Before the Storm

by Rick Perlstein

  172 The source for White’s biography is F. Clifton White with Jerome Tuccille, Politics as a Noble Calling (Ottawa, Ill.: Jameson Books, 1994). The comparison to Jimmy Stewart is from author interview with William A. Rusher. For his headlong embrace of backroom politics, see E. J. Dionne Jr., Why Americans Hate Politics (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1991), 177.

  173 “Learn from them”: White with Tuccille, Noble Calling, 58.

  174 For the creation of Clif White’s Young Republican machine I rely on White with Tuccille, 65-79; William Rusher, The Rise of the Right (New York: Morrow, 1984), 67-70, 78-79; “Old Friends,” pamphlet, LN; and author interviews with Rusher and Leonard Nadasdy. John Lindsay would soon go on to work for the Justice Department to help craft the 1957 Civil Rights Act.

  175 White sat alone in his hotel room: White with Tuccille, Noble Calling, 73.

  176 The resolutions committee, traditionally: Rusher, Rise of the Right, 70.

  176 For the business-politics movement White pioneered, see White with Tuccille, Noble Calling, 109-131; David J. Galligan, Politics and the Businessmen (New York: Pitman, 1964); “Businessmen in Politics: A GOP Candidate Is Defeated as Effort Is Made to Organize Business Behind Him,” WSJ, March 6, 1959; Max P. Skelton, “Gulf’s Political Program Studied by Other Firms,” Midland (Texas) Reporter, July 26, 1959, clip in CM, Box 70/1.

  177 One day in the summer of 1961: Rusher interview; Rusher, Rise of the Right, 98-99.

  177 Rusher called Clif White: ibid., 100-101; Rusher interview.

  178 White’s astonishingly detailed organizational files for Volunteers for Nixon-Lodge are in FCW, Box 8. For his midlife crisis see White with Tuccille, Noble Calling, 132-33; and F. Clifton White with William Gill, Suite 3505: The Story of the Draft Goldwater Movement (New Rochelle, N.Y.: Arlington House, 1967), 25.

  178 For the founding and first two meetings of the Draft Goldwater organization through the opening of an office: White with Tuccille, Noble Calling, 137-43; White with Gill, Suite 3505, 30-51; Rusher, Rise of the Right, 98-110; Jon Margolis, The Last Innocent Year: America in 1964: The Beginning of the “Sixties” (New York: Morrow, 1999), 22; and Rusher interview. For BMG’s appearance on Issues and Answers, see Lee Edwards, Goldwater: The Man Who Made a Revolution (Washington, D.C.: Regnery, 1995), 153.

  180 I draw my sense of the Rube Goldberg system for deciding Republican nominees, and White’s strategy for exploiting it, from Andrew E. Busch, Outsiders and Openness in the Presidential Nominating System (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1997), 66-76; Nicol C. Rae, The Decline and Fall of the Liberal Republicans: From 1952 to the Present (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989), 55-57; and Schlesinger, ed., History of American Presidential Elections, 3012.

  181 For Suite 3505 in the Chanin Building I rely on White with Gill, Suite 3505, 52-54; Rusher interview; and author visit.

  181 White’s materials for slide talks, including an example of his delegate map, are in FCW, Boxes 8 and 19. For his Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Midwestern, and Western trips, see White with Gill, Suite 3505, 55-56. For the bombings of ministers’ homes, see “Terror Bombs,” LAT, February 2, 1962, A1. For Rousselot, see Rusher to White, February 28, 1962, WAR, Box 18/“Congressional Contact.” Rousselot-a good soldier and a good spy: in 1965 Ronald Reagan noted that Rousselot was “willing to do anything from calling me names in public to endorsement—whatever we want.” Schuparra, Triumph of the Right, 116.

  182 For the third, Minnesota, meeting: White to Rusher, March 26, 1962, WAR, Box 154/4; White to Tope, March 27, 1962, and White to Barr, April 6, 1962, FCW, Box 19; Rusher, Rise of the Right, 136; White and Gill, Suite 3505, 56-60; and Rusher interview. “Sons of Business” affair: Thomas C. Reeves, A Question of Character: A Life of John F. Kennedy (New York: Free Press, 1991), 331.

  183 For fund-raising difficulties, see Ralph Bachenheimer correspondence in WAR, Box 154/4. For “Tope-Fernald Agency Account,” see “Letter of Understanding,” Fernald and Tope to Milliken, February 1962, WAR, Box 155/3. For ACA’s parallel efforts for the 1962 congressional elections, see invitation to November 14, 1961, meeting in FCW, Box 3/Miscellaneous; and “Group of Conservatives Assigns Secret Aides to 46 Candidates,” NYT, October 22, 1962, A1. That was the exact amount: White with Gill, Suite 3505, 62.

  183 White’s trip to Seattle: ibid., 68-69. For Chapman and Guilder’s “flaming moderates,” see Time, February 10. 1961; Paul Tillett, ed., Inside Politics: The National Conventions 1960 (Dobbs Ferry, N.Y.: Oceana Publications, 1962), 46; Hayden, “Who Are the Student Boatrockers?,” Mademoiselle, August 1961; and Rae, Decline and Fall, 81. For the movement to dump Goldwater, see Edward Cain, They’d Rather Be Right: Youth and the Conservative Movement (New York: Macmillan, 1963), 267.

  183 Washington State Republicans: August 14, 1962, press release in WAR, Box 154/4. AP and Texas polls: White with Gill, Suite 3505, 78. For Chubb Fellowship, see Kitchel to BMG, November 6, 1961, Kitchel to Williams, December 14, 1961, Williams to Kitchel, December 30, 1961, Griswold to Kitchel, April 19, 1962, Kitchel to Williams, April 27, 1962, and Brown to BMG, May 16, 1962, all in DK, Box 1/Goldwater, Barry 1947-63; and Richard Brookhiser, Weekly Standard, July 6, 1999.

  184 He removed himself: Robert Novak, “Boost for Rocky Seen as Goldwater Curtails Nationwide Politicking,” WSJ, September 14, 1962; and Novak, Agony of the GOP, 76. White, on the verge of eviction: White with Gill, Suite 3505, 75.

  184 For the NFRW convention, see ibid., 73-74.

  185 For White’s recruiting of the AMA’s president, see Annis to White, November 20, 1962, in FCW, Box 18/“American Medical Association.” For the AMA and right-wing politics: Schuparra, Triumph of the Right, 5, 18 (for Warren); Cary Reich, The Life of Nelson A. Rockefeller: Worlds to Conquer, 1908-1958 (New York: Doubleday, 1996), 507 (for HEW); Bill Boyarsky, The Rise of Ronald Reagan (New York: Random House, 1968), 101 (for Reagan and Medicare); and Tom Wicker, JFK and LBJ: The Influence of Personality upon Politics (Baltimore: Penguin, 1968), 34, 67. For AMA-PAC, see “Report of James L. McDevitt, National Director, Committee on Political Education, AFL-CIO,” FCW, Box 19/“Campaigning.” For the involvement of AMA Suite 3505, see invitation to November 14, 1961, meeting in FCW, Box 3/Miscellaneous.

  185 For the Syndicate’s loss of the YRs, I rely on White with Gill, Suite 3505, 31; and author interviews with Leonard Nadasdy and William Rusher. For Nadasdy’s reign: “Young Republican National Federation: A Record of Accomplishment,” “Dear Friend,” letter, April 25, 1962, and “Old Friends” pamphlet, all in LN; Nadasdy to author, August 23, 1998; Nadasdy interview; and Nadasdy to Nichols, March 21, 1963, FCW, Box 18/“Young Republicans.”

  185 For Hutar, see John Kessel, The Goldwater Coalition: Republican Strategies in 1964 (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1968), 144. For Hutar and Harff’s elections, I rely on Nadasdy and Rusher interviews; and “Old Friends.” For Chicago meeting of White coalition, see White to Hutar, May 3. 1962, and June 21, 1962, and meeting minutes, July 7, 1962, all in FCW, Box 18/“Young Republicans.” For Hutar’s travels, see Bree to Hutar, July 18, 1962, and October 10, 1962; Hutar to Bree, July 23, 1962 Rehmann to Cushing, November 5, 1962; and Hutar to Failor, February 18, 1963, all in FCW, Box 18/“Young Republicans.” And they got to work discrediting: Bree to Hutar, August 21, 1962; Hutar to Bree, August 23, 1962; White to Barr, September 25, 1962, ibid.

  186 BMG to Yerger letter: White with Gill, Suite 3505, 78.

  186 For White’s post-election meeting with BMG and plans for December meeting, see White with Gill, Suite 3505, 87-91.

  186 “This meeting will determine”: White to Rusher, October 18, 1962, WAR, Box 155/5. For meeting called by Senator Case, see NYHT, November 16, 1962.

  187 For the Essex Motel meeting: White with Gill, Suite 3505, 92-101; Theodore H. White, Making of the President 1964 (New York: Atheneum, 1965), 116; Novak, Agony of the GOP, 127; colored map in FCW, White/“Primaries, maps, etc.”; and Rusher interview. “Look, everybody’s been talking”: Edwards,
Goldwater, 164.

  187 The next morning, back in Alabama: Grenier to White, December 5, 1962, FCW, Box 19/“Alabama.”

  187 “A secret, highly confidential”: White with Gill, Suite 3505, 104. “SECRET MEET TO PUSH GOLDWATER”: San Francisco Examiner, December 4, 1961, A1. “GOLDWATER ’64 BOOM”: NYHT, December 4, 1962. The editorial was December 5, 1962. Alsop’s conclusion—and perhaps the earliest use of the phrase “Southern strategy”—is in undated clip, WAR, Box 154/7. The spy’s report, with verbatim quotes, ran in Advance (Spring 1963).

  188 For RNC meeting, see White with Gill, Suite 3505, 115; and Novak, Agony of the GOP, 101. For the closed-door session, see New Haven Register, December 8, 1962; and undated Alsop clip. An exceptional source for the battle over the Southern strategy is the long exchange of letters between RNC members Katherine Neuberger of New Jersey and Charlton Lyons of Louisiana in WAR, Box 155/7.

  188 On the RNC budget crisis, see Kessel, Goldwater Coalition, 125, 147.

  188 “I think you have summed up”: BMG to Kellar, December 7, 1962, DK, Box 2/Kellar.

  189 For the Phoenix Country Club meeting, see “Questions,” December 23, 1962, DK, Box 4/Draft Goldwater Endeavor; and Edwards, Goldwater, 165.

  189 Goldwater meeting with White on January 14: Rusher, Rise of the Right, 140; White with Gill, Suite 3505, 115-18.

  189 For Scranton inauguration and his tag as “first of the Kennedy Republicans,” see Murray Kempton, “Scranton of Pennsylvania,” TNR, February 16, 1963; and “New Broom,” Newsweek, January 27, 1963.

  190 Rusher wrote Goldwater: Rusher to Goldwater, January 18, 1963, WAR, Box 18/Goldwater Correspondence. Goldwater wrote back: BMG to Rusher, January 22, 1963, ibid. Frank Meyer, one of National Review’s: Meyer to BMG, February 11, 1963, ibid.

  190 “Would bend every muscle”: NYT, November 19, 1961.

  190 For February 5, 1963, meeting see Rusher interview and White with Gill, Suite 3505, 120-22.

  191 Half a dozen Suite 3505 leaders: ibid., 123-26; and Rusher interview.

  191 In March he brought Denison Kitchel: BMG to Kitchel, February 18, 1963, February 25, 1963, and Kitchel to BMG, March 5, 1963, all in AHF, Box 13/21; press release, March 19, 1963, AHF, Box 4/General Correspondence. Jay Hall, the GM executive, prepared a confidential: ibid., and “Program,” handwritten, February 23, 1963, DK, Box 4/Draft Goldwater Endeavor.

  191 On March 22 Goldwater appeared: transcript in RAC, Box 10/755.

  192 If it hadn’t been for Goldwater’s interposition: Novak, Agony of the GOP, 104; and Smith to White, cc Nichols and Rusher, March 14, 1963, WAR, Box 155/5.

  192 Robert Snowden, a Manion confederate: Kitchel to BMG, March 5, 1963, and BMG to Kitchel, March 8, 1963, in AHF, Box 21/11. Piles of mail were forwarded: Paraphernalia in DK, Box 4/Draft Goldwater Endeavor.

  192 Dominick’s refusal to chair is in White with Gill, Suite 3505, 128. Preparations for the National Draft Goldwater kickoff are described in Novak, Agony of the GOP, 129-30.

  192 The press conference transcript is in FCW, Box 18.

  193 “Another ‘draft Goldwater’ movement”: Novak, Agony of the GOP, 130. The paraphernalia is in WAR, Box 155/2. O’Donnell’s comment to reporters is recalled in Middendorf to O‘Donnell, FCW, Box 8/Peter O’Donnell. For reporters’ incredulity at White’s group, see Gilbert A. Harrison, “Way Out West: An Interim Report on Barry Goldwater,” TNR, November 23, 1963. “Barring miracles and accidents”: Newsweek, April 1, 1963.

  193 For Middendorf’s visit to Phoenix, see Middendorf to BMG, April 5, 1963, FCW, Box 18/Goldwater Correspondence. Their strategy memo is in WAR, Box 155/6.

  193 Shortly before O’Donnell’s press conference: Kitchell to Kellar, April 8, 1963, DK, Box 2/Kellar.

  194 A band of reporters cornered him: Novak, Agony of the GOP, 131. The National Draft Goldwater Committee chose: White, Suite 3505, 135. For Independence Day plans, see Viguerie to White, April 11, 1963, and Don Shafto resume, in FCW, Box 19/Rally.

  194 For NAR turning down endorsements and phone call with BMG, see Novak, Agony of the GOP, 115-16.

  194 For NAR’s unsuccessful marriage, and his affairs, see Reich, The Life of Nelson A. Rockefeller, 71-85, 202, 249-50, 470-76, 542-48 (the quote is on 473). There were rumors he was dating: Yerger to White, August 27, 1962, FCW, Box 19/Mississippi.

  194 For acceptability of divorced politicians, see Ellen Proxmire, One Foot in Washington: The Perilous Life of a Senator’s Wife (Washington, D.C.: R. B. Luce, 1964), 2; and Kathleen Hall Jamieson, Packaging the Presidency: A History and Criticism of Presidential Campaign Advertising, 3rd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), 108.

  195 For his marriage to Happy Murphy, see White, Making of the President 1964, 96-103. The From Here to Eternity photo is in Newsweek, June 3, 1963.

  195 “It is the plain fact”: Lionel Trilling, The Liberal Imagination: Essays on Literature and Society (New York: Viking, 1950), ix. Psychology of Women and Modern Woman: The Lost Sex are quoted in Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique (New York: Dell, 1984), 158, 119-21. “I think there is much”: Adlai Stevenson, “A Purpose for Modem Woman,” Women’s Home Companion, September 1955.

  196 Prescott Bush’s speech is in Time, June 14, 1963. The minister’s censure is in Novak, Agony of the GOP, 144. NAR’s appearance at the women’s conference is in Edwards, Goldwater, 176.

  197 For NAR’s supporters and the Maryland woman’s club, see Novak, Agony of the GOP, 143. For Dewey, see Ralph de Toledano, The Winning Side: The Case for Goldwater Republicanism (New York: MacFadden-Bartel, 1963), 145. The Texas GOP chair and Liz Taylor quote are in Time, June 14, 1963.

  197 Reinhold Niebuhr and the reaction of clergy is in Novak, Agony of the GOP, 144; Khrushchev, ibid., 146. For “deadsville” quote, see undated Frank Conniff clip in WAR, Box 154/7. Poll results are in White with Gill, Suite 3505, 148. Mail to New York congressmen is in NYT, May 26, 1963. The conspiracy theories of NAR and BMG are in Novak, Agony of the GOP, 145.

  197 For NAR’s slim support on the ground, see Richard Rovere, “Letter from Washington,” The New Yorker, November 3, 1963.

  197 The Cuba speech fallout is in Novak, Agony of the GOP, 106. For “fee” increase, liquor scandal, and newspaper strike, see ibid. and de Toledano, The Winning Side, 132.

  198 On April 20, Oklahoma Republicans: resolution in DK, Box 4/Draft Goldwater Endeavor. From Suite 3505, one million copies: White with Gill, Suite 3505, 257. White was so successful on a California trip: Richard Burgholz, LAT, April 30, 1963. Thruston Morton told Fortune: Richard Whalen, Taking Sides: A Personal View of America from Kennedy to Nixon to Kennedy (Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1974), 101. On the first Evans and Novak column, see Dionne, Why Americans Hate Politics, 381.

  198 For the H. L. Hunt rumor, see BMG to Kress, May 15, 1963, DK, Box 4/Draft Goldwater Endeavor. “Don’t say that,” he implored: Novak, Agony of the GOP, 155.

  198 For Nixon revival and Jack Paar appearance, see Matthews, Kennedy and Nixon, 221-22. For packaging of the ASNE speech, see FCW, Box 19/California. For Nixon’s approach to White, see White with Tuccille, Noble Calling, 151-52.

  199 That same May 2: Novak, Agony of the GOP, 156. On Romney generally, see B. J. Widdick, “Romney: New Hope for the GOP,” The Nation, February 3, 1962. For his 1958 testimony, see Novak, Agony of the GOP, 90. For his mismatches with his dinner hosts, see ibid., 88. For Knight pulling the plug, see ibid., 156.

  199 For “Draft Scranton” movement, McCabe quote, and speaking invitations, see George D. Wolf, William Warren Scranton: Pennsylvania Statesman (State College: Penn State Press, 1981), 88-89.

  199 For BMG’s Massachusetts appearance, see Novak, Agony of the GOP, 164. For the $1,000 dinner, see White with Gill, Suite 3505, 149; and Novak, Agony of the GOP, 145 (for cable).

  200 “I ask myself”: “GOP’s Goldwater: Busting Out All Over,” Newsweek, May 20, 1963. The finding that 59 percent of Americans claimed to have voted for JFK is in Alan Brinkley, Liberalism and Its Discon
tents (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998), 213. For Kristol quote, see M. Stanton Evans, The Future of Conservatism (New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1968), 94.

  200 BMG’s 5 percent pledge is in Newsweek, May 20, 1963.

  II. MOBS

  201 “It shall be unlawful”: C. Vann Woodward, The Strange Career of Jim Crow, 3rd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1973), 118. In 1957 a local black minister named Fred Shuttlesworth: Dan T. Carter, The Politics of Rage: George Wallace, the Origins of the New Conservatism, and the Transformation of American Politics (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1995), 107, 230.

  201 For U.S. Steel, see Carter, Politics of Rage, 115. For Connor’s early career, see Taylor Branch, Parting the Waters: America in the King Years, 1954-1963 (New York: Touchstone, 1988), 691.

  201 My sources for the Birmingham movement are Branch, Parting the Waters, 689-813; and Taylor Branch, Pillar of Fire: America in the King Years, 1963-1965 (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1998), 76-95.

  202 For “mutual respect and equality of opportunity” quote, see Branch, Parting the Waters, 737. “Just as we formerly pointed out”: ibid., 737-38.

  202 The drafting of King’s jail letter: ibid., 737-44.

  203 “The whole world is watching”: ibid., 757. The New York Times displayed: NYT, May 4, 1963.

  203 Pravda reported MONSTROUS: Branch, Parting the Waters, 786. In Massachusetts, Goldwater said: Time, June 14, 1963.

  204 At the White House, Kennedy dined: Ben Bradlee, Conversations with Kennedy (New York: Norton, 1975).

  204 Art Hanes’s quote is in Carter, Politics of Rage, 127.

  204 “Wherever the problem of race festered”: “The Jitters,” Newsweek, May 27, 1963. The garbage trucks detail is in Branch, Pillar of Fire, 101.