Come Nineveh, Come Tyre: The Presidency of Edward M. Jason

by Allen Drury

“It is against this difficult backdrop that we must perform our duties here this afternoon.

  “Now the Senator from Wyoming, in his customary kind and generous fashion, has accused me of wanting to hold onto my office because I am a dog in the manger, I am on an ego trip, I want to hurt and obstruct the President as he attempts to find the way to world peace.

  “How can I be a dog in the manger in an office which is entirely at the disposal of the Senate, and from which the Senate can remove me at any time by simple majority vote? And how can I be motivated by ego when I have had from this Senate, and from the people of the great state of Michigan, honors and responsibilities that would humble any man in the knowledge of his own unworthiness?

  “But, Mr. President,” he said, and his colleagues and the galleries became more intent at the change in his voice, “there is an argument to be made—and it is an argument far beyond the simple shallow sophistries of the junior Senator from Wyoming—on his third allegation. I will address myself to it very briefly, and then as far as I am concerned, let us vote.

  “It is not my purpose, I will say to this Senate, to ‘hurt and obstruct’ the President of the United States. I have dealt with a good many more Presidents of the United States than have most who now occupy this floor, and I will say that my purpose has always been to help and assist them in their almost impossible task. That is the basic purpose, I submit of any good United States Senator; and in recent decades there have been a good many good United States Senators. May those who are freshmen here today—and we now have more, as the result of a single election, than we have ever had in my experience or lifetime—measure up as well to their responsibilities.

  “Hurting and obstructing is not my job, Mr. President. But helping to maintain a balance is. And there we come to the fundamental question of how Senators regard this body, in which they are more honored and more fortunate than some of them know, perhaps, to have been given membership by their people.

  “There are two ways of looking at the Senate and its Majority Leadership, and those two ways have always conditioned the selection of the man who sits in this seat. One view is that the Senate is simply an arm of the Executive and its Majority Leader simply the man who speaks for him to it. And the other view, of course, is that we are an equal and coordinate branch of the government, working in cooperation with him to run the country, and that our Majority Leader basically speaks for us to him.

  “This latter view, of course, with a few exceptions here and there over the years—” and for a moment a fleeting amusement, unanswered by Roger P. Croy or his solemn, mint-fresh, suspicious young colleagues, came into his eyes—“has been my own. It still is.”

  He paused again, again took a sip of water. Around him the Senate shifted restlessly but heard him out.

  “I repeat, and I am not trying to deceive you, that I have many misgivings about President Jason’s new policies. But—” and his emphasis stilled the uneasy murmuring that began again through floor and galleries—“they are his policies—he has put them into effect as he had the power to do—he now faces a very great crisis as a result—and I have got to help him.

  “As have we all.…

  “I ask you, Senators,” he said softly, turning his back on Roger P. Croy so that he faced his silent, attentive colleagues (how strange it was, he thought with a knifing realization that made him feel suddenly very old, that for the first time in memory, he did not know at least forty of them at all), “I ask you: does the President not need the most skilled and experienced leadership to stand by him in this fearful crisis which now confronts us—the crisis right out there, Senators, the crisis which exists right this minute? Does he not need a man who can lead this Senate as it should be led, to work with him and alongside him, as an equally concerned and responsible partner, to save this Republic? That is what it comes down to now, Senators—to save this Republic. I have done a good deal to assist in that endeavor in past years. I trust you will let me continue now.”

  And abruptly, surprising them all, he sat down, while in the Press Gallery AP murmured, “I never thought I’d live to hear Bob Munson beg for votes.” “The mighty have fallen,” the Times replied with satisfaction. “And that ain’t all,” the Kansas City Star observed, not kidding.

  Here and there across the Senate, from Stanley at his side, from Cullee and Lafe, from Warren and Johnny DeWilton and Bessie Adams, from Lacey Pollard of Texas, B. Gossett Cook of Virginia, Magnus Hollingsworth of Wisconsin and some other loyal, familiar friends, there came handclaps and applause. But many of the old faces were gone, after this election—many, many were gone. He sat down with a cold hand on his heart, though he managed an encouraging smile at Dolly, who managed an encouraging smile back. Neither believed it.

  “Mr. President,” Arly Richardson said, the disapproval and dislike he had felt for Robert Durham Munson for a decade and more vivid in every angle of his grizzled head and tall, storklike old body, “that was no doubt a noble and moving speech. And it had no bearing on what confronts us today.

  “The Majority Leader—the Senator from Michigan—has maundered on about the two ways of looking at the Senate, and about how much he has helped past Presidents. He has tried to cover over with pious platitudes exactly what he thinks of this President. But we know, Senators—we know. Those of us who know where he has stood in the past know, and those of us who understand what lies behind his famed seductive phrases at this moment know. We also know what this President thinks of him. But perhaps out in the country they do not know. And so I wish to read to the Senate a brief letter which was delivered to me just before we convened at noon today.”

  There was a sharp intake of breath, a heightened tension in the room. Years of training kept Senator Munson’s face blank, but only just.

  “It is dated this morning,” Senator Richardson said, “and it comes from the White House. It reads as follows:

  “‘Dear Senator Richardson,

  “‘I am informed that the Senate will meet this afternoon for the purpose of selecting a Majority Leader. It is imperative for the success of my Administration that I have in that position a man upon whose loyalty, willingness and complete cooperation I can depend in these most difficult times.

  “‘I do not know whether your other duties would permit you to seek the office, but if so, and if you should be chosen for it, I would look forward to working with you.’

  “It is signed,” Arly Richardson said, “‘Edward M. Jason,’ as Senators may clearly see.” And with a gesture both impatient and contemptuous he stepped forward from his place just behind and to the left of Bob Munson, and tossed it on his desk. Then he stepped back, looked about like some tall, old, peering bird, and said with considerable satisfaction, “Mr. President, if it is the Senate’s desire that I fill this position, I shall be happy to serve.”

  Above in the Press Gallery the wire-service reporters dashed out to send their bulletins, in the Family Gallery Dolly, Beth and Crystal looked stricken, elsewhere in the galleries and on the floor an excited babble began. Cullee Hamilton was on his feet in the back row shouting for recognition. After a moment of bland delay the Vice President gave it to him.

  “Mr. President,” Cullee said, “I am a freshman in this body, but even to a freshman it seems an extraordinary thing for the President to try to intervene in our business here. What does he want, a rubber-stamp leader and a rubber-stamp Senate? It seems to me that’s what he’s after, and as one Senator, Mr. President, I don’t like it, I resent it, and I don’t want it!”

  There was a sudden burst of boos from NAWAC and many others, this time with a certain ugly, personal note. He swung about angrily on its nearest perpetrator, the new junior Senator from Ohio, a middle-aged swinger swept in from the governorship on Ted Jason’s coattails.

  “Yes, I will say to the Senator, I resent it and I don’t want it! And if he has an ounce of regard for the authority of this Senate and for his own authority, he will oppose it too. Because I tell you, Mr. Pr
esident, the road lies clear ahead if this is done. A rubber-stamp leader. A rubber-stamp Senate. And a President with no restraints who can do anything he wants any time it pleases him. A constitutional dictator, Mr. President, that’s what’s down the road if we go this way. And don’t make any smart mistake about it!”

  Now the boos rose louder and angrier, including Bob Munson’s friends, responding at last with an equal, bitter vigor. Fred Van Ackerman and at least a dozen others were on their feet shouting for recognition when the Senator from Michigan rose slowly to his. The tumult hesitated, faltered, died. One by one the Senators, even Fred Van Ackerman, sat slowly down. Bob Munson turned and deposited the President’s letter, neatly folded, on Arly Richardson’s desk. Then he turned back and began to speak.

  “Mr. President,” he said quietly, “if the Senate pleases, I would like to say a word.… It is obvious, Mr. President, that very deep and angry emotions are involved here, and it is equally obvious that if allowed to continue, they are going to tear this Senate apart. The Senate is making a spectacle of itself, Mr. President, and as one who loves the Senate, I deplore this. I think it is a very ominous thing, and what it portends for the future, I do not know. Whether it is what the junior Senator from California foresees or whether it is something less drastic, I cannot tell. But I do know it means bad business, for the Senate, for the country, and perhaps for our democracy itself.… ”

  There was an uneasy stirring from the ranks of NAWAC. But he went steadily on.

  “It is particularly ominous, it seems to me, because obviously what is involved here goes much deeper than my political fate or that of the Senator from Arkansas. It obviously goes directly to the policies of the President and whether we agree with them or not. He has polarized this Senate and very shortly now, I am afraid, he is going to polarize this country. We not only have the crisis outside our doors, but very rapidly, I am afraid, we are going to develop a very serious crisis within them. And all of this, unhappily and ironically, because he has acted in perfectly good faith, as those of us who oppose him—and yes, I will say to the Senator from Arkansas,” he said sharply as the booing began to rise again, “I will say I do oppose him—are also acting in perfectly good faith.…

  “Mr. President,” he said gravely as the noise subsided into grumbling murmurs, “I have been considering in these past few moments what I should do. It is quite obvious, I think, to anyone who knows the Senate that it is not the Senate it was last session. It is not the Senate it was before the election of last November. To a considerable degree, at least at this moment—and this moment, right now, with the crisis outside our doors, is what counts, for it will help to decide everything that follows in future months and years—it is President Jason’s Senate. And it is obvious that what he wants here will be done.

  “I have considered, in these few moments, withdrawing from the contest for Majority Leader which it is now quite apparent I am not going to win. But, Mr. President, I have decided not to do so—” sharp booing rose again but he continued calmly—“because that would not only be abandoning a fight I believe it important to make, but it would be failing to make a record I believe it important to make. Those of us who disagree should make our position known, for history’s sake if nothing else. And because there are, I believe, a good many millions of our fellow Americans who feel the same way, I am going to let things stand and make the record I believe should be made, in order to indicate to them that they are not without hope and not alone, that some of us in Congress will continue to fight against policies we believe to be desperately dangerous to this country”—again the hostile noise arose, and into it he concluded with emphasis—“and against the mood in the country which these ugly sounds—not heard very often in this room, in our history—represent. I pray to God this sound does not indicate the mood of what is going to happen to us all, over the policies of this President. But I am not so sure—I am not at all sure. And it frightens me, I will say candidly to Senators: it frightens me.

  “Mr. President,” he concluded quietly, “I ask for a quorum call, and then for the vote.”

  “Without objection,” said Roger P. Croy, matter-of-factly trying to keep the triumph out of his voice but not managing too well, “it is so ordered. The Clerk will call the roll.”

  And on the other side of the Capitol the same pattern of events prevailed. There, too, the galleries had their quota from the raucous ranks of NAWAC. There, too, many new members were eager and impatient to carry out the will of Edward M. Jason. Most of them did so in the sincere conviction that what they were doing was for the good of the country; and therefore the division over policy was just as sharp, and the determination of the President’s men just as ruthlessly adamant, as it was in the Senate. This was a day, as the ex-President could sense the moment he set foot in the big brown chamber abuzz with excitement, in which William Abbott would have to make the fight of his life if he wished to regain control of the House of Representatives.

  This he did. But he realized very soon after the Acting Speaker, Richard S. Morgan of Missouri, gaveled the House to order, that it was not going to be good enough. Even as Stanley Danta was placing Bob Munson in nomination for Majority Leader of the Senate, As McMurtry of Colorado was placing Bill Abbott in nomination for Speaker of the House. And just as Fred Van Ackerman leaped to his feet to nominate Arly Richardson, a newcomer, twenty-six-year-old Bronson Bernard of New York, was on his feet to nominate Jawbone Swarthman. After that, things proceeded just about as they were proceeding across the Capitol.

  Out of the welter of bitter charge and countercharge that ensued, while the galleries and many members booed or clapped or hissed or sneered despite Dick Morgan’s ineffectual attempts to quiet them down, the two major statements of the day came, of course, from the ex-President and his opponent. Unlike Bob Munson, whose opposition to Ted Jason’s policies was intense but at one remove, William Abbott was faced with the immediate prospect of a second repudiation of his entire policy while President. Ted Jason had repudiated it once yesterday in his inaugural and now it was clear—because Jawbone, too, had a letter from the White House which he read to his colleagues—that he wanted the House to repudiate it a second time. The memory of the haggard man in the Situation Room who had begged his forgiveness with a seeming humility scarcely ten hours ago, together with the memory of his own generous and forgiving response, was in the forefront of his mind as he began to speak. It rankled, and bitterly. And so it was that he, unlike Senator Munson, made no pretense of being able to work with the President. He embarked instead on the much riskier—and, the instinct of thirty years told him, foredoomed—course of attempting to swing the House behind him in a direct challenge to the Chief Executive. He knew that he would fail. But like Bob, for the record—and for himself—he had to make the try.

  “Mr. Speaker,” he said, when all the secondary leads and supporting players had strutted their oratorical way across the well of the House, “it is quite apparent that the House is most sharply and bitterly divided on this issue. It is quite apparent that it has come down now to a contest between the new President and the ex-President and what they believe. So be it. I didn’t want it to happen this way, but his direct intervention here has made it that way. And so be it.

  “Let me say first of all—” and the House at last was very quiet, for he had been many years on the Hill, served his country well, about him still were the great twin dignities of having been both Mr. Speaker and Mr. President—“that I give to the President every iota of respect and acknowledgment of the sincerity of his motives and his intentions. I think he really was selfless in what he thought he was setting out to do. I think he genuinely believed he could achieve peace by the means he announced scarcely twenty-four hours ago in front of this Capitol. I think he still thinks so, in spite of the response he has received from the Soviet Union. In fact, I know he does, because I was in the White House with him until four o’clock this morning, and I know how he is thinking. But it is my jud
gment, and I think it is the judgment of many here and in the country, that he has completely and abysmally failed.”

  The boos which had risen and fallen so many times during the debate rose again, the tenuous fabric of respect for his years and position was ripped apart, largely, he knew by his own decision. He welcomed it. He was in no more mood than they to temporize or be gentle.

  “Yes,” he said, and the iron in his voice was as harsh as any they could muster, “completely and abysmally failed. We know he failed yesterday and I am convinced he is going to fail today in this new proposal he has made to Moscow. He is going to fail because while he may still have hopes of making a deal, they won’t deal. He wants to dicker and they don’t. They haven’t the slightest intention of easing up on the pressure one little bit, for one little minute. Wait and see!” he said sharply into the angry, protesting clamor. “Just you wait and see.…

  “Now, Mr. Speaker,” he went on bluntly when order finally returned, “what is the responsibility of this House, in this situation? Let me tell you what it is, seeing it as one who has been both Speaker of the House and President of the United States, something no other man in our history, as I recall, has ever been. As I see it, it is this: we have the obligation to support the President and help him in every way we can when he is engaged in protecting this country against her enemies. But we have no obligation to support and help him when he is saying to those enemies, ‘Come ahead, walk over us, we believe you aren’t a bully when you are a bully, we believe you’re honorable when you’re dishonorable, we believe we can appease you when you telegraph us as clearly as actions can possibly telegraph that you can’t be appeased.’ That Mr. Speaker, is not our obligation.”

  The booing and the hissing broke out harshly again, ugly, sustained, personal. Dick Morgan in the chair rapped futilely for order but William Abbott turned to him with a dismissing wave of the hand and a scornful expression that brought silence more quickly than the gavel could.