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
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.
- Supreme Court appointments
- Gender equality
- Warren Burger
- Judicial philosophy
- Political strategy
Audio
Download MP3 (part 1) · 89.9 MB ·Download MP3 (part 2) · 90.0 MB ·Download MP3 (part 3) · 141.8 MB ·Download MP3 (part 4) · 89.3 MB ·Download MP3 (part 5) · 55.2 MB
This conversation has not yet been cut into its own clip, so the player above contains the full tape segment shared with neighbouring conversations. It begins about 00:00:41 into the tape and ends around 00:08:21.
Transcript (AI-generated)
This transcript was generated automatically by AI (WhisperX) and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Names and numbers are often wrong; speakers are not identified. Do not cite it as authoritative — verify against the audio and the finding aid.
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· Timestamps are positions within the full tape recording.
0:04Uh, John Dean called me last night about an order to Lily after the interview.
0:10Incidentally, 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.
0:21She hasn't insisted on anything, and that's why we've referred to her as... Molesting.
0:25Falcone.
0:26Falcone.
0:27And, uh... Well, that number to Falcone's the way it is.
0:32And he says she's the best thing, she's a sliced bread.
0:35He was very impressed.
0:37And he worked over Mr. Falcone for some period of time and feels he's not great, but he will not be an impediment.
0:45What does he like about her doing?
0:47Well, he says she has all the right vibrations on philosophical things.
0:52She said on crime, on the demonstration of justice, civil rights.
0:57She just comes down four square.
0:58Just couldn't be better.
1:02That's an opinion to show that I'd accept a curse in the field of civil rights that she hasn't had.
1:07But 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.
1:19I agree, but look at all the southern.
1:21There's no southern that I know of that's soft on civil rights.
1:25Not at all.
1:26Or crime law or anything.
1:29Basically it's...
1:30Unless it's something that's straight like earlier.
1:34The 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.
1:52As he gets up, he says, well, good morning, Mr. Justice.
1:57He says, do justice to them.
2:00And I'll snap back at him.
2:01He said, that's not my job.
2:03My job is to play the game according to the rules.
2:07And of course, that doesn't mean that he's going to do injustice.
2:10It means that at the highest level, that is justice.
2:13Justice is not individual and personal.
2:16A judge lays himself above the rules, but it's to play the games according to the Constitution, according to the rules.
2:22That's all.
2:23That was Frank Berger.
2:25And that's probably not what we believe.
2:27That was my speech last Friday, too.
2:29Great.
2:32I don't know.
2:32I'm sorry about the burger thing.
2:34I knew it would come up.
2:35We've got to call people, isn't it?
2:38On the lily?
2:39On the lily?
2:40No.
2:41Frank, the more I say of it, the more I... Yeah.
2:44But 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.
2:50I mean, what I meant is he's got to say that I...
2:54He says that in the name.
2:57That he...
2:58He welcomes the, he puts out some stories.
3:04He can hurt himself down at the court if it appears that Warren is supposed to win.
3:09That's my point.
3:11The 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.
3:26And you're all just reading the press.
3:27I'm like, no, no, sir.
3:31They're all hanging around.
3:32I said, Jesus, I guess it's the Niagara River.
3:34In my law school class, we had a couple women.
3:37They married guys in class and were taking on businesses here.
3:41But anyway.
3:41This ballgame has changed.
3:43This ballgame has changed.
3:44No question about it.
3:45And 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.
3:55and that nice person that we put on the civil service commission.
3:58These are strong, intelligent women, and they are about to sit back and change, John.
4:04This is coming back, becoming almost like India now.
4:08I can tell you that this really is not going to be browsied by anybody on that court.
4:14It may be what they're worried about.
4:15Well, it may be, but she is not going to be.
4:18Do you get the impression that Berger is representing others on the court?
4:24I 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.
4:40He died away from a direct attack on
4:53the woman, in quote, situation, to adjust to the incompetence that would run down the court when you should be building it up.
5:02Let me tell you what I can tell you.
5:10First of all, this is true.
5:14I think this is the greatest thing that's come along since sliced bread.
5:19I think war is a disaster.
5:22So I agree with you.
5:23Warren's lightweight.
5:24First of all, he didn't know the law.
5:26If 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.
5:37Warren's not smart.
5:38Warren ruined the court hearing.
5:40But when I was here before the court hearing, Warren had enough questions.
5:45I can tell.
5:46Boris was smart.
5:47And, of course, Black was brilliant.
5:50And 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.
5:55You can tell, John, what they're questioning.
5:57Brandon was down the table.
6:00And I know that was a smart move.
6:02I don't like that.
6:03It's a pretty smart move.
6:04But I broke it.
6:06He has more knowledge, for better or for worse.
6:10I want to vote by a great election, of course, but I can't find anyone.
6:22Find me one that's his right age.
6:25Which is my lady.
6:27I never, I guess I will not punish you.
6:31He doesn't go to that direction.
6:32He goes to the 69-year-olds and the 69-year-olds.
6:35I guess he's about 62.
6:36Or 63.
6:3663 must be nice.
6:38See, he's a 61.
6:40Look at that giant.
6:50Well, 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.
7:02The conversation never happened with E. Burger.
7:06It's all about being justice in the interest of the court and the country, and stop this foolish nonsense.
7:11Well, I think there should be other challenges.
7:17but a great feeling and understanding, and I understand it.
7:20I think he's the greatest thing to come along.
7:24This is a painful thing for me.
7:27I have these same feelings.
7:29But I am convinced that just as the time came for a black to be on that court, the time has come for an Negro.
7:36It was harder then to take a black, particularly a dumb black, and at least I'd given him a bright one.
7:42I'll just put it that way.
7:43And that he then was going to come
7:46And that he can handle it.
7:48But that he's just not up with it.
7:50I know that you can poll the country's 7% of people who say they want a woman.
7:56Maybe.
7:58But the 30% that are for that woman are called vile for it.
8:02I think you're right or you're wrong.
8:04I don't know.
8:05I should have asked Lou Harris to do a poll about a woman.
8:07I'm surprised about his.
8:10Do you think people do want a woman?
8:12I believe so.
8:13Larger than 30%.
8:16I hope so.
8:18Just because there's that many women.
8:32This whole woman business has changed.
8:38Oh, solidly, within the last couple of years.
8:41Just turned completely.
8:42You're reading this on the news?
8:44I'm absolutely convinced of it.
8:50The Democrats are living on it.
8:53They're out there feeling it.
8:55They're going through it right now.
8:58They're going through it.
9:00They're going through it.
9:08For the first time, the women don't want to be women.
9:11They want to belong to the mix.
9:14That's true.
9:15It is.
9:16They just don't want to be isolated.
9:18Yeah.
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.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.
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 September 28, 2026).