“Obviously,” Sloan said. There were five people with authorizing authority over the fund, and Mitchell was one of them. Stans was another.
Had Mitchell known of the disbursements that had gone to Magruder, Porter and Liddy?
Sloan nodded. But that was not proof Mitchell had known of the bugging. There was a remote possibility that the three had gone off on their own and spent the money on unauthorized projects, although Sloan doubted it. He was being careful.
How had it worked? How had Mitchell exercised his authority over the fund? By voucher?
It was a routine procedure, Sloan said, and in the context of a campaign with a budget of over $50 million, it had seemed insignificant at the time. When Sloan had first been approached for money, he had simply picked up the telephone and called Mitchell at the Justice Department. It only took a few seconds. Mitchell would tell him to give the money out. There had been a number of phone calls, beginning in 1971.
The reporters avoided looking at each other. While he was Attorney General of the United States, John Mitchell had authorized the expenditure of campaign funds for apparently illegal activities against the political opposition. They wanted to be sure they had heard Sloan correctly.
They had. Not only was Mitchell one of the five people with control over the fund, but he had exercised it frequently. Indeed, initially he had been the sole person to authorize the expenditures. Later, the authority had been passed to others. Magruder was among them, said Sloan.
The Bookkeeper’s account of the fund was beginning to make sense. She had said that about six people were involved. But only three that she knew of—Porter, Liddy and Magruder—had received money. The others, she had said, had simply gotten phone calls. It was all coming together. The other names were those who could authorize payments. They had been called by Sloan before the cash was handed out. Magruder had initially received money from the fund on Mitchell’s authorization. Eventually, he had been given authority to approve payments to others as well.
Mitchell, Stans and Magruder—that left two others who could authorize the payments, by Sloan’s account. Were they also on the political side at CRP?
Neither worked for the re-election committee, Sloan said, but he would go no further.
Even aside from the names, the reporters still did not fully understand the purpose of the fund. Who else would have received cash from Stans’ safe? Would they necessarily have known about the bugging?
Sloan had no reason to believe the other recipients were involved or that the money they received had financed anything illegal or improper. Only Porter, Liddy and Magruder had received large amounts of money. There were no comparable payments to others.
How could Sloan be so sure that the money withdrawn by those three had been put to illegal or improper use, if the remainder of the money was spent legitimately?
Again Sloan said he was assuming the worst. But it was more than guesswork. He had heard a lot, seen a lot.
Woodward, who had not met Sloan before, was impressed by his care and his unwillingness to mention the names of persons he had no reason to think had done anything wrong. Sloan’s credentials as a source seemed impeccable. He was thoroughly committed to the re-election of Richard Nixon and seemed convinced that the President had known nothing of the indiscretions committed by his campaign staff.
And he seemed to understand how they had occurred. Overzealousness, overkill, a desire to leave nothing to chance in the effort to re-elect the President—he had seen it all at the White House. One breathed a rarefied air when one was in the President’s service. And Sloan thought the White House might be involved in the bugging.
The other two persons authorized to approve payments from the fund, were they members of the White House staff?
Only one, said Sloan. The other was not an official in either the campaign or the administration, not a Washingtonian.
The reporters suggested that only three persons at the White House seemed likely to have had control over the fund: H. R. Haldeman, Charles Colson, and John Ehrlichman. Their money was on Colson.
Sloan shook his head. That wasn’t the way Colson operated, he said. Chuck was too crafty, too careful to put himself in jeopardy that way. If it had been Colson, he would have done it through someone else, and that hadn’t happened.
The only reason the reporters had mentioned Ehrlichman was because of his high position at the White House. If Stans and Mitchell had had to be consulted before the money could be disbursed, someone of similar stature at the White House must have been involved. Ehrlichman had no major role in the campaign, as far as the reporters knew. Haldeman, because he was the overseer of CRP, and because of his reputation, seemed a more logical choice.
Haldeman, known to the reporters by little more than his reputation for autocratic control of the White House staff, was the President’s eyes and ears in the campaign, Sloan confirmed. Through his political aide, Gordon Strachan, Haldeman was kept informed of every major decision made at CRP. Magruder was Haldeman’s man at the committee, installed there to make sure that John Mitchell did not run the committee without proper input from the White House.
Still Sloan would not say yes or no. But he said nothing to steer the reporters away from Haldeman, as he had with Colson. They were almost convinced it was Haldeman.
That left one more person—someone who worked for neither the White House nor CRP.
Murray Chotiner?
No, said Sloan.
Bernstein threw out a name Woodward had never heard before: Herbert Kalmbach, President Nixon’s personal lawyer. It was a guess. Sloan looked surprised.
Bernstein had remembered reading a piece in the New York Times the previous February that referred to Kalmbach as “Nixon’s personal attorney on the West Coast” and said that prospective clients who had business with the government couldn’t talk to him for less than $10,000. It related that his law practice had mushroomed and that he was second only to Maurice Stans on Nixon’s national fund-raising team. He was secretary of the Nixon Foundation, which was planning the Nixon Library. The story said he also worked frequently on private projects for the President and the White House.
Sloan said he didn’t want to get into a guessing game. The reporters could not tell whether this was because Kalmbach was a lucky guess or a ridiculous one. That could wait. Haldeman was the important name—if it was Haldeman.
The reporters had already helped themselves to three cups of coffee, going back to the kitchen to refill their cups. Sloan had been glancing at his watch and reminding them that he had to clean up the house. They had been there for more than two hours. It would be senseless to overstay their welcome. They tried once more on Haldeman.
If it was not Haldeman, then why not say so?
“I just don’t want to get into it,” said Sloan, doing nothing to shake the reporters’ belief that they were on the right track.
After a few more minutes of general talk about the campaign, the three of them walked to the door.
“Someday maybe you’ll be President,” Woodward told Sloan.
Bernstein was astonished at the remark, for it did not sound as if it had been made lightly. Woodward had meant it as a form of flattery, but there was an element of respect in it. And more—a hope that Sloan would survive the mess.
It was past noon when the reporters got to the office. Woodward placed a quick call to a source working on the federal investigation. By then, the reporters checked regularly with a half-dozen persons in the Justice Department and FBI who were sometimes willing to confirm information that had been obtained elsewhere. The sources rarely went further, often not that far.
This time Woodward was lucky. Sloan had told the whole story of the fund to investigators; so had the Bookkeeper. Mitchell, Stans, Magruder. That was right. The source would not volunteer the names of the other two persons who had controlled the fund. It was certain that the money had paid for espionage against the Democrats; whether it had financed the Watergate operat
ion was unclear, depending on whom you believed. The details about the fund’s operation were as described by Sloan and the Bookkeeper, he said.
Haldeman?
The source would not say.
• • •
A few minutes later they met with Bradlee, Simons, Rosenfeld and Sussman in Bradlee’s office, a comfortable carpeted room with a picture window looking out into the newsroom, a modern oval rosewood table instead of a desk, and a black leather couch. During discussions in his office, Bradlee frequently picked up an undersize sponge-rubber basketball from the table and tossed it toward a hoop attached by suction cups to the picture window. The gesture was indicative both of the editor’s short attention span and of a studied informality. There was an alluring combination of aristocrat and commoner about Bradlee: Boston Brahmin, Harvard, the World War II Navy, press attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Paris, police-beat reporter, news-magazine political reporter and Washington bureau chief of Newsweek.
Simons, as restrained as Bradlee could be hard-charging and obstreperous, liked to tell of watching Bradlee grind his cigarettes out in a demitasse cup during a formal dinner party. Bradlee was one of the few persons who could pull that kind of thing off and leave the hostess saying how charming he was.
Hardly unaware of his image, Bradlee even cultivated it. He delighted in displaying his street savvy, telling a reporter to get his ass moving and talk to some real cops, not lieutenants and captains behind a desk; then rising to greet some visiting dignitary from Le Monde or L’Express in formal, flawless French, complete with a peck on each cheek.
Bradlee listened attentively as Woodward ran down what details the reporters had about the secret fund, its control by Mitchell and Stans and the probability of Haldeman’s authority over it as well. Bradlee focused on Mitchell and the context in which Sloan had described Mitchell’s involvement with the fund.
Bernstein and Woodward thought they were on the verge of finding out the names of all five persons who controlled the secret fund and perhaps more about the individual transactions. Then they planned to write what would be a definitive account—who controlled the money and precisely how it related to Watergate.
They started to explain their plan to Bradlee and noticed that he was doodling on a sheet of paper on his desk—a sign that he was becoming a trifle impatient. He interrupted with a wave of his hand, then got to the point.
“Listen, fellas, are you certain on Mitchell?” A pause. “Absolutely certain?” He stared at each of the reporters as they nodded. “Can you write it now?”
They hesitated, then said they could. The reporters understood Bradlee’s philosophy: a daily newspaper can’t wait for the definitive account of events.
Bradlee stood up. “Well then, let’s do it.”
And, he presumed aloud, the reporters realized the implications of such a story, that John Mitchell was not someone to be trifled with, that now they were playing real hardball? Bradlee was not interrogating them. He was administering an oath.
They nodded, aware that they were about to take a bigger step than either of them had ever taken.
“Good story, good story,” Simons said, repeating an office cliché, and they all laughed.
“Go,” Bradlee said, waving everybody out of his office.
Bernstein was disappointed to see the meeting end. The editor had pushed his left sleeve up and Bernstein had seen a tattoo of a rooster. Bernstein momentarily forgot about Watergate. Bradlee, whom he regarded with an unhealthy imbalance of respect, fear, anger and self-pity (Bradlee did not understand him, he had decided long before), was always amazing him. He wished he had gotten a better look at the tattoo.
Writing the story took surprisingly little time. It moved from Bernstein’s typewriter to Woodward’s, then to Rosenfeld and Sussman and finally to Bradlee and Simons. Only minor changes were made. By 6:00 P.M. it was in the composing room.
John N. Mitchell, while serving as U.S. Attorney General, personally controlled a secret Republican fund that was used to gather information about the Democrats, according to sources involved in the Watergate investigation.
Beginning in the spring of 1971, almost a year before he left the Justice Department to become President Nixon’s campaign manager on March 1, Mitchell personally approved withdrawals from the fund, several reliable sources have told the Washington Post.
Four persons other than Mitchell were later authorized to approve payments from the secret fund, the sources said.
Two of them were identified as former Secretary of Commerce Maurice H. Stans, now finance chairman of the President’s campaign, and Jeb Stuart Magruder, manager of the Nixon campaign before Mitchell took over and now a deputy director of the campaign. The other two, according to the sources, are a high White House official now involved in the campaign and a campaign aide outside of Washington.
The rest of the story dealt with how the fund operated: Sloan’s phone calls to Mitchell, withdrawals by Liddy, Porter and Magruder, and the GAO’s determination that even the existence of the fund was apparently illegal because the expenditures had not been reported. The Watergate grand jury’s investigation “did not establish that the intelligence-gathering fund directly financed the illegal eavesdropping,” the story said. “According to the Post’s sources, the primary purpose of the secret fund was to finance widespread intelligence-gathering operations against the Democrats.”
Bernstein called CRP for the rites of denial and reached Powell Moore. Half an hour later, Moore called back with the committee’s response. “I think your sources are bad; they’re providing misinformation. We’re not going to comment beyond that,” he said. He couldn’t be budged to discuss the specifics.
Bernstein remained at the Post that night to pursue the apparent Haldeman connection and read the clips on Herbert Kalmbach. At about 11:00 P.M., he got another call from Moore, who had talked to John Mitchell and had a new statement:
There is absolutely no truth to the charges in the Post story. Neither Mr. Mitchell nor Mr. Stans has any knowledge of any disbursement from an alleged fund as described by the Post and neither of them controlled any committee expenditures while serving as government officials.
Bernstein studied the statement and underlined the soft spots. The charges in the Post story. What charges? Disbursement from an alleged fund as described by the Post. There was no denial of the fund’s existence, or that money had been disbursed, only of the way it was described. Neither of them controlled any committee expenditures. Technically correct. Sloan had controlled the expenditures, Mitchell and Stans had only approved them.
It was the cleverest denial yet, Bernstein told Moore and tried to go over it with him. Moore wouldn’t play.
The new statement would be duly recorded, along with Moore’s refusal to elaborate, Bernstein told Moore. If the Nixon committee would not respond, maybe Mitchell would, he added, telling Moore he would try to reach the Attorney General.
He wrote an insert on the new statement, and dialed the number of the Essex House in New York. He asked for Room 710. Mitchell answered. Bernstein recognized the voice and began scribbling notes. He wanted to get everything down on paper, including his own questions. Moments after the call had ended, Bernstein began to type it out. In his agitated state, it was difficult to hit the right keys.
MITCHELL: “Yes.”
BERNSTEIN (after identifying himself): “Sir, I’m sorry to bother you at this hour, but we are running a story in tomorrow’s paper that, in effect, says that you controlled secret funds at the committee while you were Attorney General.”
MITCHELL: “JEEEEEEEEESUS. You said that? What does it say?”
BERNSTEIN: “I’ll read you the first few paragraphs.” (He got as far as the third. Mitchell responded, “JEEEEEEEEESUS” every few words.)
MITCHELL: “All that crap, you’re putting it in the paper? It’s all been denied. Katie Graham’s gonna get her tit caught in a big fat wringer if that’s published. Good Christ! That’s the most sickenin
g thing I ever heard.”
BERNSTEIN: “Sir, I’d like to ask you a few questions about—”
MITCHELL: “What time is it?”
BERNSTEIN: “Eleven thirty. I’m sorry to call so late.”
MITCHELL: “Eleven thirty. Eleven thirty when?”
BERNSTEIN: “Eleven thirty at night.”
MITCHELL: “Oh.”
BERNSTEIN: “The committee has issued a statement about the story, but I’d like to ask you a few questions about the specifics of what the story contains.”
MITCHELL: “Did the committee tell you to go ahead and publish that story? You fellows got a great ballgame going. As soon as you’re through paying Ed Williams* and the rest of those fellows, we’re going to do a story on all of you.”
BERNSTEIN: “Sir, about the story—”
MITCHELL: “Call my law office in the morning.”
He hung up.
For Bernstein, the only constant had been an adrenal feeling that began with Mitchell’s first JEEEEEEEEESUS—some sort of primal scream. As the cry of JEEEEEEEEESUS was repeated, Bernstein had perceived the excruciating depth of Mitchell’s hurt. For a moment, he had been afraid that Mitchell might die on the telephone, and for the first time Mitchell was flesh and blood, not Nixon’s campaign manager, the shadow of Kent State, Carswell’s keeper, the high sheriff of Law and Order, the jowled heavy of Watergate. Bernstein’s skin felt prickly. Mitchell had escaped indictment by the grand jury, which would keep his secrets, but the reporters had said the words out loud. Though using the neutral language of a reporter’s trade, they had called John Mitchell a crook. Bernstein did not savor the moment. Mitchell’s tone was so filled with hate and loathing that Bernstein had felt threatened. Bernstein was shocked at his language, his ugliness. Did the committee tell you to go ahead and publish that story? We’re going to do a story on all of you. Mitchell had said “we.” Once the election was over they could do almost anything they damn well pleased. And get away with it.
All the President's Men Page 11
