Before the Storm

by Rick Perlstein

  291 Unless otherwise specified, my telling of the Lodge story in New Hampshire is collated from Eugene Vasilew, “The New Style in Political Campaigns: Lodge in New Hampshire, 1964,” Review of Politics 30 (1968), no. 2; Brereton, “A Yankee Surprise”; Faber, ed., Road to the White House, 17-28; and William J. Miller, Henry Cabot Lodge: A Biography (New York: Heineman, 1967), 355-61.

  291 On Lester Wunderman, see Malcolm Gladwell, The New Yorker, July 6, 1998; and author interview with Eric Wunderman.

  292 For “Henry Sabotage” nickname, see Arthur Schlesinger Jr., ed., History of American Presidential Elections, 1798-1968, vol. 4 (New York: Chelsea House, 1971), 3015.

  293 For “conspicuous absentee” quote, see NYHT, January 26, 1964.

  293 For Loeb’s “holy crusade” editorial, see Manchester Union Leader, February 17, 1964, 1. The “appeaser” piece on Lodge was the next day.

  294 “I am not one of those baby-kissing”: White with Gill, Suite 3505, 292.

  294 For “Meet Mr. Lodge” camera technique, see Edwin Diamond and Stephen Bates, The Spot: The Rise of Political Advertising on Television (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1984), 101-2.

  295 For Cassius Clay, see LAT, February 26, 1964, A1; and Branch, Pillar of Fire, 230, 250. For Air Force One, see ibid., 236. For school boycott, see Ronald Formisano, Boston Against Busing: Race, Class, and Ethnicity in the 1960s and 1970S (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1991), 33. Louis Lomax: LAT, February 29, 1964.

  296 For LBJ conversations on Lodge, see Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge, 256-62.

  296 NAR commercial schedules: “Radio and TV Availabilities” chart, RAC, Box 11/931. For costs, see Box 11/928. For Goldwater New Hampshire spots, see AHFAV, BG-VT/97.

  296 “There isn’t a person here”: March 3, 1964, rally at University of New Hampshire, FSA, Box 4.

  297 Violent crimes had increased: President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice, The Challenge of Crime in a Free Society (New York: Dutton, 1968), 22. “Career Girl Murders”: Daniel Goleman, Emotional Intelligence (New York: Bantam Books, 1995), 13. This crime occurred on the same day as the “I Have a Dream Speech.” “Boston Strangler”: LAT, January 5, 1964, A17; Rita Lang Kleinfelder, When We Were Young, 168. Chicago: “‘Mother of Yr’ Slain in Home,” CT, January 23, 1964.

  297 For Manchester Armory, see Branch, Pillar of Fire, 241; Margolis, Last Innocent Year, 155; and, for speech, AHF, Box 1/13.

  297 At New Hampshire headquarters on Monday: Lee Edwards interview.

  298 For New Hampshire results, see White with Gill, Suite 3505, 297.

  298 “I do not plan”: Brereton, “A Yankee Surprise.”

  298 For Smith comment, see Smith to Jeane Dixon, March 12, 1964, in MCSL, Dixon, Jeane L., folder. For Nixon: NYT, March 12, 1964.

  298 In the New York Times: Faber, ed., Road to the White House, 29.

  14. PRESIDENT OF ALL THE PEOPLE

  299 For Lodge’s preparations for work, see “The Lodge Phenomenon,” Time, May 15, 1964. For “at the request of the friend,” see LBJ to AP luncheon, PPP: LBJ, 493-96.

  299 Lodge’s conversation with Eisenhower is in Francis X. Winters, The Year of the Hare: America in Vietnam, January 25, 1963-February 15, 1964 (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1997), 116; and Felix Belair, “Eisenhower Urges Lodge to Pursue GOP Nomination,” NYT, December 8, 1964. For Lodge’s colonial approach to Vietnam and prima donna behavior, see Winters, Year of the Hare, 2, 87, 166-73. For “run the country” quote, see Jon Margolis, The Last Innocent Year: America in 1964: The Beginning of the “Sixties” (New York: Morrow, 1999), 211. For Harkin, see H. R. McMaster, Dereliction of Duty: Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam (New York: HarperPerennial, 1997),57.

  300 For 42 percent poll figure, see Charles Brereton, “1964: A Yankee Surprise,” Historical New Hampshire 42, no. 3 (1981).

  300 My interpretation of the relationship of escalation in Vietnam to nuclear anxieties is indebted to Winters, Year of the Hare; of the failure of “graduated pressure” and Op Plan 34-A, to McMaster, Dereliction of Duty. For the 20,000 figure, see Pierre Salinger, With Kennedy (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1966), 348; for 15,000, Michael Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge: The Johnson White House Tapes, 1963-1964 (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1997), 74; for 16,000, Christopher Matthews, Kennedy and Nixon: The Rivalry That Shaped Postwar America (New York: Touchstone, 1996), 232. Dodgy accounting methods: author interview with Hank Geier. For statistic on NLF tax collection and U.S. dead, see Matthews, Kennedy and Nixon, 232.

  300 “We’re going to rough them up”: Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge, 300. For next day’s press conference, see PPP: LBJ, 254.

  301 For softball game explosion, hear LBJT 6402.12/6. Vietcong control of land is in McMaster, Dereliction of Duty, 61. Joint Chiefs’ memo is in McMaster, 109.

  301 “If I tried to pull out completely”: Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge, 266. For LBJ’s fixation on Korea example, see George C. Herring, “Conspiracy of Silence: LBJ, the Joint Chiefs, and Escalation of the War in Vietnam,” in Lloyd C. Gardner and Ted Gittinger, Vietnam: The Early Decisions (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1997). Ilya V. Gaiduk, “Turnabout?: The Soviet Policy Dilemma in the Vietnamese Conflict,” ibid., 207-18, observes that 1964 was “the lowest point in the history of Soviet-North Vietnamese relations.”

  301 For McNamara and Khanh tour, see Robert S. McNamara with Brian VanDeMark, In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam (New York: Vintage, 1995), 112; McMaster, Dereliction of Duty, 71; Margolis, Last Innocent Year, 161; and Winters, Year of the Hare, 119-20.

  302 “The greatest gift for us”: Winters, Year of the Hare, 119. The statistics on aid are from Winters, 44.

  302 “French generals, however”: USN, March 23, 1964, 50-52.

  302 For State of the Union address, see PPP: LBJ, 112.

  302 “Post-Marxian age” quote is in Margolis, Last Innocent Year, 142, to which I am indebted for my interpretation of LBJ’s tax plan.

  303 For the history of Keynes’s reception in America, see David M. Kennedy, Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 79-82 and 357-60; and Robert Collins, The Business Response to Keynes, 1929-1964 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1981). For weather control, see “Giant Research Effort Seeks Weather Control,” LAT, February 16, 1964; Margolis, Last Innocent Year, 296; and Theodore H. White, The Making of the President 1964 (New York: Atheneum, 1965), vii.

  303 For “reactionary Keynesianism,” see Thomas C. Reeves, A Question of Character: A Life of John F. Kennedy (New York: Free Press, 1991), 334. For Eisenhower’s CEA and $12 billion deficit, see Collins, Business Response to Keynes, 152-70; and Richard Whalen, Taking Sides: A Personal View of America from Kennedy to Nixon to Kennedy (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1974), 109.

  303 For tax-cut option and JFK reluctance, see Collins, Business Response to Keynes, 178-79. “Stretches our education in modern economics”: Galbraith to JFK, March 23, 1961, in John Kenneth Galbraith, Letters to Kennedy, ed. James Goodman (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998), 40.

  304 For big business acceptance of Keynesian tax cut and CED, see Collins, Business Response to Keynes, 180-91.

  304 For Kennedy’s introduction of bill and indifference to passage, see ibid.; and Reeves, Question of Character, 334. For Johnson’s acceptance and lobbying, see Robert Dallek, Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson and His Times, 1961-1973 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 70-74.

  304 1960 platform quote in Kirk Harold Porter, National Party Platforms, 1840-1964 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1966).

  304 For Heller’s poverty program, see Taylor Branch, Pillar of Fire: America in the King Years, 1963-1965 (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1998), 175. For Kennedy’s response to Heller, see Dallek, Flawed Giant, 61. For preparation of poverty legislation, see ibid., 61, 74-80. For Goldwater quotes: January 15, 1964, speech to E
conomic Club of New York, RAC, Box 10/789.

  305 For number of civil rights bills, see Edward G. Carmines and James A. Stimson, Issue Evolution: Race and the Transformation of American Politics (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1989); 150 were introduced between 1937 and 1946 alone. He dismissed President Truman’s civil rights program: ibid., 42. Columnists Evans and Novak called his handiwork: Rowland Evans and Robert Novak, Lyndon B. Johnson: The Exercise of Power: A Political Biography (New York: New American Library, 1966), 119-40. Joe Clark quote is in Gorton Carruth, What Happened When: A Chronology of Life and Events in America (New York: Signet, 1991), 891.

  305 “The Negro fought in the war”: Dallek, Flawed Giant, 24. For Johnson’s speech echoing King, see Branch, Pillar of Fire, 92.

  306 Call to King: Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge, 37.

  306 “I’m not going to cavil”: Margolis, Last Innocent Year, 44. “Without a word or a comma”: Branch, Pillar of Fire, 210. For the legislative history of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, see Charles and Barbara Whalen, The Longest Debate: A Legislative History of the 1964 Civil Rights Act (Cabin John, Md.: Seven Locks Press, 1985).

  307 “You’re either for civil rights”: Branch, Pillar of Fire, 180. “I hope that satisfies”: Margolis, Last Innocent Year, 197.

  307 “You drink with Dirksen,” LBJ commanded: ibid., 158.

  307 NAM’s brief can be found in HR, Box 55/19. For the Richard Russell amendment, see Branch, Pillar of Fire, 258. For “prohibition” letter to the editor, see Felix W. Reese, LAT, February 13, 1964; for ABA Journal article, see David Lawrence column, LAT, February 25, 1964. For “enslavement” argument, see Branch, Pillar of Fire, 298. For Coordinating Committee for Fundamental Freedoms, see GRR, February 29, 1964; March 30, 1964; September 30, 1964; and Group Research Inc. 1963 roundup, AC.

  307 “Johnson Pledges Fight on Mental Retardation”: LAT, February 6, 1964. For Johnson’s business campaign, see Jack Bell, The Johnson Treatment: How Lyndon B. Johnson Took Over the Presidency and Made It His Own (New York: Harper and Row, 1965), 120 (for “Call me Lyndon”); Dallek, Flawed Giant, 73 (“Is there a citizens group”).

  308 “They’re all in such sensitive states”: Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge, 95. For visit of Italian leaders, see ibid., 96; for “English Scotch,” ibid., 172. For Teddy White, see ibid., 16. In his February appearance in Miami: LAT, February 28, 1964.

  308 On Baker, see G. R. Schreiber, The Bobby Baker Affair: How to Make Millions in Washington (Chicago: Regnery, 1964); and Dallek, Flawed Giant, 38-44. For summary of possible Johnson kickback, see Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge, 92. See also Carl Curtis OH, LBJL. For Goldwater’s Austin quip, see Newsweek, April 10, 1961.

  309 For arm-twisting to take Jenkins off witness list, hear LBJT 6401.24/13 and 6401.24/15. “I’ve got considerably more detail on Reynolds’s love life”: Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge, 191. For Minneapolis Tribune poll, see Dallek, Flawed Giant, 126. LBJ had eighty-eight recorded conversations about the Jenkins case in the month of January.

  309 On the utility executive, see Bell, Johnson Treatment, 126. On March 23 the Wall Street Journal: “The Johnson Wealth,” March 23, 1964, WSJ. For Time piece, “Mr. President, You’re Fun,” see Frank Cormier, LBJ the Way He Was: A Personal Memoir (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1977), 86. The chamber of commerce speech is described in Bell, Johnson Treatment, 127. Lippmann “healing man” quote is in Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge, 313; for Reston, see Beschloss, 319. Poll numbers are in LBJT 406.03/24.

  310 For Oregon primary rules, see Harold Faber, ed., Road to the White House: The Story of the 1964 Election by the Staff of the New York Times (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1965), 34; and James M. Perry, A Report in Depth on Barry Goldwater (Silver Spring, Md.: National Observer, 1964). For Smith petition, see LAT, February 15, 1964.

  310 For Lodge headquarters and quote, see Time, May 15, 1964.

  310 “Intimate contact with Gov. William Scranton”: Richard Wilson, LAT, February 2, 1964. Connecticut backers noted in NYHTEN, February 14, 1964. For Meet the Press, see LAT, February 17, 1964; for Lippmann, see LAT, February 19, 1964. Rhodes’s efforts are described in LAT, February 23, 1964. Alsop’s column is in LAT, February 25, 1964. Reader’s Digest quote is from April 1964 issue.

  311 For $25,000 fund-raising and press conference, see George D. Wolf, William Warren Scranton: Pennsylvania Statesman (State College: Penn State Press, 1981), 100.

  311 For Scranton’s not taking name off Oregon ballot, see ibid., 94, 99.

  311 For Nixon’s meeting with Haldeman et al. November 1, 1964, I rely on Rowland Evans and Robert Novak, “The Unmaking of a President,” Esquire, November 1, 1964; author interview with Leonard Nadasdy; and, for unheeded advice, Nadasdy to Nixon, March 17, 1964, LN.

  311 For NAR and Oregon mutual affection, see James Desmond, Nelson Rockefeller: A Political Biography (New York: Macmillan, 1964), 228. For chairman of board of regents, see Sensenbrenner to Walton, FCW, Box 8/Rus Walton. For February tour: Rockefeller Campaign Express, February 15, 1964, RAC, Box 12/946 (for chain saw); and (Salem, Ore.) Capital Journal and Oregon Statesman, February 7, 8, and 9, 1964. For Sabre-Liner, see Villar to Douglas, January 14, 1964, RAC, Box 11/939. For Goldwater’s San Francisco stop, see Stephen Shadegg, What Happened to Goldwater?: The Inside Story of the 1964 Republican Campaign (New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1965), 108.

  312 For Jackie Robinson in Oregon, see Arnold Rampersad, Jackie Robinson: A Biography (New York: Knopf, 1997), 385.

  15. UNITED AND AT PEACE WITH ITSELF...

  313 “Gentlemen, off the record”: Author interview with Lee Edwards. For delegate totals by March 10, 1964, see F. Clifton White with William Gill, Suite 3505: The Story of the Draft Goldwater Movement (New Rochelle, N.Y.: Arlington House, 1967), 301. Milliken telegram and Virgin Islands votes are in White with Gill, 304. See also Theodore H. White, The Making of the President 1964 (New York: Atheneum, 1965), 132.

  313 White’s convention technique is described in John Kessel, The Goldwater Coalition: Republican Strategies in 1964 (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1968), 70. Without, Life was fooled: “Goldwater’s Foreign Policy,” Life, November 1, 1963. The Washington Post had just reported: “Goldwater Aides Admit Momentum Has Changed,” WP, February 8, 1964.

  314 For White’s mounting frustrations with the Arizona Mafia, see White with Gill, Suite 35o5, 275-77, 293. Joe Alsop is quoted in Norman Mailer, “In a Blue Light: A History of the 1964 Republican Convention,” Esquire, November 1964. Kitchel’s mood is in White with Gill, Suite 3505, 301.

  314 For Goldwater being kept from White memo, see White with Gill, 287. For fund-raising, see CT, January 4, 1964, 1; Bill Middendorf, “Balance Sheet per December 31, 1963,” WAR, Box 155/8; and Finance Highlights Report No. 10, April 4, 1964, FCW, Box 8/G. R. Herberger. For New York office, see Marvin Liebman, Coming Out Conservative: An Autobiography (San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 1992), 167. “For a publicity splash”: “Neal” to Rusher, n.d., “RLN—PAR,” WAR, Box 155/7. For Kitchel’s resignation, see White with Gill, Suite 3505, 278; and Stephen Shadegg, What Happened to Goldwater?: The Inside Story of the 1964 Republican Campaign (New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1965), 100.

  314 On whether thirty-seven or forty covenants were being broken, see ABC Reports transcript, January 9, 1964, RAC, Box 10/787. For Hess biography, see Karl Hess, Mostly on the Edge: An Autobiography (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus, 1999). “It would not be America really”: American Mercury, May 1954. “If we in this hour of world crisis”: April 6, 1964, speech from Portland Hilton, AHF, Box 1/13.

  315 Expressions of culture clash came in author interviews with Lee Edwards, Ron Crawford, Charles Lichenstein, and Richard Kleindienst; and Godfrey Hodgson to author, January 3, 1997. “When you get a phone call”: F. Clifton White with Jerome Tuccille, Politics as a Noble Calling (Ottawa, III.: Jameson Books, 1994), 155.

  315 For Chicago meeting, see White with Gill, Suite 3505, 276-78; Shadegg, What Happened, 120; and Karl Hess,
In a Cause That Will Triumph: The Goldwater Campaign and the Future of Conservatism (New York: Doubleday, 1967), 21 (for “Boy Scouts” exchange).

  316 The March 18, 1964, meeting is in White with Gill, Suite 3505, 302-4.

  316 For entreaties to Kleindienst, see Richard Kleindienst, Justice: The Memoirs of an Attorney General (Ottawa, III.: Jameson Books, 1985), 32-33. For purging from strategy sessions, see White with Gill, Suite 3,505, 304.

  316 “Lee, we’re not going to have that kind of crap”: author interview with Lee Edwards.

  317 For Wallace’s Ivy League tour, see 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), 195-99; and Stephan Lesher, George Wallace: American Populist (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1994),261-65.

  317 For Wallace on the West Coast, see Carter, Politics of Rage, 200; and Leshèr, George Wallace, 268-71 (for quotes).

  317 For Cincinnati, see Lesher, George Wallace, 271-73.

  318 For Chicago, see Lesher, loc. cit.

  318 Madison appearance and the Herbstreith proposal are in Lesher, 273-74; and Carter, Politics of Rage, 203-4.

  319 For Thurmond quote from 1948, see Alexander Lamis, The Two-Party South (New York: Oxford University Press, 1984), 9. “States’ Rights have become household words”: Jim Johnson, “Orval Faubus Can Be Elected President,” CM, Box 69/4.

  319 For Wallace’s filing trip to Wisconsin, see Carter, Politics of Rage, 204.

  319 Malcolm X and “rifle clubs” are noted in Jon Margolis, The Last Innocent Year: America in 1964: The Beginning of the “Sixties” (New York: Morrow, 1999), 157. For CORE at Triborough Bridge, see Tamar Jacoby, Someone Else’s House: America’s Unfinished Struggle for Integration (New York: Free Press, 1998), 23-24. For school boycott, see Jacoby, 26.