Nixon White House Tapes › Tape 597 › Conversation 597-002
Nixon, Haldeman & Malek on Gender equality and Judicial appointments
Wednesday, October 20, 1971 · 9:17 AM–9:25 AM ET · Oval Office
AI Summary
President Nixon met with H. R. Haldeman and Frederic V. Malek to discuss the recruitment and appointment of women to high-level legal and judicial positions. Following this, Nixon consulted with Attorney General John N. Mitchell regarding specific candidate vetting, the political necessity of increasing female representation in the federal judiciary, and strategies for managing potential appointments. The participants aimed to identify qualified female prospects to address public pressure and project a commitment to gender diversity in government.
- Gender equality
- Judicial appointments
- Federal District Court
- Hiring practices
- Political strategy
Audio
Download MP3 (part 1) · 170.4 MB ·Download MP3 (part 2) · 89.2 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 00:06:08 into the tape and ends around 00:15:31.
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 Do not cite it as authoritative — verify against the audio and the finding aid.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.
6:32Is, for example, James Mann?
6:35No, James is not.
6:36Some of them were, but one of them wasn't.
6:42Check it out.
6:42We can check it out.
6:44I said we can check it out.
6:46We can check it out.
6:46We can check it out and see if that ain't a lawyer and how many years to practice.
6:58And you might also get to see if you have to check down all those things.
7:15I would not have it.
7:17What I'd like to do is see if they can then check to see if there's any others of that type.
7:25Yeah, that are outstanding in a country that are on lists that you're looking into.
7:30I don't need judges.
7:31Just because we're looking at all those, but you know, the women think about who the hell do you care about.
7:38I'm just thinking, I've occurred to me that a lot of those women, you know,
7:44Yeah?
7:45She's younger.
7:46What?
7:47She's younger than that when she's in her late 20s or early 30s.
7:50Oh, well, I don't mean that.
7:52She's got 40 years old.
7:54Hello.
7:54Yeah.
7:56Hello, Connie.
7:59Yeah.
8:07Yeah.
8:11Oh, I see.
8:11Yeah.
8:12Why don't we leave?
8:15It's a question of money.
8:36Well, God, we can arrange
8:46Well, you know, loans are hard things, but hell, that shouldn't be any problem.
8:52Anybody that's going to have a job and pay $60,000 for the rest of his life, even these days, John, ain't bad, huh?
9:02He'll still get his, pick up his senatorial pension.
9:07It won't be a hell of a lot.
9:09It'll be $10,000 a year.
9:12Yeah.
9:17Yeah.
9:18Could I ask you one other thing?
9:19Are we...
9:21I wonder if we should just do the back thing.
9:25Did you tell them not to look into bacon or salty bacon or how we leave that?
9:32Are they not checking her?
9:37They said they were told they're not qualified.
9:40Inevitable.
9:43I'm just trying to think of the answers that we have when people say, well, why don't you check a woman out?
10:08Yes, sir, all day.
10:17When I say what we want, I mean, I don't want them just taking a call.
10:22They're going to hear about ramblings.
10:24I mean, I don't want to say just no patient, but I don't want to say not all of them.
10:30That's what they're going to do.
10:32We're going to have to put it on them.
10:39Yeah, right.
10:41Right.
10:48But the bar is just being brought over, so they're gonna be, they're a stacked jury, they're gonna take, you know, let them take the wrath of the law.
11:01Is there any way that we have any place that we could push a woman up to the circuit court at the same time we do this?
11:18I must say, but I suppose we went in the way of the New York, you know, I mean, build a mile and toss a woman in there.
11:32The idea that we're sort of preparing one for, you see what I'm getting at, John?
11:37I don't, I think the idea that all this whole movement about women having been raised, we've got to indicate that we sure have that under consideration.
11:46It's not never.
11:52How about here in Washington you could donate your country?
11:57Do we have a hold on this turkey?
12:00Well, we could put some debate in there, couldn't we?
12:06One of those bastards is going to retire and die, isn't he?
12:22I think that they still appeal to me very much.
12:24I mean, not now, I see the point.
12:27But how about, I'm just having their eye on her, keeping her, I mean, I don't know, look, keep your nose clean and be conservative as hell, you know, and she can go out where God is.
12:40Will you do that?
12:41Now, Mike, what is it?
12:42Well, we're not talking about that anymore here, but I mean, what course, you know, on the street, did a trial, or...
12:54Why don't you put her on the Federal District Court?
12:56Can you do that?
12:59Here.
12:59I mean, I can put her up there pretty fast.
13:03I mean, I don't have any other money, John.
13:06That's the point.
13:07You know, there are certain women that are on courts that I don't accept military.
13:21When will that, when will that come?
13:29We can shut her up.
13:30Okay, you're leaving to go to Philadelphia.
13:33You'll be gone.
13:37But I'll be here early.
13:39And first, let's see if you have a license at the moment.
13:42Do you think Baker is considering it?
13:43Yeah.
13:43Yeah.
13:47Yeah.
13:49Yeah.
13:51Now I'm going to move on.
13:54I'm not going to...
13:55not under any circumstances going to submit it to the law.
13:58I mean, I'm just, he's just going to go, okay.
14:02And it's not going to pop, right?
14:04And we just can't be bothered.
14:06Okay, John.
14:07Yeah.
14:12Yeah.
14:15Yeah, well, we can simply say it because of him being a senator and all that kind of thing.
14:19We didn't think that Powell, the former president of the ABA, you know, he was a fighter, isn't he?
14:30Cut you out, please.
14:35Yeah.
14:35Yeah, we cannot have that.
14:39Okay.
15:38Well, that's easy to say, asshole.
15:45Well, the point is, I suppose that one of our policemen or something was a guy.
15:54No, we've had some incidents where the policemen have been handled things badly.
16:04This one, the guy...
16:06Daisy's ink wasn't on the typewriter unless it was written on the back side of it.
16:11The guy didn't see it.
16:12He said, just a second, Mr. Thompson, I'll check this for you.
16:17And that's all Daisy needed.
16:19He said, what do you do?
16:22Unless he took advantage of it, he's made a monumental, monumental job.
NARA Description
On October 20, 1971, President Richard M. Nixon, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, Frederic V. Malek, and John N. Mitchell met in the Oval Office of the White House from 9:17 am to 9:25 am. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 597-002 of the White House Tapes.
Nixon Library Finding Aid
Conversation No. 597-2
Date: October 20, 1971
Time: 9:17 am - 9:25 am
Location: Oval Office
The President met with H. R. (“Bob”) Haldeman and Frederic V. Malek.
Appointments
-Women lawyers
-Jayne B. Spain
Telephone call from the Attorney General
Woman appointees
-Judges
-Unidentified woman
John N. Mitchell talked with the President between 9:19 am and 9:25 am.
[Conversation No. 597-2A]
[See Conversation No. 11-157; two items have been withdrawn from the conversation]
Haldeman and Malek left at 9:19 am.
[End of telephone conversation]Also recorded on October 20, 1971
- 011-156 9:05 AM · 44 sec — President Richard M. Nixon, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, Frederic V. Malek, Alexander P. Butterfield, and the White House operator talked on the telephone from 9:05 am to 9:19 am.
- 597-001 9:05 AM · 2 min — President Richard M. Nixon and H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman met in the Oval Office of the White House at an unknown time between 9:05 am and 9:17 am.
- 011-157 9:19 AM · 8 min — President Richard M. Nixon and John N. Mitchell talked on the telephone from 9:19 am to 9:25 am.
- 011-158 9:25 AM · 8 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 9:25 am and 10:23 am.
- 597-003 9:28 AM · 2 hr 41 min — President Richard M. Nixon, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, White House operator, Bryce N. Harlow, Ronald L. Ziegler, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, unknown person(s), Stephen B. Bull, and Alexander M. Haig, Jr. met in the Oval Office of the White House from 9:28 am to 12:20 pm.
- 011-159 10:23 AM · 12 min — President Richard M. Nixon and Bryce N. Harlow talked on the telephone from 10:23 am to 10:35 am.
- 011-160 10:35 AM · 18 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 10:35 am and 2:23 pm.
- 011-161 10:35 AM · 4 sec — President Richard M. Nixon and the White House operator talked on the telephone at an unknown time between 10:35 am and 2:23 pm.
Cite this conversation
Conversation 597-002, October 20, 1971. White House Tapes, Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, National Archives. Audio and AI transcript via Easy Nixon, https://www.easynixon.org/tapes/597-002 (accessed September 28, 2026).