COLLECTIONS
ABOUT
EXHIBITS
COLLECTIONS
ABOUT
EXHIBITS
Date: July 1, 1971
Time: 6:00-−6:07 pm
Location: White House Telephone
Participants: President Nixon, J Edgar Hoover
Download Audio Files: MP3
Listen:
President Nixon: Hello.
White House Operator: [FBI Director] Mr. [J. Edgar] Hoover, sir.
J. Edgar Hoover: Hello, Mr. President.
President Nixon: Edgar?
Hoover: Yes.
President Nixon: I wanted to tell you that I was so damn mad when that Supreme Court had to come down. I didn’t—first, I didn’t like their decision.1
Hoover: I didn’t, either.
President Nixon: Unbelievable, wasn’t it?
Hoover: It was unbelievable.
President Nixon: You know, those clowns we got on there, I’ll tell you, I hope I outlive the bastards.
Hoover: Well, I hope you do, too.
President Nixon: I mean politically, too, because, by Go—we’ve got to change that court.
Hoover: There’s no question about that whatsoever. I had thought there was a possibility of a five to four.
President Nixon: Yeah, you know, I thought we ought to get [Justice Byron R.] White. What’s the matter with him?
Hoover: I know, well, of course, “Whizzer” White is of the old Kennedy crowd, you know.
President Nixon: Right, well, then the other one though—what in the hell is the matter with [Justice Potter] Stewart?
Hoover: Well, Stewart is a very wishy-washy individual. He switches from one side to the other.
President Nixon: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Hoover: And I wasn’t surprised that he—on this thing he switched.
President Nixon: Well, I suppose he’s affected with the Georgetown thing. But what I was going to say is that the day we went over to your place and I was trying to—it made the news, all right.2
Hoover: Oh, it made the news.
President Nixon: But the point is that if it hadn’t been for that stinking Court decision we’d have been the lead story, you know.
Hoover: Would have been the lead story.
President Nixon: And it should have been.
Hoover: And it should have been. Your remarks were simply wonderful, I thought.
President Nixon: Well, we got—I thought it was good to lay it on the line with those fellows.
Hoover: [Unclear.]
President Nixon: And you know that line that the era of permissiveness is at an end, and you notice—I thought it was really great that when I said—and I hope that you had your people get this one down because—that in 23 years that I’ve known the Director, that he has always—he has never served the party. He has always served his country.
Hoover: That’s right.
President Nixon: That sort of summed it up, didn’t it?
Hoover: It did. And I ordered today—a copy of your speech came over from the White House today—
President Nixon: Yeah.
Hoover: —and I ordered that it be printed in our national, in the Law Enforcement Bulletin, which goes to about fifteen hundred—fifteen thousand law, police departments in the country.
President Nixon: Right. Good. Good. Oh that’s fine.
Hoover: So it’ll printed in full there.
President Nixon: Well, I wanted to go there, but it got some—it got a good play. And I was glad that we could give it a shot, because—
Hoover: Well, I am deeply appreciative of what you did because it certainly was wonderful of you to do it and it’s—
President Nixon: Yeah. Well, I wanted to.
Hoover: I know you may have wanted to, but it was wonderful to do it at a time when they’ve been shooting from all sides at you, you know.
President Nixon: Oh, heck. As far as I’m concerned—you know, one thing I was going to ask your advice on, a lot of people have a feeling that I ought to—not a lot, some, they’re all mixed as a matter of fact, some people think that now that this Court has acted that I ought to make a statement about the freedom of the press and that we aren’t trying to censor them and so forth. My inclination, whatever it’s worth, is not to say so. I’ll tell you—
Hoover: I think you’re right.
President Nixon: I kind of think I should stay out, but what’s your public relations judgment on it, Edgar? I’d just like to know.
Hoover: My public relations judgment, Mr. President, is that you should remain absolutely silent about it.
President Nixon: You would?
Hoover: I would.
President Nixon: Now what’s your—now, you don’t think that that’s any great problem that they’ve been, you know, that naturally they’ve been charging that we have been trying to keep the press from printing the truth about the war and so forth?
Hoover: No, I don’t think that that’s involved because, as a matter of fact, these [Pentagon] Papers don’t harm you one bit.
President Nixon: No, actually, the stories in the [Washington] Post and [New York] Times this morning were all about [President John F.] Kennedy and [South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh] Diem.
Hoover: All about Kennedy. He was the one who started it.
President Nixon: Yeah.
Hoover: And then Lyndon Johnson escalated it, and then you inherited it, and you have brought it down. You never sent an additional man in there, but you brought it down.
President Nixon: Yeah.
Hoover: And I think what they’re trying to do is to bait you into taking a position that the freedom of the press ought not be to that extent.
President Nixon: Yeah.
Hoover: And I think we ought to be awful careful what we do in this case of this man [Daniel] Ellsberg. Because there again, they’re going to make a martyr out of him. All of the press in the country are going to, of course, come to the front that he’s a martyr. And in view of what the Supreme Court has now said, I doubt whether we’re going to be able to get a conviction of him. I hope so, but I doubt it. We’ve got a good strong case on him. And his wife test—his first wife testified very vigorously against him. And it’s a good, strong case, but I—
President Nixon: Well, I’d like to check some of the other people around him. That’s the others—there’s—I think there’s a conspiracy involved here.
Hoover: Exactly, of course, this fellow [Neil] Sheehan of the New York Times is involved. This fellow [columnist] Jack Anderson, here in Washington, that skunk that we have here.
President Nixon: Is he in it, too?
Hoover: Oh yeah, he’s in it. He was at the [Washington] Post and had copies made. I saw her on the TV last night, [Washington Post Publisher] Mrs. [Katherine] Graham. I would have thought she’s about eighty-five years old. She’s only about, I think, something like fifty-seven.
President Nixon: Oh, no, I know that. Yeah.
Hoover: And I had an idea she was a great deal older when I looked at her last night. She’s aged terribly.
President Nixon: She’s a terrible old bag.
Hoover: Oh, she’s an old bitch in my estimation.
President Nixon: [laughing] That’s right.
Hoover: But I think, from your point of view, it would be very ill-advised—
President Nixon: You don’t think we should—I should say anything at this point?
Hoover: I don’t think you should say anything.
President Nixon: Just let it cool off, let the papers come out and let them reflect on whoever they reflect.
Hoover: They’ll print what they want to print. It doesn’t reflect upon you. You had nothing to do with all of this.
President Nixon: I had nothing—none of it is about me, you know. I didn’t say a damn thing.
Hoover: Not at all. And therefore if you enter it now on the grounds of freedom of the press or anything of that, then they’ll—it’s the very thing that the enemies of the administration want to do, is to divert the attack upon you, and not upon Kennedy, and not upon [President Lyndon B.] Johnson. Now, of course, I think what’s going to happen, I think Lyndon Johnson will ultimately burst forth himself. Because—
President Nixon: Yeah. He ought to-
Hoover: You know, he’s a tough individual.
President Nixon: He ought to defend himself.
Hoover: Yeah, I think he will.
President Nixon: Yeah, well—
Hoover: And I think for that reason, your silence would be just the thing—
President Nixon: Yeah. Well, I don’t certainly plan to say anything until I have a chance to look over the weekend and see what the—
Hoover: I’d evaluate it very carefully.
President Nixon: Because—
Hoover: Because I think they’re trying to bait you into taking a position.
President Nixon: Yeah.
Hoover: This fellow [CBS President Frank] Stanton, who’s now going to be cited by the Congress for contempt of court, he shot his mouth off today. And I think the Cong—I think the House of Representatives will cite him for contempt. He ought to be cited for contempt.
President Nixon: [laughing] Oh, boy. Yeah.
Hoover: But let that be his battle, not yours.
President Nixon: Yeah, I’m not—oh, I’m not having nothing to do with him. That’s the House.
Hoover: That’s the House. It’s up to them.
President Nixon: Let them have their fun.
Hoover: And they had a unanimous vote in the committee. It wasn’t divided. And I think that’s up for him to fight out. He talks about the opinion of yesterday as being in his favor and so forth. It has nothing to do with what the House is trying—
President Nixon: Oh, well the other—the opinion yesterday had nothing to do with the Pentagon—with “The Selling of the Pentagon.”
Hoover: None whatsoever at all. They had lied about the Pentagon as they’ve lied about so many things.
President Nixon: Yeah. Yeah.
Hoover: CBS is one of the worst networks on the circuit today.
President Nixon: Right. Right.
Hoover: But I would certainly give awful careful thought about just remaining silent.
President Nixon: Well—Yeah. Well, I’m glad to get that advice. I’m going to be meeting in about an hour with these guys, and I’ll have that in mind.
Hoover: Fine.
President Nixon: Well, good to talk to you and—
Hoover: And I want to thank you again for the [unclear]—
President Nixon: Well, I appreciate the cuff links. [Laughs.]
Hoover: It was wonderful.
President Nixon: And I appreciate the cuff links.
Hoover: Thank you.
President Nixon: Bye.
Hoover: Goodbye.
D R A F T