December 17, 1975

Knaves Crowd Mt. Olympus

If misery loves company, Richard Nixon must be considerably cheered by the ghosts of his immediate presidential predecessors.

First we learned from one Congressional committee investigating the CIA that Kennedy and Johnson tacitly permitted assassination attempts against Fidel Castro and other world leaders.

Now we are told by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence that "political abuse of the FBI, and by the FBI, has extended through the years through administrations of both parties."

Specifically, the report charges that presidents "at least since Franklin Roosevelt" have conducted political surveillance on American citizens, compiled thousands of secret name-check files of unsupported gossip, and illegally wire-tapped prominent critics.

All of the disclosures illustrate the old saying that "absolute power corrupts absolutely."  The overemphasis of the U. S. Chief executive in American affairs, which began with Roosevelt in his handling of the Great Depression, has extended into our day.  We gave too much power to one man, and that power corrupted each in turn.

Here are just a few eye openers taken verbatim from the report: "Early examples of the Bureau's willingness to do the President's bidding occur under Franklin D.  Roosevelt.  In 1940 it complied with a request to run name checks, open files, and make reports on hundreds of persons who sent telegrams to the President that were - to quote the letter from the President's secretary to J.  Edgar Hoover - 'all more or less in opposition to national defense'."

"President Truman and his aides received regular letters from Hoover labeled ‘Personal and Confidential' containing tidbits of political intelligence.  Sometimes they reported on possible communist influence behind various lobbying efforts, such as activities in support of civil-rights legislation."

"President Eisenhower asked Director Hoover to brief the cabinet on racial tensions in early 1956.  What the Cabinet received was a report not only on incidents of violence, but also on the activities of Southern Governors and Congressmen in groups opposing integration."

"The request by the Nixon White House for a name check on CBS correspondent Daniel Schorr, which the FBI turned into a full field investigation, has been examined extensively elsewhere.  The staff has determined that President Johnson asked for name-check reports on at least seven other journalists."

"Another political abuse of FBI name checks occurred in the closing days of the 1964 presidential election campaign when Johnson aide Bill Moyers asked the Bureau to report on all persons employed in Senator Goldwater's office."

"The next category is abuse of the FBI's investigative powers.  There is a vivid example under the Kennedy administration involving the FBI's late-night and early-morning interviews of a steel-company executive and several reporters who had written stories about the steel executive" (who proposed to raise steel prices).

"The Committee has received materials from the FBI reflecting authorization by Attorney General Robert F.  Kennedy of wiretaps on at least six American citizens, including three executive-branch officials, a congressional staff member and two registered lobbying agents for foreign interests."

"Another abuse of FBI investigative powers under the Johnson administration was the surveillance conducted at the 1964 Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City.  The most sensitive details of the plans and tactics of persons supporting the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party delegate challenge went to the White House from the FBI's wiretap on Dr.  (Martin Luther) King and other types of FBI surveillance."

"According to materials provided to the Committee by the FBI, President Johnson asked the FBI to conduct physical surveillance on Mrs. Anna Chennault, prominent Republican woman leader, on Oct. 30, 1968, in the final days of the election campaign.  On Nov. 13, 1968, at the instruction of President Johnson, the FBI checked toll-call telephone records in Albuquerque, N. M., to determine if vice-presidential candidate Spiro Agnew had called Mrs. Chennault or the South Vietnamese Embassy."

In retrospect, Nixon's transgressions seem bush league.  Whereas earlier presidents subverted the CIA and the FBI to do their dirty work, Nixon mostly used outside mercenaries.  He had the misfortune of being hated by the liberal communicators who attempt to orchestrate political opinion in this country.

Yet, the revelations now seeping out of Congress have the super moralists in a quandary.  To maintain credibility, they must acknowledge that Nixon's sins were not unique.

Thus we witness a neat bit of side stepping by Tom Wicker, New York Times columnist, who led the attack against Nixon.

"Several things need to be said about this - the first of which is that, as apologists for Richard Nixon have insisted, a certain double standard of accountability has been at work.

"That truth will not spare those of us who condemned Nixon from the charge of his partisans - that we were looking the other way when earlier Presidents were trampling over the Bill of Rights.

"However, that Nixon was not doing much that other Presidents had not done...is not a reason to regard his forced resignation as unfair or unwarranted.  Times changed."

Indeed, times have changed.

Which suggests that if we cannot impeach presidents retroactively we can at least demote them from Mt. Olympus.

Author: Lindsey Williams