Nixon, Haldeman & Ehrlichman on Watergate scandal and Executive privilege

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This scenario works out pretty well.

Yeah.

I just used the wrong number.

I think that it is quite a reality here.

The first, let me talk about the words we did before this began.

I said, I suggest that I...

as far as others are concerned.

But if they do, John, I would play it straight out of God's name.

Of course, we do this.

Well, I've been thinking about this a little bit.

If I ever got a question like that at the grand jury, I would have to step out, ask the US attorney to step out, tell him that under executive privilege, since it is a national security matter, I can't answer.

Then I'd be happy to refer it to the president.

for his decision as to whether I should answer that or not.

But then I am in no position to respond to that.

And then if he says, well, we'll have to go talk to the judge, I'll say, I think that's what we should do.

Highly sensitive national security.

No.

I wouldn't tell him what.

And I'm just not at liberty

And the procedure we have in government for a thing like this is for the witness who's put a question like that to refer to the president for his personal review.

And I'd like an opportunity for that to be done.

I don't see you being asked the question.

I think that's right, but that's the process that I think I'm having.

And he said, well, he said, do you mind if I take the letters?

I'd like to prepare it so that in the event

I was thinking in both terms, apparently.

I'm just guessing.

And I think that's all we've got to profit from.

He should have had a letter of that sort, isn't there?

What I told him was, I said, what's the first one we're gonna send?

They told us last night.

There's no question about resigning around here.

He said, I've got better estimations in hand any time I want.

Wasn't that the proper thing to say to him?

That's fine.

He doesn't give you any indication how it's going to bleed.

No, I said, well, my lawyers will start working on it.

But he also gets this again, John.

It's strange that his lawyers think that his possible criminal liability is limited.

It's damn hard to prove.

Now, maybe, he said, basically, and I see what is involved here, because he was sort of condoning, basically, what that means.

But I said, well, it's terrible.

He says it's insane.

He didn't use the word condoning.

He said, but it's a tangential case.

He says it's a goddamn hard case.

And he said, what he and what his lawyers tell him, that the Justice Department could well come out of this without bringing in

Any indictments against anybody?

I said, what about Tolstoy?

He said, well, there are three evidence.

He's, again, recall which ones.

He's called many that he's called.

And so forth.

Call him a murderer.

Oh, yeah, that's free.

Yeah.

I hit him hard.

I said, now look here, John.

I had to leave a report.

I said, nobody's involved.

Was that true?

He said, yes.

I said, do you still believe that?

He said, yes.

As far as anybody else said, nobody had any credence.

He said, they don't involve nobody.

He said, yeah.

And on the legal side, I just found out he's got some sharpie lawyers, John.

They think this is a goddamn hard case to prove for the pedigree.

Very hard case to prove.

The government thinks so too, doesn't it?

Yeah, I told you that, that Peter Peterson didn't have a, like you said, the legal language is just terribly difficult.

It's a more of a question of the impression that what Peterson is thinking of basically, let's face it, is his PR.

And I talk about his, and I'm sure what I told you.

at least felt a little better about that than I did last night.

Now, when do I see Rogers?

Anytime you want me to stand by, I'll talk to him.

That's fine, whatever you want.

Well, I'll just call him until I can get him to be on the stand by the second or two, because maybe we'll be done.

But just as well.

He's helping us to find counsel.

Well, it works out very quickly that you became aware some time ago that this thing didn't parse out the way it was supposed to and that there were some discrepancies between what you had been told by Dean in your report that there was somebody in the White House involved, which may still be true.

Let me say that I don't want to

I don't think it is giving us anything by pissing on the Dean report as such.

No.

But I mean it.

I would say that I was not satisfied that the Dean report was complete.

And also, I felt that I ought to go, it was my obligation to go beyond that to people other than the White House.

Well, Ron has an interesting point.

Remember you had John Dean go to Camp David?

I know.

And he came down and said I can't.

Right.

That's the tip-off.

And right then you started to move.

That's right.

You said you could not write it.

And then you realized there was more to this than that.

Then you had to get rid of it.

Well, it's very simple.

You took Dean off the case right then, two weeks ago.

Right.

The end of March.

Remember the letter you signed to me?

Mm-hmm.

30th of March.

I signed it to you.

Yes, sir.

And it says, Dean's off of it.

I want you to get into it.

Find out what the facts are.

Be prepared.

Why did I take Dean home?

Because he told me he was involved.

I did agree because he was involved.

Well, there was a lot of stuff breaking in the papers, but at the same time, the scenario is he told you he couldn't write a report, so obviously you had to take him home.

And so then we started digging into it.

We went to San Clemente.

While I was out there, talked to a lot of people on the phone, talked to several witnesses in person, kept feeding information to you.

And as soon as you saw the dimensions of this thing from the reports you were getting from the staff who were digging into it, Moore, me, Garmin, others.

You began to move.

And then it culminated last week in your decision that Mitchell should be brought down here, Magruder should be brought in, Strong should be brought in.

So I say that he brought them all in.

I don't think he can.

OK, name them by name.

I would say I brought a number of people in.

I would personally come to the White House.

I will not tell you why, because I don't want to prejudice their rights.

Exactly.

But I heard enough that I was satisfied that it was time to precipitously move.

I called the Attorney General over, Attorney Peterson.

Well, the Attorney General actually

You made the call to him on Saturday.

Yes.

After you, but this is after you heard about the Brutus crack.

Did you tell me?

Before.

Oh.

We didn't hear about that until about 3 o'clock that afternoon.

Well, why didn't you go before?

This is very good.

Now, how does that happen?

Well.

How do you know?

Why wasn't you called in then?

I'm telling you who made the report.

Well, that's right.

John's report came out in the same place that Mitchell, the Brutus report came out.

But my point is.

I called him to tell him that I had this information.

But why was that?

That was because we had heard that Gooder was going to talk?

No.

We didn't.

I'll have to check my notes again.

We didn't know whether Gooder was going to talk.

That's right.

Gooder was still agonizing on what he was going to do.

Dean, but you remember you came in and said you got to call him.

I didn't talk to him until we got home from burning the tree, which was the end of the day, and I had already talked to Magruder.

My point is, when did we decide to talk to Cranky before Magruder?

Oh, yes.

I remember early in the morning I said, I'll see these two fellows, but I've got to turn this over to the Attorney General.

Which two fellows were you going to see?

Mitchell and Magruder.

We got your conclusions, or...

I mean, because I had this report, and I tried all day long to get the attorney general, who was at the golf course, and got him to say he got home for it.

I'm not sure he did.

As such, the thing that I had, that's it.

It was not a formal report.

It was a set of notes.

Yeah, a hundred notes.

A hundred notes.

Yeah.

There's seven pages or eight pages, plus all my notes of my interviews.

And then Magruder came over.

Well, you don't want to put that out.

You don't want to specify who came, but then he called in other individuals.

Then the president met with the attorney general and the prosecutor, and then got the head of the general division on Sunday.

and I also talked to Fison and gone to, I met Dean, I met Dean, Earlton, you, and I also talked to Henry Peterson on three different occasions, three different occasions that night on the phone.

Nixon, Haldeman & Ehrlichman on Watergate scandal and Executive privilege

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Nixon Library Finding Aid

Also recorded on April 16, 1973

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