Murder at the President's House

by J. R. Johnson

  Wilson earned his Ph,D, in political science at John Hopkins. Except for John Adams, who received an M.A. from Harvard, no President ever was awarded one, though many of them won honorary degrees. Two undertook university-level study abroad briefly: John Quincy Adams at Holland’s University of Leyden, and Kennedy at the London School of Economics. Madison accomplished a year of additional study at the College of New Jersey (now Princeton) following his graduation, as did also Franklin D. Roosevelt at Harvard.

  Many Chief Executives undertook specialized professional training, particularly in the field of law. Graduates of law schools were Hayes (Harvard University), Taft (Cincinnati Law School), Wilson (University of Virginia), Nixon (Duke University), and Ford (Yale University). Those who attended schools but did not obtain degrees were McKinley (Albany Law School), both Roosevelts (Columbia University), Truman (Kansas City Law School), and Lyndon B. Johnson (Georgetown University).

  The following read law in the days before formal legal training was available or commonplace: both Adamses, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Jackson, Van Buren, Tyler, Polk, Fillmore, Pierce, Buchanan, Lincoln, Garfield, Arthur, Cleveland, Benjamin Harrison, Harding, and Coolidge. In addition, at least three of those who matriculated at law schools---Hayes, McKinley, and Taft--also read law.

  Another marked similarity is in the performance of military service. Twenty-four (24), or about two-thirds of the Presidents have served in various branches of the Armed Forces or state militia units, one,Buchanan, in a private volunteer group during the War of 1812 . Interestingly enough, all except him attained officer status, eleven (11) as generals. A few worked their way up from enlisted ranks.

  Three became commanders of the Army: Washington, Grant, and Eisenhower.

  For at least 11, notable success as officers provided a stepping stone on their way to the Presidency: Washington,Jackson, William Henry Harrison, Taylor, Pierce, Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Benjamin Harrison, Theodore Roosevelt, and Eisenhower--only three of whom (Taylor, Grant and Eisenhower) were professional soldiers for the major part of their lives. The only erstwhile naval personnel among the Chief Executives have been the last five Presidents (Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Nixon, Ford and Carter), all of whom served as officers below the admiral rank.

  Despite the trend toward urbanization in the United States from its earliest days, the Presidents have overwhelmingly hailed from small towns and rural areas. , Only Theodore Roosevelt, Taft, Kennedy, and Ford were born in metropolitan areas or large cities. A number who came from rural areas, including Jackson, Polk, Fillmore, Buchanan, Lincoln, and Garfield, as well as possibly Taylor and Pierce, literally rose from “log cabins “ to the White House. Most of the others were born in modest homes amid humble or middle-class surroundings. Van Buren was born in his father’s tavern. A few individuals of agrarian origins belonged to well-to-do families; or they and members of their families subsequently advanced to positions of wealth and prominence.

  In line with the predominance of rural origins, the fathers of more than the Presidents were, at one time or another, farmers or plantations owners. Others were professional men or executives, including several lawyers, clergymen, teachers, and financiers. Additional diverse occupations include: ironmaker, livestock dealer, carpenter, blacksmith, tanner, tavern keeper, surveyor, mechanic, storekeeper, merchant, and tavern porter.

  According to a recent survey of nearly 70 people who lived a century or longer revealed that the best United States President of the past 100 years to nearly 40 percent of the group was Franklin D. Roosevelt.

  When a New President of the United States take office and moves into the White House, he enters a dwelling that is a home, office, and goldfish bowl as well a “protective bubble” all in one. The president’s family must get used to it, he must do the best he possibly can within it and in spite of it. He is never far from crowds or the glare of the limelight, and at times he must surely be the loneliest man in America, when he is called on to sit alone and make a decision that may change the course of both American and world history.

  The President is the people possession for four years or eight years in some cases: when he speaks. he speaks for the people, and the White House has long echoes in its hallways and corridors. For example, the White House gets part of its tone from one President who never lived in it--George Washington.

  For an executive mansion he had a imposing town house in New York and then in Philadelphia. He held “levees” after the royal manner, with powdered footmen in the entrance hall. He lived in a style intended to prove that the Chief Executive of the United States was a person of great importance.

  In recent decades the world has drawn much closer to the White House. Perhaps it would not be too much to say that the heads of states of foreign nations take an alert in what happens there as the governor of the several states did in the old days. Still the White House is a peculiarly American institution. It reflects the personality of the man who occupies the White House, it also reflects the total personality of the people who voted and put him there. It is their own special possession and symbol, embodying what they have hoped for and dreamed of and want to live up to.

  Still the man who lives in the White House must find the care of the of office as inescapable as his own flesh and bone. To talk to a friend who has a new baby to welcome or death to mourn, he may to snatch moments from planning an international conference.

  The White House which is the central Executive Residence, flanked by the East Wing West Wing as well as Office Building-the former State Department which now houses offices for the President’s staff and the Vice President--and Blair House, a guest residence. The Chief Usher coordinates the day to day household functional operations at the White House.

  The White House includes a building comprising six stories and 55,000 square feet, 132 rooms and 35 bathrooms, 412 doors, 147 windows, twenty-eight fireplaces, eight staircases, three elevators, five full-time chefs, a tennis court, a single lane bowling alley(officially called the Harry S. Truman Bowling Alley), a movie theater(officially the White House Family Theater), a jogging track, a swimming pool, a putting green. It receives up to 30,000 visitors each a week. -the Ground Floor, State Floor, Second Floor, and Third Floor, as well as a two-story basement. The White House was constructed on October 13, 1792, the house was designed by James Hoban of white painted Aquia Creek sandstone in the Neoclassical Palladian style.

  On Saturday, November 1, 1800, John Adams became the first president to take up residence in the building. During Adams second day in the White House, he wrote a letter to his wife Abigail, containing a prayer for the house. President Adams wrote:

  “ I pray Heaven to bestow the best of blessings on this House, and all that shall hereafter inhabit it. May none but honest and wise men ever rule under this roof.”

  Franklin D. Roosevelt had Adams's blessing carved into the mantel in the State Dining Room.

  When Thomas Jefferson moved into the house into the house in 1801, he (with architect Benjamin Henry Latrobe) expanded the building outward creating two colonnades that were meant to conceal stables and storage areas.

  In 1814, during the War of 1812, the executive mansion was set ablaze by the British Army in the Burning of Washington, destroying the interior and charring much of the exterior. Reconstruction began almost immediately, and President James Monroe moved into the partially reconstructed Executive Residence in October 1817. Construction continued with the addition of the South Portico in 1824 and the North in 1829. Because of crowding within the executive mansion itself, President Theodore Roosevelt had all work offices relocated to the newly constructed West Wing in 1901. Eight years later, President Williams Howard Taft expanded the West Wing and created the first Oval Office which was eventually moved as the section was expanded. The third floor attic was converted to living quarters in 1927 by augmenting the existing hip roof with long shed dormers. A newly constructed East Wing was used as a reception area for social events; Jefferson's colonnades
connected the new wings. East Wing alterations were completed additional office space. By 1948, the house’s load bearing exterior walls and internal wood beams exterior walls and internal wood beams were found to be close to failure. Under President Harry S. Truman, the interior rooms were completely dismantled and a new internal load bearing steel frame constructed inside the walls. Once this work was completed, interior rooms were rebuilt.

  The term White House is often used a metonym for the Executive Office of the President of the United States and for the president’s administration and advisers in general, as in “The White House had decided that…”

  The property is a National Heritage Site owned by the National Park Service and is part of the President’s Park.

  The White House Complex is protected by the United States Secret Service and the United States Park Police.

  NASAMS (Norwegian Advanced Surface to Air Missile System) were used to guard air space over Washington, D.C. during the 1992 presidential inauguration. The same NASAMS units have since been used to protect the president and all air space around the White House which is strictly prohibited to aircraft. For security reasons, the section of Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House is closed to all vehicular traffic, except government officials.

  Marine One is sometimes the preferred alternative to presidential motorcades, which can be expensive and logistically difficult. The controlled environment of a helicopter adds greatly to the safety factor as well. It is used to transport senior Cabinet staff and foreign dignitaries.

  The rotor rung fast and the helicopter rose several hundreds of feet off the ground.. The copter hovered above the ground. Two others just like it rose and joined it, before it gained attitude and left the area of the White House complex.

  The other two helicopters gunships carrying heavy duty electronics to detect any threat to the presidential helicopter from a missile, from an airplane, from a shot fired from the ground, and to take electronic countermeasures to the fired shot if necessary.

  The Presidential helicopter flew on the left side of the formation this particular afternoon. Sometimes it flew in the middle, sometimes on the right. An attacker would not know which helicopter carried the President on board of it. This has been referred to as a presidential shell game. As a security measure Marine One always flies in a group with identical helicopters as many as five.

  Marine aviators flying Marine One do not wear flight suits during flights, but rather the Marine Blue Dress Charlie/Delta uniform. More than 800 Marine supervise the operation of the Marine One fleet, which is based in MCAF Quantico, Virginia, with additional operating location at Naval Support Facility Anacostia in the District of Columbia, but is more often seen in action on the South Lawn of the White House. At Joint Base Andrews Naval Facility in Maryland, it is sometimes used to connect to Air Force for longer journeys. Marine One is met on the ground by at least one Marine in full dress uniform(most often two with one acting as an armed guard).

  Marine One is also equipped with standard military anti-missile countermeasures such as flares to counter heat-seeking missiles and chaff to counter radar-guided missiles, as well as AN/ALQ-14A infrared countermeasures. HMX-1 operates a total of thirty-five (35) helicopters of four differents types.

  To add to the security of Marine One, every member of HMX-1 is required to pass a Yankee White background check before touching any of the helicopters used for presidential travel.

  Marine One is transported via C-17 or C-5 military transport planes(as is the president’s limousine) wherever the President travels, within the U.S. as well as overseas. At presidential inauguration, the Marines offer the outgoing President a final flight from the U.S. Capitol to Joint Base Andrews Naval Air Facility.

  Marine One has not been the subject of any accident or attack through 1993.

  On June 20, 1993 five months to the day Thomas Jefferson Reid took office as President of the United States, the White House Counsel Richard Royster day began with nothing out of the ordinary. He decide to forgo his morning jog, and his wife Rebecca described his demeanor that day as better than it had been” in a while.” Royster left for work promptly at about 8:00 a.m. Rebecca saw him for the last time standing “stiffly” in the kitchen.

  She kissed him goodbye in their quaint kitchen, as he left their Georgetown home driving his 1990 silver-gray Honda Accord which bore Tennessee license plates. On the way to the White House, he dropped his daughter, Jessica, off at work and his son, Robert, at the Dupont Circle metro station for the Scholastic Aptitude Test preparation course.

  He arrived a bit later than usual to his office, at 8:50 a.m. rather than his customarily punctual 8:00 a.m. He had time to grab a cup of coffee and a bran muffin before attending the 9:00 a.m. morning meeting of the White House Counsel office staff. After the meeting ended, he attended a White House ceremony announcing the appointment of William Freeman to replace Dennis Reed, who had been fired amidst allegations of ethical improprieties the day before. It was the first time in history a president had fired a head of the FBI, Reed would later declare his firing had “seriously compromised” the Royster investigation.

  Before Linda Jones left the office for her lunch hour, she asked if there was anything she could do for her boss “No,” Royster said, “I believe I have everything,. I need”

  Jones said, “Yes sir, I will see you later after lunch.” Royster responds, “Have a nice lunch Linda.”

  After reading the The Washington Post, newspaper for a few minutes, he then decides to go out to lunch at his favorite restaurant in Georgetown, The Daily Grill. He told his secretary Jones”I will be back after lunch.”

  He walked out of his office after offering his co-worker Deborah Smith some leftover M&M’s from his official White House candy jar. He was wearing his Brooks Brothers navy blue pinstripe suit, white shirt with striped tie and black Johnston Murphy wing tips shoes upon his departure from his office. Royster did not carry his leather monogrammed briefcase or anything else in his hands to lunch.

  As Royster left the White House he passed by Secret Service agent Robert Gates, the last person known to have seen the White House Counsel alive.

  “How are you doing, sir?” Gates asked.

  “Fine,” Royster replied, giving the agent a half smile as he walked off, out of the door of the White House.

  Upon his arrival at the Daily Grill at 1310 Wisconsin Avenue NW, in which the Georgetown Inn is conveniently located with the premises. Royster turned off his cell phone to avoid any interruptions while having his lunch on that particular day away his office. A number of people tried unsuccessfully to reach him by cell phone. One missed call showed up on his cell phone, C. Grantham Hunt, Royster’s former partner at the Hart Law Firm called to discuss finalizing work that Hunt had been doing to set up a blind trust for the Reid’s. Royster, who was acting as Hunt’s contact point at the White House, was supposed to have the Reid’s sign some documents to complete the process.

  Hunt stated that there was nothing about the blind trust that would have provided a source of concern to Royster, nor did Royster ever express any concern.

  He dined heartedly on a California chicken burger, French fries, kale caesar salad complimented with a Sea Breeze. He finished his lunch and hailed down a cab at the corner of M Street & Wisconsin Avenue NW, returning to his office at the White House at 2:00 p.m.

  Contrary to the White House spin, Richard Royster’s connection to the Reid’s was primarily via Ashley rather than Tom, Richard and Ashley had been partners at the Hart law firm and allegations of an outgoing affair had persisted from Memphis days to the White House itself.

  Richard Royster had been struggling with the Presidential Blind Trust that normally is a trivial matter, the trust had been delayed for five months and the U.S. Trustee was beginning to make noises. One of the requirements imposed on the Presidency is that the personal wealth of the First Family be placed in a blind trust for the term of office. The reasons for this step should be o
bvious. The First Family, with access to inside information, is in a position to personally profit quite handsomely from that information. There is a name for that. It is called “insider trading” and it’s a crime.

  The reason that the trust is “blind” with the First Family unaware of just exactly how their funds are invested, is to prevent awareness of personal wealth from influencing matters of National Policy.

  Since its inception, each President has had the blind trust completed and in the hands of a trustee at the time of the President’s inauguration as required.

  With one exception.

  The trust declarations for Thomas Reid’s assets were not delivered to the trustee’s office on Inauguration Day. Or the day after that, or the next week, or the week after that, or the next month, or the month after that!

  On June 20, 1993, five months to the day after Tom Reid vowed to preserve, protect, and defend the United States Constitution, the trust declarations still languished, unfinished, on the desk of the man tasked to complete them, the White House Counsel Richard Royster.