Tip and the Gipper: When Politics Worked

by Chris Matthews

  Dealing in such a way was Tip O’Neill’s style, but change was not, and those who knew him understood this. He’d come to the House of Representatives in 1953 with a predecessor, the rich and handsome young war vet, John F. Kennedy, clearly a hard act to follow. From his many dealings with JFK over the subsequent years, Tip knew charisma firsthand. Certainly, too, his great hero Franklin Roosevelt had possessed an overabundance. These experiences, however, had not prepared him for what he now faced.

  Tip now saw the response Reagan drew on February 18 at his first joint session of Congress. It was like nothing he’d ever witnessed. As tough and proud as he was, Tip must have glimpsed the shape of his future as he looked out into the historic chamber at all those familiar faces, many of whom he’d worked alongside, or in opposition to, for decades. Watching Reagan’s effect on them, he could see both the appeal and, for him and his fellow Democrats, the menace.

  When asked later about the seemingly mesmerized response to Reagan’s appearance that night, O’Neill was candid. With the professionalism that anchored his political self, he told the press that the public reaction to the president’s performance was “tremendously strong.” He didn’t stop there: “I don’t know how many telegrams we’ve received. . . . The honeymoon is still on, no question about it.”

  As the weeks passed, O’Neill continued to feel the glare of Reagan’s star power even if he chose not to admit it. Asked in early March if the new president’s honeymoon was “wearing thin,” he didn’t take the bait. “We are not ready to play hardball yet,” he said. Yet it was clear that the seeming ease with which the administration was getting out its message—with neither press nor public ready to break the spell—bothered him. “What I am curious of is the honeymoon with the press. I don’t recall any president and a press having a honeymoon as this one.” Soon, by the time only another week had passed, he was starting to acknowledge the challenge being put to him. What he admitted, cautiously, was that the Democrats themselves, under his leadership, might bear some responsibility. “We haven’t communicated well with the press,” he said.

  But still, it was a problem he understood how to address, at least on one level. The reporters covering the Hill were a known quantity. Faithfully, every day the Speaker would appear fifteen minutes before each House session in H210, his ceremonial office, and take their questions. He and they all understood the rules. There were no TV cameras present. For Tip, it was facing the world beyond H210 that threw him from his comfort zone.

  “He was very persuasive with people individually or even in small groups but as a public speaker, it wasn’t his strength,” his daughter Susan told me. “And he knew that about himself, which is why he didn’t like going on camera initially.” Tip never minded admitting to his uneasy relationship with television; it was old news to him. “As you know,” he’d joked to a group of journalists the year before, “I haven’t won many campaigns based on my looks.”

  The career he’d made for himself, starting in Massachusetts, had been constructed in the age before television. Like Reagan, he’d grown up listening to the radio. But, unlike Reagan, his career hadn’t begun in front of a microphone. Instead, he’d cut his teeth in person-to-person politics. Becoming over time a Capitol Hill insider, he’d ascended to the Speaker’s chair through the potent mix of backroom popularity and cajolery. That was the way you did it, and he’d proved himself an adept maneuverer. The skill sets of the U.S. Congress were ones he’d observed throughout his career, matching and bettering them as needed.

  The problem was, a different game was now afoot, and new talents were about to be asked of him. He’d be going up against a master of a medium, television. A few of the people around Tip recognized the problem and were in the market for a solution. One thing was for certain: he couldn’t continue to hold back.

  Early in 1981, I’d received a call from Martin Franks, whom I knew from the Democratic National Committee. He had an idea he wanted to discuss, one that would involve me. I was ready to listen. Back in the fall, I’d often counted on Marty to help with party background info on campaign speeches I was writing for Jimmy Carter. Now he’d moved on to a bigger job—executive director of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC)—and was thinking about the task before him in large terms. The Democrats had lost the White House and the Senate; the House now was their last redoubt. As the majority party there, they needed to be heard from; they needed to make noise, make it frequently, and make it matter.

  After explaining this to me as background, all of which I well understood, Marty proceeded to get to exactly what was on his mind. The Speaker had been holding daily press conferences, regularly attended by those reporters whose congressional beats made them his captive audience. But the takeaway he tended to offer them was weak gruel: mostly just humdrum updates on the legislative schedule. It was a terrible sin of omission, Marty argued. Here was a stage Tip had all to himself every single working day, when Congress was in session, and yet it was an ongoing series of missed opportunities. Sure, he’d been doing it in exactly the same way ever since he’d first become Speaker four years earlier, and so had every Speaker before him. But why not think outside the box? Why not use those press conferences to get out the party’s message, to fight back, to make news?

  My role in this scheme, if Franks managed to talk me into it, was to sign on as communications director for the DCCC. There my chief mission would be to help Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill in his new role as party spokesman. What Marty was asking of me now was to meet with Congressman Tony Coelho, the young Californian who’d been elected to chair the campaign committee. He would be the House Democrat most responsible for getting Democrats to hold and strengthen the House majority in the 1982 elections.

  I was skeptical. It’s not that I doubted the potential of Marty and his boss Tony’s Big Idea—but I wasn’t sure I could manage to make it work. It seemed to me a man like Tip O’Neill would have a well-established operation that wouldn’t readily admit strangers. Quite honestly, I also couldn’t imagine him willingly taking assistance, let alone direction from someone not belonging to his handpicked inner circle. I’d grown up in Philadelphia and knew big-city pols; I knew they liked hiring people with deep-rooted connections and never wanted outsiders getting into their business. I’d assumed that Tip O’Neill was a proud captain who ran his ship the way he wanted to and wasn’t willing to have an outsider, picked by Tony Coelho or anyone else, serving in his crew.

  But what a challenge! It’s always the challenge that gets me. And, of course, I saw the problem: it was Tip’s image, clearly. He was the fellow—the symbol, really—whom the Reagan people had chosen to attack for the very reason that he didn’t represent the new breed of post-Watergate Democrat. There was no confusing him with the party’s Young Turks, those chosen in the elections of 1974 and 1976 who wanted to cut back on deficit spending, who wanted to skim down the size and bureaucracy of government, who wanted to modernize. In other words, he was hardly someone of my political generation. Nor was I of his.

  Tip O’Neill was an old-school, street-corner figure, and a big spender to boot. How would I fit in with him? How would he fit with someone like me who hadn’t inherited a New Deal attitude about government? Having grown up in a Republican family, I’d been drawn to the Democratic side by Eugene McCarthy and his anti–Vietnam War crusade in 1968. Then, as a Peace Corps trainee down in Louisiana, I’d cast my first presidential vote for Hubert Humphrey because of his civil rights leadership and, equally, because I liked his running mate, Edmund Muskie. The senator from Maine reminded me of McCarthy, and I saw him as a true reformer. This belief had been reinforced when, working on the Senate Budget Committee, I’d watched him working steadfastly to control the federal budget, controlling and bringing reason to government spending.

  Yet even feeling strongly those concerns, I agreed to meet with Coelho. After the Californian and I had talked—I can’t pinpoint the exact moment—I decided to go for it.


  One thing I figured was that I’d be in for a dose of culture shock. I’d spent four years back in the 1960s at Holy Cross, and so had experienced New Englanders up close. But now it was 1981 and I’d just finished four years working alongside the Georgians who’d come up north with Jimmy Carter.

  Once I’d signed on with Marty and Tony, my plan of action was to get myself well briefed by a couple of savvy guys about both the Speaker and his men. I needed to have a good idea beforehand of what sort of operation I was heading into. What was especially important was to get a snapshot of who my new colleagues were, how they fit into the pecking order of the O’Neill office, and how each interacted with Tip and with one other. It was critical to know what to expect before I took my place alongside the Speaker’s team—which, like Reagan’s, was a small, tight group.

  What I learned is how much Tip relied on his closest aides when it came to the business of keeping Congress functioning. It was because these men had the Speaker’s ear that other House members treated them with such respect and attention.

  Here are the most important members of Tip’s trusted associates, the ones I got the skinny on before meeting them. First, there was Kirk O’Donnell, chief counsel to the Speaker, who’d been, before he came to work for Tip, a highly effective top aide to Boston mayor Kevin White. It was Tip’s son Christopher (known as “Kip”) who’d encouraged his father to bring O’Donnell on board, looking to add to the staff the kind of political street smarts Kirk had in full. Kip also had wanted a skilled player who’d be able to see both the big and little picture. Most vitally, the son was looking for a person who’d protect his dad. Kirk had turned out to be a brilliant hire, going on to win the Speaker’s highest accolade. He’s “hard as a rock,” Tip O’Neill would say of him approvingly. What impressed me, once I got to know him, was how fearless Kirk was, so absolutely sure of his position. Tip had to beg him to take the job. And Kirk was always willing to take on anyone who dared to confront him. That said, though, his reputation was always that of “a good guy” to have a beer with.

  O’Donnell, I soon learned, was working in cahoots with Congressman Coelho when it came to bringing me in. Both believed the Speaker was poised to become a national figure far larger than any previous Capitol Hill leader. I should add that Kirk, older than his own years, was steeped in the ways of the bygone political world of Boston. Over the time we spent together he worked carefully to educate me with regard to the lore he held so dear, above all those political rules and maxims that had guided the previous generations. Most important, he made it very clear that there are rules and that they exist for good reason.

  Gary Hymel, the Speaker’s administrative assistant, was the most visible of O’Neill’s top aides. His large desk, in the room right off the House chamber, adjoined the Speaker’s ceremonial office, making him the front gatekeeper. A former newspaperman from New Orleans, he’d been a top aide for House majority leader Hale Boggs of Louisiana. Then, when the twin-engine plane carrying Boggs was tragically lost over Alaska in 1972, Gary, with the agreement of the Boggs family, helped Tip, who’d been majority whip, to win election to become majority leader. In addition to handling the press, Gary was the Speaker’s key liaison with southern members. Observing him in action, I could tell he was an extremely popular guy around the House.

  Leo Diehl, who held the same highest-ranking title as Hymel, “Administrative Assistant,” was another quintessential political operator. Elected to the Massachusetts legislature from an adjoining district in 1936, the same year as O’Neill, the two quickly became friends for life. Leo, who’d been crippled by polio as a boy, relied on crutches, refusing ever to resort to a wheelchair. He and Tip would, without the slightest embarrassment, sing old neighborhood songs—“Paddy McGinty’s Goat” and “Nobody Knows What Happened to McCarty”—on their way down those great corridors at night. Leo’s desk was in the little anteroom to Tip’s working office, hidden along the Capitol’s East Front. From this well-placed spot he was entrusted by Tip to decide which lobbyists to let through the door, whom to hit up at fund-raising time, and what scores warranted settling. Leo and Millie O’Neill were the only ones who called the Speaker “Tom.”

  Ari Weiss, Tip’s legislative whiz kid, came from a different generation and had a different set of skills. He somehow had the knack of knowing what was happening in the House each morning within minutes of arriving at his desk. It was uncanny. Because of this, the Speaker relied on him completely, always wanting Ari in the room and at his side whenever legislation was being discussed. Yet there was another, important fact to know about Ari, over and beyond his legislative radar, which was that he and Tip were rooted in a mutual past, despite the four-decade difference in their ages. “I knew his father and his mother,” the Speaker liked to say, and this shared history was, for Tip, the coin of the realm.

  The moment had now arrived for my first meeting with the man himself. It took place in his office on the East Front of the Capitol, secreted far away from visiting tourists. He was behind his desk and leaning toward me, his short-sleeved shirt showing off his huge forearms as I took my chair. He seemed to me at home in this world, organic to the place.

  He was curious about me, and the feeling was obviously mutual. It’s possible my notions before meeting him owed a lot to those caricatures I’d been recruited to help combat. With so many years intervening since then, it’s hard to remember now at what moment my imagined Tip O’Neill suddenly merged with the real one. The one thing I will never forget is the “animal” aspect to him, something that dominated the space around him. If power is measured in physical presence, he projected it in strength. What sat before me was a bear of a man.

  One thing that was clear from the start was that this national figure whose reputation I’d long known about regarded me as a professional. I’d arrived on his doorstep with advance billing that told him I could help fix his problem. If I’d been a golf pro—or a plumber, for that matter—he’d have treated me the same. Beyond that, what linked us right off the bat was the way his need matched up with my readiness to get to work. There were also the stakes that brought me there in the first place. What he and I both knew—and neither of us wanted to say, certainly not at this meeting, at least—was that if he didn’t win this fight there wouldn’t be another.

  Given all this, I was relieved he felt no need for coyness. Looking me straight in the eye, he said, “Tell me what I’m doing wrong and what I’m doing right. Let’s have a little conversation.” After listening to what I had to say, he made an unforgettable declaration. “You know an old dog can learn new tricks,” he pronounced. And, when I heard him say that, my sense of anticipation about what lay ahead, and what we might do together, kicked in. And guess what else? I saw how it would be a way to tap again into the fighting energy I’d felt back on Air Force One, writing speeches for President Carter.

  It wasn’t long before I was reporting for work. The pattern of my days now weirdly echoed that of a decade earlier when I’d split my time between Senator Moss’s office by day and guarding the Capitol, armed and ready, by night. In the current era I would spend my mornings checking the national news and looking for ammo that Thomas P. O’Neill, Jr., the battling national Democrat, could fire at Ronald Reagan. I knew that O’Neill needed to get larger, to grab some top billing by injecting himself into the fast-moving news cycle.

  Each day, too, I’d drop into Kirk O’Donnell’s office to discuss with him the current agenda, specifically the topics to be covered at that morning’s session in front of reporters. I soon began to produce short statements for Tip to use. They were designed to be what beat journalists call “news helper,” colorful copy to liven up what they’d go back to their desks and file. My hope was that those covering Tip would be more likely to quote him if he delivered such lively zingers. That was the idea. But for a good many weeks, I’m sorry to admit, the Speaker decided to ignore any of the offerings I’d knocked out with such excitement.

  After ca
tching the Speaker’s press conference each Tuesday through Thursday, which was usually over by noon, I’d walk over to the headquarters of the DCCC on nearby North Capitol Street to tackle whatever was waiting for me there. If on the Speaker’s team I was playing defense, here I was on offense.

  At the DCCC one of the ideas I came up with was the creation of the Congressional News Service, a made-for-the-occasion periodical whose only purpose was to stir up trouble for incumbent GOP House members. The contents of any “edition” consisted solely of customized news items featuring Republican members of Congress that would then be mailed to their local newspapers and TV and radio stations. It was modeled after Nader’s Capitol Hill News Service, where I’d once worked, but the content we now assembled was specifically focused on Republicans. It consisted of embarrassing items that normally went unmentioned in official constituent newsletters, for example, how much this member or that had enthusiastically enjoyed that year’s Paris Air Show. To keep it legit, each edition, with its official-looking banner, included a credit line at the bottom of the page clearly reading “Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.” That said, I’ll be the first to admit the size of the typeface required not just excellent eyesight but a weary editor’s alertness.

  I remember one punchy Congressional News Service headline I particularly enjoyed. It read, COYNE CAN’T COUNT! The member in this case was James K. Coyne III—a freshman Republican from Bucks County, Pennsylvania, who may not even have remembered the legislation involved until the Congressional News Service reminded him. The best I can recall, it derided the Republican doctrine that cutting taxes and raising defense spending would somehow avoid higher deficits. But any sins the opposition committed, however obscure, were rightly fair game, as far as I was concerned, and so I’d write up the stories I liked and send them out. Later, after a newspaper in Congressman Coyne’s district had used our item, I received a clipping of it attached to an appreciative note from the Democrat whom Coyne had beaten the year before. Keep up the good work was the message.