Nixon & Ziegler on Gridiron Dinner and White House Correspondents' Association

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Yes, sir.

I want to .

Yes, sir.

I talked to yesterday.

And McGovern is accepting.

And I had a little .

Currently, the whole women's is passed now.

And do I have women?

The wives?

No, no, no wives, but the Shirley Chisholm types who wouldn't go last year are going this year.

I have a Thomas who, you know, was involved last year.

Women going?

So women going, yes.

But in their own capacity?

In their own capacity.

As?

Are they having a better life?

No, no, I don't know.

No, no, it's just the women who, like Congress, career women who are going.

The Republican speaker is Bush.

The Democratic speaker will be McGovern, who has accepted.

So it comes down to whether or not you go.

He said that they would very much, because he feels that the gridiron is moving now back into its traditional role, he hopes, they would very much like to keep that moving by having the gridiron

your invitation committee at least take a courtesy call on you to extend an invitation, understanding that you may accept or you may not accept, and they would understand that you would not accept.

So I just wanted to relay that to you as a part of the factor also.

Then it comes down to whether or not you should or should not go.

I want to give you a number.

You've done this several times.

I didn't tell you this, but I'm going to give you the rest of your life as a correspondence, a radio correspondence.

Every time you've done it, you regret it.

Because it's all you've done.

So that's what we have to look at, if it does us good.

I doubt if it does us good to go there and do your best to show them the idea of going off and being nice to them socially.

I don't know that we can do anything about it, but I do feel that we certainly do.

We certainly do take away the tools of criticism.

I don't do criticism, but I'll ask for a tool from them.

And as we've talked before, I think we want to continue to handle the press in a firm way.

But I just don't want the attitude to develop amongst the press corps

the tone to be established in the White House, in terms of our relation with the press, that would, beyond what it traditionally is, that I think could hurt the, could hurt the Nixon presidency.

Well, I think, no, I don't think that social events are,

For example, they have, you know, my recollection is they do not have pictures taken.

That's correct.

I will not do that.

See, Ross said, when I was talking to him, I said, do you mean the governor is accepted, Bob?

And he said, yeah.

He said he'd give a lousy speech, but he's accepted.

I'm sure the governor will give a lousy speech.

He doesn't have the substance to give it to him.

Well, I think that's more of a gift than writers.

Right.

He said he loved it.

He said it was very good.

He's pretty.

He's very hard.

He's a good writer.

He's a very good writer.

I, uh...

I don't want to get into the position of having to do the others.

is whether or not it would not be in terms of the only reason we'd want to do this would be to help relate to the point that was made earlier whether or not you would be better off doing a drop-by a brief drop-by a brief drop-by not sitting through the entertainment but dropping by and giving a few remarks to the White House Correspondent Center to the

White House photographers down there, not to go and eat their food, but just to go drop by and say, hello, gentlemen, and make a few remarks.

If you wouldn't be better off doing those two things.

Well, they need just to drop by.

They have a request in which there may be some dates on the committee to discuss with you as to when they would be available.

Do a drop by to those three and not do the gridiron and simply be able

I can't be out of town.

I think that's too obvious.

I've got this church service to do.

For the greater?

Yeah, not for the greater.

It's for the times.

That's only 10th.

10th.

I'll be here.

Well, do you feel that God likes the others, or I don't care?

I mean, I just think it's... Or is it better just to do all this for the energy?

I think it depends on the entertainment.

I think if they have, you know, one of those guys up there who's an impressionist and all this type of thing, I think it's ridiculous.

That's right.

You know, a mimic of the president.

But if they have a good singer or something of that sort.

In other words, they have entertainment rather than a comic.

And a comic won't go.

That's right.

He didn't drop by.

I didn't drop by.

In fact, for example, the last time we went to the White House Correspondents, it was extremely embarrassing.

The first time I had bad speech, I remember he cut in on that poor guy from U.S. News, and he would drop in.

Then they sat there, and they had to go through their awards.

The awards were very bad.

I would never do that.

I would never sit there.

If, for example, I won the Carter's Awards,

I wouldn't mind presenting awards to people if I knew what the hell they are.

I'm not going to present awards to somebody else.

I don't want to be there.

I think actually if Jim can do it, it's a little better to go by and listen to the entertainment.

remarks, thanking the board, thanking the entertainers.

I think that's, everybody understands the entertainers, if they have the right kind of entertainers.

Well, there's some formula that can be worked out.

I don't mind.

That would fall into the drop-by category.

We would, however, not be bound by any of these.

I might as well, with all the stuff we have coming up here, invite you to be on the phone.

Screw ourselves up.

Absolutely.

Because we don't have to do them all first year.

We have a couple.

We don't have to do them all.

I think we should do one.

I'll get you back to the greater.

What's your... My feeling is not that, quite frankly, Mr. President, for you to go to the greater.

That's my... That is my gut reaction.

Why?

Well, I think more than anything else, it's about government.

The fact that the campaign, what he said during the campaign, was so strident that then he was away.

And when he said it, I really didn't hear it.

Right.

Let me suggest this.

I don't know if it's night or day,

See, if I don't go, I don't believe, I don't like the sound of going out of town, that's why you better be out of town to get an autograph.

And I say, well, I mean, Lord, that's the ultimate sign that you just have to go.

Do you know what I mean?

So there is what we're faced with.

Just say, no, I can't publish.

Or you just say the president declined the invitation.

He's inviting some of the publishers and so forth to the church every Sunday.

I don't know.

I'm concerned.

However, if that is a decision that you said we don't have to make, there might be a validity in having the Roth committee come in simply to extend the invitation.

What Roth said when he asked for this, he said, we will fully understand if the president, if we come in and go through with the election,

that he may not come or would not come.

And I think we could have them in for four minutes.

They could go through their ritual.

And you would say to let them know.

And then about three or four days, I simply write Bob a note, a very nice note, saying the president has declined the invitation to attend the gridiron this year.

You know, without committing to the future years of his decline of invitation.

Why don't you, at the present time, accept the White House Correspondents?

Whatever you have to do.

You might have them.

They'll get you the data, sir, when you get out there.

Okay?

Yes, sir.

This will be a way to have a career.

Nixon & Ziegler on Gridiron Dinner and White House Correspondents' Association

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Nixon Library Finding Aid

Also recorded on February 21, 1973

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