The Kennedy Half-Century (62 page)

President Nixon carefully followed Kennedy’s press, underlining sections of newspaper and magazine articles about him and scribbling comments such as “a plug for Teddy.”
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When Kennedy attacked the administration on Vietnam in April 1972, Nixon became enraged—and completely engaged. Kennedy declared himself “appalled” by the “moral and military bankruptcy” of Nixon’s war policy. To Nixon’s delight, Senator Bob Dole was dispatched to say that Kennedy’s remarks deserved “the condemnation and contempt of every decent American.” Referring directly to Kennedy’s ties to JFK and LBJ’s Vietnam involvement and perhaps indirectly to Chappaquiddick, Dole asserted that Kennedy “should never accuse anyone of having blood on his hands.”
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Nixon’s aides, including William Safire and Pat Buchanan, produced
detailed analyses of Kennedy’s strengths and weaknesses as a candidate. Safire’s memo from November 1971 was especially perceptive:

SUBJECT: Kennedy Victory Scenario

I notice some people around here actually looking forward to Kennedy as the Democratic nominee as “easiest to beat.” To dispel that notion, here is a quick rundown of ways he can be expected to turn Chappaquiddick to his advantage.

Pre-Convention

1.
Carrying the torch
. “The torch has been passed” was a memorable quotation from JFK. Teddy will constantly harp on the brother’s fallen torch theme. Not subtly, either—“we Kennedys can’t make plans” is a sledgehammer, strictly emotional, playing on the guilt feelings of many Americans, and because it is bad taste does not make it bad politics.

2.
The Sudden-Maturity rationale
. How do they come to grips with the failure of courage at the [Chappaquiddick] bridge? Answer: Each of the brothers underwent a deep sea-change at some stage of their lives. The Bay of Pigs changed JFK, enabling him to rise to greatness at the Cuban Missile Crisis; Bobby, too, underwent an enormous change from the [Joseph] McCarthy counsel, ruthless and coldblooded, to the warm and compassionate friend of the underprivileged he came to appear to be in 1968 … Kennedys traditionally overcome their pasts; the “record” has never been held against them, and to more people than we like to think, will not be this time either.

The Campaign: Making Chappaquiddick work for Kennedy.

3. The pressure to open up the sealed verdict will be allowed to grow; then, probably in Houston, scene of the Ministers Conference where JFK “faced up” to the Catholic issue, Teddy will break his silence on Chappaquiddick. The same people who deride a “Checkers speech” as cornball will see this as a human appeal for fairness and a brave exposition of a man’s soul. The tape will then be played wherever it is most useful to Teddy.

4. The President can avoid television debates with any other candidate; but a public yearning for a Nixon-Kennedy rematch on television would be well-nigh irresistible. Ducking or delaying would only play up their “courage” pitch, which would directly answer that loss of courage at the bridge.

5. The polls will be far more volatile than usual, reflecting the emotional responses sure to be triggered in a campaign that plays on national guilt, past assassinations, pleas to rise above vicious innuendo, and the like …

6. Great stress will be laid on the number of threats he receives, the impassioned pleas of the Secret Service to limit his campaigning to safe television appearances, and his courageous refusal to be kept away from
crowds. He will motorcade Dallas. The “old” Teddy ran away from trouble; the “new” Kennedy will not run away. He will prove his courage once and for all in Dallas, on the final weekend of the campaign.

Why do I write this memo? I think we can beat Kennedy. But it is important that we recognize the wild and wooly nature of the campaign he could put on and stop thinking he would be the easiest candidate to beat.
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A bit earlier, Pat Buchanan—ever the hardball combatant—had also urged an aggressive posture to distinguish the liberal Ted from his much more centrist brother, JFK:

No matter that EMK [Ted] is adored by the Party’s Left, we have a serious problem only if he gets well with the Party’s Center. The more he acts like Brother Bobby the better off we are; the less he acts like brother John, the better off we are.

Socially, Kennedy is out of touch with the political mood. The Jet Set, Swinger, See-Through Blouse cum Hot Pants crowd, the Chappaquiddick-Hoe down and Paris hijinks—the more publicity they all get, the better.

Since EMK will be trafficking on the JFK myth, it would be well to document JFK’s tough line on defense, foreign policy, Vietnam, Europe, etc. over against EMK’s positions—to provide conservative Democrats with some rationale for abandoning the little brother of their hero.
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Nixon and everyone else with political sense in the White House understood that a campaign against Kennedy would be fraught with peril, and best avoided. The goal was clear: Avoid goading Ted into the race while building up McGovern to the extent possible. As Buchanan put it in an April 1972 memo, “Though [Kennedy] would be unacceptable to the South, in a national election, he would bring to his candidacy all the McGovern support, plus the Kennedy charisma, plus the support of the Meanys [George Meany, head of the AFL-CIO] and Daleys. A Democratic Party deeply divided, thirsting for unity and victory, would welcome a Kennedy. For this reason, we do
not
believe our strategy should be to flush Kennedy out. As Kennedy is elevated, McGovern recedes—and We Want McGovern.”
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And McGovern they got, on their way to a forty-nine-state landslide victory in November. McGovern had hoped that Kennedy would run as his vice presidential candidate, but Kennedy would have no part of it. If this third
Senator Kennedy was going to endure unrelenting scrutiny because of Chappaquiddick and risk possible assassination on the campaign trail, he would run not for the second slot but for the top job, and in a year more promising for Democrats than 1972 was turning out to be. After the withdrawal of Mc-Govern’s eventual pick for vice president, Missouri senator Thomas Eagleton (who was discovered to have had electric shock treatments for depression), McGovern tried to recover with a dose of Kennedy glamor, choosing JFK’s brother-in-law Sargent Shriver as Eagleton’s replacement. But the former head of the Peace Corps was no antidote for the Democratic ticket’s long list of electoral handicaps.

The demise of the Ted Kennedy specter for Nixon’s reelection did not make the president any less wary of the Massachusetts senator. By this time, Nixon’s psychology was purely Kennedy-averse, and he was always wary. As John Dean suggested, “It always was apparent to me that Nixon had not forgotten how close the 1960 election with John Kennedy had been. After Watergate Ted Kennedy was one of the first to start investigating in the Senate … Nixon didn’t think Ted was going to run against him. At that point it was too late and McGovern was the nominee. But Nixon just sees this hand again, the fine hand that denied him [in 1960], and he wonders whether the Kennedy people might have the wherewithal to deny him a second term.”

Kennedy campaigned extensively for McGovern in the fall of 1972, and after a direct appeal to Nixon by family matriarch Rose Kennedy, who worried about her last son’s safety, Ted was provided with Secret Service protection until after election day. Nixon and Haldeman seized upon this opportunity to collect political intelligence, planting a Nixon loyalist, retired agent Robert Newbrand, in Kennedy’s Secret Service detail, though all indications are that Newbrand turned up little actionable intelligence.
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Already looking to 1976 and the possibility that Kennedy could emerge as the consensus choice to reclaim the White House for the Democrats, the Irish American Nixon shared a few thoughts about the Irish American Kennedy during an Oval Office discussion. White House aide Ken Clawson recorded for posterity Nixon’s unusual views about his own ethnic group in a September 1972 memo:

The President … discussed at length the disciplines required of the Nation’s Chief Executive … Referring to Senator Kennedy, the president wondered aloud whether the potential presidential candidate might not lack the stringent disciplines of a President. He said that the Irish, in particular, deteriorate rapidly without strong personal discipline. Such a deterioration might remove many of the appealing qualities that Senator Kennedy now appears to possess, the President said.
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While the Nixons and Kennedys kept their distance during the Nixon White House years, given the partisan history between them, one exception occurred the evening of February 3, 1971, when Jacqueline Kennedy responded to an invitation from the Nixons for a private visit and dinner at the White House.
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This event marked her and the children’s first visit since they had moved out in early December 1963. By all accounts it was a pleasant, sentimental occasion, enjoyed by all the participants.
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But there are political considerations in everything for a White House occupant. Two aides had reports on Haldeman’s desk the next morning. Mort Allin called it “truly an outstanding move here in having Jackie in and just the initial reports look very good. One thing we might avoid—too much description … of what a warm evening it was … Any more pushing of that theme could become overkill.”
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Another assistant, Robert C. Odle, Jr., agreed but offered, “It might be pointed out quietly to friendly columnists that this is Mrs. Onassis’s first visit since 1963 and that she refused LBJ’s invitations.”
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During his presidency, Richard Nixon avoided other Kennedy gatherings, including all commemorations of November 22, 1963—sending only emissaries with wreaths to JFK’s grave and mentioning the anniversary in an official proclamation just once, on the tenth anniversary in 1973, which coincided with Thanksgiving.
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When Haldeman suggested to Nixon very early in his first term that he might want to reopen the Warren Commission’s investigation of the Kennedy assassination, Nixon wasn’t at all interested; such a move, favored by Haldeman because he recognized the growing controversy about the commission, would have been astonishing and might have overshadowed the new administration’s initiatives.
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Privately though, Nixon admitted that the Warren Commission’s investigation had been deeply flawed. When presidential hopeful George Wallace was shot and seriously wounded during a campaign stop in Laurel, Maryland, the president called FBI senior official Mark Felt (later made famous for his role in bringing Nixon down as “Deep Throat” during the Watergate investigation) and said, “Be sure we don’t go through the thing we went through—the Kennedy assassination, where we didn’t really follow up adequately. You know?”
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Nixon also declined to attend the opening of the Kennedy Center on September 8,
1971, giving as the excuse his desire not to steal the spotlight from the famous family. The president was harshly criticized by some for skipping the event.
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In fact, Nixon may have been trying to avoid the left-wing politics of the featured entertainer, Leonard Bernstein.
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On the whole, Nixon seemed to prefer to avoid mentioning JFK at all—with the exception of two big subjects where Kennedy’s actions helped Nixon’s public case, Vietnam and Watergate. On one occasion Nixon’s omission of JFK caused a controversy. Despite having a dozen or more opportunities in official and unofficial forums, Nixon never mentioned President Kennedy in connection with the July 1969 moon landing, which had been achieved because of Kennedy’s bold commitment in 1961.
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Such a salute would not have detracted from Nixon’s ceremonial role and might well have enhanced its public relations value with a sprinkling of bipartisan graciousness. Imagine if Nixon had included JFK’s 1961 call for a moon landing on the plaque that now rests on the moon’s surface—an act that would have forever linked his name and Kennedy’s in a powerful symbol of national unity to denote a supreme human triumph. Yet Nixon could not bring himself to do it, and the obvious exclusion generated censure.
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Nixon finally acknowledged Kennedy’s role in the moon program only when it ended, with the return of
Apollo 17
in December 1972.
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It was also never consciously or explicitly acknowledged that Nixon’s innovative, dramatic moves in foreign policy followed the post–Cuban Missile Crisis plans of a chastened President Kennedy. Having come so perilously close to war in 1962, JFK had begun to explore the pathways to peace, encouraged by the similar desires of Premier Khrushchev. JFK’s American University speech in June 1963 and the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty later that year were the antecedents of détente. Yet Nixon went far beyond Kennedy’s tentative steps with the Soviet Union and reconstructed the nature of U.S.USSR relations. And there is no indication Kennedy ever conceived of constructive engagement with China, nor would it have been politically possible for a Democrat in the 1960s to have reached out to “Red China” in the way Nixon did in 1972. Nixon’s fierce anticommunism protected him from soft-on-Communism attacks, while Democrats were already perceived in some quarters as too eager for accommodation with the Reds—plus, China had fallen behind the Iron Curtain under the Democratic Truman administration. In any event, Nixon’s stellar foreign policy realignments were a source of justifiable pride for him and his party, far outstripping what even a reelected President Kennedy could have hoped to do.