White House Ghosts: Presidents and Their Speechwriters
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The call: Nathan Diebenow, “Party Rebuilding,” Lone Star Iconoclast, November 26, 2006.
“I’m here”: “L.B.J.’s Young Man ‘In Charge of Everything’”; the time of the swearing-in comes from the President’s Daily Diary, November 22, 1963, LBJ Library.
“This is a sad time”: Marked-up, typed speaking card, November 22, 1963, “11.22.63 Remarks of President upon arrival at Andrews Air Force Base” folder, Statements of Lyndon Baines Johnson, LBJ Library.
Johnson scrawled: Ibid.
At Andrews: Horace Busby, The Thirty-First of March (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2005), 159–60.
He wanted the speech: Walter Heller, “Notes on Meeting with President Johnson, 7:40 p.m., Saturday, November 23, 1963,” contained in Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.’s journal.
“I didn’t think”: Michael R. Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge: The Johnson White House Tapes, 1963–1964 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997), 40–41.
“the strong can be just”: November 25, 1963, John Kenneth Galbraith letter to the president and attached speech draft, JFK Library.
a French chateau–style: “Ormes & the Man,” Time, November 17, 1961.
“corned it up”: Schlesinger journal.
“He is very hurt”: Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge, 82.
“This is of course”: Schlesinger journal.
Sorensen did not see: Ibid., Stewart Alsop, “Johnson Takes Over: The Untold Story,” Saturday Evening Post, February 15, 1964.
On the car ride…they agreed: Alsop, “Johnson Takes Over.”
“We spent”: Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge, 82.
“All I have ever”: “TCS—11/26/63” draft of speech, “11.27.63 Remarks of the President Before a Joint Session of Congress, House Chamber—Capitol” Folder I, Statements of Lyndon Baines Johnson, LBJ Library.
“—and I who cannot”: Marked-up version of ibid.
One of the speech’s signature: Horace Busby note to President Johnson and speech draft, November 26, 1963, “11.27.63 Remarks of the President Before a Joint Session of Congress, House Chamber—Capitol” Folder I, Statements of Lyndon Baines Johnson, LBJ Library.
“He’s got good sentence”: Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge, 280.
“The two roles”: Richard N. Goodwin, Remembering America: A Voice from the Sixties (New York: Harper & Row, 1989), 268.
He later advised: Harry McPherson, A Political Education: A Washington Memoir (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1995), 327.
“Almost from the outset”: Jack Valenti LBJ Library oral history interview, July 12, 1972, LBJ Library, 3.
“Nor were any of my”: Goodwin, Remembering, 275.
“It was great”: Author interview with Richard N. Goodwin.
Goodwin sifted: Goodwin, Remembering, 253.
“There’s no question”: Author interview with Jack Valenti.
“I have had a lot”: “Transcript of Johnson’s Assessment in TV Interview of His First 100 Days in Office,” New York Times, March 16, 1964.
Johnson had been “badgering”: Robert Dallek, Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson and His Times, 1961–1973 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 80–81.
“Men deceive themselves”: “Elucidator,” Time, September 27, 1937.
“fragment of rhetorical stuffing”: Goodwin, Remembering, 272.
“It was evident”: Jack Valenti OH, July 12, 1972, LBJ Library, 4.
“fondling and caressing”: Ibid.
“The country was alive”: Goodwin, Remembering, 273.
“It ought to do just fine”: Ibid., 278.
“I can tell you”: Beschloss, ed., Taking Charge, 404, 404n.
To drive home his point: Ibid., 404n.
“Doug, I want you”: Douglass Cater LBJ Library oral history interview, April 29, 1969, LBJ Library, 7.
The following February: Ibid., 8–9.
“Nothing compares”: Quoted in Jack Valenti, This Time, This Place (New York: Harmony Books, 2007), 170.
He told people: Author interview with Ervin Duggan.
“because I was from the South”: Ibid.
“this approach…this campaign”: Horace Busby memorandum to the president, September 9, 1964, “Memos to President—October 1964” folder, Office Files of Horace Busby, LBJ Library.
“Too often there is”: W. J. Jorden memorandum to Douglass Cater, with Cater cover note to the president, September 18, 1964, “Memos to the President, September–November 1964 folder,” Office Files of S. Douglass Cater, LBJ Library.
“Tell Goodwin”: Ken Hechler, “Ex-White House Speech Writers Go Down Memory Lane,” Sunday Gazette-Mail, October 13, 1985.
“The Great Society”: “JOHN STEINBECK MATERIAL FOR READING AT THE INAUGURATION,” undated, “1.20.65 The President’s Inaugural Address folder,” Statements of Lyndon Baines Johnson, LBJ Library.
Goodwin included that phrase: Valenti, A Very Human President, 65–66.
“fell flat on his face”: Robert Hardesty, “Searching for a News Lead: Writing Speeches for LBJ,” unpublished text.
“the drop outs”: John Steinbeck letter to Jack Valenti, April 20, 1964, “Speech Material—John Steinbeck [1964] folder,” Personal Papers of Jack Valenti, AC-84-57, LBJ Library.
“It makes a lovely picture”: John Steinbeck letter to Jack Valenti, May 19, 1964, “Speech Material—John Steinbeck [1964]” folder, Personal Papers of Jack Valenti, AC-84-57, LBJ Library.
Goodwin had drafted: Goodwin, Remembering, 355.
The 1965 State of the Union: Ibid., 364.
“It will be difficult”: Bill Moyers memo to the president, February 9, 1965, “Memos to the President and Others [1/64–10/65]” folder, Office Files of Bill Moyers, 1965, LBJ Library.
a North Vietnamese attack two days earlier: Seymour Topping, “Seven G.I.’s Slain in Vietcong Raid: 80 Are Wounded,” New York Times, February 7, 1965.
“I have some concerns”: Horace Busby memo to the president, February 27, 1965, “Memos to the President—February 1965” folder, Office Files of Horace Busby, LBJ Library.
They were confronted: Dan Carter, The Politics of Rage: George Wallace, the Origins of the New Conservatism, and the Transformation of American Politics (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995), 247–49.
“Well, governor”: Goodwin, Remembering, 321.
“was like an avalanche”: Author interview with Valenti.
“What do you”…would tell the press: Goodwin, Remembering, 323.
“The hell you did”: Ibid., 325–27. Valenti disputed this version of events, maintaining that he and Johnson selected Goodwin on the evening of Sunday, March 14, and assigned him the speech then. Johnson too, in his memoirs, says that a first draft was waiting for him in the morning. Goodwin sources his account of the Johnson-Valenti morning scene to Moyers, who in turn claims no knowledge of it. (Garth Pauley, LBJ’s American Promise: The 1965 Voting Rights Address [College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2007], 91–92.)
“I thought you might”: Ibid., 329.
“There was, uniquely”: Ibid., 327.
Goodwin borrowed: Pauley, LBJ’s American Promise, 93–94.
“Although I had written”: Goodwin, Remembering, 329.
Valenti and especially Moyers: Pauley, LBJ’s American Promise, 95.
When Goodwin finished: Goodwin, Remembering, 328.
“I almost died”: Robert Mann, The Walls of Jericho: Lyndon Johnson, Hubert Humphrey, Richard Russell, and the Struggle for Civil Rights (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1996), 461.
“It flowed naturally”: Author interview with Goodwin.
Martin Luther King, Jr., told aides: Goodwin, Remembering, 310.
“Perhaps more than any”: E. Frederic Morrow letter to the president, March 17, 1965, “Voting Rights—3-15-65” folder, Office Files of Horace Busby, LBJ Library.
“He talked about what”: Jack Valenti memo to the president, March 16, 1965, “3.15.65 Special Message to the Congress. The American Promise” folder 1 of 2, Statements
of Lyndon Baines Johnson, LBJ Library.
“Remember those assistants”: Hardesty, “Searching for a News Lead.”
“Most of the stuff”: Goodwin, Remembering, 418.
Johnson reacted predictably: Ibid., 420–21.
“that lay somewhere”: Valenti, A Very Human President, 11.
He would only be gone: Valenti LBJ Library OH, October 18, 1969, LBJ Library, 6.
“Johnson chose me”: Author interview with Valenti.
Valenti lived in the White House: Valenti, This Time, This Place, 166.
“With his small, flashing”: “Inside the White House,” Newsweek, March 1, 1965.
His brief ranged: Goodwin, Remembering, 336.
“He would seek”: Author interview with Harry McPherson.
At twenty-nine, the youngest: Dallek, Flawed Giant, 68.
He was a true believer: “L.B.J.’s Man for the Press,” Life, September 10, 1965.
He drank only: “L.B.J.’s Young Man ‘In Charge of Everything.’”
“I remember the sheer presence”: Quoted in Eve Berliner, “The Moral Core of Bill Moyers,” undated, www.evesmag.com.
“The care of human life”: “L.B.J.’s Young Man ‘In Charge of Everything.’”
He once gave Goodwin: Goodwin, Remembering, 388–89.
“Perhaps Moyers’s”: Patrick Anderson, “The No. 2 Texan in the White House,” New York Times Magazine, April 3, 1966.
Joseph Califano: Joseph A. Califano, Jr., The Triumph and Tragedy of Lyndon Johnson: The White House Years (College Station: Texas A&M University, 2000), 12.
When Johnson telephoned: Ibid., 25, 168.
“It was a very activist”: Author interview with Joseph Califano.
By 1967 he kept: Califano, Triumph, 179.
“Califano handled the domestic”: George Christian, The President Steps Down (New York: Macmillan Company, 1970), 13.
“You know what he thought”: Author interview with Califano.
“Rose Garden Rubbish”: Peter Benchley LBJ Library oral history interview, November 20, 1968, LBJ Library, 17.
In 1965, Busby asked: Robert Hardesty LBJ Library oral history interview, March 26, 1969, LBJ Library, 2.
“They were really running”: Author interview with Califano.
One night at eleven: Author interview with Robert Hardesty.
They would write individually: Hardesty OH, LBJ Library, 4.
Waking in the middle of the night: Ibid., 22.
After a particularly stressful day: Author interview with Califano.
“Brevity was the cardinal rule”: Hardesty, “Searching for a News Lead.”
Califano and Harry McPherson: Author interview with Califano.
Ben Wattenberg, a Bronx native: Ben Wattenberg LBJ Library oral history interview, November 23, 1968, LBJ Library, 26–27.
“I’m going to go home”: Hardesty, “Searching for a News Lead.”
There were three ways: Ibid.
“Can’t you add something”: Douglass Cater LBJ Library oral history interview, May 26, 1974, LBJ Library, 5.
“Therefore. That’s an important”: Author interview with McPherson.
“In an activist administration”: Author interview with Duggan.
The president convened: Dallek, Flawed Giant, 275.
“What the U.S. is doing”: Horace Busby memo to the president, July 21, 1965, “Vietnam” folder, Office Files of Horace Busby, LBJ Library.
He “could see”: Doris Kearns Goodwin, Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1976), 282.
“People can take almost”: John Steinbeck letter to Jack Valenti, July 22, 1965, “Speech Material—John Steinbeck [1965]” folder, Personal Papers of Jack Valenti, AC-84–57, LBJ Library.
It was not a chip Johnson: Califano, Triumph, 117; Valenti, A Very Human President, 192.
A ceaseless week: Goodwin, Remembering, 423.
but not Goodwin, with whom Johnson: Dallek, Flawed Giant, 301.
The speech was “getting there”: Califano, Triumph, 118.
At day’s end: Goodwin, Remembering, 423–24.
“It was just too much”: Califano, Triumph, 117–18.
“At forty yards”…“would love it”: John Steinbeck letter to Jack Valenti, January 7, 1966, “Speech Material—John Steinbeck [1966]” folder, Personal Papers of Jack Valenti; AC-84-57, LBJ Library.
“thoroughly investigated”: Jack Valenti letter to John Steinbeck, January 22, 1966, “Speech Material—John Steinbeck [1966]” folder, Personal Papers of Jack Valenti; AC-84-57, LBJ Library.
“We have to, simply”: Dallek, Flawed Giant, 348.
Valenti pressed Johnson: Author interview with Valenti; Valenti, A Very Human President, 217–19.
“I must confess”: Valenti, A Very Human President, 217–19.
“He never felt comfortable”: Author interview with Valenti.
“Why didn’t Johnson do a better job?”: Author interview with McPherson.
“What he was trying”: Harry McPherson oral history interview, January 16, 1969, LBJ Library, 14.
Bob Hardesty was dining at home: Except where noted, the account of the drafting of the March 16, 1966, Goddard Trophy speech comes from Hardesty, “Searching for a News Lead.”
“There is more chance”: Carroll Kilpatrick, “LBJ Vows Landing on Moon by ’70,” The Washington Post, March 17, 1966.
The initial luster of the moon: Deborah Cadbury, Space Race: The Epic Battle Between America and the Soviet Union for Dominion of Space (New York: HarperCollins, 2006), 273–74; Charles Murray, and Catherine Bly Cox, Apollo: The Race to the Moon (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1989), 161.
Shortly before he was to speak: Evert Clark, “President Reaffirms Goal of Moon Landing in 60’s,” New York Times, March 17, 1966.
“because of budget cuts”: Ibid.
That very night: Cadbury, Space Race, 298.
“You damned speechwriters”: Hardesty, “Searching for a News Lead.”
“Holy God”: Ibid.
“had solved a speechwriting problem”: Will Sparks, “Who Talked to the President Last?” (New York: W. W. Norton, 1971), 56–57.
Looking for a news lead: Hardesty, “Searching for a News Lead.”
“I choose not”: Valenti, This Time, This Place, 274.
“I guess I just didn’t”: Ibid., 278.
He had known Johnson: Dallek, Flawed Giant, 298.
“When the president blew up”: Author interview with Hardesty.
“Looking at the fact”: Charles Maguire LBJ Library oral history interview, July 8, 1969, LBJ Library, 37–38.
“were really dreadful”: Ben Wattenberg LBJ Library oral history interview, November 23, 1968, LBJ Library, 17.
“The material that is”: Robert Kintner memo, May 17, 1966, “Robert Kintner Memos 5.16.6 to 5.19.66” folder, Office Files of Robert Kintner, LBJ Library.
“As you know”: Robert Kintner memo to Robert Hardesty and Will Sparks, July 5, 1966, “Chronological—July, 1966 A–P” folder, Office Files of Robert Kintner, LBJ Library.
“always angry”: Robert Kintner LBJ Library oral history interview, July 13, 1972, LBJ Library, 29.
“McPherson is one of the few”: Valenti, A Very Human President, 54.
“after you’ve worked”: Dallek, Flawed Giant, 227.
The writers were doing their job: Charles Maguire, memo to Robert Kintner, March 31, 1967, “Office Files of Robert Kintner. 3.1.67–3.31.67” folder, Office Files of Robert Kintner, LBJ Library.
“There shouldn’t be quite”: Peter Benchley LBJ Library oral history interview, November 20, 1968, LBJ Library, 31.
“All right, damn it”: Ibid., 32.
“movie star handsome”: Author interview with Harry Middleton.
“I was the least competent”: “A Celebration of the Life of Peter Benchley,” April 30, 2006, privately produced DVD with video clips, including Benchley recounting his days in the Johnson White House.
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��He is somewhat”: Robert Kintner memo to the president, February 22, 1967, “Chronological—Feb. 1967—Pres-Z” folder, Office Files of Robert Kintner, LBJ Library.
He could be funny: Liz Carpenter, Presidential Humor (Albany, TX: Bright Sky Press, 2006), 9; author interview with Middleton.
Writing a toast: “A Celebration of the Life of Peter Benchley.”
“I was convinced”: Author interview with McPherson.
One night in 1968: Except where noted, the story of Benchley’s “firing” comes from the author’s interview with Middleton.
“He didn’t get paid”: Author interview with Califano.
“I don’t remember that”: Author interview with McPherson.
Lady Bird would say: Author interview with Middleton.
“He is one of the last spellbinders”: Maguire OH, LBJ Library 22.
“I always considered”: Author interview with Hardesty.
“I want to get my hand”: Author interview with Duggan.
“No matter how much”: Kintner OH, LBJ Library, 1.
“He waved his arms”: Roy Reed, “A New Presidential Style: That Was ‘the Real Johnson,’ His Old Friends Say,” New York Times, November 18, 1967.
“pretty darned effective”: Ibid.
Goddammit, Johnson said: Author interview with Hardesty.
He never used: Harry Middleton, LBJ: The White House Years (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1990), 200.
“I think he was especially”: McPherson OH, LBJ Library, 21.
“And so, my friends”: Except where noted, the entire account of January 14 comes from Horace Busby, The Thirty-First of March, 172–76.
“to read, think, and come up”: Ibid., 17–19.
Square-faced and quiet: “Johnson Takes Over.”
A heavy smoker: Busby, The Thirty-First, xvi.
Middleton, who not only went on: Author interview with Middleton.
“You feel each other”: Busby, The Thirty-First, xiii.
“Ultimately, I had fitted”: Horace Busby LBJ Library oral history interview, April 23, 1981, LBJ Library, 29.
One morning in June 1964: Valenti, A Very Human President, 118–19.
In October 1967: Busby, The Thirty-First, 197–98.