Conversation 775-011

TapeTape 775StartTuesday, September 12, 1972 at 12:28 PMEndTuesday, September 12, 1972 at 1:15 PMParticipantsNixon, Richard M. (President);  Hickel, Walter J.;  White House photographer;  MacGregor, Clark;  Ehrlichman, John D.Recording deviceOval Office

On September 12, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon, Walter J. Hickel, White House photographer, Clark MacGregor, and John D. Ehrlichman met in the Oval Office of the White House from 12:28 pm to 1:15 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 775-011 of the White House Tapes.

Conversation No. 775-11

Date: September 12, 1972
Time: 12:28 pm - 1:15 pm
Location: Oval Office

The President met with Walter J. Hickel.

[The White House photographer and members of the press were present at the beginning of the
meeting.]

             Greetings

             Refreshments

                                       (rev. Oct-06)

            Photograph
                -John D. Ehrlichman's and Clark MacGregor's schedule

            The President's wardrobe
                -The President’s trip to the Soviet Union
                -James H. Duff

            Duff

            Herman Welker
               -Arrival in Senate with the President in 1950

            Harry S. Truman

            Carey Estes Kefauver

            Hickel's schedule
                -Arrival at White House
                     -Northwestern air strike

MacGregor and Ehrlichman entered at 12:31 pm.

            [General conversation]

            1972 Presidential campaign
                -Contributions
                    -MacGregor
                    -Don S. Hewitt
                -George S. McGovern policies
                    -Businessmen
                -Hickel
                    -Visits through US
                        -Tone of feeling in US
                    -Domestic situation
                        -Hickel’s views
                              -Retired persons
                              -Financial community
                              -Industrialists
                              -Vietnam War as a factor

                                   (rev. Oct-06)

                  -Possible mandate
                      -Effect on America
                      -Unemployment
                           -Compared to Depression era
                           -Factors
                           -Department of Health, Education, and Welfare [HEW]
                           -Department of Housing and Urban Development [HUD]
                           -Department of Transportation
                           -Department of Interior
                  -Foreign policy
                      -Public opinion
                           -Hickel’s travels
                               -South
                               -University of San Diego
                           -The People's Republic of China [PRC]
                           -Soviet Union
                           -Vietnam War
                           -Domestic concerns

*****************************************************************

BEGIN WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 1
[Personal returnable]
[Duration: 18m 53s    ]

END WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 1

*****************************************************************

              -Hickel’s travels
                  -Questions and answers
                       -Audience response
                       -Inflation
                       -Unemployment
                       -Taxes
                       -Foreign policy
                            -Vietnam

                      (rev. Oct-06)

              -PRC
              -Soviet Union
              -Middle East
     -Preview of issues
         -The President's administration
         -Positive actions
              -Productivity
              -Rise in Gross National Product [GNP]
              -Decrease in unemployment
              -Earnings on rise
              -Georgia
                    -Mass transit
-Issues
     -Revenue sharing
     -Welfare reform
     -Environment protection
     -Transportation
     -Housing
     -Government reorganization
     -Congressional support
         -Need for mandate
         -Effect on Presidential actions
              -Domestic proposals
                    -Compared to foreign policy
              -Administrative reorganization
     -Department of Transportation
         -Highway Trust Fund
              -Congressional support
-The President's State of the Union Address in 1971
     -Policies of reform
         -Congressional response
              -McGovern’s allies
         -Governmental responsiveness
              -Positive effect of reforms
                    -Welfare reform
                    -Executive reorganization
                    -Revenue sharing
                    -Initiative on health services
     -Publicity
         -Colleges

                                     (rev. Oct-06)

              -Cities

*****************************************************************

BEGIN WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 2
[Personal returnable]
[Duration: 1m 12s     ]

END WITHDRAWN ITEM NO. 2

*****************************************************************

          The President's administration in review
              -Gains in foreign policy
                  -Arms control
                  -Environmental control, health
                       -Soviet Union
              -Domestic policy
                  -Continued Congress support
                       -New Congress initiative
                       -Transportation
                       -Urban development
              -Support from American people
                  -Changes in economic America
                       -Transportation
                       -Urban development
                            -Present compared to future
                            -Eric Hoffer
                            -Hickel’s view
                            -Transportation problems
                                 -John A. Volpe
                       -Vietnam War
                            -Hickel’s view
                       -Domestic policies
                       -Cities as new monument
              -Transporation
                  -Washington, DC

                          (rev. Oct-06)

            -Subway system
            -The President’s policies
                 -Support from residents
        -Hickel's talk with John C. Whitaker
            -Composite transportation system
        -New opportunities compared to 1950s
            -Anti-trust laws
            -Deregulation in system
                 -Railroads
                      -International Brotherhood of Teamsters
                 -New laws
                      -Congress action
            -Government regulations
                 -Need for improvement

Foreign policy
    -Hickel
        -Arctic
        -Soviet Union
        -PRC
             -Possible visits
                 -The President’s view
    -Dean Rusk, Stewart Udall, Luther Hodges
        -1961 trip to the Soviet Union
    -Japan and Siberia
    -Indonesia
        -Singapore
        -Hong Kong
        -Mediation between US and PRC
        -Hong Kong
        -Malaysia
        -Singapore
        -Hickel’s view
             -Natural resources
        -Admiral Padown (?)
             -Source of resources
    -Japan
        -Exports from Alaska
        -Canada
        -Soviet Union

                                        (rev. Oct-06)

                           -Sea of Japan
                           -Vladivostock
                 -Japanese technology
                     -Singapore and Hong Kong
                     -Human resources
                 -Indonesia
                 -Article in Readers' Digest written by Hickel
                     -Request by Hobart D. (“Hobe”) Lewis
                           -Bob R. O’Brien
                           -Alaska
                               -Importance

            Presentation of Presidential gifts
                -Janice (Cannon) Hickel
                     -Peking
                -Watch

Hickel, McGregor and Ehrlichman left at 1:15 pm.

This transcript was generated automatically by AI and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Do not cite this transcript as authoritative. Consult the Finding Aid above for verified information.

I wouldn't know how to do it, Mr. President.
Oh, here's the gate.
Bye.
I had to ask for a date.
How are you?
Nice to meet you.
Nice to meet you.
How are you doing?
Great.
Good.
Great.
Mr. President, we hear Carlton and Greg are going to join us.
They want a principal first.
Okay.
Fine.
Fine.
Fine.
If they come, I'll let them stay out of the way.
That's a big command commission.
It's a great business.
It's great.
Not too much.
I've got a sort of collection of lighter suits because somebody, when I was in Russia, I wore light suits.
I like very light suits.
Yeah, I like light suits.
Yeah, I understand that.
Thank you.
Hold it now.
Keep walking, keep walking, right?
Well, they
Well, normally, normally we go to the strike.
Normally we go to the strike.
Yeah, well, see.
What about?
Well, so normally we go to Chicago and we're here.
But last night I left at 7.
I flew to Seattle and had to change planes.
And then I flew to Chicago and had to change planes and come in here.
But it's a five-hour difference.
I left at 12.
It's one year time.
It's one year time.
I think it was the wife's birthday.
It was the wife's birthday.
It was the wife's birthday.
It was the wife's birthday.
It was the wife's birthday.
Well, thank you, Don.
Well, I have never been on that time.
It was a long time.
Curtis and all of his friends, you know.
And he attributed it to the campaign.
He's a great partner.
Right?
Oh, listen.
Because it's going on.
Yeah, for Don Iroh has a place in 1952.
He said, I'm the only man in the world who knows where Ebony is.
And so he and the non-Iraks said they will contribute to your campaign for the dark white friends at least for the next eight weeks.
Don, don't do it.
Don, don't do it.
No problem, sir.
And he said, I think that's what our parents thought.
But if you're getting down to it, my book called Blue Markets,
I really don't think...
I've covered it a lot, but it's just for background.
In the last 18 months, I think about a week or so, I go around to a section of the country, as you might know, Clark or Johnson, and talk to all kinds of groups of people.
I say that, in all sincerity, honestly, I wouldn't say I...
The funny move in America, the Truman election, I'm not saying I know you're ascetic here, I won't tell you that it's like that, and yet it's an odd, odd thing.
There's a sort of a restless, bad, young move.
And I think what we have to do, first, you've got to get to the election.
That's the practicality of it.
But you've got to learn that.
But then I think after that, I think it's really okay to climb.
In my opinion, they're going to be tougher the next four years than the last four years, in my opinion.
Because the question is that the retired people going back to Tampa Florida, my dad, their questions are the same.
The war is an excuse for lots of aggravation.
Excuse.
So I think you have an opportunity.
People will preach at you, and I don't want to preach.
See, I don't preach.
But there's a great opportunity here.
I think it's going to be a mandate.
That mandate can be a great plus in history.
And for America, that's the most important thing.
That's the way I see it.
The trouble is that it's not paying for the unemployment problems.
It's the same thing.
It's about the same tax law.
It's about the same thing.
There's different factors at work.
And I think that the solution is basically in the approach to the city, but to the animals that are leading them in.
Part of the EGW, part of us, part of transportation, part of the charity.
And I won't go into that now.
I'll talk about that later.
But you should think about that.
The foreign bank, I don't think anyone in the century has ever handled it more directly, more forcefully, or better.
I mean, I just thought, let's be frank, I didn't think it right, but that ain't true.
But you know, it really does.
But I go around, and I go to tough places.
I'll go to the South, or I'll go out to, I was at the University of San Diego, for example, in May or June.
And you go over there normally, you don't react.
A negative reaction.
I don't want the positive.
I want to find out what's wrong.
There's nothing wrong.
There's nothing wrong.
That China-Russia thing, it's a great thing.
What happens in Vietnam is something that's going to happen.
Yeah.
Well, the real thing, the real correctional thing is the leftist thing.
And I think we have a couple of years to...
to the fate that I have made.
So what can I do?
Here's what I'm doing.
What are they questioning about the demonstration?
Do you know that?
We have a question on climate change.
Thank you.
Thank you.
And in response, you get a chance for us to talk about the initiative of the People's Republic of China in the broadest degree.
So let's go ahead and have a chance to read.
All right.
We have one of the forums.
We have one of the forums.
Great.
Now, how do we have all of us
What are the positive things we can talk about?
People live in the future, so I don't want to talk about that.
What can we say that the direction we're going to head in the next four years?
They look like anticipation, you know, really.
Productivity is up.
Growth is up.
Jobs are up.
Real estate is up.
Are there any things we can talk about?
Problems?
I'll tell you about the issue in Georgia.
I know that.
Well, one of the issues we talked about is that in the case, we made a reference to the case well before, in the case of many things, many numbers proposed to be made in the environment, in the case of
the number of bulls in the area of transportation, housing, and so forth.
In the case of government reorganization, the government has laid the board of this Congress and now we've got it.
So we need a mandate in order to go forward on the domestic front, as the President has been able to go forward on the international front.
On the international front, the President can move without the Congress.
He can move first if the Congress has to approve.
On the domestic front, he can propose if the Congress discloses.
And that's why we need
You need a situation where the president will be able to get cooperation with Congress moving forward on these progressive issues for reorganization, reform, restoration.
He'll be able to load you up with materials.
One page is on every issue.
I saw it right in my head.
Well, we saw it.
But is there any thought?
The question has come up on every section of the country.
Is there any thought?
Taking the highway trust fund and putting it into a transportation fund.
We're fighting that right now.
We're a foreigner.
We're fighting on both sides of the same thing.
And while we're up against it.
We're going to get a little bit of Congress.
But we're in that.
We're having down our goddamn Trump.
Because if we had the truth, we would.
We're in the party, though.
We're in the right to do that.
The party can say about that for better or for worse.
I don't know about that.
I don't know what I should talk about.
But at least we're on the right track.
One of the best political documents we had.
in January 1971, when he was the instrument for change, change that works.
And he allotted this broad program to the Congress, and the Congress controlled the process, particularly by the
We can use it because it's a big thing because of the problems in the city.
I say to the public, we've made great strides in foreign policy.
Now we've got to finish the job.
We started with arms control.
We've got to continue.
We started with cooperation with the environment and health, et cetera, with the Russians.
We've got to continue.
But then I think the message people and I said, we have put before the most imaginative program in history.
The Congress is silent, so will people.
They need to mandate a strong, positive vote of support so that the next Congress, whatever it is, Democratic or Republican, will feel that the country has spoken, not might have to get off their ass and do something.
You need it.
It won't take a lot of your time, but you need the transportation.
You need it.
We just got to, Mr. President, quit billing cities for economic reasons.
And we need to start...
The problem we're going to have in America, beyond our time, is going to be the city.
If you ever have an uprising in the country, it's going to be there.
It won't be on the farm.
It won't be in the colleges.
It's going to be in the goddamn city.
They're really going to see one.
But they're the masters of it.
I remember, I said, five hours, very confident.
And there is a government.
Five hours.
And it was a yelling, shouting thing, and he had his eyes closed, and he said, this city's be damned, it's not true.
And finally I got to see what the problem was, that you can't run from this thing.
That's where the people are.
How in the goddamn hell did you run from this thing earlier?
You can't run from it.
And then when he got right out and asked him a question, he's walking the street in the water.
I know.
It basically is, how do you get to work it back?
And you know, you may not think that's a problem.
But it is a problem.
And one of the real things, another thing that I see, the free will is causing more problems than they're solving.
And all these things, I don't know if we can talk about it, but dammit, we have to face it.
And I think the monuments of the next administration is not a library of some hill, but it's the heart of the city, it's the people, and you get that.
But that lasts forever.
And it's there.
I can see it.
I don't know if I can have it.
I can see it.
I can see it clear.
And I don't want to be, you know, too strong.
But after 18 months, I've really seen where the damn problem is.
Vietnam is an excuse.
It's something they can all zero in on.
In my opinion, Vietnam is behind it.
In my opinion.
And I think you were going to have maybe a couple of years on a domestic thing.
I've watched that.
And I don't think it follows the fighting against the Southerners.
the president of the leadership on this, and he cracked the congressman.
He ruled the leadership.
And you can walk out and see it.
Well, you could deliver a two-hour sermon just on the president's leadership on the heart of this city, which is an equal city, every one of you said it.
And the law and order, the salvation of the main city, if you've got that with the community leaders, they're black, primarily, coming in and making this.
Literally, thank you, Jim.
Because they're safer in our homes.
They are now going to be able to get to the front work.
Because you've got to get back to our private transportation system here.
And it's a situation of full employment.
And it's a model.
And it's the only damn city we run.
And it works.
Put that on the board.
Take a look.
Take a look.
You don't have to have laws or anything.
And I think what we really need is a composite transformator.
You take a truck line, can't work with a railroad, can't work with an airline, can't do this.
This is causing problems.
There are questions that come up.
It's a big and a hard to solve.
We have to take a look at this whole free and advisory side thing.
Now is the time.
It wasn't a problem.
Before radio, television, fast communications, and transportation, the problem started to come in the 50s.
Here and there.
Right now, we have.
You have.
you just got what you had but you if you don't have a problem you don't have the opportunity you have a great opportunity i say the hell with the antitrust laws i don't care what you're reading is that
Well, that can never happen.
You can't get that if you get your law changed.
Number one.
And I'm not doing it with regulation.
No.
Supposing a truck line doesn't work, the railroads, the department says it's not in a truck.
Then why don't we just leave the show a little bit?
And just hear that out of Congress.
Well, I'm getting a suit.
The way you have to do it is through a program of deregulation.
We've got bills in Congress now that we're trying to park for.
The railroads are in such hellish trouble, too, that they've gone outside of the way.
But that is a combination of two things.
A combination, by and large, is the truth.
It's a combination of bad management and bad government regulations.
Our duty is to set hands on that.
Both of them.
All of them are bad.
All of them are bad.
Listen, I'll look you up.
All right.
Well, that's about it.
I appreciate it very much.
I want to say, too, that I know you're interested in all the archivists and also the Russian-China thing.
When this is over, if you would like to do something, please do so.
It will be very easy to do so.
No problem.
China has a problem with everything.
Well, it's a problem because it's all on a case-by-case basis.
And a question as to how fast they open.
But I think it would be very helpful for you to go to both.
And really, we'd be glad to work it out.
In the China thing, it will be a question of whether they will open.
Fuck, you've got to find a reason to go there, so that they can have a reason to fight.
Let me, let me, thank you, Mr. President.
Right, right.
Uh, many years ago, I saw the behalf.
And, uh, I, I was one of the eight guys that followed up the hands on the conference in 1961.
Russ, you know, and Hodges were there.
This one wasn't too popular to do a lot of things.
Russia was there.
There was that behalf.
And again, I can just say what I see.
Don't allow Japan and Siberia to get together.
They're going to the sink.
And so you've got to look at what's the answer.
Always look ahead to see what the answer is now.
The answer, in my opinion, is Indonesia.
You see, Indonesia, many more Hong Kong employees, in my opinion, are brokers that are through.
I think it's going to be pretty safe.
This guy is an adult, young ass.
You're only 42.
Journey has a problem with the colonels that are younger than us.
What's the case with the adults?
You know, the colonels, they go and keep them there for a long time.
But if you're looking at that rural age, you have it better than anybody.
But I'm just saying, and I know the cats pretty well.
They may come over to feed with me once a week, and I go there quite often.
But I haven't been in there in the last couple of years, but I'm working on many things.
But, and the reason I see it is because they are three stories out of the last.
Now, if that doesn't happen, the Canadians can't work.
They're going to have to deal with Russia, because they're right across from the Sea of Japan and level off the dock.
And if, if, uh, if the technology and, uh, resources of the Japanese tie up, tie Korea's right, the Zimbabwe, you've got to keep that in mind.
Keep it in mind.
They've got the worst body, the worst people, what do they need?
People.
That's what makes them work.
And so in Singapore and Hong Kong, at least we've got a few people.
Everybody just works as a trade.
And the media sets it down.
And 120 million people.
It's a rich as hell resource.
And so the ballgame ends up with even more money.
At some point.
Because somebody's got something, somebody needs it.
That's what you've got to do.
That's what you've got to do.
That's what you've got to do.
In fact, I'm doing an article with your cousin, Moses, whose name is Robert.
Who's your cousin?
Robert.
Robert, who?
He had something to do with it.
He did a small riot in the drogue and made a deal, paid it on his whole bank called Charlie's Time to Come.
He's dying.
You'll see.
I agree.
Who scared the hell out of these?
Really?
I'm not kidding.
The world has looked at them.
No, I'm not kidding.
They were just wretches.
Hey!
Oh, man.
I don't know.
That was awful.
You know what I called her?
She's a great gal.
You know, I called her.
I said, my God, that's awful.
I told her, God, it's awful.
She said, boy, that's awful.
Call her back.
I just can't do this.
And I called her.
Anyhow, the birthday worked out alright.
I'm here.
What do you think?
The only thing about it is that you can get better.
But it just can't be changed.
You have to get it done.
And then you can have it to be changed for the modern.
That's all she gets for a person.
That's very nice.
And here's the CD.
That's the old one.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Don't forget the straw.
Don't forget that.