by Billy Graham
He was so devastated after those defeats that some who knew him best questioned whether he would ever pull out of it. One day he and I were walking together on the Riviera course where we were playing golf with Grady and actor Randolph Scott. On that occasion, Nixon was one of the most disconsolate people I had ever seen. His shoulders were stooped as if the world had caved in on him.
Impulsively, I flung my arm around him. “Dick, I believe you’ll have another chance at the presidency,” I said. “The world situation is getting worse. There’ll come a time when the American people will call on you. You have the ability and the training to be president of the United States. Don’t give up.”
“No,” he said in a low voice, “it’s finished. After two straight defeats, it’s not likely I’ll ever be nominated for anything again, or be given another chance. I’m just going back into law practice.”
In the next election year, 1964, when the Republicans nominated Barry Goldwater to run against President Lyndon Johnson, Nixon brought a magnificent speech to the Republican convention, pleading for party unity. He toured the country making speeches for Goldwater. At a whistle-stop in Bangor, Maine, where I was preaching at the time, I went out to the little airport to hear him speak. When he learned that I was there, he sent for me. I met him in a private area, and he spent an hour with me, much to the bewilderment and displeasure of the local Republican hierarchy.
“I doubt if Goldwater can win,” he confided in me, “but I’m going to do everything I can to help him.”
As the 1968 election loomed on the horizon, Nixon’s name surfaced among the prospective Republican candidates. I had no leanings toward any of the announced Democratic hopefuls. If Lyndon Johnson had not told me a year earlier that he would not seek reelection, it would have put me in a quandary as to which friend to vote for.
En route home from a trip in December 1967, I received a message in Atlanta that Nixon wanted to see me in Key Biscayne, Florida. I had the flu and was running a high temperature, but I phoned home and told Ruth of the change in our plans. She had gotten used to such changes; at least she tolerated them.
Dick was staying in a cottage at the Key Biscayne Hotel as guest of the owner. He vacated his front bedroom for me when we arrived, taking the back one for himself. His friend Bebe Rebozo was staying at the hotel too. As was often the case during our conversations, I read Scripture to him and had prayer.
We attended the Key Biscayne Presbyterian Church together on Sunday morning and watched a muddy Green Bay Packers football game on television in the afternoon. Then he asked me to walk with him on the beach. I was feeling weak from the fever (which, as I was soon to learn, was developing into pneumonia), but I dragged myself along anyway.
He was musing about a bid for the presidency and wanted to know what I thought he should do. It was only two months since we had been together at his mother’s funeral. Maybe he was remembering how she had said to him on her deathbed, “Dick, don’t quit.”
We walked as far as the lighthouse, a couple of miles round-trip, and got back none too soon for me. I was about ready to collapse.
I had no intention of advising him what decision to make. The assassination of Jack Kennedy a few years earlier, the seemingly endless and morale-draining war in Vietnam, the campus demonstrations against that war, the takeovers of buildings by radical students, the draft-card burnings that fall—all these combined to throw us into a national crisis. It was daunting in the extreme for anyone who considered seeking the leadership of the country.
“You still haven’t told me what to do,” he said to me two days later as I was leaving.
“If you don’t run, you will always wonder if you should have,” I said to him. “I will pray for you, that the Lord will give you the wisdom to make the right choice.”
Nixon remembered that day (although somewhat differently) in his memoirs and also in a personal letter to John Pollock, one of my biographers, to whom he wrote, “He [Nixon meant me] was ill at the time, but when we took our long two-mile walk to the lighthouse at Key Biscayne, he was insistent that, because of the problems the country faced abroad and my experience in international affairs, I had an obligation to run.
“He made it clear that he was not against Lyndon Johnson; they were good friends. But he felt that the country was in crisis in 1968 and that Johnson because of the division among his own advisers would be unable to provide the leadership that was needed. . . . Whether the issue was foreign or domestic, he always had a point of view and expressed it articulately and effectively. I think one of the reasons he felt free to do so was that he knew I would not disclose his personal views to others unless he had publicly expressed them.”
That might have been how Nixon remembered the walk and the talk, but that was not the way I remembered the incident.
Nixon’s candidacy materialized seven months later. Frankly, it muffled those inner monitors that had warned me for years to stay out of partisan politics. Even though our Crusade ministry demanded my time and energy all across this country as well as overseas, I could not completely distance myself from the electoral process that was involving such a close friend. As far as his attitude was concerned, he was more cautious than I: he strongly admonished me not to make any public endorsement of him or to associate with the campaign in any way. He thought that any politicking on my part would have negative repercussions for our ministry.
In 1960 Nixon sought recommendations for a running mate from many friends and advisers. In response to his question, I urged him to consider Congressman Walter Judd from Minnesota. A former missionary to China, he was an expert in foreign policy and a strong intellectual foe of Communism. But one day, when Nixon and I were riding in the backseat of his car, he gave me his reasons for not taking my suggestion. I did not think they were valid. If he had followed my advice, maybe he could have beaten Kennedy. There were some who thought his choice of Henry Cabot Lodge was detrimental.
I struck out the next time around too. Before the 1968 Repub-lican convention, Nixon invited me to come to New York and have dinner with him in his apartment. As we sat in front of the fireplace, he floated a few names of vice-presidential prospects for my reaction—Nelson Rockefeller, John Lindsay, and others, maybe twenty in all. The cons outweighed the pros for most of them, in my opinion. Then I set forth my favored choice, Senator Mark Hatfield of Oregon, a devout evangelical whose liberal Republicanism would give a good ideological balance to the ticket. “I believe he would be a devoted and loyal vice president,” I said. “He certainly would appeal to the strong Christian vote, Catholic as well as Protestant.”
Nixon didn’t say much in response. Although I brought the issue up again in subsequent conversations before the convention, he dodged making a commitment.
In Miami on the night he was nominated, he invited me to meet him at the hotel. He took me by the arm and led me to the room where the choice of a vice president would be discussed and decided.
“You’ll enjoy this,” he said. “This will be a little bit of history.”
I was surprised that he had waited this long before making his decision. I had heard of smoke-filled rooms where political deals were made, but this surely didn’t fit the stereotype in my mind. Maybe it was a Republican version: a huge oval room with elegant carpeting, draperies, furniture, and crystal chandelier. The five senators, five representatives, three governors, and various party leaders all matched the surroundings. One writer listing all the dignitaries present put me in a category by myself: “sidekick.”
Nixon went around the room and asked everyone their opinion. Many names for vice president were bandied about. Nixon then turned to me and looked me squarely in the eye. “Billy, what do you think?” he asked.
There was a sudden quiet in the room. No doubt people were wondering why I had been invited. Well, that made it unanimous! Nevertheless, I spoke my piece. “Dick, you know that I’ve always been for Senator Hatfield,” I reminded him, listing my reasons again. That was th
at. I went back to my hotel.
What followed a few hours later was like a verbal Ping-Pong game.
About six-thirty the next morning, Nixon phoned me.
“I haven’t made up my mind, but I’ve got to make the announcement this morning. How about offering a prayer for me?”
I readily promised him I would. It was more to my liking to talk to the Lord about all of this than to dialogue with a group of political professionals. It wasn’t the first such prayer I had made. I called Hatfield, who was staying with Bob Green and his wife, Anita Bryant, in Miami, and told him what I had just heard.
“I don’t think it’s going to be me,” he said, although I sensed that he would have been glad to accept.
About an hour later, the phone rang again. It was Nixon, saying that Spiro Agnew had been chosen and asking if I would call Hatfield to tell him the decision.
Like every other American outside the state of Maryland, I asked the question of questions: “Spiro who?”
Nixon then told me his reasons for that choice, none of which was persuasive to me. I was puzzled that so brilliant a tactician as Nixon would wait till the last minute and then choose somebody completely unknown to the electorate.
The phone rang yet again. This time it was my longtime acquaintance Herbert Klein, who was also a Nixon adviser (and who later became Nixon’s communications director at the White House). “Dick wanted me to call you,” he said, “and say that he hasn’t decided after all. It’s still between Hatfield and Agnew. You’re to call Hatfield and tell him that he’s still in the running.”
When Mark got my call, he was as surprised as I was.
The eventual final announcement that Agnew was the choice came much later than the press had expected. I felt a real letdown in my heart; indeed, I even felt a little sick. I had nothing personal against Governor Agnew; I had never met him. All I knew about him—admittedly some negative things—I had heard a few days earlier from David Brinkley on the television news. Nevertheless, I could not help but feel disappointed, for I knew that Hatfield would have brought a positive moral and spiritual influence to the office.
That night at the convention, Nixon made his acceptance speech. Then I was brought out to the podium to render the service for which I had been invited: I gave the closing prayer. Then I slipped away from the platform as quickly as possible and hurried back to the Key Biscayne Hotel. (The owner, Bob Mackle, was gracious enough to let me stay there for free whenever I was in south Florida; he often moved out of his personal home on the beach to let me or Mr. Nixon stay there.)
The next night Nixon decided to move to that hotel. “I don’t know whom I should eat with tonight,” he said to some of his staff. “But if I eat with Billy Graham, everyone will understand, and there’ll be no criticism.”
So he, Bebe Rebozo, T.W., and I ate together in the hotel restaurant. A lot of people came by to congratulate the new candidate.
A few weeks later, I attended the Democratic convention in Chicago, at their invitation. I did not want people to think I was favoring one party over the other; everyone knew of my friendship with both Nixon and Johnson, and many wondered whom I actually favored. I gave one of the prayers on the night when President Johnson was scheduled to address the assembly.
From my room in the old Stevens Hotel on Michigan Avenue, I watched antiwar demonstrators and assorted radical protesters creating all kinds of mayhem. Mayor Richard Daley’s riot police met them right in front of the television cameras. “The whole world is watching!” they screamed in unison.
Sitting backstage with leaders of the Democratic party—I had more friends in the Democratic party than I did in the Republican party; being a southerner, I knew most of them—I shared their apprehension of worse things happening. The mood was so ominous that Lyndon Johnson’s staff had kept in constant phone contact from the White House, waiting to learn whether it was safe for him to come to Chicago and give his scheduled speech. Since it was his birthday, as well as his swan song as President, everyone was looking forward to honoring him. I was especially pleased at the prospect of sharing my friend’s special night. But in the end, it seemed the only prudent thing for him to do was to stay in Washington.
On that memorable and historic evening, when it was apparent that President Johnson could not come to his own convention, I was scheduled to lead a prayer and then Anita Bryant was to sing. During my prayer, the noise barely died down in the convention. As in most political conventions, up until that point most speakers were ignored by the majority of the people; they were busy debating, visiting, arguing, making deals. Delegates were even having caucuses on the floor. After my prayer, when Anita Bryant got up to sing, it grew quiet; people gave her more attention than they did me, and a good round of applause. But a pall still hung over the convention—something that was darker than mere political pessimism.
The Democrats wound up nominating as their presidential candidate another longtime friend of mine, Hubert Humphrey of Minnesota (then serving as Vice President under Lyndon Johnson). The coming election would pose a personal conflict of loyalties for me after all.
As the postconvention campaigns got under way, I thought I was pretty clever at concealing my presidential choice. After our final Crusade of 1968 ended in Pittsburgh around Labor Day, I tried to follow events at a discreet distance.
On the day of the election, I called Nixon and wished him well.
“Please come to New York,” he said, “and watch the election returns with me tonight.”
“I’m not sure I ought to do that,” I replied. “There will be so much press there. But I’ll come and stay in a nearby hotel. If you lose, I’ll come over to your hotel and pray with you and your family.”
“Okay,” he agreed.
T.W. and I left for New York immediately and checked in at the Hilton. Nixon was at the Waldorf Towers.
Final election results were delayed in coming because the voting was so close. I went to bed before the verdict was in. Next morning, after the results became apparent, Bebe Rebozo called. “Nixon wants you to come before he talks to the press,” he said. “He wants to talk to you.”
T.W. and I immediately got a cab to the hotel. Rebozo met us and led us into Nixon’s suite. Only he, Pat, Tricia, and Julie were in the room. The first thing I did was to congratulate them for the victory.
Nixon suggested that we all stand in a circle and hold hands. He asked me to pray. I thanked the Lord for what I believed was God’s plan for the country: that Nixon should lead us in the next four years. I prayed also for each member of the family and gave thanks for the spiritual heritage of his mother, Hannah.
He had something to ask before letting me go. He took me over to the window and spoke in a low voice. “Billy, you know we’re in a terrible mess in Vietnam. President Johnson has ordered a stop in the bombing, and I think it’s a great mistake. We are on the verge of victory in Vietnam. If we stop the bombing now, we are going to be in big trouble. We’ve got to find a way out of that war. While we have plans, we need prayer that God will help us to find a way.”
In early December, I left to spend the Christmas holidays visiting our troops in Vietnam. I got back just in time for the inauguration. Nixon wanted me to do all the prayers at the swearing-in ceremony, but I objected.
“Dick, you’ve got to have all faiths represented, or you’re going to have trouble.”
“No, I just want you,” he insisted.
Eventually, Nixon gave in to the ecumenical idea, and I suggested other clergy, including my friend and supporter Rabbi Edgar Fogel Magnin, of the large Jewish synagogue on Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles.
Nixon had asked me for a five-or ten-minute prayer. I did not pray that long—I think my words ran to four minutes—although Time magazine described the prayer as a mini–inaugural speech!
My ecumenical strategy was undercut again when Nixon insisted that I preach a week later, on January 26, at the first White House worship service of his administration
. That would be followed days later by the National Prayer Breakfast, which he planned to attend. I was scheduled to speak again on that occasion, which would have meant a number of times in a row, and I protested. (Some of the press were already calling me chaplain to the White House, a title I neither sought nor wanted.) Bill Jones, my business friend from Los Angeles, had other thoughts: “As long as I pay the bills for the breakfast,” he said, “Billy Graham will be the speaker.” I did speak, but because the program was running late, I cut my talk down to just one of my four points. Everyone had come to hear President Nixon.
Nixon was nervous about the first White House church service. Cliff was with me, and Bev was to sing. That morning the President ran downstairs and looked into the East Room every few minutes to see how many people were coming and who they were. Then he rushed back upstairs to us, sitting down at the piano and playing hymns while Bev sang.
Nevertheless, this church service, destined to become a White House tradition during Nixon’s administration, was criticized by some as an infraction of church-state separation.
“It’s the most popular thing we have,” White House staffer Lucy Winchester was quoted in the New York Times Magazine as saying. She felt that mainstream Americans could relate to a president at prayer. I spoke at four of those services, as did Norman Vincent Peale. (Nixon had attended Peale’s Marble Collegiate Church when he was in New York City, and Julie and David had been married there by Dr. Peale in December 1968. Although Julie had invited me to participate in that wedding, I couldn’t since I was in Vietnam.) Other speakers included leading Protestant, Roman Catholic, and Jewish clergy.
Shortly after that first White House worship service, Ruth and I were on Fiji, a layover on our flight to New Zealand. “It was Sunday,” she remembered, “so we decided to walk to the nearest church service. They were repairing the big church, so we met on the verandah of a little house. The week before, we had been at the White House for the worship service. The contrast was so startling, and yet it made the little service out there all the sweeter. Just a hundred years ago, they were headhunters.”