frederic V. Malek, Herbert G. Klein, Jayne B. Spain, Patricia R. Hitt, Helen D. Bentlye, Barbara H. Franklin, Elizabeth Hanford, Nancy Hanks, Sallyanne Payton, Ethel B. Walsh, and White House photographer met in the Oval Office of the White House from 12:19 pm to 12:27 pm.
- 563-006 12:29 PM · 1 hr 17 min — President Richard M. Nixon, Alexander P. Butterfield, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, Rose Mary Woods, White House operator, Thelma C. ("Pat") (Ryan) Nixon, Henry A. Kissinger, Stephen B. Bull, Manolo Sanchez, John N. Mitchell, John D. Ehrlichman, George P. Shultz, Edward L. Morgan, and Bruce A. Kehrli met in the Oval Office of the White House from 12:29 pm to 1:45 pm.
- 007-114 12:32 PM · 43 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Thelma C. ("Pat") (Ryan) Nixon talked on the telephone from 12:32 pm to 12:33 pm.
- 007-115 12:33 PM · 5 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 12:33 pm and 1:47 pm.
- 563-007 1:45 PM · 5 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Manolo Sanchez met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 1:45 pm and 1:47 pm.
- 563-008 1:45 PM · 9 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 1:45 pm and 1:47 pm.
- 563-009 1:45 PM · 7 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and Manolo Sanchez met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 1:45 pm and 1:47 pm.
Cite this conversation
Conversation 563-003, August 13, 1971. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/563-003 (accessed October 9, 2026).