Nixon, Campbell & Davis on 1972 Presidential Election

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All right, this has got to be set up so we can get a good picture, if you don't mind.

Stand right here.

Wait a minute.

How are you going to get a picture of the others?

Step over to the side here.

Very good to have you here.

I appreciate your help.

Thank you.

This is Delegate Lacey Fleckman from Bedford, Virginia.

Right.

All right.

Good to have you here.

Now, Delegate is the same as the... Our office.

Our office.

I don't know what that is.

This is Delegate Sloan.

Right.

Sloan.

All right.

Good to have you here.

Thank you very much.

I'm Delegate Calvin Powell from Danville, Virginia.

Yes, I appreciate it.

I'm Mr.

Delegate Russell Conneal from... President, I've heard of you.

Oh, yes.

Mr.

Delegate Melton from Virginia, Virginia.

Oh, yes.

Yes, sir.

That'll be Warren Davis from Fairbanks County.

He just said bye.

From Democrats to Republicans.

Which way?

That's a long time ago.

This is one of those by a state senator, but he's a big one.

Oh, yeah, Phil.

I know all about it.

I'll tell America.

Listen, Senator, what do you have in Parkinson, Richmond, Virginia?

I hope you're out in the water out there.

Yes, sir, I am.

Good.

Son of the son of the son of the son of the son of the son of the son of the son of the

And Senator Frederick T. Gray of Chesterfield, Virginia.

Very good.

And Delegate Charles W. Gunn of Lexington, Virginia.

Yes, very good.

Lexington, yes.

And this is the President Pro Tem of us and Honorary Deputy Willie of Richmond, Virginia.

Yes, how are you?

Yes, good.

Well, good to have you here.

Thank you.

I'm Leviticus Rutherford Paul of Henrico County.

Where is that?

Right here.

Well, we appreciate your help.

The next gentleman is a former member of the Iowa State Advocates, now known as the State Highway Commissioner, Thomas R. Glassman.

Now the gentleman from Lynchburg Advocate, we've known him since the fall of our football club, the University of Tennessee.

I don't need any description of football.

All I need is my football hat.

Yes, I don't see how he ever does it.

How many times have you had full-space time with this man?

A lot of help.

He was quick.

I'm sure you notice how a man with an open chain, a Republican-Budget state champion, is a genuine dad.

I'm sorry, but this time I say it.

I hear it better than how they say it.

Very good.

Mr. Brown, the next gentleman, is that Mr. Augustin from Oldenau?

Yes.

Good to see you.

Right home, right here.

Right.

Good to see you.

The next gentleman is from Virginia Beach.

He's short.

All right.

Good to see you.

Good to welcome you.

Thank you.

I understand we follow a congressman now, Secretary John Mosh from Winchester.

Say, Roethlisberger, get this liberal in here.

Huh?

You're looking more healthy than you thought.

And you do too, Senator.

Hey, Spence, how are you?

I went by your radio the other day and watched Marvin.

Do you have any information?

And I remember the beach was almost right up at the level of your house.

And then after a year after a year it ducked down.

I really don't know what we can do about it, but maybe we can do something.

I wish to tell you how I met him.

He was raised in the 20s in George Mountain to be Claude Trello.

We hung around and reciprocated in kind and just had a great time.

I had always liked old sex.

One of the last ones in the group I played was a very special friend of all of ours,

one of our really outstanding service in Virginia, Chase Smith-Perry, a great friend of yours.

Good to see you.

And I didn't realize it until my father's pro-war wall that they gave me in 69.

I'm a little soft, but you can tell what I've been talking about.

Right?

I want to take a link to that.

Yes.

Well, I want to say to you, do you want to take a picture?

I don't know whether it's probable or not.

I'll stand here.

I'll sort of stand.

I think if we could, Mr. President, we could double up.

One thing about volunteers, they know how to get the pictures.

Yes, if you could, uh, call me a little, uh, I'd offer you chairs, but they can't afford them.

We had some very vigorous differences.

But both believe in America's international role.

Both believe in a strong United States.

Both believe in a strong economy for the United States.

Both believe in, for example, the whole area of law enforcement, at least we expressed that.

We both believe in those responsible elements that would move against the permissive attitudes, which even then were beginning to show themselves.

Now, what happened after that?

We do have a situation where the two candidates, and I would trust that we could say both of them with the best of intentions, certainly both, and reach honest conclusions that the country needs different things.

I mean, if you take national defense, I don't have any questions about the political problems.

the other candidate who's come to the conclusion that we ought to cut $32 million out of the defense budget, cut our carriers from 6 to 6, and get out of Greece, and do this and that and the other thing.

That's in my view some sort of hope.

In my view, it would be a disaster for the United States, dangerous for the United States and the free world, because from where I sit, I've looked across the table and fresh down on the one hand,

And Joe and I, on the other hand, I realize that despite the great initiatives that we've made toward discussing differences and negotiating about them, I never want whoever sits behind this desk to be presiding over the second strongest defense in the world and a $32 billion cut, a $10 billion cut.

Defense means that the United States is destined to be second to the Soviet Union.

And 25 years from now, it will be second to the Soviet Union.

and China.

We can't let this happen.

That is why on this issue of national defense, why we'd all like to spend less on defense and put more on our problems at home.

First, we're going to get rid of wastage that we can.

It is essential that the United States is going to be able to develop policies that will have neutral reduction of the burden of arms, which is what we can all do.

We've got to keep America strong.

So there's the difference.

The difference isn't going to be resolved by any debates.

People have got to choose that way or the other way.

I would say, too, that in that deal with domestic policy, the issues are very clear, even though, naturally, as a candidate, it goes along, particularly challenging certain changes to the views on certain things.

But when you come right down to it, if there is one policy that would add billions to spending, and therefore billions to the burden of taxes, and millions to the welfare loans, as a matter of fact, that $1,000 proposal would add $85

million people to welfare roles in the United States.

$6,500 a year proposal, that's the other one that was introduced to the Senate, would add to 60 million people to welfare roles.

That is the right direction.

We all want to do what we should do for those that can't help themselves.

But anything we stand for in this field, this is our position, should be designed

to move people from welfare into work and also welfare, rather than move .

And if you pay people enough, they'll sit in their panties.

I know that there is a new wealth.

You pay the average person.

This is again a difference in attitudes towards it.

It really goes down to the philosophical.

There is a debate going on through the centuries about the nature of man.

There are those who believe that man, as an individual,

is one who really wants to work, who wants to get ahead, who wants to take care of himself and so forth.

Not true of mine.

Many do, perhaps most, but there are great numbers of people who need the incentive of competition, the incentive of having to do something, or they're going to sit right there and take it.

And we're going to build a perfect system here.

welfare and the burden that, of course, there's the rules for the destruction of our economy, the raising of the taxes and everything else that we have.

But because you are in the state in which we have just appointed a new judge in the Supreme Court, I think a lot of people were saying that because I was looking for some Georgia in the South and I was looking for some racist Southern, it had nothing to do with it, that what I was looking for was for a man that recognized that, oh, it's the Supreme Court,

where you are not elected by anybody, but appointed by the President of the United States.

It's the job of those judges to interpret the law, and not make the law.

It's the job of those who are elected in the Congress, in the House and Senate, to make the law.

And so Justice and Justice Powell, and Rasmus, and Berkeley, and Blackman, are very honest men, very decent men, who happen to disagree with Mr. Justice Douglas, for example.

Douglas believes, he's always voted that way, and he's got three or four colleagues still on that court.

He believes that it's the purpose of the Supreme Court, regardless of what the Congress has done, regardless of the will of the people in the Supreme Court, to determine what's best for the American people.

That isn't the job of the court.

It's a job of the Congress, and sometimes the Congress is pretty far off.

So what I'm simply saying, if you'd like to look at various issues, I know that this is an issue, Governor, that's very big in your state.

Not because Virginia's a great state, Virginia's a very, I know this state extremely well.

I left the law school with Mr. Jim Simpson, and I said to him, in fact, don't leave him.

I know that as far as the state is concerned, what you believe is that you believe in what we call a strict construction of the Constitution of the United States by those on our courts, wherever they are, because this wave of permissiveness is swept through the

four, five, six, seven, and eight.

It hasn't stopped, but it's been turned around.

We're going to turn it more.

And so one of the things that's going to be involved in this next four years, what man do you want to appoint the next three judges of the Supreme Court of the United States?

Now, you don't see much about that issue in the papers, but we're going to hear about it.

That's probably the most important thing the next president is going to do as far as domestic affairs are concerned.

At least the

I think, and I've had some ideas, people have all said, well now, the other day, we're going to have to buy New York, and it's a little more, a little more beauty, and all of this is part of our economic resistance.

Now that you've appointed these four conservatives, I assume you've got other chances to balance the appointments.

I say no.

As far as I'm concerned, the court needs a little more balance, too.

Four is enough.

I don't want to make the speech too tough to say this,

I know it's very difficult to determine.

I simply want you to know, as I told John Kahn, those who have some will remain Democrats working with the inner party, working through changes, which, of course, is your right and responsibility to make that decision.

Others may should.

Whatever the case might be, I believe that the time has come in this country for basically a real line-up

of people, parties, based on what people believe rather than what they may have as a party label.

And we'll be looking for, I know that none of you are probably interested in

this, but you should know, and finding people who will find positions.

We're not going to look after their names to see whether they have an R or an E. We're going to look after their names to see whether or not they have that kind of philosophy.

We believe what we represent is the United States.

That's the only way you can build a new kind of coalition.

We usually can list before people sign up.

The tradition in this room, as you know, is the seal on it.

which is there, there.

And of course, it's in the flag over there.

And here it is in conflict.

And just to show you, this is a totally bipartisan deal.

I don't even have my initials on it.

I love another thing about political men coming to Washington.

They sometimes really have trouble in their homes because if your wives say, where were you?

It's a little trick also, but it's a little seal, a little hope.

Now if you don't have it, you know, you want to give it to your wife,

So anyway, we were most grateful.

I'd rather think that they think that this may not be as great along your way of thinking as it is to stay where they once were.

I'll give you the search, too, here.

We'll distribute the rest in the account for Mr. President.

It's like girls can take months.

Right.

Yeah, well, they have special tours.

They've got everything they want.

Thank you very much.

Mr. President, you're going to get an invitation to make an address to the Woodrow Wilson birthplace in September.

Now, President Eisenhower went down there and spoke there in 1960, as you recall, just over a year.

Now, I've had a hand or two, I've worked a little bit in that operation.

And what my thought was, if you decide to accept that, number one, you're speaking in the South,

the birthplace of a president who was international.

That's right.

He was hanging that isolationist tag on the McGovern people.

He seized the intellectual initiative and pointed out that he was an educator, an author, and a university president.

Now, President Eisenhower's father was born 5 miles from Stanford.

President Lincoln's father was born 30 miles from Stanford.

Thomas Jefferson was born, 35 miles from St. Paul.

See, now, Wendell Wilson, if you know better than I, was an admirer of Jefferson and of Lincoln.

And when you talk about a moment in history, I believe that you've got to.

I believe that you've got to do it and move in there, go aside a bit, and take that wrong course.

the wives of Jefferson and Lincoln and Wilson, and the popularity bias in Howard, and make a speech that puts the isolationist tag and put the cap-and-gown community on the defensive, defend their position based on Woodrow Wilson, who justified American intervention in No Man's Land, Freedom House, and Miles O'Lantern Street.

I've written a little paper for you.

He's in Mexico.

Yes.

He's in Mexico.

Right.

He didn't want to.

He didn't.

I've written a little paper on that.

Nixon, Campbell & Davis on 1972 Presidential Election

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Nixon Library Finding Aid

Also recorded on August 7, 1972

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