To take advantage of this, Nixon suggested a new idea to Deaver. Years before, Deaver and Nixon had discussed the importance of taking advantage of modern forms of communication. “You will recall the conversation we had in San Clemente several years ago,” Nixon now wrote, “about the use of radio. Why not exploit the president’s unique ability in using this medium?”
The former president went on to urge that a “weekly ten-minute radio talk on Sunday evenings” would allow the new president to “dominate the Monday papers.” It would also allow Reagan to bypass the Washington press corps and speak “directly to the American people.” Deaver loved the idea, although he changed it to Saturday rather than Sunday in order to influence the Sunday morning news talk shows. On April 3, 1982, Reagan delivered the first of what would be 331 Saturday radio addresses during his presidency.2
Nixon praised another Deaver initiative—the first lady’s anti-drug campaign. He called the plan a “ten strike.” He reassured Deaver, saying, “Don’t be concerned that the Washington ‘witches’ in the press try to knock it down as an attempt to change a poor image. Just as the heathens worshipped the idols they built, so the media must always worship the myths they have created.”3
As the weeks rolled by, Nixon stayed in touch with Deaver. He continued suggesting ideas to him. When Reagan met with the returning hostages from Iran, Nixon suggested that Reagan use a similar meeting to tie up some loose ends from the Vietnam War. “It occurred to me that without any publicity whatever that he could invite the same POWs who had dinner with him in Sacramento to have a private dinner with Nancy and with him at the White House,” he suggested. Deaver appreciated much of Nixon’s counsel, but he was only interested in Reagan’s best interests. He wasn’t particularly interested in reopening the Vietnam issue. That idea of Nixon's was ignored.4
Meanwhile from his townhouse in New York City, Nixon carefully observed as the Reagan cabinet nominees went before the Senate for confirmation. One of the most controversial was the one Nixon cared about most—Al Haig—to be secretary of state. Nixon never knew that Haig had worked behind the scenes to help push him out in 1974, and he remained close to him. He regarded Haig as a tough soldier who was just the right man for the job at the State Department.
When Haig’s role in Watergate became an issue in the Senate hearings, Nixon found himself in the crosshairs. The Senate committee wanted the Watergate tapes. These were technically controlled by the National Archives, but Nixon had the authority to release them. He told the Senate it would take a subpoena to get the documents. He was outraged that the very presidential materials that had been denied to him could potentially become public. Eventually the standoff ended. Haig was confirmed, and Nixon was ecstatic. Haig, Nixon said, was “the meanest, toughest, most ambitious son of a bitch I ever knew. He’ll make a great secretary of state.”5
Back home in New York, Nixon began holding stag dinners at his townhouse. Thinkers, writers, and influencers were invited to join him for drinks and dinner. Among those who would dine with him from time to time were Hugh Sidey of Time magazine, the economist Alan Greenspan, and his old friend and columnist Bill Safire. After dinner, Nixon would serve drinks and talk politics. He would hold court on topics ranging from the Reagan White House to the NFL. And he never failed to fascinate his audience. He also began reaching out to younger and more conservative writers and became friends with R. Emmett Tyrrell, who was the editor of the conservative publication the American Spectator.
On March 30, 1981, as Nixon was going about his daily routine in New York, news broke from Washington—the president had been shot. As Reagan was leaving the Hilton Hotel in Washington after giving a speech, John Hinckley Jr. had fired a series of shots at him, including one that bounced off the presidential limousine and into Reagan’s side. Nixon was horrified. Having been president himself and having watched as John Kennedy was assassinated in 1963, he couldn’t help but have an emotional reaction to the event. He watched the endless news coverage as doctors worked to save Reagan at George Washington University Hospital in Washington.
Nixon felt compelled to comment publicly. Through his daughter Tricia, he issued a statement to the press that he was “thankful” the president had survived and that he and Pat were “praying for the recovery of all the wounded and for the president’s recovery.” His measured tone was in stark contrast to that of his friend Al Haig who embarrassed himself—and damaged his position in the Reagan administration—by declaring from the White House Press Briefing Room that he was “in charge” while the president was in the hospital.6
By early April, the reports from George Washington Hospital were encouraging—Reagan was on the mend. The bullet had stopped just short of his heart, and the doctors had been able to remove it. By the end of the month, Reagan not only returned home to the White House, but was also preparing to address Congress. Surviving the assassin’s bullet gave the Gipper new momentum to push for his agenda.
Much to Nixon’s chagrin, Reagan chose to focus his attention on his plan to cut taxes. In a stirring address to Congress, Reagan went all in on his economic agenda. As he stood at the podium in the House of Representatives, wave after wave of applause came over him.
“You wouldn’t want to talk me into an encore, would you?” Reagan said. From there he had the Congress—and the country—in his hands. He pushed for sweeping reductions in the marginal tax rates as a way to get America’s economic engine humming again. After the speech, the White House would claim that it was inundated with calls, letters, and telegrams supportive of the president’s tax cuts.
One observer who remained skeptical was Nixon. He believed that Reagan should have focused his newfound political capital on what he saw as the most important issue—facing the Soviets. And he feared the impact the tax cuts might have on Reagan’s foreign policy.
In a conversation with Peter Peterson, who had served as his commerce secretary, Nixon sharply critiqued Reagan’s economic strategy. “He would have been smarter to go slower,” he said. “If he had asked for, say, five percent, he could have sold it on the Hill. Now, he can’t, and the Soviets know it.”7
Nixon’s concern was that Reagan would get bogged down in a quagmire of negotiations with Congress over tax cuts while the Soviets watched. This would do little to deter recent Soviet aggression in places like Afghanistan. “We’d be better off politically unified behind a smaller figure,” he told Peterson, adding that a smaller tax cut would “scare the hell” out of the Soviets because it would indicate that Reagan was ready to compromise and move on to foreign policy.
But Reagan often surprised the experts. And his economic recovery package proved to be such a case. The president worked aggressively to court “Boll Weevil” Democrats like Phil Gramm of Texas. And by the summer, enough conservative Democrats had pledged their support and the tax cut package was passed. Reagan signed it into law in August at his ranch near Santa Barbara.
Nixon took the high road publicly and supported the president. While in Washington state to attend his niece’s wedding, he headlined a fundraiser for the King County Republican Party. In his remarks, he said that because of the “Reagan Revolution, the whole direction of the country is going to change. It’s already changing.” He added, though, that it would take “at least eight years” to undo the Democratic policies of the last generation.8
After securing his signature domestic policy victory early in his first term, Reagan was now ready to do exactly what Nixon wanted him to do—focus on foreign policy. And Nixon was ready to help Reagan do just that.
* * *
While Reagan had been busy looking for votes for his tax cut bill that summer, Nixon had been busy looking for a new home. In June, the Nixons purchased a fifteen-room contemporary home in Saddle River, New Jersey, for one million dollars. It was situated on more than four acres with a swimming pool, a tennis court, and a wine cellar. Nixon would maintain his office in New York and commute into the city each day. The new location would g
ive the family more space to host and entertain. Nixon had become especially concerned when he saw girls at the Catholic school across the street from his New York townhouse smoking marijuana. He didn’t want his grandkids to see anything like that. Now in the New Jersey countryside, they wouldn’t.
The Nixons then sold their townhouse on East Sixty-Fifth Street. The Syrian government was looking for a residence for its delegate to the United Nations and agreed to purchase the Nixon townhouse for $2.6 million. By September, the Nixons had moved out and were fully relocated to their new place in Saddle River.
* * *
On October 6, a few days after moving into the new house, Nixon sat in his new study editing another book manuscript when Al Haig called from the State Department and revealed that Anwar Sadat had been assassinated at a military parade in Egypt. The parade had been organized to celebrate the Egyptian military’s seizure of the Suez Canal in October 1973. At the end of the procession this year, assassins had emerged from their military truck and began firing at the dignitaries. Sadat refused to cower and faced the gunmen directly. He was immediately shot and killed.
After Haig outlined the events to Nixon, the former president asked if a delegation had been formed to represent President Reagan at the funeral. Haig indicated that no final decisions had been made. “Well,” Nixon responded, “whatever the president does, I am going to go.”9
Nixon was not alone. Carter was also planning to attend. And since President Reagan had decided to defer to the Secret Service and not attend for security reasons, he decided to include President Ford and send the three living ex-presidents to represent him.
Before leaving for Cairo, the three presidents met at the White House for a brief reception with President Reagan. Following hors d’oeuvres and drinks, the current president and his three predecessors stepped onto the South Lawn for a brief ceremony. Nixon, in a dark suit and blue striped tie, stood immediately to Reagan’s right as the president took the podium. Though he had attended a state dinner with President Carter in 1979, that had been a closed press event. This time, here he was at last—back at the White House in full view of the public. It was his first time on the South Lawn since he had departed in Marine One in August 1974.
Reagan delivered brief remarks praising Sadat as someone who had “stood in defiance” of those who threatened peace. As he concluded the speech, he looked to the three men surrounding him and offered a “a heartfelt thank you to these men here, these three who are making this mission on behalf of our country. I thank you, and if I may, in the language of my own ancestry, say: Until we meet again, may God hold you in the hollow of His hand.”
The former presidents then boarded the marine helicopter and lifted off on their way to Andrews Air Force Base. The irony could not have been lost on Nixon—just seven years before he had made this same journey in the moments before his presidency officially ended.
President Reagan welcomes former presidents Ford, Carter, and Nixon to the White House on their way to represent him at the funeral of Anwar Sadat. (National Archives and Records Administration)
“I kind of like that house down there,” he joked to the other former presidents as the helicopter flew off of the South Lawn.10
The flight to Cairo was a long one. A number of congressional leaders were on board. Nixon made sure to stop and visit with each one. He showed signs that his personal Watergate battle had ended. When he spotted the Washington Post’s Haynes Johnson, who had covered the Watergate scandal, Nixon politely asked him how he was doing. And when he came across Senator Charles Percy, he seemed unconcerned with the Senator’s support for his impeachment. “Chuck Percy has stood by presidents in foreign policy,” he said as he shook the man’s hand.
Once they had arrived in Cairo, the former presidents were under tight security at the hotel. The next day at the funeral, the air was thick with tension as the Secret Service worried about a possible terrorist attack on three former presidents. The U.S. delegation wore bullet-proof jackets underneath their suits. And when the funeral procession went past the very reviewing stand where Sadat had been murdered just a few days earlier, the bullet holes could still be seen.
Still, no incidents materialized and the funeral ended without any issues. But when Carter and Ford arrived at the airport for the return trip home, Nixon was missing. They learned from Haig’s staff that Nixon would be traveling separately to Saudi Arabia. Much confusion ensued about the origin of this side foray into the Middle East and whether the Reagan administration had approved it. In fact, Nixon had worked with Haig on visiting Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Tunisia, and Morocco. But questions remain as to whether Haig kept the White House informed. Since the trip was unofficial and since the White House probably would have been concerned, it seems likely that Haig provided vague details at best to President Reagan. The final and official version of events was that Haig had told Reagan, but that the president had forgotten about it—an unlikely story, but one that the White House stuck with as Nixon’s trip unfolded.
After making his way through four Middle Eastern countries and meeting with officials in each one, Nixon landed in Paris, where he set up at the Crillon Hotel. He then worked with the American Embassy in Paris to issue a public statement about his trip. The Reagan administration was keen to use Nixon’s trip—and his public statement—to endorse its own plan to sell $8.5 billion worth of Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) planes to Saudi Arabia. Israel was not happy about it. And the plan had stirred up much debate in the U.S.
Nixon’s friend Richard Allen, now serving as Reagan’s national security advisor, asked the former president to issue a statement about the trip and specifically comment on the AWACS sale. In his statement, Nixon praised the sale and suggested that “if it were not for the intense opposition” of Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin that it would not be controversial. He also blamed “parts of the American Jewish community,” a comment that accurately represented the domestic politics of the issue but invited criticism that he was essentially blaming American Jews. Allen sent the piece around to his colleagues at the White House and called it “splendid” and “exactly what we had hoped he would do.”11
The trip—and Nixon’s report—represented another step forward in his journey back. Here was the only president who had been forced to resign the presidency, and yet he was not only representing the current American president at a state funeral in Egypt, but he also was meeting with leaders of key countries in the Middle East and publicly commenting on the wisdom of the controversial Reagan arms policy in the Middle East.
The media devoted ample attention to Nixon’s comments. The Washington Post stated plainly that this recent foray into the politics of the Middle East had continued his “rehabilitation.” And Time approvingly called him a “ubiquitous elder statesman without portfolio.”
* * *
As the first year of the Reagan administration came to a close, Nixon was pleased with how his friend was doing. “I like and admire [Lech] Walesa,” he wrote to Reagan after Time magazine selected the leader of the Polish Solidarity Movement for its “Man of the Year” award, “but in my book, Time missed the boat: President Reagan should have been Man of the Year.” Sure, Nixon was trying to flatter the president, but he also believed the country was in far better hands than it had been with Jimmy Carter.12
Back home in New Jersey, Nixon recovered from the long trip and read the reviews. He could see that his work was paying off. But he knew a real legacy would require more than a trip around the world and some positive news clippings. He wanted a presidential center where he could define his own legacy once and for all.
Chapter Eleven
A Home for the Nixon Library
“To hell with ’em. We’ll go to Yorba Linda.”
The concept of the presidential library is a fairly new one. It was Franklin Roosevelt who signed the legislation and Herbert Hoover who became the first former president to build a place where the public could visit a museum
and a scholar could research his papers. Before that, presidential papers were housed in Washington, D.C. The goal of the presidential library was to take presidents out of Washington and put them back into the places from which they came. If people wanted to get a real understanding of a president, the thinking went, they needed to see where he was from and how his beginnings had shaped him.
The fight for a Nixon library had begun almost the minute he left the White House. And as in so much else of Nixon’s career, he had to fight a unique battle. That’s because Congress had passed and President Ford had signed legislation requiring that all of Nixon’s papers stay in Washington because of their importance in the ongoing Watergate litigation. Nixon’s lawyers had immediately challenged the new law, arguing that Nixon was being singled out with special rules. He was, but in 1974 most people didn’t care. He was still viewed negatively by so much of the public.
Inside the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum. (Jeremy Thompson)
Nixon knew that litigation could take years, but he was eager to get moving on the library. So on April 26, 1975, at the Annenburg Estate, plans were announced to build a Richard M. Nixon Presidential Library on the campus of Pat’s alma mater, the University of Southern California. The USC Board of Regents and USC president John Hubbard joined Nixon in making the announcement.
At that time, Nixon told reporters that he was “very pleased” with the arrangement and that he looked forward to the day when scholars could undertake “historical research and public study” on his papers. Even the faculty and staff at USC seemed genuinely excited. “I’m exhilarated,” school librarian Roy Kidman told the press. “It’s like the biggest thing that ever happened to USC,” added student Karen Kennedy, “except the national championship.”1
After the Fall Page 13