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By Martin Waldron N. ¥. Times News Service AUSTIN, Tex. — Lyndon Johnson is pictured in a series of oral histories of his presidency as a somewhat indifferent administrator who could browbeat his assistants one moment and praise them extravagantly the next. Transcripts of the cral es were among about 230,000 of the 31 million documents on the Johnson administered and its edu cation programs that were opened at the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library on the University of Texas campus here Jan. 25. The histories were recorded at Johnson's request. He has said he wants historians to have complete information by which to judge his administration. Several of the histories are remarkably frank about a wide range of subjects. WHILE TAPING their recollections, Johnson's aides were questioned about the former President as a man about his temper, his reputation for earthy language and his work habits — as well as about his education programs. Their responses indicate: — He was capable of making momentous decisions in stanteously and then poring over trifles for hours. He wanted to make as many decisions as possible, even down to choosing who would fill lowly federal ap pointments. — He had, along with a penchant for “lusty” stories and ‘‘barracks’’ language, a liking for such poetic devices as alliteration and a strong feeling for the beauties of nature. ‘He bore grudges, cutting of as “disloyal” anyone he thought was not supporting all of his programs en thusiastically. An example was provided by Francis Keppel, former U.S. commissioner of education, who described a political crisis that erupted in 1965 after federal aid was halted to the Chicago schools. The Office of Economic Opportunity felt that Chicago was hot following federal school desegregation guidelines, Keppel said, and so he put out a letter to hold up any education aid to the city. _ Mayor Richard J. Daley of Chicago — “sputtering mad,” according to Keppel — flew to New York City to see Johnson, who had gone there to meet with Pope Paul VI. Daley accused the CEO of trying to undermine him politically, Keppel said, and the President sent Wilbur J. Cohen, who held several positions in the administration including that of Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, to Chicago “to straighten out the mess. From the time of that in cident, neither Johnson nor Daley trusted the CFO, Cohen said in his oral history. Cohen said that if he would recommend that some able OEO administrator handle a difficult assignment, Johnson would refuse, saying: “All those OEO fellows are disloyal. KEPPEL SAID THAT in the Cicago incident and the hiring of Henry Loomis, former director of the Voice of America, for a position in the Office of Education was the cause of his downfall as com missioner of education. Johnson was furious with Loomis, Keppel said, because Loomis, when resigning from the Voice of America, had said that some government departments had tried to in terfere with operations of the radio station and had not made it clear that he was not talking about Johnson. After the hiring of Loomis, Keppel said, “I was replaced very soon.””* AS PRESIDENT, Johnson was capable of putting subordinates in awkward positions. James Gaither, who tran sferred from the Justice Department to become an assistant to Joe Califano, a presidential adviser, said he had been in the White House only about an hour or so on his first day on the job when the “Potus''’ phone began ringing. The Potus for President of the United States) line is used only by the President so that an assistant knows that the bass is on the line when it rings. It was late at night. Almost everyone had gone home, although the President and Califano were still working, and Gaither was waiting for Califano to tell him what his duties would be. “TL looked around praying that someone else would pick it up and there was no oime there,” said Gaither. “‘So I did.” Gaither said he answered the phone saying, “Mr. President, Joe has gone down to your of fice, I think, and Johnson's response was ‘you don’t think I know that. He’s sitting right here with me. Gaither said that the President then demanded to know why his speech an nouncing the end of an airline strike was not on the telerompters, ‘and I told him I didn't know and he said, ‘Well, get somebody and get it put on,” and I said, ‘Mr. President, there’s no one here,’ and he said, “Well, I'll hold the line and you go find somebody,’ and he was clearly very mad and made some rather wild assertions about the lack of administrative support which he received in the White House.” “Needless to say, Gaither said, “‘I was scared to death as I ran out in the hall trying to find someone who knew how to work a teleprompter typewriter.” Gaither said he could not find anyone and when he finally got up enough nerve to go back to the phone, where he thought the President was still waiting, he found that Johnson had turned the phone over to Califano. The episode passed without further words, Gaither said, and he found out later that the two men who do put presidential speeches on teleprompters had been dismissed that afternoon. KEPPEL SAID THAT he had found Johnson was very shrewd in his ability to handle his staff, praising one, damning another. Wilbur Cohen, who had been associated with Johnson off and on for 20 years, said he found the former President ‘‘essen tially a populist at heart and one who was deeply concerned about the Biblical injunction of honoring thy father and thy mother. He has both a father and mother complex.” Cohen said that while others had found Johnson to be devious, “I never found him particularly devious with me.”’ But he said that Johnson did have a hot temper and on oc casions used vulgar language. Cohen went on: “I have heard him when we were on his ranch going by and watching the animals, refer to all sorts of sexual charac teristics of the animals and people. “And then five minutes later, you could stand on the hillside there watching the sun set and you'd find a man who was a poet in describing the sunset and the relationship of the land to the people and his hopes and aspiration for people. “This was a man like a combination of Boccacio and Machiavelli and John Keats. COHEN SAID Johnson's administrative methods were sometimes unpredictable. “Lyndon Johnson could spend as much time on some ap pointment to an advisory committee of some person as he could on a big, gigantic issue,” Cohen said. “As a matter of fact, I have had the situation where he took my recom mendation on very, very big issues without a moment's discussion and then we would spend hours of differences of opinion on appointing one man or one woman to some 2+ member committee whom he didn’t think was somebody who should be put on it.” Douglass Cater, who became one of Johnson's speech writers, said he and Johnson, along with Jack Valenti and Bill Moyers, both aides to Johnson, swam naked in the White House pool, with Johnson working all the time, giving orders or supplying information. Cater said that Johnson was particular about his speeches. He wanted clear sentences and short words. Cater said that Johnson wanted a little poetry in his speeches, that he liked alliteration and liked his speeches to include something that was of a newsworthy character, “‘some idea or ex pression of fact that would surprise and interest people.” Cater said that Johnson seldom,if ever, read , for Pleasure. He said he never saw him read a murder mystery, as President Kennedy had, or a western adventure, as “He just loved to talk, reminisce,” said Cater. “He has a fantastic capacity for just reminiscing, detailed reminiscences about people and Situations in his past. Tremendous sense of humor. A satirical humor, particularly, in which he would mimic a man or a conversation.” Public Notice NOTICE OF PUBLIC HEARING Notice is hereby given of 2 public hearing before the Planning and Zoning Commission of the City of Columbia, Missouri, to be held in the Council Chamber of the Municipal Building in said City on Thursday, February 17, 1972 at 7:00 p.m.0 give all citizens and interested parties an opportunity to be heard in relation to the following: CONSIDERATION OF AMENDMENTS OR MODIFICATIONS TO PORTIONS OF THE ®-1, ONE FAMILY DWELLING DISTRICT, AND C-R, PLANNED COMMERCIAL RECREATION DISTRICT, or THE COLUMBIA ZONING ORDINANCE, PERTAINING TO GOLF COURSES. PLANNING AND ZONING COMMISSION Thomas E. Baumgartner. Chairman Insertion date; February 2, 1972
Newspaper Details
Columbia Missourian Newspaper
Columbia, Missouri, US
Wed, Feb 02, 1972
Page 15
Full Page
Clipped by
Larry C.
USA 29 Jun 2026
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