Burning Down the House
Page 38
45. Shirley, Citizen Newt, 15.
46. Editorial Board, “Gingrich Deserves Election,” Atlanta Daily World, October 31, 1976.
47. Newt Gingrich, “Let’s Quit Picking on Jack Flynt,” August 24, 1977, box 38, File: Speeches, NGP.
48. Candace Gingrich, Accidental Activist, 49–50.
49. Dale Russakoff and Dan Balz, “After Political Victory, a Personal Revolution,” Washington Post, December 19, 1994.
50. Sheehy, “Inner Quest of Newt Gingrich.”
51. Shirley, Citizen Newt, 31.
52. Gingrich, interview with Kondracke, December 13, 2012, 4.
53. Frank Gregorsky to Bob Weed, April 2, 1979, box 40, File: What Newt Said in 1980, NGP.
54. Newt Gingrich, “Tip O’Neill Termed Dictator by Gingrich,” August 1, 1978, box 25, File: O’Neill Dictator, NGP.
55. Campaign Flyer, 1978, box 17, File: Brochures, Forms, NGP.
56. “Newt’s Family Is Like Your Family,” New Georgia Leader, October 1978, box 24, File: Clippings, NGP.
57. “Two Good Reasons for Newt Gingrich,” Jackson Progress-Argus, September 7, 1978.
58. Steely, Gentleman from Georgia, 100–101.
59. Newt Gingrich, “Speech to the College Republicans at the Atlanta Airport Holiday Inn,” June 24, 1978, PBS.org.
60. Laurie James, interview with Frank Gregorsky, October 29, 1980, in The First Two Years, box 39, File: The First Two Years, NGP.
61. “Shapard Critical of Opponents’ TV Ads,” Baltimore Sun, October 18, 1978, box 24, File: Clippings October, NGP.
62. “Friends of Newt Gingrich,” press release, November 4, 1978, box 25, File: Shapard Violations, NGP.
63. Steely, Gentleman from Georgia, 105.
64. Ron Taylor, “At Last, Gingrich Fans Throw a Victory Party,” Atlanta Constitution, November 7, 1978.
65. Shirley, Citizen Newt, 36.
66. Thomas E. Mann and Norman J. Ornstein, The Broken Branch: How Congress Is Failing America and How to Get It Back on Track (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006), 64.
67. Laura Kalman, Right Star Rising: A New Politics, 1974–1980 (New York: Norton, 2010), 311.
68. Russakoff and Balz, “After Political Victory, a Personal Revolution.”
69. Saul Friedman, “The Congressional Charm,” Charlotte Observer, December 7, 1978.
70. “Newt Gingrich on the 1994 Republican Revolution and His Career in Politics,” interview with William Kristol, November 21, 2014, conversationswithbillkristol.org/video/newt-gingrich.
Chapter 2: A Political Wrecking Ball
1. Ann Woolner, “Gingrich Fights to Build Party,” Atlanta Constitution, November 25, 1979.
2. Woolner, “Gingrich Fights to Build Party.”
3. Gingrich to Anderson, January 11, 1979, box 145, File: Diggs Stuff—RNC Clips, NGP.
4. William J. Mitchell, “GOP Freshman After Diggs,” Detroit Free Press, January 13, 1979.
5. Newt Gingrich, “Congressional Double Standard,” February 22, 1979, box 145, File: Diggs Stuff—RNC Clips, NGP.
6. Newt Gingrich, Lessons Learned the Hard Way (New York: HarperCollins, 1998), 87.
7. Julian E. Zelizer, On Capitol Hill: The Struggle to Reform Congress and Its Consequences, 1948–2000 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 81.
8. This analysis was based on a memo from David Warnick. See Warnick to Gingrich, January 9, 1979, box 145, File: Master File on Our Stuff, NGP. A better model, in Gingrich’s mind, was the Kentucky Republican “Pork Barrel John” Langley, who was convicted of a felony, sentenced to prison, then reelected while on appeal. Cannon’s Precedents used this case as the basis to conclude that a “member convicted by the courts refrained from participation in the proceedings of the House pending action on his appeal.” See Gingrich to Charles Bennett, February 16, 1979, box 145, File: Master File on Our Stuff, NGP.
9. Mary Russell, “Wright Says House Shouldn’t Expel Diggs if Courts Uphold His Conviction,” Washington Post, January 20, 1979.
10. David Warnick to Newt Gingrich, 1979, box 145, File: Convicted Felons, NGP.
11. Craig Shirley, Citizen Newt: The Making of a Reagan Conservative (Nashville: Nelson Books, 2017), 42–43.
12. Sean M. Theriault, The Gingrich Senators: The Roots of Partisan Warfare in Congress (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013).
13. “Republicans Move to Expel Diggs, Convicted of Fraud, from House,” Los Angeles Times, March 1, 1979.
14. Gingrich to Staff, March 7, 1979, box 147, File: Task Force Stuff, NGP.
15. “Gingrich Agrees with Decision on Diggs,” Atlanta Daily World, July 8, 1979.
16. Frank Gregorsky, Personal Diary, December 13, 1980, in The First Two Years: Oral Histories, 45.
17. “Gingrich Unveils Proposals to Clean Up U.S. Congress,” Atlanta Daily World, February 28, 1980.
18. Richard J. Cattani, “Reagan, Congressional Republicans Display Unified Front,” Christian Science Monitor, September 16, 1980.
19. O.D. Resources, Project Majority: Building a Republican Team, November 5, 1979; Gingrich to Michel, May 5, 1981, box 40, File: Project Majority, NGP.
20. “Inaugural Day Notes: Being 15 Feet from Sinatra ‘Neat’ to Newt,” Atlanta Constitution, January 21, 1981.
21. David Broder, “The Meaning of the Mandate,” Washington Post, November 12, 1980.
22. Newt Gingrich, “Tip O’Neill Can Make Things Tough for Reagan,” December 1980, box 288, File: Dump O’Neill Project, NGP.
23. Michael Burns, interview with Frank Gregorsky, December 16, 1980, in The First Two Years; Gingrich to Conservative Colleague, 1980, box 288, File: Dump O’Neill Project, NGP.
24. Craig R. Hume, “Mr. Gingrich Goes to Washington,” Atlanta Constitution, January 14, 1979.
25. John M. Barry, The Ambition and the Power: A True Story of Washington (New York: Viking, 1989), 71.
26. Gingrich to Washington Team, June 8, 1981, box 291, File: Staff Memos 1982, NGP.
27. Dennis Farney, “Republicans Reflect on What They’ve Wrought,” Wall Street Journal, August 6, 1981.
28. Michael Reese, “The Right-Wing Revolt,” Newsweek, August 16, 1982, 24.
29. “Tax Vote Shows Politics Still Washington’s Game,” Atlanta Constitution, August 20, 1982.
30. Gingrich to Fellow Republican, March 18, 1982, box 456, COS Files 6–13, File: 12, NGP.
31. Ann Woolner, “Gingrich Tries to Shut Down Government to Prove Point,” Atlanta Constitution, April 4, 1982; Peter Grier, “Washington Warms Up to Balanced-Budget Law,” Christian Science Monitor, March 24, 1982.
32. Steven K. Beckner, “Rep. Newt Gingrich: A New Conservative Leader for the ’80s,” Conservative Digest, May 1982, 6–11.
33. “Newt Gingrich on the 1994 Republican Revolution.”
34. Gingrich, Lessons Learned the Hard Way, 170; Zack Smith, “For Newt: ‘Nixon’s the One!,’” Politico, January 20, 2012.
35. Gail Sheehy, “The Inner Quest of Newt Gingrich,” Vanity Fair, September 1995. For a study of the Conservative Opportunity Society (COS), see Zachary C. Smith, “From the Well of the House: Remaking the House Republican Party, 1978–1994” (Ph.D. diss., Boston University, 2012).
36. Newt to Friends, 1987, box 456, COS Files 6–13, File: 11, NGP.
37. Newt to Friends, 1987, box 456, COS Files 6–13, File: 11, NGP.
38. Gingrich to Whip Planning Group, June 14, 1983, box 456, COS Files 6–13, File: 12, NGP.
39. Gingrich to Colleague, February 8, 1983, box 460, COS, File: 30, NGP.
40. For a thoughtful collection of essays about Michel, see Frank H. Mackaman and Sean Q. Kelly, eds., Robert Michel: Leading the Republican House Minority (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2019).
41. “The House: A Brash New Republican Style,” Newswee
k, February 27, 1984, 45.
42. Gingrich to Michel, June 8, 1983, box 458, COS, File: 22, NGP.
43. Bill Lee to Congressman Gingrich and Eddie Mahe Jr., January 31, 1984, box 1078, File: NA, NGP.
44. Lee to Gingrich and Mahe, January 31, 1984. See also Lee to Gingrich and Vin Weber, February 17, 1984, box 462, File: 55, NGP.
45. “Legislative Action,” C-SPAN video archives, January 25, 1985.
46. Gingrich to Tom Coleman, Vin Weber, Mark Siljander, and Don Ritter, June 27, 1983, WHORM, Subject File, box F0008, File: 174424, RRPL.
47. Gingrich to Coleman, Weber, Siljander, and Ritter, June 27, 1983.
48. T. R. Reid, “Congress: The Best Little Soap Opera on Television,” Washington Post, April 29, 1984.
49. Stephen E. Frantzich and John Sullivan, The C-SPAN Revolution (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1996), 275.
50. Minutes, COS, December 17, 1983, box 44, File: Frank Gregorsky on Memos from Newt 1994, MSP.
51. “Symposium: Jack Kemp and the Reagan Revolutionaries in the House,” March 6, 1982, Jack Kemp Oral History Archive, 20–21.
52. Richard Berke, “Trent Lott and His Fierce Freshmen,” New York Times, February 2, 1997.
53. Newt Gingrich, interview with Morton Kondracke, December 13, 2012, Jack Kemp Oral History Archive, 25.
54. Zelizer, On Capitol Hill, 214.
55. Julian E. Zelizer, Arsenal of Democracy: The Politics of National Security—from World War II to the War on Terrorism (New York: Basic Books, 2010), 81–273.
56. Nancy J. Schwerzler, “Gingrich on Crusade Against Democrats,” Baltimore Sun, May 21, 1984.
57. Gingrich to Reagan, July 1, 1983, WHORM Subject File, box F00303, File: 152945, RRPL.
58. Jim Wright, Personal Diary, April 24, 1984, JWA.
59. Frances E. Lee, Insecure Majorities: Congress and the Perpetual Campaign (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2016), 96.
60. Editorial, “‘Dear Comandante,’” Wall Street Journal, April 17, 1984.
61. Jim Wright, Personal Diary, April 24, 1984, JWA.
62. “Televised Partisan Skirmishes Erupt in House,” Congressional Quarterly, February 11, 1984, 246.
63. Newt Gingrich, “House Floor Strategy for Republicans,” 1984, box 692, File: June Files, NGP.
64. Bill Lee to Eddie Mahe and Newt Gingrich, July 15, 1983, box 458, File: 22, NGP.
65. Shirley, Citizen Newt, 100–101.
66. Marcus Stern, “Young Conservatives Make Waves at Every Chance on the House Floor,” Daily Breeze, April 16, 1984.
67. Frantzich and Sullivan, C-SPAN Revolution, 51.
68. Michel to O’Neill, May 11, 1984, box 458, File: 26, NGP.
69. John Lawrence, Class of ’74: Congress After Watergate and the Roots of Partisanship (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2018).
70. Chris Matthews, Tip and the Gipper: When Politics Worked (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2013), 295.
71. “Newt Gingrich on the 1994 Republican Revolution.”
72. “A Conversation with Newt Gingrich,” C-SPAN video archives, December 10, 1986.
73. Eileen McNamara, “Shouting Match,” Boston Globe, May 16, 1984.
74. Shirley, Citizen Newt, 103–104.
75. Richard Cheney and Lynne Cheney, Kings of the Hill: Power and Personality in the House of Representatives (New York: Continuum, 1983).
76. Phil McCombs, “The Unsettling Calm of Dick Cheney,” Washington Post, April 3, 1991.
77. “Republicans Assail O’Neill; Increasing Hostility Feared,” New York Times, May 18, 1984.
78. Deborah Baldwin, “Pulling Punches,” Common Cause Magazine, May/June 1985, 23.
79. T. R. Reid, “O’Neill, Colleagues Trade Static,” Washington Post, May 15, 1984, www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1984/05/15/oneill-colleagues-trade-static/72a6b45e-4e1a-4f36-8229-8f12d43f185e.
80. Katharine Q. Seelye, “Gingrich First Mastered the Media and Then Rose to Be King of the Hill,” New York Times, December 14, 1994.
81. Matthews, Tip and the Gipper, 206.
82. David Osborne, “The Swinging Days of Newt Gingrich,” Mother Jones, November 1, 1984; Myra MacPherson, “Newt Gingrich, Point Man in a House Divided,” Washington Post, June 12, 1989; Peter Osterlund, “The Capitol Chameleon,” Los Angeles Times Magazine, August 25, 1991.
83. Tom Shales, “As the Hill Turns,” Washington Post, May 17, 1984.
84. Lungren to COS, May 29, 1984, box 458, File: 27, NGP.
85. David Crook, “House TV: Is It out of Control,” Los Angeles Times, May 24, 1984.
86. Jim Wright, Personal Diary, May 16, 1984, JWA.
87. Greg McDonald, “Newt Gingrich Is Making His Mark on the GOP These Days,” Atlanta Constitution, December 15, 1983.
88. Jonathan Alter et al., “Reagan’s Roaring Start,” Newsweek, September 3, 1984, 30.
89. “GOP Platform Panel Bars Tax Hikes, Defies Reagan,” Los Angeles Times, August 14, 1984.
90. Greg McDonald, “Newt Gingrich Is Current Superman of GOP Convention,” Atlanta Constitution, August 22, 1984.
91. Osborne, interview with author, April 17, 2017.
92. Osborne, “Swinging Days of Newt Gingrich.”
93. David Boles, interview with Alan McConnell, 1985, box 24, File: Working Toward a Conservative Opportunity Society, 103, MSP.
94. Lois Romano, “Newt Gingrich, Maverick on the Hill,” Washington Post, January 3, 1985.
95. Gingrich to Republican Colleagues, December 4, 1984, box 456, File: 10B, NGP.
96. Eleanor Randolph, “Odd Man Out in the House,” Washington Post, January 1, 1985.
97. C-SPAN video archives, February 7, 1985.
98. The following account of Gingrich during the Indiana recount crisis comes from Nicholas Lemann, “Conservative Opportunity Society,” Atlantic, May 1985, 22–36. Lemann followed Gingrich around for a profile as this crisis unfolded. See also Lois Romano, “Rep. Gingrich Still Thinks Big, but Without Being So Abrasive,” Boston Globe, January 30, 1985.
99. Lemann, “Conservative Opportunity Society.”
100. Lemann, “Conservative Opportunity Society.”
101. Lemann, “Conservative Opportunity Society.”
102. Lemann, “Conservative Opportunity Society.”
103. Lemann, “Conservative Opportunity Society.”
104. Lemann, “Conservative Opportunity Society.”
105. Jim Wright, Personal Diary, March 5, 1985, JWA.
106. Guy Vander Jagt, press conference, April 16, 1985, transcript, box 471, File: Republican Leadership, NGP.
107. Zach Nauth, “House Task Force Vote Favors Democrat,” Los Angeles Times, April 23, 1985.
108. Zach Nauth and Paul Houston, “GOP Protests Plan to Seat Democrat in 14 Hour Fight,” Los Angeles Times, April 24, 1985.
109. “First Week of Democratic Dictatorship in the U.S. House,” April 16, 1985, box 471, File: Republican Leadership, NGP.
110. Stephen Engelberg, “G.O.P. Plans a Showdown Today on Disputed Indiana Seat,” New York Times, April 30, 1985.
111. Mark Starr, “Congress: A House Divided,” Newsweek, April 22, 1985, 29.
112. Robert Michel et al. to Republican Colleagues, April 29, 1985, box 471, File: Republican Leadership, NGP.
113. C-SPAN video archives, April 30, 1985.
114. Newt Gingrich, “Notes on Self Government,” Atlanta Daily World, May 5, 1985.
115. Steven V. Roberts, “A House Divided,” New York Times, May 3, 1985.
116. Margaret Shapiro and Dan Balz, “House Seats McCloskey,” Washington Post, May 2, 1985.
117. Shapiro and Balz, “House Seats McCloskey.”
118. Gloria Borger, “Paralysis in the House,” Newsweek, May 13, 1985, 36.
11
9. Newt Gingrich, “Notes on Self Government,” Atlanta Daily World, May 12, 1985.
120. Jim Wright, Personal Diary, May 2, 1985, JWA.
Chapter 3: The Perfect Foil
1. Steven Roberts, “Democrats Also Select Foley as Majority Leader—Coelho Defeats Rangel for Whip Position; Wright Is Chosen as Next Speaker of House,” New York Times, December 8, 1986.
2. “James C. Wright Jr.,” New York Times, December 9, 1986.
3. “A Conversation with Newt Gingrich,” C-SPAN video archives, December 10, 1986.
4. J. Brooks Flippen, Speaker Jim Wright: Power, Scandal, and the Birth of Modern Politics (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2018), 20–21.
5. Flippen, Speaker Jim Wright, 23; Ben Procter, “Jim Wright,” in Profiles in Power: Twentieth-Century Texans in Washington (Arlington Heights, Ill.: Harlan Davidson, 1993).
6. John M. Barry, The Ambition and the Power: A True Story of Washington (New York: Viking, 1989), 44–45.
7. Nathan Koppel and Kristina Peterson, “Jim Wright, Former House Speaker, Dies at 92,” Wall Street Journal, May 6, 2015.
8. Flippen, Speaker Jim Wright, 25.
9. Flippen, Speaker Jim Wright, 32–35.
10. Flippen, Speaker Jim Wright, 39.
11. Flippen, Speaker Jim Wright, 47–48.
12. Rowland Stiteler, “The Most Powerful Texan in Washington,” D Magazine, March 1980.
13. Stiteler, “The Most Powerful Texan in Washington.”
14. Paul West, “The Wright Stuff,” New Republic, October 14, 1985.
15. Jack Z. Smith, “Growing Up Wright,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, February 17, 1985.
16. Jeff Prince, “The Speaker in Winter,” Fort Worth Weekly, July 4, 2007.
17. Flippen, Speaker Jim Wright, 98.
18. Smith, “Growing Up Wright.”
19. Brian Cervantez, Amon Carter: A Lone Star Life (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2019), 202–3.
20. David R. Mayhew, Congress: The Electoral Connection (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1974).
21. Fawn Vrazo, “How Texans See Wright’s Predicament,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 5, 1988.
22. The Changing Congress: The Rules of the Game, National Educational Television Network, 1965, Texas Archive of the Moving Picture (Austin).