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Conversation 015–004

Date: November 17, 1971
Time: 5:23pm - 5:25pm
Location: White House Telephone
Participants: President Nixon, John Erlichman, White House Operator
Download Audio Files: MP3
Listen:

President Nixon: Hello?

White House Operator: Mr. Erlichman.

John Erlichman: Yes, sir!

President Nixon: Hi. How are you getting along on that [Charles] Percy matter?

Erlichman: Well, Clark [MacGregor] closed the deal.

President Nixon: Was he able to close it all right?

Erlichman: Right. And I’ve been tied up this afternoon, Clark sat with him and they pretty well wrote up a little memorandum of understanding on it.

President Nixon: Yeah. Now the understanding of course does not mean in my opinion that we put this in the budget necessarily.

Erlichman: That’s correct.

President Nixon: Don’t you agree?

Erlichman: Yes, sir.

President Nixon: Because we can still go forward with our — well, that’s the only thing that concerned me after I talked to you, that we — I don’t want Percy to say that we’ve changed our — one of our major things of postponing revenue — postponing welfare reform because of a need to implement it and so forth.

Erlichman: I think we can take the position that it’s just too iffy. That it’s something we’ve agreed to support that we are not introducing. And we’re simply going to abide the outcome.

President Nixon: I get it. Good. In other words, we’re supporting an amendment. Good deal. That’s good. Well, I think it’s the less of two bad choices.

Erlichman: And it postpones and time’s on our side.

President Nixon: Yeah. Well, it really gets down to the fact that there’s a chance of beating one and damn little chance of beating the other, as I understand it.

Erlichman: That’s correct.

President Nixon: Even though we have both governors, the big governors, [Ronald] Reagan and [Nelson] Rockefeller on our side, each for different reasons, one for principle and the other — well, both for principle.

Erlichman:Pretty much.

President Nixon: Rockefeller just believes that this sinks revenue sharing, and it does.

Erlichman: Right, right.

President Nixon: Isn’t that his argument?

Erlichman: That’s his argument.

President Nixon: Well Reagan’s argument is not that, Reagan’s argument is that it’s going to mean an escalation of welfare costs, and he’s dead right about that. It puts it on the top. God damn that Percy for coming up with such a horrible thing.

Erlichman:Yeah.

President Nixon: Well, I suppose it’s because of trying to help [Richard] Ogilvie, huh?

Erlichman: Well, yes. And then he’s up this time.

President Nixon: Yeah, yeah. I must say though, on the Ogilvie thing, will you now go ahead and try to help him with —

Erlichman: We are going to help him.

President Nixon: All right. I’d give him his nickels and dimes.

Erlichman: Well, the way we do it actually works to our advantage, because it moves some welfare cost into fiscal ‘72.

President Nixon: I see.

Erlichman: We’ll pile him up in this fiscal year —

President Nixon: I get it.

Erlichman: — which is pretty well busted anyway, and take some of the load off for next year.

President Nixon: And that’s what you’re doing with him?

Erlichman: Right. It helps his cash flow problem about 50 million dollars worth.

President Nixon: My God, that’s a hell of a help.

Erlichman: Sure is.

President Nixon: What the hell is he screaming about?

Erlichman: He’s not screaming now, you see. It’s our senator friend who took the bite out of us.

President Nixon: I see. But Ogilvie feels pretty good? He should.

Erlichman: Oh, he feel’s fine.

President Nixon: Because he’s going to be able to survive.

Erlichman: Sure.

President Nixon: Ok, John, thank you.

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