Six Crises

by Richard Nixon

  The President, stretched out on his back in bed, was in great pain. When I visited him in the hospital two weeks later he told me, “I got this pain in the middle of the night—boy, it sure hurt—I never told Mamie how much it hurt.”

  Dr. Snyder administered immediate emergency treatment to counteract the blood clot before it was too late. He gave the President three injections: one to dilate the arteries in the heart, another to increase the liquidity of his blood to prevent clotting, and morphine to ease the pain and shock. This undoubtedly is standard medical procedure in such cases, but then Dr. Snyder faced the crisis of his career. There he was alone, the only person in the world who knew that the heart of the President had been damaged. It was somewhat after three in the morning in Denver, after six in the nation’s capital. Should he call for help, summon the heart specialists of the nation, and thus spread the word of the President’s bout with death around the world? That would be the easy, routine way—sharing the responsibility. But it would entail the risk of shocking Mrs. Eisenhower and her seventy-seven-year-old mother, and the excitement could even endanger the President’s chances for recovery.

  Deciding that complete, undisturbed rest was the best treatment for a coronary, Dr. Snyder chose to let the world wait while he did the best he could by himself. He gave the President a second injection of morphine at 3:45 A.M. to ease the pain. At 4:30 A.M. the President fell asleep. Dr. Snyder sat by the bedside and waited.

  At 7 A.M., in line with his decision, he telephoned the press room of the Summer White House and left word for Assistant Press Secretary Snyder that the President had indigestion and would not keep his morning appointments. Thus the doctor allayed the suspicions of the press. The world was given the unexciting news that the President had indigestion. For twelve hours the truth was kept from the world for the President’s benefit and at the risk of a career and reputation to his doctor. It was not until President Eisenhower awoke from his drugged sleep at 12:30 P.M. that Dr. Snyder called Fitzsimmons Army Hospital to have an electrocardiograph brought to the Doud home. It was not until 2 P.M. that Dr. Snyder’s original diagnosis had been confirmed by an electrocardiogram which showed a lesion on the anterior wall of the heart. Only after the President had been moved to Fitzsimmons Hospital did Dr. Snyder telephone the shocking news to Murray Snyder.

  In his report to the White House Dr. Snyder later wrote: “It was difficult for me to assume the responsibility of refraining from making public immediately the diagnosis of coronary thrombosis. I postponed public announcement because I wished the President to benefit from the rest and quiet induced by the sedation, incident to combatting the initial manifestations. This decision also spared him, his wife and mother-in-law emotional upset upon too precipitant announcement of such serious import. This action, I believe, limited the heart damage to a minimum and enabled us to confirm the diagnosis by cardiogram and make an unhurried transference from home to hospital.”

  I believe most would agree that Dr. Snyder met the crisis of his career with skill and courage and that he deserves the commendation of his medical colleagues in the country.

  It was not because we lacked confidence in Dr. Snyder that for several hours that evening in Bill Rogers’ home we discussed by telephone and in person the problem of providing the best possible medical care for the President. Not only must the care be the best to assure his recovery; it was vitally important that the people of the nation be convinced that every possible effort was being made to get the best doctors in America to the President’s bedside.

  We presented the problem to General Wilton B. Persons, Deputy Assistant to the President, who was in charge of the White House staff during the absence of Sherman Adams, when he arrived at the Rogers’ house shortly after 7:30. Persons informed us that Colonel Thomas M. Mattingly, Chief of Cardiology at Walter Reed Army Hospital, was already on his way to Denver with a team of Army doctors. He said that Mattingly had a national reputation as an outstanding heart specialist and would provide the President with the best possible medical care.

  I had already discussed this problem on the phone with Secretary of the Treasury George Humphrey and Foster Dulles before Persons arrived. They had both strongly recommended that a civilian specialist be brought into the case on a consulting basis. Rogers and I had reached the same conclusion. As I told Persons, we had nothing against military doctors, but we could not overlook the fact that many people in the country might have more confidence, however unwarranted, in a civilian heart specialist of national reputation. George Humphrey was among those who suggested that Dr. Paul Dudley White, heart specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital and a pioneer in cardiology, would be an excellent man for this assignment.

  General Persons undertook the delicate and difficult task of informing Dr. Snyder of our views in a tactful manner. He made it clear that the suggestion that Dr. White be brought into the case was in no way intended to be a reflection on either his or Dr. Mattingly’s competence, but that in view of the public relations aspects of the President’s illness, adding a civilian consultant to the team of Army doctors would be reassuring and helpful. The fact that he and Snyder had been close personal friends for years made it possible for Persons to succeed where someone else might have failed in raising a quite understandably touchy subject. Dr. White flew out to Denver the next day on an Air Force plane to join the President’s staff of physicians. As a pioneer in cardiology and a founder of the National Heart Association, he was in the best possible position to reassure the nation, as he did, that Colonel Mattingly, who headed the medical staff at the President’s side, was “among the very best” of heart specialists in the country.

  With this problem out of the way, Rogers, Persons, and I turned to a discussion of how the day-to-day operations of government were to be conducted during the President’s incapacity. Neither the Constitution nor any law of the land provides for a situation in which a President is incapacitated for a temporary period. The President stands alone as the supreme authority of the Executive branch of government. The Cabinet and National Security Council can advise but cannot act for him. They cannot become a collective commander-in-chief of the armed forces, or sign legislation into law, or appoint judges, or decide high policies of government. Nor could I. Constitutionally, the Vice President is designated by the voters to take over only “in case of the removal of the President from office, or of his death, resignation or inability to discharge the powers and duties of said office. . . .” The Constitution does not make clear what it means by “inability to discharge the powers and duties of said office.” It does not say who shall decide when a President is disabled, whether the Vice President assumes the “powers and duties” of the presidency or the “office” itself, and just how a President who recovers his health can then recover his office. However, this problem did not present itself seriously that first night or, for that matter, during the ensuing two critical weeks of the President’s illness. President Eisenhower was fully conscious and presumably able to make the most important decisions affecting national security, if such were needed, during his stay at Fitzsimmons Hospital.

  The problem for us was how to carry on in his absence without allowing the government to drift dangerously in foreign or domestic affairs. There is a political axiom that where a vacuum exists, it will be filled by the nearest or strongest power. That had to be avoided at all costs.

  The solution seemed clear to me, as it did to several of the key men in the Administration with whom I spoke over the Rogers’ kitchen wall phone. The general policy was set that night and the details were worked out by ear through the following week: the “team” would carry on the Eisenhower policies and precepts in a confident atmosphere of “business as usual.” Political comments and any semblance of a struggle for dominance on the team would be scrupulously avoided.

  Eisenhower himself had established the concept of the “team” in one of his campaign speeches in 1952 when he declared: “When I speak of substituting good gover
nment for poor government, I do not mean electing one individual, one symbol, one person to typify the might and majesty of America—by no means. I mean to elect a team, to send to Washington the pick of our men and women chosen according to merit.” This team concept was a part of our everyday life in Washington; everyone who worked with Eisenhower was aware of it. There was one other theme of the President’s which always stood out in my mind, to the effect that he was not bringing to Washington a group of personalities but rather a set of principles which would guide his Administration in all its endeavors.

  The President, who had spent his entire adult life in the Army, brought to Washington the “staff system” for conducting business in the White House. Each Cabinet member was given complete authority, along with the concomitant full responsibility, of his own section of operations. Where problems overlapped two or more departments, the President appointed a council. For a unique question, he formed an ad hoc group to handle it. Thus, he tried to get the best brains available to work on problems confronting the government. They did the groundwork. They put in the long hours of deliberation and argument. Then their report and recommended decision, or sometimes alternate choices, were sent up, always through channels, to him for final decision. Having chosen his Cabinet and staff on the basis of each man’s ability to handle his job, he had confidence in the men working for him, trusted them, and delegated authority to them. Finally, though, in the staff system, he received the essence of the problem, the thinking that went into it, and the recommended solution. And then he either approved the decision, rejected it and substituted his own, or sent the problem back for further study.

  There were some shortcomings to this system, particularly notable when there was an undetected failing in the complete gathering and study of the facts which should have been but were not presented to the President. But no one system can ever handle perfectly the multitude of problems which flow through the White House. The staff system did, however, keep to an absolute minimum the clashes of personalities, the bickerings, and scramble for power which characterized the two previous Administrations—and appear to be taking hold in the present one.

  Of course, it has been argued that orderliness in government is not its prime objective, and that new ideas are more apt to flow amidst a clash of powerful personalities and an influence of tug-of-war which characterized the Administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt. The answer must be subjective, depending upon the personality of the Chief Executive, and yet it would seem a man could decide the complex problems which face a President better in tranquillity than from a puppet-master’s perch, guiding a hundred strings with his ten fingers.

  Eisenhower was by training a man with an orderly mind. He liked things in their proper place and order. Soon after he was established in the White House and the avalanche of paper, red tape, and ceremonial affairs descended upon him, he was heard to exclaim, “When does a man get some time to think around here!”

  Despite whatever divided opinion there may have been before September 24, 1955, everyone saw clearly the wisdom of the staff system when the President was stricken. There were no jealousies and no struggle for power among the members of the Cabinet. Opinion was unanimous that the “team” must carry on. Only the details had to be worked out.

  One question came up that evening to which we applied this principle. Secretary of the Treasury George Humphrey expressed his concern about leaving the next day for economic talks in Ottawa. Dulles, Humphrey, Secretary of Agriculture Ezra Taft Benson, and Secretary of Commerce Sinclair Weeks were scheduled to discuss trade and economic problems with their Canadian counterparts. I urged Humphrey that they all go to Canada as scheduled so as to avoid any impression that the business of government was grinding to a standstill with the President ill.

  Rogers, Persons, and I talked until after midnight trying to anticipate the problems the Administration would face and the action which should be taken to deal with them. After Persons left for home, I telephoned Pat and found that the reporters were still waiting for me to return. In fact, they were in the playroom in our basement at her invitation, and she had just served coffee to the group. Under the circumstances, I decided it would be best to stay at Bill Rogers’ house for the night.

  Bill and I talked on for another hour, and then at about 2:30 I went up to the second-floor guest room where Mrs. Rogers had laid out for me a towel, toothbrush, and a pair of Bill’s pajamas. Even had the President’s illness not been on my mind I would not have slept well that night, and as it was I did not sleep at all. I have hay fever at that time of year and the pollen count must have been at an all-time high in the Washington area. On the floor above me, Bill’s fifteen-year-old son, Tony, a ham radio operator, was engaged in some kind of all-night sending and receiving contest, and I could hear the high-pitched dots and dashes of the Morse code penetrating the ceiling overhead.

  But in any event, it would have been impossible for me to go to sleep. My thoughts went back to the first time I met the President, when he was commander of the NATO forces in Europe, and of the great moments I had been privileged to share with him since then—highlighted by the unforgettable occasion when, with Pat and Mrs. Eisenhower, we had stood together on the stage in Chicago’s Convention Hall after the Republican nomination in 1952. During the three years I had been Vice President, I had not consciously thought of the possibility of his becoming ill or dying. I doubt if any Vice President allows his mind to dwell on such a subject. Only once had the President himself remotely brought up the idea of succession. That had been about a year before when I had ridden to Denver with him at his invitation on the presidential plane, Columbine. Just after we had taken off, he said: “Dick, I’ve made a bad error here. I really don’t think you and I should ever be on the same plane together.” He saw to it that we never were after that.

  I thought of Pete Carroll, a long-time friend and military aide to the President, one of the ablest and best-liked men in the White House, who had succumbed to a heart attack in September 1954. He had been only in his forties.

  The whole range of affairs and potential problems discussed that evening went through my mind. Fortunately, this was vacation time in government when there was a lull in the usual rush of activities. Several long-range projects were underway, like preparation of the budget and the State of the Union message, but there seemed to be no pressing item that required immediate presidential action. Congress was in adjournment; there was no pending legislation. The cold war seemed frozen for the moment; the hammer and sickle was not poised to strike in any specific soft spot of the world. Everyone in government was exploring for anticipated problems and how they could be handled or delayed during this crisis.

  It occurred to me that this was far different from any other crisis I had faced in my life and had to be handled differently. I had always believed in meeting a crisis head-on. The difficult period is reaching a decision, but once that has been done, the carrying-out of the decision is easier than the making of it. In meeting any crisis in life, one must either fight or run away. But one must do something. Not knowing how to act or not being able to act is what tears your insides out. Once I became convinced that Alger Hiss was guilty, the tension produced by doubt and soul-searching was relieved and I was able to pursue the investigation through to its conclusion with renewed effectiveness and decisiveness. Once I had decided to fight and not run away from the fund attack in 1952, I fought for my political life with every resource at my command.

  But this crisis was different. My philosophy has always been: don’t lean with the wind. Don’t do what is politically expedient. Do what your instinct tells you is right. Public opinion polls are useful if a politician uses them only to learn approximately what the people are thinking, so that he can talk to them more intelligently. The politician who sways with the polls is not worth his pay. And I believe the people eventually catch up with the man who merely tells them what he thinks they want to hear.

  But contrary to my usual instinct
s, I knew that the correct course in this crisis was precisely to lean with the wind. As long as the President was seriously ill, this would necessarily be a period of inaction, a period in which I could not act decisively. The crisis not only was different, but it probably would be long and difficult.

  My own position as Vice President called for maintaining a balance of the utmost delicacy. On the one hand, aside from the President, I was the only person in government elected by all the people; they had a right to expect leadership, if it were needed, rather than a vacuum. But any move on my part which could be interpreted, even incorrectly, as an attempt to usurp the powers of the presidency would disrupt the Eisenhower team, cause dissension in the nation, and disturb the President and his family. Certainly I had no desire or intention to seize an iota of presidential power. I was the Vice President and could be nothing more. But the problem was to guard against what I knew would be easy misinterpretation of any mistake, no matter how slight, I might make in public or private. The crisis was how to walk on eggs and not break them. My problem, what I had to do, was to provide leadership without appearing to lead.

  At 4:30 the telephone rang. It was Jim Hagerty on his final call of the night saying the situation was unchanged, the President was resting comfortably. I went back to bed and continued to lie awake for the rest of the night thinking of the problems I would face in the morning.