The April 30, 1964, executive session of the Warren Commission dealt with a potpourri of matters, such as additional areas of inquiry that should be explored (e.g., taking Ruby’s deposition); reaching a decision that two or more Commission members should go to Dallas to examine the entire assassination scene; the problem with the Kennedy family not wanting the autopsy photos to become a part of the record because they didn’t want the president “to be remembered in connection with those pictures” (the tentative position was to honor the family’s request but to have at least “a doctor and some member of the Commission…examine them sufficiently so that they could report to the Commission,” if such be the case, that there was “nothing inconsistent with the other findings in connection with the matter in those pictures”); the realization of the “very serious problem now in the record” that Governor Connally had testified earlier in the month that he was sure he wasn’t struck by the same bullet that struck Kennedy; taking time, near the end of the session, to look at the front windshield of the presidential limousine, which was brought into the conference room; and even such matters as agreeing to buy and read the first ever pro-conspiracy book, Who Killed Kennedy?, published in London that month by an American Communist expatriate named Thomas Buchanan. (Dulles: “I think I can get it through London [by asking] my former associates [at the CIA] to arrange through the British [intelligence] services there to get us a copy of this book immediately.”)160
At an early May staff meeting, Rankin told the attorneys to wrap up their investigations and submit their first draft chapters of the report by June 1, with June 30 set as the deadline for publication. To the hardworking staff lawyers, these dates seemed rather more exhortative than mandatory. Some teams had yet to resolve thorny problems in their areas, others had turned up new evidence requiring still further investigation. Junior counsel Arlen Specter, working virtually alone in his area, felt the time pressure as keenly as anyone, but never believed it jeopardized the integrity of the results. “No one ever said sacrifice thoroughness for speed,” he told the HSCA years later.161 Arlen Specter and Joseph Ball were the only ones who made the June 1 deadline, the others still trying to wrap up their fact-finding.162
The Warren Commission members met in executive session on May 19, 1964, to resolve the most politically sensitive issue they had yet to be confronted with. Several months earlier, General Counsel Rankin had asked the FBI to conduct full field investigations on each member of the Commission staff for security clearances, since they would be reading classified documents in their work. The FBI took much longer than Rankin had anticipated, but all the reports were now in and there were problems with two assistant counsels. A few years earlier, Joe Ball had joined in with other members of the California Bar Association to denounce the House Un-American Activities Committee (UAAC) for the way it conducted itself during a trip to the West Coast. The Commission members had no problem dismissing the issue with regards to Ball, all agreeing, without even a vote, that his employment should continue.
But the FBI field investigation also found that Norman Redlich had been a member of the Emergency Civil Liberties Council, which not only was against the UAAC, as many Americans were, but was considered to be a Communist-front organization by the UAAC as well as the Internal Security Committee of the Senate, though it was not on the attorney general’s list. The FBI check on Redlich was so thorough that it included interviews with elevator operators at Redlich’s New York City apartment building, neighbors of his at his vacation home in Vermont, even, remarkably, with the obstetrician who had delivered him. Someone obviously had leaked the FBI report and Redlich had become subjected to attacks in the conservative media as well as from speeches on the floors of the House and Senate, questioning his loyalty to America and whether the Commission could possibly issue an objective report with such an important leftist staff member like Redlich on it.
Rankin, who knew Redlich from Yale Law School and had been the one who hired him to work on the Commission, opened the discussion by saying that Redlich was a brilliant man who had been working “long hours, longer than anybody else,” someone who was “more familiar with our work than anyone else, and has been of great assistance to me and other members of the staff,” all of whom were “very much disturbed about the attack on him. They have worked intimately with him and are fully satisfied of his complete loyalty.” Rankin added that with a deadline for the report set for June 30, he absolutely needed Redlich to help him, particularly since the staff was soon to be depleted by several members who had to go back to their law firms in early June, such as Eisenberg, Jenner, and Hubert. Rankin felt there was “no question of Mr. Redlich’s loyalty as an American citizen” and asked the Commission members to formally determine that he had a “right to a security clearance.” Rankin noted the irony that Redlich had already been working with “classified materials” for months.
The Commission members then started a spirited debate on the issue, which consumed almost fifty pages of transcript. The member who led the argument to terminate Redlich’s employment was Gerald Ford, who acknowledged that the FBI report did not contain “a scintilla of evidence that he is a member of the Communist Party. As I read the report, he’s given in this connection a clean bill of health.” And Ford didn’t question Redlich’s loyalty. The problem, Ford pointed out, was that the report of the Commission “will be a part of American history as long as the country exists. And it is vitally important, because of the nature of the assignment, that we be as free of any criticism as possible. The image of the Commission, in my opinion, is something that just cannot be tarnished in any way.” Ford’s most telling point, which he reiterated several times, and with which all of the members other than Warren seemed to agree, was that a person with Redlich’s affiliations (he was a member of several other left-wing “cause” groups), if they had been known at the beginning, would not have been hired. “Since I would not have approved an individual with these affiliations then,” Ford said, “I have a terrible time trying to convince myself that we ought to continue the employment” now, though Ford felt it was “very regrettable,” since he liked Redlich, admired his work, had “no doubt whatsoever about his loyalty,” and didn’t want to “hurt him in the slightest.” Boggs, Cooper, Russell, and Dulles agreed with Ford that Redlich should be let go, Dulles saying he should be terminated even though his departure would “cripple us a great deal.”
Warren made it clear that in his mind, Redlich would have to be retained since the only issue was whether he was a loyal American, and since no Commission members thought he was not, there was no basis to terminate him. Warren added that if, indeed, the Commission were to decide that there was “any question of his loyalty, the least we could do” would be to give Redlich an opportunity to defend himself, saying the courts had held that in government employment, “before you discharge a man for security reasons…he has a right to an administrative hearing.” If the other members were concerned about the “image” issue with Americans, “we would at least want to have an image of fair play…to those who have worked for us, and who have been loyal to us…if we expect people to think we have been fair to Oswald.” Warren said that to fire Redlich now without cause would be “un-American,” tantamount to “dropping him as a disloyal individual. And that is a hurt that can never be remedied as long as a man lives.” Warren added that “there will be very little morale left in the staff of this Commission” if Redlich was let go, the staff already “deeply offended” by the assault on Redlich.
McCloy joined in strongly with Warren, noting that “if we dropped [Redlich] at this point, we would be in the middle of as great a controversy as if we did not,” receiving “as much criticism” as they would “if we retain him.” He also made the point that at the heart of the attacks on Redlich was that he could influence the report, which McCloy felt was ill-founded, since the Commission, not the staff, was “going to be responsible for this report.” Cooper agreed that “the Commission is going to mak
e the report,” not the staff. Rankin had said that the staff, of course, would only prepare drafts for the Commission’s revisions and ultimate approval.
Since no one on the Commission personally questioned Redlich’s loyalty as an American, and all had a high opinion of him and his work, the Commission finally decided to issue a press release not even mentioning Redlich, simply saying that “all” Commission staff had been cleared for security purposes.163
Meanwhile, arrangements were made to test the single-bullet hypothesis in Dallas on May 24 with an elaborate reenactment of the assassination in Dealey Plaza. The tests confirmed the theory of Specter, Redlich, and other assistant counsels that the alignment of Kennedy’s and Connally’s bodies to each other in the presidential limousine was such that the bullet that struck Kennedy in his upper right back and exited his throat would have had to go on to hit Connally.164 Two weeks later Specter, Rankin, and Warren went to Dallas. Specter’s assignment was to take Warren to the sniper’s nest window and explain the single-bullet theory to him. After Specter did so, Warren walked away from the window, silent, apparently absorbing and understanding the theory for the first time.165 “It was the only time he was quiet and listened for a few minutes,” Specter would later recall. “He didn’t say anything, but I think I convinced him.”166
In late May, Chief Justice Warren announced that other than the Commission’s report, the supporting volumes of testimony and evidence would not be published owing to the prohibitive cost.167 General Counsel Rankin and a number of assistant counsels felt it was virtually obligatory that these volumes be published. Rankin asked the Government Printing Office for an estimated cost. The figure he received was “something around one million dollars, or thereabouts.” Warren was shocked.
“My, we can’t spend money like that,” he told Rankin.
“Well,” Rankin replied, “I think the report without it is not going to have the validity that it will have if it is supported and people can check out what we did.”
Warren advised Rankin to speak to the congressional members of the Commission. Rankin approached Senator Russell first and told him what he recommended and why. Russell agreed immediately. “Go right ahead,” he told Rankin, “don’t worry about it. We will get the money for you.” Russell himself enlisted the support of the three other congressional members of the Commission—Boggs, Ford, and Cooper—and the funding was arranged.168 The cost of printing the report and the first fifteen hundred copies of its twenty-six volumes eventually came to $608,000.169
When Redlich and Willens told Warren that the June 30 deadline could not be met, he became so agitated and flush that Willens, for a moment, feared that Warren might have a heart attack. Calming down, Warren said with a tone of resignation, “Well, gentlemen, we are here for the duration.”170 The deadline for the report was extended to July 15.171 Although Rankin constantly urged his staff to keep moving, the general feeling among them was that there was more emphasis on getting it done right rather than quickly. Specter noted that “as we moved along…there were comments on attitudes that we should be moving along, we should get the investigation concluded,” but he was clear that they “did not seek to sacrifice completeness for promptness.”172
The Warren Commission met in executive session again on June 4, 1964, to address a single issue, a spate of articles in major newspapers and national magazines that the Commission had already reached a decision that Oswald killed Kennedy and there was no conspiracy—he had acted alone. There had been speculation about this before, but now the stories were adding the imprimatur of the Commission itself by saying the source of their story was “a Commission source” or a “source close to the Commission” or even “a spokesman for the Commission.” Warren was confident that no Commission member was the source of this information, but he wondered who was leaking it. Without accusing anyone, he said, “Now, the staff of the Commission, individually or collectively, may have come to certain conclusions such as this. However, the staff, individually or collectively, have no right to make such implications to the press.”
There were two problems with the story. Number one, the media was essentially, as Representative Ford said, “preempting what we may or may not say.” Obviously, if the story the media was presently peddling, and could be expected to peddle right up to the time the Commission’s report was issued, turned out to be accurate, the report would be completely anticlimactic and bereft of all weight. The other problem was that the story just happened to not be true. Not only hadn’t the Commission made a final judgment yet on the issue of Oswald’s guilt and conspiracy, but not once in all its executive sessions had the Commission even, Warren said, “discussed these matters as a Commission to my knowledge. I don’t like being quoted when I have not made any final judgment.”
Ford: “When we see this practically every day now, and in responsible and highly regarded newspapers, I think it has gotten to a point where something ought to be done.”
McCloy agreed that something should be done and recommended that the Commission put out a statement that no final judgment had been reached on either of the two issues. Indeed, as Warren said, the Commission was still taking testimony. The Commission agreed to issue an immediate statement to the press.
Warren: “We will see if this won’t stop it. I hope so.”173
On June 7, Warren and Congressman Ford held a special hearing for Jack Ruby in the interrogation room of the Dallas county jail. The room, overlooking Dealey Plaza, was crowded with a menagerie of attorneys and law enforcement personnel. At his trial, Ruby had wanted to testify in his own defense but had been talked out of it by his counsel, the flamboyant San Francisco attorney Melvin Belli, who had tried to convince a Texas jury that Ruby was a victim of something called psychomotor epilepsy, a novel medical theory which implied that at the very moment of the shooting, Ruby had been temporarily “insane” and was not really responsible for his actions. Now, touchingly eager to tell his story to the chief justice, Jack regaled Warren and the other Commission members with a confused, harrowing account of his agonized thoughts and actions over the weekend of the assassination. Ruby seemed unable to understand why the city he loved and for which he had committed his act of heroism had turned on him and brought him so low.174
The Commission announced the completion of its hearings on June 17,175 and ten days later General Counsel Rankin told the press that the report would not be released until after the Republican National Convention, due to begin on July 13.176 All five senior counsels—Adams, Coleman, Ball, Hubert, and Jenner—returned to their private practices, leaving only junior assistant counsels to continue working for the Commission full-time. The arduous task of writing the final report fell on the shoulders of twenty or more different staffers, including Norman Redlich and Alfred Goldberg, the Department of Defense historian. The basic approach was for the assistant counsels to submit draft chapters on the area they worked on to the Commission members for their review.177 Howard Willens reported in 1978 that “each chapter of the Warren Commission report went through six or more substantial redrafts, with different persons assuming editorial responsibility at different times.”178 Willens would later tell the HSCA that author Edward Jay Epstein’s summary of who wrote the final report was “seriously flawed and should not be relied upon,” adding that “it is a matter of record that [Epstein] interviewed only a few members of the Warren Commission staff…Accordingly, his summary substantially overstates the contributions of some members of the staff, understates the contributions of others, and does a disservice to the twenty or more members of the staff that participated significantly in preparation of the final report.”179
Redlich, working up to eighteen hours a day, seven days a week, thought the work “would go on forever.” Goldberg finally told Warren that it was “impossible” to finish by July 15, and the deadline was extended to August 1, then August 10. Because of staff disagreement on the use of psychological terminology to describe Oswald’s behavior, Rankin arranged
for three psychiatrists to meet with staff and Commission members for an all-day colloquium, which ultimately concluded that there was not enough evidence for reaching any firm conclusions about Oswald’s motives and psychology. When a draft chapter on the subject was submitted on July 20, Redlich and Rankin thought it too psychological and sent it back for a rewrite.180
The August deadline came and went as Commission staffers struggled to reach a consensus on the particular language. The deadline for the completed report was soon extended to mid-September. Meanwhile, the pressure to publish the report kept increasing. Most of the commissioners and staff wanted to publish the report as soon as possible to keep it from becoming a political issue in the fall elections. Finally, on September 4, galley proofs of the final draft were distributed to commissioners and staff for correction.*
That very same day, however, Assistant Counsel Wesley Liebeler wrote a memorandum to General Counsel J. Lee Rankin in which he recommended that further investigation be conducted to resolve the implications in the testimony of Sylvia Odio.181 (See discussion of the Odio matter in conspiracy section.) It elicited a response from Rankin that has become a famous part of the imperishable lore of the assassination that Warren Commission critics love to cite for the proposition that the Warren Commission was never really interested in getting to the truth. Rankin told Liebeler, “At this stage, we are supposed to be closing doors, not opening them.” The conspiracy theorists,182 up to their old tricks, never bother to tell their readers the precise context in which Rankin made this remark—the very day that the final draft of the Warren Report was being distributed to the commissioners and staff. When I spoke to Liebeler about Rankin’s remark, he said that because of the circumstances, Rankin’s words “were not inappropriate at the time. From the beginning we were all after the truth, and there were no limitations on that. We could do anything we wanted to do. But this was at the very end, when the report was about to go to press, so he [Rankin] said something to the effect that at that point we should be closing doors not opening them.”183 In other words, Rankin, it seems, was simply showing his irritability over the fact that after all this time, the Commission should be in a position of closing all doors. There shouldn’t be any doors still to be opened.
Reclaiming History Page 68
