Conversation 830-002

Transcript (AI-Generated)

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 Do not cite this transcript as authoritative.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.

Hi, how are you?

Hi, Mr. President.

Let's sit over here.

I didn't want the usual picture.

First meeting is here.

You said it, Professor, I didn't mean to get in the way, so I suggest a little chat.

Let me talk about a couple of brief business schedule items.

First, I'm going to give the reception, and I will give the reception for the new members of the House and Senate, the elected members of the House and Senate on Friday.

We couldn't do it, of course, tomorrow.

Because, you know, they'll be running, having their own parties.

Thursday was when we planned it, but the Boggs thing knocks that out.

Brady is all right, because I thought Britain couldn't do it because of the Truman thing.

But that is not a funeral.

That is more of a service night.

And I've already gone out there, so I probably will not attend that.

That's really for the people here that didn't go, you know.

That's my view.

Johnson is not coming.

That's my resolution.

So we were, what we would like to do, we'd like, we were, remember we did last year, too, we'll have the, we will have the, I think there are about 40 Republican side people, I remember them, very excited, who are new at the House of Senate.

And we'll have them in their lives from 6 o'clock.

And we're inviting them to sit and cry and achieve justice.

I thought they'd like to see him.

Yeah, I can't believe it.

Yeah, it's random.

Yeah, fine, fine.

So, uh, I will, uh, confirm that.

The, uh, at the end of the hour, we'll be talking about it.

It's, uh, in line with our discussion.

Uh, is that, uh,

I would like to have a joint leadership meeting, and in this instance, add to the group the committee people who have to do with the economic side, because this involves two parts.

It involves the wage and price control,

And second, it involves our own reorganization of that, which does not affect the administration's relations with the Congress, but does affect how we work here.

And I think that the members of the Congress should know.

You know, I think this is where, you know, whatever we're getting, putting shelves, basically, is awful.

When Congress came in, I really had it this way already, in this particular area where the Secretary of the Federation was talking about.

Let me say that in that respect, and I say it doesn't change the rest of the Congress, it probably will be opening for more efficiency here.

It will allow us to reduce the buy-off span for a lot of those people out in the agencies.

And it will allow the Congress to have where there is something that crosses

Yeah.

He said he was one of the great linebackers.

One of the great linebackers.

He said he was a great linebacker.

It's good to see you.

My recollection, maybe, was I just caught snatching a game with Mike Mansfield.

It was a very good press season game.

He made, I think, in one of the games, the most tackles in the NFL tackles.

I just put it in my mouth.

I thought I asked Mike when he came in earlier.

It was the same guy.

I mean, the real guy.

I had the same position.

I used to be in the Super Bowl lines.

The center, Kenny Ball, wrote his ankle.

Fort Worth.

And if you want to believe the game, we almost killed that guy and we can keep talking about it.

What is that?

When we have an ineligible man, we have Fort Worth in the game.

Thank you.

It's one way to entertain to be the 11th.

Or the 16th.

Thank you very much.

Jerry, try and see Walker, Jerry.

I don't think so, sir.

I think it was North Carolina.

North Carolina.

That's the central.

And Texas Chapman.

Yes, yes.

That's a good second.

Now, maybe that's not right.

I think it was on my responsibility.

But it was the southern.

That's for sure.

It was not together.

Thank you.

That shows you how important it is.

That's good.

I do know where Andy Davis went to school.

as it will have, the big five, plus the committee chairman, banking and currency, government reorganization, finance, ways and means.

That's probably the people that will need it.

Now, then, to give you a feel, but I was planning

how we can develop a pattern over these and show you that in the next four years, since we have this split personality in the administration, just learned over the four years.

And I've already told you, and I've told tenants, of course, I've told you and Jerry that it simply doesn't make sense

President to meet every week with the minority and attempt to develop their policies for the programs that we're going to get through Congress.

Now that does not mean, that does not mean that you should not meet with your own energy to do what we should not do.

But what I would think,

but also in the fields of domestic policy, which do not involve partisanship.

Like, for example, government reorganization, where we have some ideas that are quite important, wage price controls and things of that sort, where the lines are ideological lines rather than partisan lines, that what we would like to do is develop

a situation where, just to hear, without publicizing too much of your life, I intend to meet with the full Republican leadership about once in a while.

Then I'll meet with, say, you and our Republican human chair, maybe on a current basis, perhaps.

Then what I would like to do, and here I'm sure you will see

And I'm going to do exactly the same with Albert.

I think I should leave the Albert alone.

I have found that there's been a little sensitivity on that point where they were... Albert did not object.

He didn't raise the chair for it.

But Albert felt sometimes that if I met with you, as we did from time to time, and I did with a kid,

But what I did, we usually met with Howard and Ford and Boggs.

So I would meet with Carl, you know, just to have him in.

Not too often.

Basically, there isn't as much to do with the House as there is with the Senate, obviously, because the Senate has more confirmation foreign policy with another kind of relationship.

And then we will work out, you know,

in those private meetings that we would have.

And of course, me and Dr. , what I would hope to do would be to work out those areas where my parts of meetings would be absorbed and not looking at it, turning around to the other side.

What would be very helpful for me would be to have your views,

uh... uh... uh...

And it will still not be on a formalized basis where we'll have a five-hour meeting.

We shouldn't have a meeting unless there's something to get about.

That's right.

But except in your case and mine, I think we should just meet on a fairly regular basis as we have.

We can only get together about every three or four weeks because there are things we can get around privately that I do not want to get around with, frankly, someone like that.

Mr. President, Steve, report policy.

There's a unit outbound 31 race.

And I'm afraid this war is settled in some fashion.

And it's going to be a fun celebration.

People are very disturbed throughout the country, too.

And it's a matter which

you personally I told you in some way that that last inch could be covered and we would reach not only like Vietnam but that's the primary source of Alaska as well and I hope and pray that it would be possible that this could be done before the 20th of January and I'll be able to send it to you in January work it really deep I just came

should be the policy of the committee and what they should do.

And I found the committee very restrained, very concerned, very disturbed.

And your friends in that committee just as much disturbed as anyone else.

I think this is in the deep.

And people don't know why.

There's been a step down in the bombing.

The mail that I get, the meetings, talking to members is one of great distress.

And they just don't know what to do.

And that's a dangerous situation to be in, because they're going to strike out in all directions.

If something isn't done, I don't really talk about these things with you.

But I feel some kind of concern personally that I just felt I should.

Because as the saying goes, this is the end of the line.

That's over there.

And they're hoping some way you can do something.

covers that last inch.

And with this horrible war to be in trouble because it's been bad for us at home.

And all these factors which are surprising now rise to the surface again.

Mike, let me say that I'm sure you're aware that no one is more aware of this than I am.

And no one has perhaps got a better state on that than me.

I'm going to get into it as quickly as possible.

I don't want to have it too well-known.

What I would like to suggest is this.

Before the negotiations, which began on the 8th, and probably will last for three to four days, it will last a minimum of three days, in my view.

uh it would be uh it would be uh very uh very detrimental to what is now a situation where we're on the one hand when i say said i don't mean it

or this and that or the other thing, but to suggest how they want to be settled.

Now, what I would like to do in this instance of Monday is say two things.

First, that when I meet with the leaders on Friday, I will only take at most three or four minutes to just say there are negotiations beginning on Monday.

That's what we will do.

As soon as we get the results of those, we will have an opportunity to talk further about the final negotiations that are in process.

And, of course, they're already there in process today at the Secretary of Defense meeting.

This is not a dodge.

I've got the purpose here.

In fact, they're all being very useful for me a lot.

go on television and say, well, here's how close we are, and here's what they're saying, and here's what we're saying, and here's if they would give here, we would do that, but might that destroy the whole thing?

Because it's very close.

Now, the point is that the I would like for Henry, who will be back tomorrow, to give you

I don't want to do it with anybody else.

He's not going to do it with Scott.

We're not going to do it with Franklin Fulbright or the others.

At this point,

first i would appreciate it if you

when you are asked whether or not this matter was discussed, if you would simply say that, yes, it was, but that if you would say that you do good that as far as anything I said, that in this instance you would say that I did not want to comment on the substance of the negotiations at this time.

I think it's very important.

to others about the substance but i will tell you something about it so that you do that oh yes here's the situation we had a deal on october 8th it was uh it was basically agreed in person

What happened then is that the doctor went back, and when the next meeting was held, they pulled back just prior to the election.

And then, three days before the election, they sent a message and said, we will be glad to meet again.

We will meet again.

And at that time,

We'll come back to negotiate the series from so far and so on.

When Henrik said, and basically it was an unfortunate statement, unfortunate not because it was inaccurate, but because it raised hopes which were not intended.

He said peace was at hand.

He was absolutely correct.

He thought that was the case, but it wasn't

Thursday before election, I pulled off of that, where I simply said we will not sign an agreement until it's right.

The reason for it was not that we were not igniting across the teams.

The reason had to do, candidly, with Cambodia, with Laos, and with the PMC.

We were concerned, and also, another point, an unequivocal agreement regarding the POWs.

I feel very strongly that we cannot make an agreement with them unless within 60 days after we sign the DOWs are released.

We cannot have the conditions on that one point.

So what happened here is conditions were attached on that point.

What happened too was that they backed off their agreement to have us inspire Cambodian models.

they backed off in terms of the DNC.

Now, by the DNC, let me explain the intricacies of that thing.

All that I am suggesting is that it posed what would appear to be an insoluble problem in terms of having an agreement, which would mean anything, which would not

for a continuation of the war .

Now, what did the agreement entail?

The treaty, it did this.

It provided, when we had the agreement in principle, for the three things that I set forth in May.

It provided for a ceasefire throughout Indochina, including Catalonia and Laos.

It provided for a ceasefire in place

And so that's why you had all of it held basically for Saigon.

Because the ceasefire in place for Saigon had agreed to that.

Always implies that all forces remain in place.

And Saigon says, why don't you get the north enemies out?

Well, if you get the north enemies out, that's not a ceasefire.

So anyway, it provided for a ceasefire.

It provided for an unconditional return of all feudal

And it provided for three elections, you know, the three supervised elections in which the North Vietnamese would participate with the South Vietnamese in the electoral supervisor body.

But where South Vietnam retained its, where South Vietnam retained its own sorority and so on and so on.

But the electoral commission was to be one that was basically

That's why you heard so much talk about the coalition government and so forth, which I know I've had it all go and said, this is not a coalition government, which it never was.

Well, so much for that.

Without going into too much, I'm going to go into details.

I reckon, you know, questioning the details of what happened.

When he went back to Paris for the meetings, which lasted about eight or nine days, for reasons that we are unable to,

We were unable totally to understand.

They backed completely away from their earlier agreement.

Now, by backing away from the agreement, I mean, it had been signed by either side, but the commitments had been made.

We proceeded on that assumption, and we were trying to bring Saigon along on that assumption, and we could have, mind you.

But then what they did was to back away from...

to raise basically a number of dilatory conditions, which would have meant not just weeks but months more negotiation.

Sullivan was there, he was working on the technical side, and just basically threw up his hands and he just, there's many, he said it was clear that they said they want to continue talking, but they do not want to reach agreement.

I was in daily contact with Mr. Gerente, his reporting day, and I kept him there day after day after day.

He was supposed to be there every day.

He stayed with me.

And what happened was that each day they would go up the hill and down the hill, up the hill and down the hill.

In the meantime, the biggest infiltration that they had in two years

that was occurring in the middle of, in North Vietnam.

Under the circumstances, it was, we tried for three tortuous, long days, the three last days of the third region, to get them to come back, in other words, to the basic principles and to work out these details that are going to vary from details next to the wood building.

That's what happened.

Now those,

developed is that, without going into the merits, they have now agreed to come back to me, not in the technical talks where they're working out the protocols for us in the second day, but they've also agreed to meet, as you know, this year in the evening.

The one thing

very important is that we not indicate that we are optimistic about this, or that we not indicate that they are coming back and agree to agree, agree to agree.

We have to be in a position where they can come back and gracefully

for the position that they need to move to in our society.

It could be that there are only two outstanding issues, and those issues can be resolved.

One is the D.N.C., the other one, I can't really explain it.

They can be resolved by, in a matter of two to three days, in my opinion.

And that's history's opinion as well.

We, I will tell you that at this point,

And as you know, I have never misled you with any optimistic statements about this war, because I know how to deal with it.

I will tell you what this is worth, that we have strong reason to believe that they are now ready to return the attitude that they had immediately before the election, on October 8th and October 26th.

And if they are ready to do that, the agreement will be reached.

That's over and ready.

We are not.

I mean, don't be disappointed.

We are ready.

There's no question about that.

Let me tell you, too, we're not insisting on anything unreasonable.

We're not insisting on anything unreasonable.

We're not going to bid beyond what we had had earlier.

We are not, for example, insisting that all minority entities have to be withdrawn from South Vietnam, which, of course, is what gives us a hell of a lot of trouble with Saigon.

But we told Saigon that we agreed that we offered in May 8 a ceasefire.

She went along with us then, and we're still in, see?

So our position is not unreasonable.

The unreasonable position is theirs, as in it.

But we are not going back.

We will make sure to be reasonable, as reasonable as we can.

We will not do the nitpicking.

We're trying to get an agreement as quickly as we can.

uh just as soon after that develops that process develops next week uh we'll talk to you again well i appreciate the college of me mr president but i felt that i should quite study what i said because i just feel that i have a few senators

I don't want us to be in a position because of the agreement that was sloppily put together that we have any obligation to get back in there.

That's the other point.

still deeply involved in Laos and Cambodia.

This is, these are the things that are involved.

We're trying to get the all-Indo-China settlement, I find.

It's terribly important to try to get all of that.

And that's what's right in all this.

And we want to get a settlement that will last.

And I think that we're very, very close.

Very close.

When I say very close, I mean, I'm understanding.

As far as I can see, there's

It's so close that we could go on that continent, but I would appreciate it if you would not.

I think if you could say, yes, we did discuss it.

You expressed your concern.

Obviously, we should say that.

I think the concern remembers the Senate.

I think I'd say the President, too.

If you would, I would say, I just want to be in a position where I have a

Negotiations with the intention to negotiate seriously with the Green Party.

That's what we have to do publicly.

I won't say more, but that would be the most helpful thing you could say in terms of my relationships with the other members of the House.

The question of substance.

If the Green Party had substance, I'd stay out of it.

And I would stay out of it for this reason.

You could say that the President

that the President said as far as substance is concerned, say, yes, we discussed some substantive matters when he agreed to give us an agreement on the general status of the negotiations.

But as far as substance is concerned, that it would be very detrimental to the negotiations at this very sensitive stage to have any public discussion of the substance.

And therefore, he wouldn't mind a comment on the substance.

Would that be all right?

Be fine.

Now, Mr. President, we have our caucus tomorrow.

You can tell me that.

I intend to say a few things on Vietnam and other things.

Too many things have piled up since the general society died.

If someone's going to lay off the table, I guess I'll be the one.

So it won't be a Senate speech or anything like that.

And it sure as hell won't be a State of the Union speech because only the president can do that speech.

But it's going to cover a lot of things.

which I think are important, and it's going to cover our relations with you.

And I'm going to say that we're prepared to go at least halfway and to express the hope that the relationship between the two of us, as soon as your conversation 10 days ago, will be better, and that

We have responsibility, yes, you have.

Yours is greater.

But ours is something which we can't avoid either.

We'll see what will happen.

Now, there's going to be some resolutions presented to the Congress, to the Senate.

The governor called me this afternoon and said he's going to introduce a resolution requesting the president to

come before the Senate.

But I think about, well, I said, anybody in that conference can offer any kind of resolution they want.

Then it's up to the conference to decide.

I didn't say that even the conference did decide, and I'm not at all sure it would, that then it would be up to the Senate that others are going to bring up resolutions on seniority and this, that, and the other thing.

Well, look, in negotiations, I only have one.

I recall that I always took that position when Johnson was here.

And many times when I thought he wasn't doing right, he would ask to do the same position.

And he has respectfully asked it at this particular time.

But don't let the Senate screw this up.

If it does, then we'll have to assume the responsibility for it.

It's very close.

But if the Senate wants to move in directions here at this time, knowing what I have just told you, this is a very heavy responsibility for the Senate to take on itself.

Well, now, this is something which I thought the caucus was going to have there.

But my feeling is it's quite a play.

Oh, sure.

You'll have to be very good at answering somebody.

I know I tried so hard to be as sure as your eyes could.

Oh, I don't mind two days.

It would take a lot of four years to survive.

Four years?

You've been in the hospital for the past 25 years, haven't I, sir?

First time in the house, 47, I think, yeah.

confirmations uh do you uh i understand you feel you can do a double track deal for instance oh yes we would appreciate that we have a good amount we'll take them up we've got them all up there and uh they're out there now yeah i signed them all that's why i didn't take any time off after the election until just before christmas because i had all everything everything done and uh we've got the whole bag up there right now and we really appreciate the fast action

Yes, as soon as they get out of Kennedy and I will urge them to go back to the next exhibition in Vermont.

We'll take them out.

Because we like to get things moving, too.

Now, I'm feeling the war on the way.

I'm not going to set a deadline.

We tried it.

That's one of the things I wouldn't let anybody do, whether it be Andy or anybody else.

I would set an election deadline because that would have been disastrous.

It's not right to tell the American people in the United States before or because of the election.

My deadline is as early as possible and all I can say is to

And you, when you're talking to Henry, you could examine him on any of these things as closely as you want.

I mean, any kind of subsidy that you are told to make.

And he can show you, if you want, the last, these portions of the transcript of the last meeting, and show you what the problem is.

I think you might say, well, all I want, Mr. President, is what you want.

I'll do it.

You just said that.

Well, I take too much of your time.

Well, we'll get along.

We'll get along well, I think, with these things.

There's going to be mutual kinds of problems and so forth.

We'll get the war out of the way.

Maybe we can have some other problems.

Well, maybe.

It won't be so difficult now.

The other thing you can try with this experiment into all of us, regardless of our politics and what not.

It's really a tragedy.

Yesterday was the 11th.

Okay, Mr. President.

Fine, Mike.

Well, we wish you a Happy New Year.

Say to you, girls, when you're in law, I'll put a check on Mike Mansfield.

He's a big guy.

Good luck.

Thank you very much.