University of Virginia Library

The Reselling Of The President, 1972

News Analysis

By Charles Weir

With the mid-term Congressional
elections three months past, the
Nixon Administration has launched
its unofficial re-election campaign.
The election in November of 1972
is still a distant nineteen months
away. Why then the need for such
an exact, long range campaign?

Saddled with an unfriendly
Congress, the "Bring Us Together"
program never really got off the
ground. Taking these defeats
personally, just as he did with the
press in 1960. President Nixon
turned elsewhere in the government
for support The Supreme Court
could not be made friendly with
the defeats of Haynesworth and
Carswell. With only a few staff
fights to resolve over picking
priorities, Nixon took his plans to
his Cabinet departments.

Rough Going

Never known as one to really
push hard on Civil Rights and Civil
Liberties, Mr. Nixon found the
going rough from both the
professional bureaucrats and the
lobbyists. The advice that he
got was progressive and unfamiliar.
Not only were those difficulties
enough, but the bureaucracy had
become so large that it was no
longer enough for a department
head to be familiar with his field,
but more importantly an expert in
public administration (witness the
near revolution in HEW and the
rapid exit of Robert Finch.

Even Presidential orders became
lost by the wayside. An example of
this was Mr. Nixon's order to
destroy our stockpiles of nerve gas.
Several months ago, the first
anniversary of that order had seen
one small shipment disposed of by
the Army.

A weakness became apparent in
the government if either someone
down the line had stopped the
order or an outside lobby group
had silently killed it. The President
does not have the time and effort
to trace down all of his orders and
ideas. He must use some political
favors in almost anything he does.

Some endeavors can be very
costly as he found out with
Haynesworth and Carswell and the
D.C. Crime Bill. How could he
overcome these problems that he
faced after less that two years in
office?

His political analysis told him to
take his story to the people. He
evidently took either the wrong
story or took the right story to the
wrong people. The plan worked to
some degree because he fared
much better than the average
President for a non-Presidential
election. He did suffer though
because he offered some of his best
Representatives to the Senatorial
races and lost almost everywhere
but Tennessee. Mr. Nixon and Mr.
Agnew also went about cleaning
their house of liberals.

When the election results came
out and showed that Americans still
voted an overall middle-of-the-road
ballot, the President found that he
had wasted much of his own, his
party's and his country's time,
money and effort.

Long-Distance Plans

With two years to go until his
own re-election, Mr. Nixon saw that
a long-distance election plan would
have to be charted. His kick-off
point would be the State of the
Union Address. Before that, he
would have to begin his new style
of going to the people. This merely
called for stepping up his campus
visitations, meeting more people
and having plenty of the "Silent
Majority" to Thanksgiving and
Christmas dinners.

Since the beginning of this year
he has been mailing out copies of
his own and Vice-President Agnew's
speeches. These are toned down
from their inflammatory speeches
on the campaign trail. Members of
the administration are touring the
country visiting all the gatherings
that they can, trying to sell the
President's programs of health
insurance, revenue sharing and
guaranteed income. Spot
announcements plugging the
President's programs have been
made available to radio stations.

Mailings of direct importance
are being sent to certain select
groups. Notices on the
improvement of labor conditions
are being mailed at random to blue
collar workers. Any meager
improvement in race relations by
the Administration is heralded as a
modern breakthrough and mailings
are sent out to black voters.

The President and
Vice-President also plan to do
more traveling within the country.
Recently, Mr. Nixon was invited to
speak here at Virginia. He is
presently scheduled to talk to two
basically white upper middle class
groups while in the state.

A talk with students here might
be very beneficial. As long as be
continues to speak on campuses
like Tennessee and Nebraska where
dissenters are physically abused, he
will not get a broad view of student
opinion. I do not, however, expect
him to speak at Berkeley or
Columbia. Nor if he comes here do
I expect an answer to why we have
Americans fighting in Laos.

Poor In Polls

When the last Gallup poll
reported on the Presidential
contenders. Mr. Nixon ran only one
percentage point ahead of Mr.
Muskie (when Mr. Wallace was not
included). They ran even with Mr.
Wallace entered. It appears that Mr.
Nixon may have to rely elsewhere
than the South for his "Emerging
Republican Majority."

Starting almost a full two years
before election day. Mr. Nixon
evidently recognizes that his actions
of the first two years of his
Administration have left a lot to be
desired. And if he wants to be
re-elected then he had better
change his tone and that of his
Administration.