Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 593 › Conversation 593-001

Nixon & Sanchez on Supreme Court appointments and Gender equality

Friday, October 15, 1971 · 8:43 AM–9:09 AM ET · Oval Office

ParticipantsNixon, Richard M. (President); Sanchez, ManoloConversation593-001 on Tape 593 (tape position 00:00:41–00:08:21)StartFriday, October 15, 1971 at 8:43 AMEndFriday, October 15, 1971 at 9:09 AMRecording deviceOval OfficeSourceNixon Library record for 593-001 ↗

AI Summary

President Nixon consults with an advisor (identified in the transcript as John, likely John Dean) regarding the potential nomination of a woman to the Supreme Court. The discussion evaluates the political necessity of appointing a female justice, the shifting cultural dynamics of the women's movement, and the opposition likely to be encountered from Chief Justice Warren Burger. The President ultimately expresses a strategic conviction that appointing a woman is necessary, despite internal institutional resistance.

Audio

part A, 0:41

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This conversation has not yet been cut into its own clip, so the players above hold the full tape, shared with neighbouring conversations. By the archivists' log it runs from 00:00:41 to 00:08:21 into the tape; their log often drifts a minute or two from the audio, so listen for the subjects in the finding aid.

NARA Description

On October 15, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon and Manolo Sanchez met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 8:43 am and 9:09 am. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 593-001 of the White House Tapes.

Nixon Library Finding Aid

Conversation No. 593-1

Date: October 15, 1971
Time: Unknown between 8:43 am and 9:09 am
Location: Oval Office

The President met with Manolo Sanchez.

     The President's schedule
          -Camp Hoover

Sanchez left at an unknown time before 9:09 am.

Transcript (AI-generated)

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 Do not cite it as authoritative — verify against the audio and the finding aid.

Download transcript (.txt) · JSON data

Timestamps are positions within the full tape; click one to play the tape from there.

Uh, John Dean called me last night about an order to Lily after the interview.
Incidentally, if I could just interrupt you for a moment, if we, and going that way, we don't refer to her as Lily on the bench the way that she, she insists on that.
She hasn't insisted on anything, and that's why we've referred to her as... Molesting.
Falcone.
Falcone.
And, uh... Well, that number to Falcone's the way it is.
And he says she's the best thing, she's a sliced bread.
He was very impressed.
And he worked over Mr. Falcone for some period of time and feels he's not great, but he will not be an impediment.
What does he like about her doing?
Well, he says she has all the right vibrations on philosophical things.
She said on crime, on the demonstration of justice, civil rights.
She just comes down four square.
Just couldn't be better.
That's an opinion to show that I'd accept a curse in the field of civil rights that she hasn't had.
But he has all the answers, he has all the right answers, and John, you will generally find somebody that's hard of law and also hard of civil rights.
I agree, but look at all the southern.
There's no southern that I know of that's soft on civil rights.
Not at all.
Or crime law or anything.
Basically it's...
Unless it's something that's straight like earlier.
The best story that illustrates it is that, which I really think is, if it could be, if it could be told that way, is, is, is, is the holes where our hands are, you know, where our hand drives all through the car, horse and buggy things.
As he gets up, he says, well, good morning, Mr. Justice.
He says, do justice to them.
And I'll snap back at him.
He said, that's not my job.
My job is to play the game according to the rules.
And of course, that doesn't mean that he's going to do injustice.
It means that at the highest level, that is justice.
Justice is not individual and personal.
A judge lays himself above the rules, but it's to play the games according to the Constitution, according to the rules.
That's all.
That was Frank Berger.
And that's probably not what we believe.
That was my speech last Friday, too.
Great.
I don't know.
I'm sorry about the burger thing.
I knew it would come up.
We've got to call people, isn't it?
On the lily?
On the lily?
No.
Frank, the more I say of it, the more I... Yeah.
But with regard to Warren, I don't want Warren to take this in a way that he's got to take the lead on it.
I mean, what I meant is he's got to say that I...
He says that in the name.
That he...
He welcomes the, he puts out some stories.
He can hurt himself down at the court if it appears that Warren is supposed to win.
That's my point.
The one thing that's running strong, as I told you, so I thought, I think it's just, I used to think, frankly, John, it was just like people, that's like Rita Hauser and the one you had working.
And you're all just reading the press.
I'm like, no, no, sir.
They're all hanging around.
I said, Jesus, I guess it's the Niagara River.
In my law school class, we had a couple women.
They married guys in class and were taking on businesses here.
But anyway.
This ballgame has changed.
This ballgame has changed.
No question about it.
And what I'm saying, and what it's convinced me to do is I see these women trying to hear, you know, this is one that we made kind of a tough day ahead of the Maritime Convention.
and that nice person that we put on the civil service commission.
These are strong, intelligent women, and they are about to sit back and change, John.
This is coming back, becoming almost like India now.
I can tell you that this really is not going to be browsied by anybody on that court.
It may be what they're worried about.
Well, it may be, but she is not going to be.
Do you get the impression that Berger is representing others on the court?
I gathered from the long conversation that we had yesterday that there was a rather wide discussion of the situation up there yesterday, because he mentioned about the black men, told them how great of men the Churchill private was.
He died away from a direct attack on
the woman, in quote, situation, to adjust to the incompetence that would run down the court when you should be building it up.
Let me tell you what I can tell you.
First of all, this is true.
I think this is the greatest thing that's come along since sliced bread.
I think war is a disaster.
So I agree with you.
Warren's lightweight.
First of all, he didn't know the law.
If he was a good politician and allowed some justice, he would have been, frankly, I'm no lawyer, but I would have been a hell of a lot better than him as a politician.
Warren's not smart.
Warren ruined the court hearing.
But when I was here before the court hearing, Warren had enough questions.
I can tell.
Boris was smart.
And, of course, Black was brilliant.
And Harlow was asking, I mean, Harlow had some feelings with it, but you know, I didn't need to care if it suddenly got there.
You can tell, John, what they're questioning.
Brandon was down the table.
And I know that was a smart move.
I don't like that.
It's a pretty smart move.
But I broke it.
He has more knowledge, for better or for worse.
I want to vote by a great election, of course, but I can't find anyone.
Find me one that's his right age.
Which is my lady.
I never, I guess I will not punish you.
He doesn't go to that direction.
He goes to the 69-year-olds and the 69-year-olds.
I guess he's about 62.
Or 63.
63 must be nice.
See, he's a 61.
Look at that giant.
Well, I would suggest, Mr. President, that I just tell Warren Burger that this whole concept is unacceptable all the way around, and it's not going to be discussed any further.
The conversation never happened with E. Burger.
It's all about being justice in the interest of the court and the country, and stop this foolish nonsense.
Well, I think there should be other challenges.
but a great feeling and understanding, and I understand it.
I think he's the greatest thing to come along.
This is a painful thing for me.
I have these same feelings.
But I am convinced that just as the time came for a black to be on that court, the time has come for an Negro.
It was harder then to take a black, particularly a dumb black, and at least I'd given him a bright one.
I'll just put it that way.
And that he then was going to come
And that he can handle it.
But that he's just not up with it.
I know that you can poll the country's 7% of people who say they want a woman.
Maybe.
But the 30% that are for that woman are called vile for it.
I think you're right or you're wrong.
I don't know.
I should have asked Lou Harris to do a poll about a woman.
I'm surprised about his.
Do you think people do want a woman?
I believe so.
Larger than 30%.
I hope so.
Just because there's that many women.
This whole woman business has changed.
Oh, solidly, within the last couple of years.
Just turned completely.
You're reading this on the news?
I'm absolutely convinced of it.
The Democrats are living on it.
They're out there feeling it.
They're going through it right now.
They're going through it.
They're going through it.
For the first time, the women don't want to be women.
They want to belong to the mix.
That's true.
It is.
They just don't want to be isolated.
Yeah.

Also recorded on October 15, 1971

  • 011-096 8:43 AM · 7 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 8:43 am and 9:09 am.
  • 593-002 8:43 AM · 25 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 8:43 am and 9:09 am.
  • 593-003 8:43 AM · 2 min — President Richard M. Nixon and unknown person(s) met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 8:43 am and 9:09 am.
  • 593-004 8:43 AM · 3 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Stephen B. Bull met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 8:43 am and 9:09 am.
  • 011-097 9:09 AM · 2 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Donald McI. Kendall talked on the telephone from 9:09 am to 9:10 am.
  • 593-005 9:09 AM · 2 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Donald McI. Kendall met in the Oval Office of the White House from 9:09 am to 9:10 am.
  • 593-006 9:10 AM · 29 min — President Richard M. Nixon, Stephen B. Bull, Henry A. Kissinger, and Peter G. Peterson met in the Oval Office of the White House from 9:10 am to 9:36 am.
  • 593-007 9:37 AM · 14 min — President Richard M. Nixon, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, Manolo Sanchez, and Henry A. Kissinger met in the Oval Office of the White House from 9:37 am to 9:52 am.

All 21 conversations from October 15, 1971 →

Cite this conversation

Conversation 593-001, October 15, 1971. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/593-001 (accessed November 13, 2026).