First Ladies

by Margaret Truman

  “Do you like to cook?” asked one smarty.

  “Yes, I like to cook,” Rosalynn replied. “But I’m not doing much of it this year. I’m trying to get Jimmy Carter elected President.”

  When other questioners baited her about Jimmy’s admission in a Playboy interview that he had lusted after other women, she replied without a flicker of hesitation: “Jimmy talks too much but at least people know he’s honest.”

  Later a reporter asked her if she had ever committed adultery. “If I had,” she replied, “I wouldn’t tell you.”

  One reporter called Rosalynn “a Sherman tank in a field of clover.” Another came up with a nickname that stuck—and hurt—“the steel magnolia.”

  Rosalynn gamely tried to deal with these sideswipes. She claimed she did not mind being called tough—if the word meant “strong.” But she did not like the implication that she was insensitive, unfeminine, and determined always to have her own way. She did not see her partnership with Jimmy Carter as a power struggle—and she had deep compassion for the poor and disadvantaged in America.

  But Rosalynn did not deny she could often get her own way with her husband. At one point during the 1976 campaign, she promised that if Jimmy was elected, he would create a commission to do something about the deplorable treatment of America’s mentally ill. “Then,” she says with an almost devilish glint in her hazel eyes, “I went home and told Jimmy”

  The Carter partnership had two components which made it unique. It was profoundly religious, and it was intensely ambitious. The religious component meant Rosalynn could simultaneously claim she had her own identity and freely submerge her personality and ideas in her husband’s. The ambition was lofted on both religious and secular idealism to an almost dizzying height. The Carters came to Washington with the heady conviction that they could and would change America and the world.

  Mental health became a major item on Rosalynn’s program. But she did not hesitate to add Mrs. Bumpers’s immunization program as well as a concern for older Americans and a determination to do more for woman’s rights, including the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment. On top of this load she piled the desire and/or determination to be the President’s political partner on almost everything that came across his desk in the Oval Office. It was an agenda that would have exhausted a superwoman. When she announced she was also going to tackle the decay of America’s inner cities, one reporter groaned: “She’s trying to take on all the problems we have!”

  Within a few weeks of entering the White House, Jimmy asked Rosalynn to represent him on an unprecedented diplomatic mission to South America. She was to visit seven countries to explain the administration’s foreign policy and explore “substantive” issues with the head of state in each nation. In effect, the President was telling the leaders of these countries that they should listen to the First Lady as closely as they would have listened to him.

  Here is how Rosalynn explained that expedition to me: “Every head of state in the world wanted to learn as much as possible about Jimmy Carter. No one knew him. He couldn’t go everywhere. He had made several important speeches on South America, which I had heard and read and thoroughly understood. So we decided I could represent him down there.”

  The substitution did not work very well. The macho males of Spanish America balked at taking advice and counsel from a woman. Through various back channels their governments communicated their unhappiness to the U.S. State Department, claiming that they found it impossible to evaluate the importance of the First Lady’s messages. The State Department was privately irked by Rosalynn upstaging them and leaked these complaints as well as negative comments in the South American press about her unappointed, unelected status.

  In several countries Rosalynn’s appearance gave local politicians a chance to sound off about aspects of U.S. policy they disliked. Although she had been briefed by top administration officials before she left, Rosalynn was not prepared to debate these policies. All she could do was promise to report the complaints to the President and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee when she returned. The State Department, supposedly trying to defend her against criticism in the American press, put a demeaning label on the trip when a spokesman said Rosalynn’s main task was “asking questions.”

  Although a poll showed the public gave the First Lady’s mission a seventy percent approval rating, Rosalynn and Jimmy never again ventured into coequal diplomacy. The next several times she went overseas, it was in more traditional First Lady roles, to extend presidential sympathy at the funeral of Pope Paul VI, or to visit Cambodian refugee camps in Thailand. She returned from the latter trip appalled by the suffering of these victims of the fanatically Communist Pol Pot regime and announced she had another cause to support.

  To keep up with the political problems of the Oval Office, Jimmy Carter made sure that Rosalynn was briefed regularly by his national security people, congressional liaison staff, and similar experts. Beginning in 1978, she also took the unprecedented step of sitting in on cabinet meetings. Rosalynn’s explanation makes sense in the context of their partnership. “I was constantly asking Jimmy why he or a cabinet officer had made this or that decision,” she told me. “I tried to follow these things through the press and TV, but their reports were frequently misleading. Finally Jimmy got tired of explaining the reasons and background for decisions to me and suggested I sit in on the cabinet meetings so I could get the real facts.”

  Although Rosalynn insists none of the cabinet members was troubled by her presence, a lot of nasty criticism surfaced in the press. Defensively, Rosalynn maintained she made no attempt whatsoever to exercise her coequal authority. She simply sat in the back of the room and took notes. But she learned the hard way that in Washington politics, appearances count for a lot.

  Like other presidents, including Harry Truman, Jimmy Carter insisted that he found his First Lady an invaluable sounding board for ideas and issues. They met once a week for a “policy lunch” and spent several hours almost every night discussing their mutual jobs. Except for the Mental Health Act and a few other issues, it is almost impossible to detect Rosalynn’s stamp on any major bills or decisions. But that is hardly surprising, when two people think so much alike.

  Perhaps the most visible evidence of Rosalynn’s coequal status was the size of her White House staff. Instead of the pathetic handful of typists plus a social secretary and an assistant serving my mother in the Truman White House, Rosalynn commanded a cadre of twenty-one, including a press secretary, a social secretary, and a chief of staff who was paid the same salary as the President’s chief of staff. Rosalynn’s office in the East Wing was another first. Previous First Ladies had operated from a semioffice or study on the second floor. But Rosalynn decided she wanted to keep that area of the White House completely private, a zone of total relaxation for the President and the rest of the family.

  As a world-class late sleeper and eternal putter-offer, I can only express awe at this First Lady’s energy. U.S. News and World Report published the following summary of Rosalynn’s first year in the job: she visited sixteen foreign nations and twenty-one U.S. cities; put 250 hours into being the honorary chairperson of her mental health commission as well as its roving spokesperson; presided at thirty-nine White House receptions, twenty congressional breakfasts, and eight state dinners; spent 210 hours learning Spanish and another 71 hours being briefed on problems foreign and domestic—and walked daughter Amy to her public school almost every morning!

  The New York Times called Rosalynn “the most influential First Lady since Eleanor Roosevelt.” I was intrigued to discover that she was christened Eleanor Rosalynn but preferred the middle name. Once or twice, President Carter referred to her as “my Eleanor.” Unquestionably, there were similarities. At one point Jimmy remarked: “She never loses an argument. When I think an argument is over and I won it… a week or a month later it revives itself.”

  But there were also differences, some obvious, some baffling. Unlike t
he Roosevelts’ tormented marriage, the Carter union was a powerful positive force in both their lives, enabling them to keep quarrels to a minimum. In an interesting switch, Rosalynn admitted to me that she was “the politician” in their partnership. She wanted Jimmy to postpone until his second term some difficult decisions, such as the controversial treaty with Panama, which gave that nation eventual control of the canal. But he demurred, insisting on putting the national interest first. In another switch, it was she, not Jimmy, who needed protection from overwork. Jimmy seemed to have an inner voice that told him he had done enough for one day. Rosalynn often had to be pried out of her office for a jog, a game of tennis, or a swim in the White House pool.

  Rosalynn Carter rivaled Eleanor Roosevelt as our most energetic First Lady. Here she visits a refugee camp in Cambodia. She tackled a staggering range of issues and problems as our first public presidential partner. (Carter Library)

  Rosalynn was also far more thin-skinned than Eleanor Roosevelt, who sailed serenely above the ferocious epithets and accusations flung at her. In a 1984 panel on life in the White House at the Gerald Ford Presidential Library, Rosalynn confessed that the hardest thing for her to do each morning was read the newspapers, with their inevitable criticisms of Jimmy and often of her. She berated the press—always a mistake—when they sniped at her grown children’s conduct in and out of the White House. Her son Jack, who steered clear of the Washington publicity maelstrom, said: “Mom [has] always taken every affront to Dad personally. She’s a lot worse now.” One historian of the Carter presidency criticized Rosalynn’s judgment of people because it was based almost entirely on their loyalty to Jimmy—not on an objective estimate of abilities or liabilities.

  Enough minuses. Partner Rosalynn can justly claim a lot of the credit for the Carter administration’s remarkable record on woman’s rights and opportunities. Jimmy appointed three women to his cabinet and named no fewer than forty-one women to lifetime jobs as federal judges. Rosalynn also fought hard—but in vain—for the Equal Rights Amendment, and frequently spoke out on women’s issues.

  This pioneering First Lady can also claim some of the credit for the biggest foreign policy triumph of the Carter administration, the Camp David accords between Egypt and Israel. This act of daring perfectly suited the Carters’ outsider role. An insider might have wavered at the possibility of alienating the millions of Jews who are among the major vertebrae, if not the backbone, of the Democratic Party. Rosalynn told me how, one day when she and Jimmy were alone at Camp David, she suggested inviting Prime Minister Menachem Begin of Israel and President Anwar Sadat of Egypt to confer there. “I said the place was so peaceful and beautiful, if they could not reach an agreement here, they couldn’t do it anywhere. A few days later, Jimmy decided it was a good idea.”

  In spite of her ceaseless efforts on so many fronts, Rosalynn Carter never made it to the top of the lists of most admired women, like some of her far less activist predecessors, such as Pat Nixon and Mamie Eisenhower. One writer who studied her style with the Mental Health Commission blamed it on her “cool” personality—and on the mixed political signals she sent. People found it hard to decide when she was speaking as the compassionate First Lady and when she was being a White House political operator.

  Historians, on the other hand, rate Rosalynn highly, in one poll putting her third, behind Eleanor Roosevelt and Lady Bird Johnson, in the top ten of most effective First Ladies. On another hand, at a 1993 panel about First Ladies and the Media held at the Smithsonian, the panelists, all women, remarked somewhat ruefully (they obviously wished it were otherwise) that Rosalynn was the least memorable of recent First Ladies.

  Whether this tells us something about the American public or about Rosalynn Carter is a tough call. Whether it adds up to more than a hill of beans is also a good question. But as a politician’s daughter, I see a connection between being a public partner and the public’s perception of a First Lady. The more public the partnership, the more identified the First Lady becomes with all the imbroglios, scandals, and problems of her husband’s administration. If the public’s perception of his presidency bleeds into the failure zone, the First Lady’s popularity sinks with the President’s.

  This is, to some extent, what happened to Rosalynn Carter. I am not trying to sit in political judgment on the Carter administration here. I am only trying to assess what happened to their presidential partnership. The same historians who rated Rosalynn third among effective First Ladies of modern times rated President Jimmy Carter next to last, barely above Warren G. Harding. Maybe they were trying to confirm the adage that there are lies, damn lies, and statistics—especially polling statistics. But it is a judgment that is hard to ignore.

  Unquestionably, the Carters had the best intentions, and they tried to do a great many things. Too many, in the opinion of several recent historians. Seamy friends and relatives, notably banker Bert Lance, who inspired the appointment of a special prosecutor, and Jimmy’s brother, Billy, with his off-the-wall attempt to represent Libya’s terrorist regime, created disillusioning headlines. The Carters were also unlucky. Inflation soared, the economy stalled. International events, such as the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, gave them rude shocks, to which their responses seemed inadequate.

  The coup de grace was the Iranian seizure of the American embassy and its staff in Tehran. No President could have done more to cut this Gordian knot—but it seemed the ultimate proof, piled on top of Afghanistan and the all too recent memories of Vietnam, that America had lost its place as a strong, resourceful world leader. One old Washington hand reportedly said to Jimmy in the middle of this crisis: “I think maybe you’ve used up all your luck getting here!”

  Finally, when they submitted their four years to the judgment of the American people in 1980, the Carters found themselves face to face with Ronald Reagan, one of the greatest vote getters in presidential history. In this final struggle, many people felt Rosalynn damaged her image as First Lady and exposed yet another vulnerability of the public partnership. She abandoned mental health and her other good causes to hit the campaign trail for Jimmy again. Grappling with the Iranian hostage crisis, the President felt he had to stay close to the White House. The First Lady’s sudden switch from altruism to ambition troubled many people.

  The ferocious intensity of Rosalynn’s reelection effort was visible in her comment after they lost to Ronald Reagan. Someone remarked that Jimmy did not seem in the least bitter about the defeat. “I’m bitter enough for both of us,” Rosalynn said.

  I fear that both Jimmy and Rosalynn came to Washington with an exaggerated idea of the power of the offices of the President and the First Lady. These offices can make some things happen, but my father frequently commented on how little even the President can do to get his own way on a dismaying variety of problems. This is even more true for the First Lady. Things are changed in politics not merely by the naked power of the office but by working within the system, having influential friends both inside and outside Washington. Jimmy and Rosalynn painfully lacked these connections. Rosalynn in particular suffered from the lack of a network of powerful women ready to defend, support, and promote her. These hidden but by no means silent backers were among the prime secrets of successful First Ladies such as Eleanor Roosevelt and Lady Bird Johnson.

  I know some people want to see a coequal First Lady up to her eyes in politics. But Rosalynn Carter’s experience—and Edith Wilson’s and Helen Taft’s—makes me wonder if this is the best way for every First Lady to achieve maximum effectiveness in her peculiar job. Becoming First Lady does not, after all, endow a woman with magical qualities, enabling her to deal expertly with any and every problem that floats into the modern White House. While I am heartily in favor of women achieving maximum opportunities and power, I doubt that the First Lady is the ideal symbolic vehicle for this ascent. There are too many ambiguities and complexities in her role. To narrow the test of her success or failure to her ability to acquire and wield politi
cal power is, in my opinion, a serious mistake.

  Again, I am coming down on the side of maximum laissez-faire. First Ladies should all be allowed to do their impossible job their own ways and take their chances with the results. That thought is a good transition to a political partnership as different from the Carters’ as the rural roads of Plains, Georgia, are from the elegant streets of Beverly Hills.

  Chapter 12

  —

  THE MOST

  PROTECTIVE

  PARTNER

  NANCY REAGAN HAD A FAR MORE DIFFICULT TIME THAN JACQUELINE Kennedy when she tried to bring a touch of class to the White House. She was assailed as a coldhearted snob and an egotistic playgirl by a mélange of critics with a ferocity that must have made her sympathize with Marie Antoinette—and occasionally wonder if she might suffer a similar fate. Seldom has so much vitriol been flung at a First Lady who saw herself as nonpolitical.

  Like Jackie Kennedy, Nancy’s first reaction to her new job was panic. She called old friends such as the silent film star Colleen Moore and confessed to being “scared and lonely.” This anxiety may explain some of the unfortunate remarks and decisions Mrs. Reagan made in her first few months in the White House.

  When she was asked if she was going to espouse a cause, like many recent First Ladies, Nancy disdainfully announced she did not have one. For those who knew her, these were strange words. When Ronald Reagan was governor of California, Nancy had been the guiding spirit of the Foster Grandparents Program, which urges older Americans to “adopt” poor children and let them know someone cares.