Conversation 795-017

On October 10, 1972, President Richard M. Nixon, H. R. ("Bob") Haldeman, Manolo Sanchez, Alexander P. Butterfield, Stephen B. Bull, and Ronald L. Ziegler met in the Oval Office of the White House from 1:37 pm to 2:30 pm. The Oval Office taping system captured this recording, which is known as Conversation 795-017 of the White House Tapes.

Conversation No. 795-17

Date: October 10, 1972
Time: 1:37 pm - 2:30 pm
Location: Oval Office

                                        (rev. Nov-03)

The President met with H.R. (“Bob”) Haldeman.

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[Duration: 3m 54s ]

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Manolo Sanchez entered at an unknown time after 1:37 pm.

        Item for Rose Mary Woods

Sanchez left at 1:40 pm.

Alexander P. Butterfield entered at 1:40 pm.

        The President's schedule
            -Blacks
            -Hispanics
            -Italian-Americans
            -Ethnic leaders
                 -Marriott Key Bridge motel
                      -The President’s upcoming visit to Atlanta
                           -Timing
                           -Radio talk
                 -Family, staff schedule
                      -Julie Nixon Eisenhower
                      -Herbert G. Klein
                      -Edward C. Nixon
                           -Donald McI. Kendall
                      -Tricia Nixon Cox
                           -LaCrosse, Wisconsin
                      -Julie Nixon Eisenhower
                           -Barcelona, Spain

                                     (rev. Nov-03)

              -Vice President Spiro T. Agnew
              -Marriott
           -Meetings
              -Blacks
              -Jews
              -Washington, DC government
                   -Washington Post, Washington Star
                   -Walter E. Washington
                   -Public interest
                       -Crime

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       US-Poland Science and Technology agreement
          -Signing ceremony
          -The President’s recent meeting [with Witold Trampczynski]
              -Film presentation
          -Casimir Pulaski Day
          -Polish government
              -Communists
                   -Polish-Americans
          -Government
          -William P. Rogers
          -White House
              -Possible ceremony
                   -State Department
              -Dr. Edward E. David, Jr.
          -US-Soviet Union [trade] agreement

       The President's schedule
           -Senators

                           (rev. Nov-03)

     -Debt control
          -Public statements
          -Breakfast meeting, October 10, 1972
          -Radio address on Federal spending, October 7, 1972
          -Camp David
          -House of Representatives
               -William E. Timmons view on passage
          -Debt ceiling
               -Public understanding
               -The President’s recent radio speech
                    -Spending ceiling
-Nature of events
-James S. Copley
-Publications
     -Samuel Newhouse
     -William Randolph Hearst
     -Roy Howard, Thomas Vail
-Post-1972 election plans
     -Post-inaugural plans
     -British
     -French
     -Henry A. Kissinger previous conversation with Haldeman
          -Chung Hee Park
     -The President’s recent meeting with Quadriand
          -December 15, 1972
     -Budget
     -Inaugural address
-State of the Union address
-Kissinger
-Inaugural address
     -State of the Union address
          -New Congress
          -Speech writer
          -Progress
          -Parties for contributors
-Possible Senate leaders meeting
     -Kenneth R. Cole, Jr.
     -Busing legislation
          -Recent breakfast meeting
               -Gerald R. Ford
          -Cloture vote
          -James L. Buckley, Robert P. Griffin, Howard H. Baker, Jr., William E.

                                          (rev. Nov-03)

                      Brock III, Harry F. Byrd, Jr., John G. Tower
                          -Request
                      -John Ehrlichman, Timmons, Charles W. Colson
                          -Recommendations
                      -Cloture vote
                          -Cole
             -Camp David
             -Publishers and editors
                 -Reception

        Letters
            -Congressmen and Senators

        Possible Senate leaders meeting
            -Tower
            -Recent breakfast meeting
            -Letter on busing
                 -Ehrlichman
            -Timmons
            -Tower
                 -Texas
                 -Clark MacGregor
            -Baker, Brock, Byrd, Griffin, Buckley, Tower
                 -Busing legislation
                     -The President’s support
            -Busing issue
                 -Presidential meetings
                     -March 1972

Stephen B. Bull entered at an unknown time after 1:40 pm.

        Request for Ronald L. Zeigler

Bull left at an unknown time before 2:00 pm.

        Meeting with Senators
           -Public statements on busing
                -Speeches, press conferences
           -Tower

Zeigler entered at 2:00 pm.

                                         (rev. Nov-03)

         Busing
             -Zeigler’s recent press conferences

Butterfield left at 2:02 pm.

                  -Defense
                  -Ford
                        -Recent breakfast meeting
                  -Cloture vote
              -[Cole’s] memorandum for the President
              -Moratorium
              -Equal opportunities legislation
              -Cloture vote
              -Ziegler's coordination with Cole
                  -Meeting with the Senators
              -Cole’s memorandum
              -Cloture vote
                  -Result

         The President's schedule
             -Possible Senate leaders meeting
                 -Ehrlichman, Edwin L. Morgan
                 -Photograph session
                      -Cole
                 -Reception
                 -Ehrlichman and Morgan
                      -Differing views

         Melvin R. Laird press conference
            -Daniel Z. Hinken’s previous telephone conversation with Ziegler
            -Kissinger’s schedule
            -Vietnam negotiations
                 -George S. McGovern television appearance, October 10, 1972
                 -Administration response to proposal
                     -Instructions for Laird
                          -Bombing, mining, prisoners of war [POWs], surrender

Ziegler left at 2:08 pm.

         The President's schedule
             -Senate leaders meeting
                 -Duration

                                         (rev. Nov-03)

                    -Reception
                -Baker
             -Camp David
             -Washington
                -Washington, DC
                    -Public interest
                    -Narcotics

        Speeches
            -Radio Address on Crime and Drug Abuse, October 15, 1972
                -William L. Safire’s draft [on philosophy of government]
                -Radio Address on the American Veteran, October 22, 1972
                -Raymond K. Price, Jr.’s draft
                -American spirit
                    -Safire’s draft
                    -Paternalism compared to freedom
                    -Work ethic
                -Compared to issues of taxes, crime, farming, veterans
                    -Philosophical theme
                -Foreign policy
                    -Kissinger
                -Vision of America
                -Press

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Ziegler entered at 2:19 pm.

        Senate
            -Cloture vote

                                        (rev. Nov-03)

Ziegler left at 2:20 pm.

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[Duration: 8m 19s ]

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         The President's schedule
             -Letters
             -Crime speech
                 -Camp David
             -Camp David

The President and Haldeman left at 2:30 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 was talking about these blocks that we just started to get a straight line.
First, I've done the blocks, and I don't want to continue to do them.
We were just forward, and now you've got some.
There's some reason that I don't know about these.
But I've
For me, it's a doubt.
There's no overriding reason.
No, there really isn't.
I mean, I've done the blacks, so why don't I get the name administration Mexicans?
Maybe a few Italians.
You approved that the other day.
But the Spaniards began doing it for another reason.
I haven't done that.
I have never done that.
I've done the blacks.
We are getting blacks.
turned out for another obvious reason.
We should go over that Marriott thing for 200 ethnic leaders.
And I'm turning that out for a reason.
I will have been in Atlanta the other day.
I'm thirsty.
I had a full day.
And also, I'm going to be doing some sort of radio program at the end of the week.
And I just think it's just too much to play with.
And also, they are better than the leaders and the rest.
I'm just not sure it's his problem on that one.
You can have a building.
You can have one of those.
One of those, I think, over there.
Yeah, I don't want to be there.
Well, anybody here in the line here?
How about my brother?
Yeah, he looks fine.
He's kind.
He's a good guy.
He's a good guy.
He's a good guy.
Well, he's kind.
Well, he's a good guy.
Well, he's a good guy.
Trisha would be in La Crosse.
Julie would be in Barcelona.
Yeah.
Well, I told me they'd be around.
It'd be great to ask him to go by.
He's the only man.
But I'm not going to do it, and I don't want to be buggered.
I know that's loaded too much.
There's a group over there that knows.
Well, the only reason for even, I recommend it, though, I would have left it in for consideration just because it was ethnic.
I mean, I would have liked to have it in my game.
I told Alex, I don't have more blacks and I don't have any more Jews.
Right?
For D.C., you haven't
That ROTC crime thing, we always think culturally crime.
We have been around that crack on team time.
It's a hell of a lot of work.
You've got this lousy story to give it all.
The Washington Post and the Washington Star don't give a word about that.
They don't care.
They don't care about crime in there.
They don't care about it here.
And the idea that you have a reflection of the way it does not work.
We pay that way.
We pay that way.
I've had it in here four times already.
And these people have it there.
Yep.
So I do so much for them.
The other thing is that we're turning down also, we don't want to do any of the things like the signed Polish agreement.
There's reasons for doing that, which, of course, they don't understand here.
I mean, I don't mind having a Polish guy
Well, that's all right.
But there's a hell of a lot of people in this country that don't like Polish communists, our Poles.
See, just to overdo that, just a little bit, the Polish government is a double-edged sword, much more so than it is on the Russian government, much more so.
Because of what the US, well, a lot of them, I think a lot of them are the worst, are US Russians, and then more of them, exactly.
So that's why we turned that down.
And we'll let Rogers do it.
Generally speaking, what we want to do is to stop all cats and dogs all the way along.
No, but the proposal was...
It would be a White House ceremony.
That's right.
That's right.
If the president doesn't come, it shouldn't be a White House ceremony.
It should be the State Department.
The proposal was really just to put in an appearance.
Roger's state is still...
Yes, I agree with that.
Not with the coalition.
I agree with the coalition people.
We have the other one up there.
But you're going to get those agreements if you sign too many, too.
We're overdoing it.
We're overdoing it.
I know.
I know that.
We've got so many agreements already.
Yeah.
They're running out of our ears right now.
Well, also, it gets to the point where people are not down there.
Maybe you're just using them.
That's just one too many.
There'd be no more agreements submitted of any kind.
I may not do some of the others here.
The other thing that we have to get at is the
They want me to meet with eight senators about the debt control, and I'm not going to do that.
I've made that pitch.
I've made it strong.
And meeting with those senators is a total pain in the ass, with nothing in it for them.
And it's on a passive side.
You make a public pitch, which is what matters.
That's right.
I mean, it is not going to be to say, well, the president's working.
I've got that.
I don't think we have to make that point.
We made it this morning, right?
Yeah.
I made it on the radio, right?
I made it with the congressional.
So you meet with them.
What's the show?
They said, Brady, you can't pay.
I wouldn't have any Republican senators you can't pay with.
It's unbelievable.
Well, that's what you've got to do at that point.
Yeah, that was a different thing.
But my feeling is that I should do it now.
I've done an instruction.
I've got to get on with something else.
Instructions in the lab may pass the house.
Well, then it's all that excitement that set me up anyway.
I'm not so sure it's going to pass the house.
People, I think that's a serious question.
And also the Bob's right there.
is doing something.
Nobody knows what you're talking about.
Your speech, you said I'm going to keep taxes down and keep talking about the debt scheme.
That's not a good idea, but if you ask them now, I still don't understand.
No, no, no.
I don't want to also try and fail.
Well, that's a generally speak for trying to keep the Nick Maxx out.
Yeah.
We want to do things that are really count from a newsman's point of view.
I agree that people can read the news and produce copy.
You were right.
I shouldn't.
I mean, I've done copy a dozen times.
He's about to die.
I know he's been about to die for a couple years, and I know I'm so glad to see him, and he's a hell of a supporter.
But let me say one mistake.
Well, I did that for a reason.
I mean, the old part is that we at least draw, you know, fill the earth with the water and get to town.
And, uh, Roy Howard would be the syllabi for something in there.
Tom Bale.
Well, I read Frank McKenzie.
You're not going to change it.
That's right.
They're not going to change it.
They're not going to change it.
They're not going to change it.
They're not going to change it.
They're not going to change it.
They're not going to change it.
They're not going to change it.
They're not going to change it.
And we've got to change our pitch on that, too.
We'll do it after the inaugural.
Because the time between the election and the inaugural should not all be available.
We're going to have to do it.
One thing I'm doing to keep some people alive is keeping the thing hanging over that I might have to do something for the branch and so forth.
I'm sure as hell I'm going to do a call.
I've told Henry there's no foreign visits until after the inauguration.
I understand that.
Mike White is.
He's come back to appeal that you have to address the parts of Korea.
And I've said we can't.
No, we're not going to have any.
Period.
So, Mike and I are making this a .
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
. .
That isn't enough time, right?
You also figure that you've got to...
I've got a problem, too.
I've got a budget.
And I've got to go out there and I wrote, which Christ will never be able to write, in the State of the Union.
That's not never going to be over three months afterwards.
The State of the Union.
You see, there isn't any time.
You're absolutely right.
It's an absolute flat-out...
I said you won't deliver the State of the Union address.
You'll just send the State of the Union address.
Don't you agree?
Yeah.
Because the inaugural takes the place of it.
You have to do the inaugural, so you get a hell of a lot better ride on that than you want to stay the year.
Unless you want two opportunities.
With that, no reason.
Because that's always the new Congress, right?
You probably have to be slower.
Not that much.
I mean, for that time, maybe we would have got some speaker.
Well, maybe you would be able to lay down a program there that you wanted.
You lay down a program for Congress, and then that's it.
The inaugural list doesn't get into that.
That program will cut it back.
The program, they'll program it.
Yeah, yeah.
The issue of charges in Congress, which would be bad.
But we really should keep the time.
I know this was brewing up in Ken Cole's office.
This is a proposal to meet the senators on the anti-busting legislation and discuss it today at Boston.
the President's commitment to passage of anti-bussing legislation to review the legislative situation of the Senate, and to focus on the President's position opposing bussing.
Well, I can focus on the President's position this morning at the leaders' meeting in the board, and all the other things.
They just lost the vote.
Baker, Brock, Byrd, Griffin, Buckley.
See, that's a request.
They've had a request in that they want to see you.
It's not our idea.
Right.
They've got a letter that they've been following up on every day.
They really can ten minutes to close and recommend.
I think it's political for those guys.
All right.
See you tomorrow.
They already had a role today, didn't they?
I don't know.
Let's just...
I think that's the reason it was for them.
Well, I'm not going to campaign with him tonight.
I could have seen you through with that.
This is not that important.
I could be through with that in 45 minutes.
Never.
You know what?
These are not publishers or editors.
Associations.
They are publishers and editors.
I know.
Well, the point of this is to find out whether or not the time should be done.
If you're going to do these, now, who is this?
problems I've got.
I'm trying to work those damn letters out.
I don't know where those letters to the Congressman are.
I've got some ideas on those.
Who is this?
It's Howard.
Yes, yes.
I don't want him down here.
Not now.
I don't want him.
I know that I don't want him right at the time of these other assholes when he puts...
I have an uneasy feeling about that meeting.
I think that here again, Bob, it's going to be a winless exercise, which, of course, we've already hit it today.
Would you call it that again?
Because you might have talked earlier about it.
or anything that would get Tennyson in there, no.
No, no, Tennyson would have to be a party because of the tower.
The tower's been told about the Texas, but he's still pushing.
I don't think he's pushing very hard.
Have you talked to Clark about the tower?
Oh, I want to find out here.
Who's all on the list?
Baker, Brock, Berg, Griffin, Buckley, Tuff.
I'd say this meeting would spike rumors that the president is not fully behind the anti-blushing bill.
But in the name of God are the rumors, and I hope they'll be there for some.
Focus attention on your personal efforts to get this legislation.
We had the writer in the class, we would set it, get it set up, and then we'd talk about it.
I mean, we had everything, speech, press conference type stuff and all that, but they were talking about meeting with senators.
They were talking about getting their own guests.
That's the craziest one here.
But Ron, did you make the buzzing point this morning?
Yes, I did.
What did you say?
You said that I had raised the buzzing point, and I needed my full support, and so forth.
Or I would have come up, or... No, I was going over the various issues that you discussed, and I referred to national defense, but I think...
You didn't make them like this.
Well, it would be Jerry, you know, Jerry Ford had left.
Well, maybe he'll make it up on the hill.
I mean, I just wanted to be sure that they know that I'm totally behind that.
Yeah, I had hit that very hard yesterday.
Did you hit it that I was behind the filibuster?
I mean, behind the cloture?
No, I didn't hit behind the cloture.
What did you say?
I didn't say anything about the cloture.
What was it, though, that helped you hit the bus?
Just that you, you know, you support...
Bussing legislation have been and continue to be for bussing legislation.
Just hit it out that way without specifically referring to cloture.
See, I think you're right that it's a question for the Senators if he did it yesterday.
Well, he did it the first time.
Well, I thought I did.
There's just one mention of it.
The Senators now say, I mean, I've just got a letter, a memo from Crowe saying that I'm not identified enough with the issue.
Bussing?
Yeah.
So it's that...
legislation.
Well, now, wait a minute here.
You've got to keep in mind here now, the strategy that we're getting from the people who, you know, are dealing with hill people is that, you know, the president wants his moratorium.
Right.
And, you know, the legislation on the money, equal opportunities legislation has to live with that.
But I don't even get bogged down in those kind of details when I'm briefing.
I just say the president is against busing these four legislatures.
But now maybe the reason the senators are getting them is not because of something that has been written.
I've seen it written along this line, but maybe they're getting it because of the way we're dealing with the culture vote and the legislation of the
Well, we're well coordinated with Cole.
He knows what I'm saying and he's consistent on what I'm saying.
I'll raise it with him again.
It made this procedure.
See, we had not taken a public position on ..
The culture lost by three votes today.
Only three.
And I think it was three.
It was a very short vote.
It was an electronic low vote.
Forty-five.
Well, they're killing them.
That's the way it's going to work.
They're going to kill them.
They're going to hang.
I think are two big problems for their service agreement.
Sure.
Well, that's our issue.
And this isn't occurring.
I mean, this is a request that's been in, and they've been pushing for, that has been held up.
It was bogged down to an early minute.
Morgan, so whether they should do it.
Do we want a picture taken?
No.
Well, no.
I don't know.
I don't care.
It's my opinion.
It's must be a picture.
I don't know, Bob, I don't like to be in the picture.
That's the other thing.
I think it all depends on how, you know, what the estimate is.
Mr. Howell, the place you're on is locked today.
That's right.
Fine.
But it's going to be offered again.
Well, I'll tell you what.
You might be with Cole.
Let me check.
All right.
And I'll try to do it at 4 o'clock.
I've got to go over and get signed up for this little jazz here tonight.
Why don't we just do it at 4 o'clock today, Bob?
All right.
I had a little discussion with Taylor.
Because there was a debate on this one between...
I'm working with... Well, I don't know.
You know, bottom line, there was a problem.
I remember now.
This is from when we came up with this happening yesterday.
Where were you working on it?
You know, I could work on it.
Morgan had one view, and Erwin had the other.
They were one on one judicium, and the other didn't want to do it.
And it turned out to be resolved in this way.
Well, listen.
My time's fine.
I don't feel like it'll help any of them.
I'm all for it.
I'm not...
We'll see.
We'll see.
I had Hankin on the phone about the Laird press conference tomorrow might have disappeared, you know, coming back late tonight and so forth.
You think we should just let that ride?
I don't think Laird's had a relationship yesterday, has he?
No, but...
His problem is what you said about having nobody comment on the dance.
He's not going to comment on negotiations.
He isn't going to comment on negotiations.
If Larry can go over and kick the hell out of the, you know, out of the beverage, without commenting on negotiations, that's all we need.
What happens if he's in trouble?
Well, no, you see, he has a government on TV tonight.
That one is Vietnam planned.
Now, if Laird walks down there tomorrow, will he be able to stay away from Vietnam?
Oh, we're not going to go to Vietnam.
No, he's got to be on Vietnam.
He's the governor of Vietnam, not on negotiations.
But isn't this the status of our negotiations?
He only goes into the substance content status of the government's proposal.
Attached to the government, doesn't look like that at all.
You've got to take him on the bombings, you've got to take him on the bindings, you've got to take him on the POW exploitation, you're going to have to take him on the white flag.
That's what he has to do.
I don't see any harm in it.
Blair just faced away from it and just said that there's no, uh, just very mild, some negotiations, and just said, I have no comment on that, whatever.
All right.
And he shouldn't even say what they're doing.
Oh, sure.
All right.
I would like somebody to get .
OK. OK.
I want to be sure you said that.
Let me just be sure.
I'm sure it's 20 minutes, too.
That's the other thing.
We have a real cut-off that I've got to go over to this paper editor or something.
You see what I mean?
Yeah.
I just have an uneasy feeling.
I haven't seen Baker whine about coming to David's place.
Every one of those candidates there, she would come in five, 10 minutes about one hour.
I just thought I'd have a feeling that
I just got to, you know, you put me in the position to schedule it.
Well, I'm not going to.
I'm not going to say yes.
But I don't like to have to put him off.
Right.
You shouldn't have to.
You know, it's every one thing.
The beauty of it, you can't date it any day.
All the crap that's going to get to you.
Right.
Although now they're not really looking at you don't have to see Mary Washington all those things are
Each of those things is someone's view of what might be useful in proving a point.
But our evidence is different from Washington.
That's been a hell of a long time.
Right now, it's 40.
I don't think people get one damn about the statistics in Washington, DC.
If they do, you sure make a point.
If you get a chance to look at that speech.
That's the thing about those.
When did you want that one done?
Saturday.
Not this week.
Not this week.
Before Saturday.
Would you like it Saturday?
If you want the crime.
Well we thought about a speech next Wednesday.
That's a possibility.
It was a little over a year.
We started with a few guys, and we still haven't got one, have we?
The next four years, another salvage.
That would be caramelism versus freedom.
Not bad.
It gets to sort of the kind of stuff you're talking about in the...
In the simplistic ways.
Well, it's a depth level type guy who...
Since the war gap, they've been doing all that again.
I haven't read it, so I don't know.
I think you don't want to do all these speeches just on issues.
I agree.
You've got to do one on the tax issue.
Right.
And you do one on the crime issue.
Then you need to do one that's philosophical rather than...
It should be philosophical.
You've got to do one on fire.
You've got to do one on barracks.
It's foreign countries.
And probably one on foreign policy.
And five Asian speeches.
They've got one on foreign policy.
They're not...
finish looking at it and then you're just going to look at it again.
They just said, you know, look ahead before we are used to it.
That's all right.
We're running out of control.
We're running out of control.
They don't whine about it.
So they said we haven't said anything, right?
A little harder than we were saying from here to Winston.
And it wasn't the candidate.
Yeah, they would deliver to get a card on that.
Now they can't.
Yeah, right.
As we've said, we aren't going to get the bounce on it, but we haven't had it.
And especially the philosophical ones, you know.
But I don't worry about it.
Some people will hear them.
And the fact will be that they've been done.
The press will have to hear them.
They won't lie.
I quote you, I quote you, I quote you, I quote you.
I've got some ideas about the campaign letters I'm working on.
I'll try to get those.
But the crime speech you don't need until Saturday.
So I can do that tomorrow.
Good.
I'd like to show you those.