Notes on People
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/1974/11/19/archives/brezhnev-emerges-for-the-shah-notes-on-people-senator-howard-h.html?searchResultPosition=53Posted: Nov. 19, 1974
The arrival in Moscow yesterday of the Shah of Iran brought back onto the political scene Leonid Brezhnev, the Soviet Communist party leader. Mr. Brezhnev was out of sight most of last week, suffering from, what diplomatic sources believe was influenza. He was forced to cancel scheduled meetings with Prime Ministet Sirimavo Bandaranalke of Sri Lanka and Senator Walter F. Mondale, Democrat of Minnesota. The shah is in the Soviet Union for a three‐day “working visit,” in keeping with an understanding between Iran and the Soviet Union’ that the two nations try to exchange annual visits.
Violette Verdy, a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet, returned to the stage of the New York State Theater in a leading role yesterday for the first time since suffering a foot injury in September of last year. The occasion was a program that preceded the 11th annual matinee fund‐raising luncheon of the Friends of City Center.
The French‐barn ballerina, who was partnered by Edward Villella, explained backstage that although she was able to dance in a few minor roles following her injury, she finally had to stop dancing altogether last spring.
The 1974 Gold Medal of the National Institute of Social Sciences will be presented at a dinner here on Dec. 5 to Golda Meir, former Premier of Israel; Roy Wilkins, executive director of the National‐Association for the Advancement of Colored Peopie; George P. Shultz, father Secretary of the Treasury, and Lieut. Col. Peter M. Dawkins, the former all‐round scholar and athlete at West Point, who is now a military assistant to the Deputy Secretary of Defense.
From Villanova, Pa., and from the Channel Island of Guernsey came assurances that the Fitler‐Wilson wedding plans remain unchanged, despite reports in the British press that all is off. the same,” Said Rachel Fitler, the 77‐year‐old aunt of Margaretta Fitler Rockefeller, wife of Nelson A. Rockefeller.
In St. Peter Port on Guernsey, Michael Wilson, Miss Filler's 29‐year‐old fiance, who used to be her chauffeur in Palm Beach, Fla., said: “Our relationship is too deep to be called off at long dis tance. Things are still the same between us.” Miss. Fitler said that the only thing that's really changed since their engagement came to light is that “I've had six proposals.”
Senator Howard Baker, Jr., of Tennessee says he hopes to make about $500,000 over the next three years through the lease of 24,000 acres of land for coal strip mining. The money would be his profit from a 10 per cent interest in the company that owns the land to be leased in Morgan and Scott Counties, the Republican Septor said.
Less than a year after‐Elliott Gould, the 38‐year‐old actor, and Jenny Bogart, 24, decided to give up the idea of being unwed parents and marry, Miss Bogart was in Santa Monica Superior Court in California suing for divorce.
Mr. Gould, formerly the husband of Barbra Streisand, and Miss Bogart had “irreconcilliPle :differences,” his wife laid in seeking the divorce.
When they married, in Las Vegas in December, 1973, they already had two children—Molly, 2, and Samuel, a year old. Miss Bogart is seeking support for herself and the children.
With Jan. 6 approaching, Gov. Ronald Reagan of California, who leaves office then after two four‐year terms, has already lined up some part‐time work. The 63‐year‐old Republican will be host of a radio commentary called “The American Viewpoint,” which will be syndicated to stations around the country. Mr. Reagan will tape five of the five‐minute programs weekly for Harry O'Connor, a Los Angeles producer. He is also expected to travel extensively making speeches in which he will expound the conservative viewpoint.
ALBIN KREBS
Notes on People
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/1975/01/10/archives/notes-on-people-richardson-is-hailed-in-new-job-by-ford.html?searchResultPosition=126Posted: January 10, 1975
A rare personal statement by President Ford accompanied his official announcement yesterday that “with special pleasure” he had chosen Elliot L. Richardson to be Ambassador to Britain. Senate confirmation is considered a certainty.
“I warmly welcome Elliot Richardson back into the service of our country,” the Presidential statement said, “and am confident that he will represent America with the highest distinction.”
The statement, unusual in connection with the announcement of Ambassadors, lauded Mr. Richardson's record of public service. It was interpreted as taking indirect note of his nominee's decision in 1973 to resign as Attorney General rather than carry out President Nixon's order to discharge the Watergate special prosecutor, Archibald Cox.
President Ford, announcing his choice on Mr. Nixon's birthday, said he had “known and worked with Elliot Richardson since he first joined the Eisenhower Administration as Assistant Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare.” He traced his “extraordinary achievement” in serving “successively as Under Secretary of State, Secretary of H.E.W., Secretary of Defense and as Attorney General.”
The 54‐year‐old Mr. Richardson, who would succeed Walter IL Annenberg if confirmed, is currently a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington.
Haim Herzog, who served as Israeli military, naval and air attache in Washington from 1950 to 1954, has been asked by Foreign Minister Yigal Allon to head the Israeli delegation to the United Nations, succeeding Yosef Tekoah, who is retiring. A former general and director of military intelligence, Mr. Herzog is best known as a military analyst on radio, television and the press. His wife and the wife of Abba Eban, Israel's 195059 chief United Nations delegate, are sisters.
Prince Rainier of Monaco announced yesterday through a Paris spokesman that legal action would be taken against unspecified “newspapers and magazines more avid for sensationalism than for objective information” that have reported that Princess Grace is ill. Several papers in France and elsewhere have said that the Princess is being treated by Dr. Violette Nuovo, a Paris specialist in cytology. The Princess was reported by The Associated Press to have flown Wednesday from Paris to the United States, and the IrishAmerican Cultural Institute said it expected her as guest of honor at its Jan. 18 din
“I just don't want to go through it again,” Senator Hubert H. Humphrey of Minnesota said in St. Paul, asserting that he would sign affidavits of noncandidacy to keep his name off Presidential primary ballots in 1976. “I'm not going down the primary route or run around to these state conventions,” said the former Vice President and 1968 Democratic Presidential nominee. ‘'If the party should turn to me” by national convention time, he said, “that's different matter.”
The superintendent of Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming, Gary E. Everhardt, has moved up to the post of director of the National Park Service, it was announced yesterday by Secretary of the Interior Rogers C. B. Morton. He succeeds Ronald H. Walker, who resigned after controversy over contracts between the Park Service and some of his personal acquaintances.
Mr. Everhardt, a 40‐yearold native of Lenoir, N. C., graduated from North Carolina State College as a civil engineer in 1957. He began his Park Service career immediately as an engineer on the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina, Virginia and Georgia.
Three days after he finished eight years as Governor of California, Ronald Reagan began his second career in radio. The former movie and television actor, who will be 64 next month, spent his first five years after college as an announcer and sports broadcaster. Wednesday he taped 10 five‐minute political commentaries for daily broadcast —and read the call letters of subscribing stations for 80 promotional announcements —in his producer's studio at the corner of Hollywood and Vine. Mr. Reagan took a break when Sally Cobb, owner of the Brown Derby restaurant half a block brought in champagne and said, embracing him briefly, “You're back home, Ronnie.” Mr. Reagan will also write a weekly newspaper column syndicated by Copley News Service at introductory rates of $2 to $15 a week, depending on a paper's circulation.
On the Boulevard du Temple in Paris Jacqueline Serveau was sitting at the back of her flower shop yesterday when the show window caved in, and there, among the flowers, stood a baby elephant. The surrealistic scene came about when Youmi, a baby elephant, broke away from the nearby Cirque d'Hiver and, evidently spotting his reflection in the shop window, lunged for it. As confusion and traffic problems mounted, the elephant invaded several other storefronts. He was captured in a post office, where one customer was seen hiding in a phone booth.
LAURIE JOHNSTON
If Reagan Is Candidate, He'll Drop Radio Show
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/1975/11/09/archives/if-reagan-is-candidate-hell-drop-radio-show.html?searchResultPosition=5Posted: November 9, 1975
LOS ANGELES, Nov. 8 (AP) Julie Nixon Eisenhower may take over Ronald Reagan's daily radio show if Mr. Reagan becomes a formal candidate for the Republican Presidential nomination.
If the former Republican Governor of California becomes a declared candidate, equal time rules will force him off the 320 stations that now broadcasts his show.
Mrs. Eisenhower, 27 years old, the daughter of former President Richard M. Nixon, is one of nine persons ranging from John Wayne the actor, to Senator Barry Goldwater who are lined up to fill in for Mr. Reagan on the five‐minute daily commentary show.
The World
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/1975/11/09/archives/the-world-angola-is-trying-to-decide-whos-in-charge-now-senior.html?searchResultPosition=107Posted: November 9, 1975
Continued
In Summary
Angola Is Trying To Decide Who's In Charge Now
When three Portuguese warships sail from Luanda tomorrow after dusk, taking the remaining 3,000 Portuguese troops with them, Portugal's African empire will no longer exist. The last end largest colony, Angola, will, have been returned to the Angolans, although which Angolans will rule is in violent dispute.
Three black nationalist groups, all of which fought the Portuguese for more than a decade, are now fighting Among themselves to gain control of the independent Angola.
The Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola controls the capital, Luanda, and other large sections of the country. It is strongly challenged by the two other groups: the Angolan National Liberation Front and the Union for the Total Independence of Angola. National Liberation Front troops have penetrated to just outside Quoifangando, a few miles from Luanda.
The Popular Movement is preparing to proclaim itself the sole government of the new nation, but its proclamation will be challenged. A 500‐man force, spearhead of a larger force of both Union and Front troops, is advancing from the south toward the capital.
As in the neighboring Congo (now Zaire) a decade ago, the Angolan struggle involves outside parties. The Popular Movement, led by Agostinho Neto, is believed to be financed and assisted by the Soviet Union and its allies a 200‐man Cuban unit, which arrived a month ago, is leading the defense against the challenge from the south,
The National Front, led by Holden Roberto, is supported by Zaire, and probably indirectly by the United States. The National Front and the National Union, backed by Zambia and led by Jonas Savimbi, have fought each other in the past but are now reportedly forming a unified military and political command.
Not yet directly involved is South Africa, but the white government there is concerned that Angola's fighting will spill over into South‐West Africa (or Namibia, as Africans call it).
Thus, with the same external powers involved, and the presence of white mercenaries with the National Front forces and the lack of a clearly dominant group among the black nationalists, many observers fear that Angola is heading for the same fratricidal warfare that befell Zaire.
‐ The Portuguese first began to settle Angola in 1491 and, with a brief interruption in the 17th century, have controlled it since, In the last year, their other African colonies, Mozambique, Guinea‐Bissau, the Cape Verde Islands and Sao Tome, have peacefully gained independence. Few observers feel Angola will have similar good fortune.
Senior Officers in Bangladesh Are Winning Out
Since the overthrow and murder in Bangladesh last August of Sheik Mujibur Rahman, the younger majors and colonels who staged the coup have been in conflict with senior officers who had helped Sheik Mujib achieve independence for the nation.
Last week, the senior officers seemed to have won, Khandaker Moshtaque Ahmed, Installed as President by the majors, was forced to resign. The junior officers themselves fled to Thailand. Bangladesh is practically sealed off from the rest of the world, but last week's events apparently began with the killing in jail of two former Prime Ministers and two other political leaders. All had been close associates of Sheik Mujib since Bangladesh became independent of Pakistan four years ago. Outsiders are uncertain how the killings occurred — the refugee officers in thailand deny responsibility — but Dacca radio referred to the murders as “heinous crimes” and the Government launched a judicial inquiry.
Official radio reports said that under a newly proclaimed amendment to the Constitution, Chief Justice A. M. Sayem of the Supreme Court has been sworn In as President.
But Mr. Sayem is a nonpolitical figure, and will have no power. Instead it seemed that Maj. Gen. Ziaur Rahman, who earlier in the week had been dismissed as commander of the army, had been reinstated and had taken over full powers to run the country as chief martial law administrator.
(The subcontinent, Page 4.)
Mrs. Gandhi Cleared by Court
The Indian Supreme Court has unanimously overturned the June 12 conviction of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi for illegal actions during her 1971 election campaign. The decision was based not on the law in effect in 1971 and last June but on Parliament's retroactive rewriting of the statutes that turned previous offenses into acceptable practices.
The verdict ended a legal threat to Mrs. Gandhi's continuation in office and she has given no sign of ending the state of emergency imposed following widespread political disturbances at the time of her June conviction.
She said the controls, under which she has near‐dictatorial powers, were still necessary to protect India from external forces—which she didn't identify—that are “trying to weaken the country in order to create instability.”
Mrs. Peron's Enemies, Divided
Although President Isabel Martinez de Perlón is ill, has been implicated in a major corruption scandal, has seen most of her political support vanish, she remains in office, mainly because her political enemies have not figured out how to get rid of her without a military overthrow of the Government, which most commanders of the armed forces want to avoid. Impeachment is a possibility. Opposition deputies presented a bill in the Chamber of Deputies calling for Mrs. Perón's removal on grounds of corruption and incapacity to govern, but the Peronist majority in Congress would have to split to gain the majority vote.
And she still has the power of the Presidency to seek public support. Mrs. Peron last week ordered a wage increase of about 20 percent for Argentine workers. The raise endangers a two‐week‐old Government plan to stabilize wages and prices and to bring under control the inflation rate that often climbs by 1 percent a day.
The wage increase may not be enough to swing labor behind Mrs. Perón. Unions have been demanding 40 percent.
The future of the country lies with the military. Generals and admirals have been meeting to discuss possible action. Military officials, remembering their failure to stabilize the country during the seven years they ruled, 1966 to 1973, still seek a “solution by political leaders.”
If that does not come soon, Mrs. Perlón, who has been President since her husband died in July, 1974, may finally be forced to resign.
‘Saving’ the Panama Canal
Theodore Roosevelt once bragged, “I took Panama,” but some of his admirers, fearful that the Ford Administration is about to “give away” control of the canal, are organizing a lobby to prevent change. They hope to inject the canal “issue” into the 1976 Presidential campaign.
During the last several months the lobbyists have gained the ear of influential people. One is the former Governor of California, Ronald Reagan, who has spoken frequently about the canal issue, often using phrases from lobbyists’ letters. Gov. George A. Wallace of Alabama has raised the issue in a way that indicates he would use it in a 1976 Presidential campaign.
The pressure group claims about 100,000 supporters. It has powerful backing in Congress.
Since June, 1974, the Administration has been negotiating a new pact with Panama to replace Theodore Roosevelt's 1903 treaty. The purpose of the negotiations is to acknowledge full Panamanian sovereignty over the 533‐square‐mile Canal Zone. The canal lobbyists says the United States “owns” the Canal Zone just as it owns the East Coast's Inland Waterway or the Erie Canal.
Belize: Britain Shows the Flag
It smacked of Lord Palmerston and 19th‐century gunboat diplomacy. But Britain's decision last week to send warship and troops to Belize, the last British colony on the American mainland, was part of the very 20th‐century difficulty of shedding an empire.
The British said they had acted to preserve the security of the largely black, English‐speaking enclave from a military threat posed by Spanishspeaking Guatemala, which has claimed the territory for generations. Belize has been self‐governing for 12 years, but Britain Is still responsible for defense, foreign affairs and Internal security.
A draft resolution before the United Nations General Assembly, sponsored by 43 nations, including Cuba and many others from the Caribbean, calls for self‐determination for the 135,000 citizens of Belize (the former British Honduras) and negotiations between Britain and Guatemala. Following last week's action, the search for such compromise was stepped up.
Thomas Butson
A Collection Of His Most Memorable Broadcasts
It was late on a summer day in 1974 and Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. had just completed a recording session for a series of radio programs. The film and television star was relaxing with his friend and radio producer, Harry O'Connor, enjoying a cup of coffee and sharing a few thoughts on the state of American politics. Soon the conversation turned to a subject of mutual concern: the need for a nationally recognized radio spokesman who could present the conservative point of view. Was such a spokesman available? Zimbalist suggested that one might be, in January when Ronald Reagan left office after completing his second term as Governor of California. O'Connor responded enthusiastically to the idea of Reagan writing and voicing a daily conservative commentary, and eagerly accepted Zimbalist's offer to contact Reagan in his behalf.
And thus was born what has become the single most successful radio syndicated program in the history of broadcasting. The Reagan commentary series, which the Governor readily agreed to undertake, was an instant success. Within six months it was being aired daily in over 350 U.S. cities.
Then, late in 1975, at the urging of thousands of his fellow citizens Ronald Reagan declared that he would be a candidate for his party's nomination for the Presidency.
Producer O'Connor and Governor Reagan
Side One
America's Strength 2:33
Looking Out A Window 2:24
Superintendent's Dilemma 2:43
Public Employees 2:53
The Little Red Hen 2:24
Side Two
Capitalism Vs. Socialism 3:04
Father And Son 2:29
Incredible Bread Machine 2:59
Socialism 2:53
President Calvin Coolidge 2:51
Produced by Harry O'Connor
Edited by Ken Weintrub
Mastered by Virco Recording
Design Concept Douglas Boyd Design
Withdrawing from his radio program (to be replaced by U.S. Senator Barry Goldwater), Reagan spent the next nine months criss-crossing America in pursuit of that goal and came very close to winning it. Accepting defeat with grace, he campaigned energetically for his party's ticket.
Ronald Reagan eagerly returned to his radio commentary chores in the fall of 1976. Each and every weekday he presents his viewpoint on the national and international events which shape our lives, and discusses people who inspire those whose lives they touch.
Ronald Reagan, too, touches many lives. His program reaches an estimated 30 million listeners each week and the direct response his broadcasts generate is easily measurable. Stations and sponsors who present his commentary offer listeners reprints of Reagan's comments and find it difficult to handle the requests that pour in. And Reagan himself is aware. As he commented to O'Connor at a recent recording session, "Everywhere I go, people tell me what they heard me talking about on the radio that day, or that week. I know radio had tremendous impact, but this is unbelievable!"
New York Magazine - July 21, 1980 When Reagan Spoke From The Heart By Michael Kramer
At the moment, Ronald Reagan is the odds-on favorite to be the next president of the United States. His record, of course, will be examined thoroughly. One part of the record, ignored till now, is the thousand-odd radio broadcasts Reagan made from 1975 through 1979--three-minute spots listened to by approximately 30 million people. Michael Kramer got transcripts of these broadcasts and reports on the highlights.
Reagan Writes
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/31/magazine/reagan-writes.htmlBy William Safire
Posted: Dec. 31, 2000Former President Ronald Reagan will be gently reminded on this coming Feb. 6 that it is his 90th birthday. Affectionate greetings will pour in from all over the world, and many historians will note that his policies in the 80's not only curbed a raging inflation but also helped bring about the end of the cold war.
And yet that appreciation for his skill as ''the Great Communicator'' will be tempered by the impression held by many that the amiable Reagan was essentially an actor, a skilled performer who relied on lines written by his aides. But thanks to the recent discovery of a trove of 670 of his radio speeches, written in the late 1970's as the former California governor prepared to run for president, we can see the development of an unconventional political thinker and controversialist.
He wrote the conservative essays himself, in ink on yellow pads, often while on airplanes. No ghostwriter submitted a draft. In the Reagan Revolution that was a-borning, these handwritten documents prove (to the dismay of all speechwriters) that the original revolutionary was Ronald Reagan.
Most of the documents were found by the scholar Kiron K. Skinner among the Reagan papers. They are raw drafts, with Reagan's self-editing apparent, and reveal a writer adept at marshaling a philosophical argument in a listener-friendly, conversational style. In today's age of composition on computers and writing by government committee, we are struck by the workings of one man's mind expressed through a pen in his hand.
One of the selections from ''Reagan, In His Own Hand,'' to be published next month, was found in Reagan's desk by Martin Anderson and Annelise Anderson of the Hoover Institution, who edited the book with Skinner. It goes beyond the radio scripts of the 70's into his presidency. How did he prepare for his first meeting with a Soviet foreign minister in 1984?
According to George Shultz, then our secretary of state, Reagan was supplied with talking points. The president took the suggestions to Camp David and wrote his own talking points, setting a different tone and explaining why we would respond strongly to the Russians' massive military buildup and why he intended to continue to assert the need for protection of human rights. Shultz recalls that Andrei Gromyko was ''able to see that President Reagan was speaking about deep-seated beliefs and meant every word that he said.''
That presentation was laid out in Reagan's own hand -- scripted by him for presentation by him -- and now illuminates the history of that moment. Shultz, reviewing the document, concludes, ''Maybe he was a lot smarter than most people thought.''
Electoral College,
April 13, 1977
After Vice President Walter Mondale presented the Carter administration's proposal to abolish the Electoral College in favor of direct popular election of the president, Reagan denounced the idea as limiting the campaign to ''a cluster of metropolitan areas in a few states'' -- which would greatly advantage Democratic candidates. He offered a counterproposal, keeping the state-by-state majority count but eliminating the chance of faithless electors. This essay may well presage the Republican response to Senator-elect Hillary Clinton's abolition proposal in the wake of the Bush-Gore election of 2000.
If the electoral college isn't on the endangered species list it should be. At least it should be declared a game bird and given a few months a year when it couldn't be shot at. I'll be right back.
The move is on to revise the election laws.-aAgain! High on the list of changes is the Electoral College which V. Pres. Mondale has proposed elim is elimination of the Electoral College. system. Now I doubt if very many of us could find an excuse for continuing the ceremony after each Presidential election in which appointed electors in each state (one for each Sen. & Congressman) go to the state capitol and re-elect the already elected Pres. And maybe some of you think that's all they are talking about doing.
Unfortunately there is more to it than that.The very basis for our freedom is that we are one nation Nation, a Fed. of Sovereign States. Our const. recognizes that certain rights belong to the state & cannot be infringed upon by the Nat. govt. This is the guaranty that small states or rural, sparsely populated areas will have a proportionate voice in national affairs.
Those who want to do away with the electoral college really mean they want the Pres. elected in a national referendum with no reference as to how each state votes. Thus a half dozen rural states could each show a majority for one candidate and be outvoted by one big industrial state opting for his opponent. What this kind of popular referendum means is that Presidential candidates would be tempted to aim their campaigns & their promises at a few states with big city populations cluster of metropolitan areas in a few states and the smaller states would be without a voice.
If the would be executioners of the electoral college are sincere let them eliminate the college but continue to tote up the vote by states. with each states decision giving it the majority in each state deciding that the state casts all it's votes (one for each Sen. & Congressman) for the winning candidate in that state Based on majority rule within each state that states electoral votes, one for each Congressman & Senator, would be given to the winner of the majority vote. The possibility of an appointed electoral going electoral college member voting on his own would be eliminated but everything else would remain the same. Yes it is possible under this system to have a Pres. with less than elected with a smaller total vote than his opponent but it has only happened 3 times in 200 yrs. Is that worse than having a Pres. who only carried a dozen out of our 50 states and got all the his votes from big urban areas? Would his programs in agriculture be fair to farmers or would they be aimed at helping consumers in big city markets?
The other proposed elec. law changes are equally flawed. The Hatch act would be liberalized so as to allow increased participation in campaigns by pub. employees. There are roughly 15 mil. govt. employees.-gGrant they each influence one additional vote and that is you have a voting block of 30 mil. with a vested interest in high taxes, big govt. & more govt. programs. A congressman or Senator would think twice before launching a crusade to reduce burocracy or govt. revenues.
Then there is a part of the reform calling for easy voter registration. Let the voters walk into the polls on election day and sign up & vote. The idea being that low voter turnouts are due to the present registration rules. Somehow they skip over the fact that mils. of already registered voters don't vote. What's their excuse?
And of course they pooh, pooh the idea that voter fraud might be encouraged. Well in one state right now where they have such easy registration the count in the last election of a Congressman has been challenged. So far they've found a half dozen oil stations, several warehouses & empty lots, a cemetery & two public parks that voted for him.
This is RR Thanks for listening.
Abortion Laws,
April 1975
This laboriously rewritten radio address shows the way Reagan wrestled with the abortion issue, first as governor and then writing later in retrospect. Note the way he crossed out long passages and concentrated his ''answer as to what kind of abortion bill I could sign'' into a succinct statement defining abortion as ''the taking of a human life'' and permitting it only in defense of the mother's life (''& I'll & include health'') and in the case of rape. He later stopped including ''and health.'' Subsequent G.O.P. platforms took a stronger anti-abortion position, but this document shows how Reagan framed the issue in his mind as he began his ascent to the presidency.
An unborn childs property rights are protected by law-it's right to life is not. I'll be right back.
Eight years ago when I became Gov. I found myself involved almost immediately in a controversy over abortion. It was a subject I'd never given much thought to and in a sense one upon which I didn't really have an opinion. In other words as But now I was Gov. and it turned abortion turned out to be something I couldn't walk away from. A bill had been introduced in the Calif. legislature to make abortion available upon demand. The pro & anti forces were already marshalling their troops and emotions were running high. Then the author of the bill sent word down that he'd amend his bill to anything I felt I could sign. The ball -- to coin a cliche -- was in my court. Suddenly the it had become necessary for me to take a position & on a subject I'd never before given as I said on a matter I'd never really ever given any thought to I had to have a position on abortion.
To shorten this down I did more studying, researching & soul searching on this matter than on any thing that faced was to face me as Gov. in all my those 8 years in office. I discovered that neither medicine, law or theology had ever really found a common ground on the subject. a com. any consensus on the Views ranged from those On one hand there were those who Some believed an unborn child was like some kind of no more than a growth on the body female & she should be able to remove it as she would her appendix. Others felt a human life existed from the moment the fertilized egg attached itself to the ovary wall was implanted in the womb. I now Strangely enough Calif. had a law passed almost unanimously by the same legis. that was so divided on th this on this subject couldn't agree on abortion had unanimously passed had passed by a virtually unanimous vote a law making anyone liable guilty of murder it murder to abuse a pregnant woman. to the extent that when so doing to so as to cause the ''death of the her unborn child.'' I found further that an unborn child (called a fetus by those who support abortion) has property rights. Another inconsistency-the unborn have property rights protected by law. A man can will his estate to his wife & children & any children yet to be born of his marriage. Now a law is being proposed that Yet the proposed abortion law would let one person for whatever reason take the life of the that unborn child. deny the unborn the protection of the law in preserving its life.
I went to the lawyers on my staff and verified this property right right of the unborn to own property I've mentioned. Then I asked if there wasn't some inconsistency in deny denying the same unborn child the right to life. I posed a hypothetical question. Wouldn't an What if a wo pregnant woman were widowed and became a widow during her pregnancy & found her husband had left his fortune to her & the unborn child. Under the proposed abortion law couldn't she abort the child she could take the life of her child & inherit not half but all of her husbands estate. the entire fortune & where-in did was that this different from murder Wouldn't that be murder for financial gain? The only answer I got was that they were glad I wasn't asking the questions on the bar exam.
I learned from D the med. profession that from the moment of the a fertilized egg was is implanted in the womb an a individual human being had has been created with its individual physical characteristics & even personallity traits already established.
My answer to the his question of what kind of bill I could sign as a turned out to be a belief I now hold very strongly. An abortion is the taking of a human life. It can only be justified on the same grounds we permit in our Judeo- basis that we recognize the right to take a life in our Judeo-Christian tradition. the taking of a life in self defense That is in defense of our own. I believe a mother has the right to protect her life & I'll include her health against even her own unborn child if it is threatened by anyone including her own unborn child. I go so far as to say that just as she has the right to protect herself against rape she has the right to protect herself against the result of that rape & therefore can rid herself of a child or refuse to have a child resulting from rape.
There is a quite common acceptance in medical circles that the cell-let's call it the egg-once it has been fertilized is on it's way as a human being whose with individual physical traits & personality characteristics have already been established determined.
My answer as to what kind of abortion bill I could sign was a bill one that recognized an abortion was is the taking of a human life. In our Judeo-Christian religion we accept that each one of us has recognize the right to take life in defense of our own. Therefore an abortion is justified when it is done in self defense. My belief is that a woman has the right to protect her own life & I'll & include health against even her own unborn child. I also I believe also that just as she has the right to defend herself against a rapist rape she can protect herself against a child resulting from that violation of her person. rape she does should not have be made to bear a child resulting from that violation of her person and therefore abortion is an act of self defense.
I know there will be disagreement with this view but I can find no evidence whatsoever that a fetus is not a living human being with human rights.
Free Enterprise,
April 16, 1979
After four years of practice in writing these radio essays and as the 1980 presidential campaign approached, Reagan produced ''clean copy'' on a subject he liked to revisit: comparing the capitalist and socialist systems. In this 1979 address, he made a point of changing the terminology from ''capitalist'' to ''free markets'' and took the homely example of the telephone to show the benefits of the profit motive and the drawbacks of government intervention. A generation later, as global telecommunications exploded in use, the Reagan hands-off position largely remained the order of the day.
It isn't unfair to say that today the world is divided between those who believe in the free mkt. place & those who believe in govt. control & ownership of the economy.
I'll be right back.
Our free mkt. system is usually termed capitalism and by that definition capitalism has hardly been around long enough to deserve all the evil for which it is being held responsible.
Most of us aren't really conscious of how recently the capitalist system came into being. Possibly we look back & think of the extravagant luxury of kings & emperors & see that as capitalism. We have a modern counterpart today in the rulers of Marxist nations. The ruling hierarchy of the Soviet U. live on a scale more akin to royalty than do the heads of capitalist countries.
Maybe our trouble is caused by the term capitalist itself. Actually all systems are capitalist. It's just a matter of who owns & controls the capital-ancient king, dictator or private individual. We should properly be looking at the contrast between a free mkt. system where individuals have the right to live like kings if they can have the ability to earn that right and govt. control of the mkt. system such as we find today in socialist nations.
We have a very visible example of the contrast between the free mkt. & govt. ownership in a household necessity we take for granted. The invention of Alexander Graham Bell- the telephone offers us irrefutable proof of the superiority of the free mkt.
As recently as 1880 there were only 34,000 miles of telephone wires on the whole N. American Continent. There were dozens & dozens of small telephone companies using several different kinds of equipment and there was no inter-connection between these different count companies. The same situation prevailed in all the other so called advanced nations.
If someone had openly advanced a plan to put a phone in every home, on every farm, in every hamlet & city and hook them all together I'm sure someone would have said, ''only govt. has the resources to do that.''
Now strangely enough in most other countries govt. did take over the telephone system and to this very day the telephones in a great many countries are part of the postal system. In America the govt. wasn't bulldozing it's way into the free mkt. place as it is today. For that we can be grateful. The scattered, competing phone companies were left to the magic of the mkt. place. And that magic worked as it always does.
We take the phone so much for granted it's hard to realize things weren't always this way. We can dial directly to virtually any point in the world country and to a great many outside the country.
With int no intention of insulting anyone it I have to say it only takes a few days trip in many of those other countries to where the telephone is a govt. service to realize there is a difference. Getting A long distance call there can be quite an adventure-so can getting a phone installed.
But here we have them in our cars if we like, in private or corporation owned executive planes & on boats. We bounce long distance calls off privately owned satellites and use telephone lines for network radio & remote broadcasts of sporting & special events.
And all of this came about because private individuals wanting to make a profit for themselves kept thinking of better ways to serve us, services to offer, confident that we'd want that better service.
This is RR Thanks for listening.
Mr. Minister,
Sept. 23, 1984
Before facing Andrei Gromyko, President Reagan put his thoughts in order about disarmament and human rights. He cut out his ''I don't eat my young'' opening and went directly to business. As the second crossed-out paragraph shows, he decided against expressing a willingness to negotiate limits to weapons in outer space. Note the diplomatic way he suggested that the lifting of our grain embargo was influenced by the Soviets' release of Pentecostal dissidents taking refuge in our Moscow embassy. In defending criticism of Soviet repression of human rights, he reminded Gromyko of the ethnic origins of Americans with a Reaganesque, ''A man does not forget his mother because he has taken a wife.''
Mr. Minister I've looked forward to this meeting and wish it could have taken place 3 or 4 years ago. I very much want to hear your views but if you dont mind I'd like to begin by expressing a few thoughts of my own, hoping that I can persuade you that I dont eat my young.
There are differences between our 2 pol. & ec. systems and I dont think either one of us will change. But we do have to live in the world together and we do have some things in common. We are both superpowers as viewed by the rest of the world and the rest of the world knows that the fate of all mankind is in our hands: that a war between us could literally wipe out all humankind.
Mr. Minister I tell you with all sincerity the U.S. will never start such a war. Now you may say you have nothing but my word for that but I ask you to look at the record. When W.W. II ended-a war in which we were allies, we were the only nation whose industry was intact, -- not ravaged by war. Our military strength was at it's greatest & we alone had the ultimate weapon, the nuclear bomb.
We could have dictated to the world. We didn't. Instead we set out to help not only our allies but also our erstwhile enemies to rebuild their economies & their industrial strength.
At the same time We dismantled our military and today have only 2/3 as many nuclear weapons as we had in 1967. We have in these last few several years removed 1000 nuclear weapons from Europe & will have removed another 1400 by 1988. -
Insert 1: During these same years-since the Salt I agreement was signed the Soviet U. has added 6000 warheads, 3800 of those since the signing of Salt II. Since 1972 we have built only 2 systems-you have built 31.
Yes we are rebuilding our depleted strength now because your own massive military buildup, the greatest in world history, is far beyond any defense needs and we feel it is a threat to us. From Lenin through Brezhnev your leaders & others high in your govt. have repeatedly proclaimed their dedication to world revolution & the eventual one world communist state. There were missiles in Cuba, continued expansion in S. East Asia & Africa as well as in Latin America.
Let me make it clear I'm citing some of the reasons why we feel you are a threat to our security and why we are determined to acquire sufficient strength to deter hostile action against us by you. We are not out to achieve superiority but we do not intend to become vulnerable to an attack or to an ultimatum in which our choice would be surrender or die. or to outright attack.
Now you have expressed a belief that we are the aggressor and while I've already listed some reasons why we dont think there is any substance for such a belief let me take that a step further. We are well aware of the great losses you suffered in W.W. II. We know also that history records invasions of Russia going back over the centuries. Can we not take steps to clear the air of these suspicions? Would not arms reductions be an easy problem to solve if we could prove to each other that we neither of us has any aggressive intent?
We both know that other countries have turned to nuclear weapons and more are quietly working to achieve that goal. The danger of some such proliferation is the possibility of accidental war brought on by neither of us but triggering a conflict that could ultimately involve us both. But what if we who have the power to destroy the world should join in saving it? If we can reach agreement on reducing and ultimately eliminating these weapons we could persuade the rest of the world to join us in doing away with all such weapons.
Your country has proposed the beginning of negotiations to limit weapons in outer space. We are ready for such negotiations but we also want to begin negotiations for the reduction of offensive nuclear forces. We think there is an inherent relationship between these 2 classes of weapons. We believe a first objective could be, conclusion of an interim agreement that establishes on the one hand immediate constraints on space weapons & on the other begins the process of reductions in offensive nuclear arms.
We have shown each other that we can make some progress on bilateral issues. We have come to agreement on some several matters beneficial to us both. Maybe one of the things we should consider with regard to arms negotiations is the presence of senior levels in addition to the technicians. Another idea is a back channel which allows us to explore problems and solutions and to exchange ideas informally without commitments. We are ready to begin such a process with you & Ambassador Dobrynin if you think such an idea has merit.
Mr. Minister I know you feel we are invading your sovereignty rights when we get into the area of human rights. I hope you've noticed that we would prefer quiet diplomacy on this subject but let me point out why we are concerned. Ours is a nation of immigrants. We are made up of the bloodlines of all the world and we our people retain a loyalty to the countries of our heritage. their origin. A man does not forget his mother because he has taken a wife. We also have a governmental system responsive to public opinion. It is easier for us to arrive at agreements with you if segments of our society are not upset by what they feel is a violation of human rights in the land of their ancestry. May I point to an example your handling of the matter of the pentacostal familys in our embassy. We have not, nor will we indicate in any way that this was anything other than a generous action by your govt. Your handling of that matter made such things as the grain embargo agreement easier for us to achieve.
I know some of your colleagues with less knowledge of our system than you have possibly think an American President can simply make decisions & they become policy or law. We have an elaborate system of checks & balances which as you know makes a President's life not quite that simple.
r. Minister the people of both our countries if asked would, I know, say peace was their greatest desire. If we really are worthy to be of being their leaders shouldn't we provide them with what they want above all else. And have we any right to lead if that is impossible for us to deliver?
C-SPAN Booknotes
Kiron Skinner: Reagan In His Own Hand
Source: https://www.c-span.org/video/?163338-1/reagan-handProgram Air Date: April 29, 2001
Kiron Skinner talked about the book which she co-edited, Reagan, In His Own Hand: The Writings of Ronald Reagan That Reveal His Revolutionary Vision for America, published by The Free Press. The book collects President Reagan’s recently discovered writings from the late 1970s, when he delivered more than a thousand radio addresses. He wrote about two-thirds of these himself, in longhand on yellow legal paper, dealing with almost every national policy issue during the 1970s. The bulk of the book comprises these radio addresses, but a concluding section includes everything from a short story Reagan wrote as a school assignment when he was 14 to his letter in 1994 revealing his Alzheimer’s disease.
Reagan, in His Own Hand
Source: https://www.hoover.org/research/reagan-his-own-hand
Ronald Reagan delivers his radio commentary, 1977.
Ronald Reagan radio commentary : sound recordings, Box 8, Hoover Institution Archives.
Shaping the World for 100 Years to Come
September 1, 1976
In this election year many of us talk about the world of tomorrow but do we really think about it? I’ll be right back.
Sometimes it’s very easy to get very glib about how the decisions we are making will shape the world for a hundred years to come. Then A few weeks ago I found myself faced with having to really think about it. what we are doing today & what people (not history) people like ourselves will say about us.
I’d been asked to write a letter for a "time capsule" which would be opened in Los Angeles 100 yrs. from now. It will be The occasion will be the Los Angeles Bicentennial & of course our countrys tri-centennial. It was suggested that I mention some of the problems confronting us in this election year. Since I’ve been talking about those problems for about some 9 months that didn’t look like too much of a chore.
Ronald Reagan’s handwritten pages.
So riding down the coast highway from Santa Barbara–a yellow tablet on my lap (someone else was driving) I started to write my letter to the future.
It was a beautiful summer afternoon. The Pacific stretched out to the horizon on one side of the highway and on the other the Santa Ynez mt’s. were etched against a sky as blue as the Ocean.
I found myself wondering if it would look the same 100 yrs. from now. Will there still be a coast highway? Will people still be travelling in automobiles, or will they be looking down at the mountains from aircraft or moving so fast the beauty of all I saw this would be lost?
Suddenly the simple drafting of a letter became a rather complex chore. Think about it for a minute. What do you put in a letter that’s going to be read 100 yrs. from now–in the year 2076? What do you say about our problems when those who read the letter will alr know what we dont know–namely how well we did with those problems? In short they will be living in the world we helped to shape.
Will they read the letter with gratitude in their hearts for what we did or will they be bitter because miserable the heritage we left them was one of human misery?
Oh I wrote of the problems we face here in 1976–The choice we face between continuing the policies of the last 40 yrs. that have led to bigger & bigger govt, less & less liberty, redistribution of earnings through confiscatory taxation or trying to get back on the original course set for us by the Founding Fathers. Will we choose fiscal responsibility, limited govt, and freedom of choice for all our people? Or will we let an irresponsible Congress take the final set us on the road our English cousins have already taken? The road to ec. ruin and state control of our very lives?
On the international scene two great superpowers face each other with nuclear missiles at the ready–poised to bring Armageddon to the world.
Those who read my letter will know whether those missiles were fired or not. They Either they will be surrounded by the same beauty I knew as I wrote the letter we know or they will wonder sadly what it was like when the world was still beautiful. before that awful day when civilization broke down.
If we here in this election year of our Lord 1976 today meet the challenge confronting us,–those who open that time capsule in 2076 100 yrs. from now will do so in a place of beauty knowing peace, prosperity and the ultimate in personal freedom. consistent with an orderly, civilized society.
If we dont meet keep our rendezvous with destiny, the letter probably will never be read–because talk of individual freedom will not be permitted in that world 100 yrs. from now which we are shaping and they will live in the world which we had a hand in shaping and we left them, a world in which no one is allowed to read or hear such terms as of individual liberty or freedom of choice. & individual liberty.
Looking Out a Window
January 27, 1978
It’s nightfall in a strange town a long way from home. I’m watching the lights come on from my hotel room window on the 35th floor.
I’ll be right back.
I’m afraid you are in for a little bit of philosophizing if you dont mind. Some of these broadcasts have to be put together while I’m out on the road traveling what I call the mashed potato circuit. In a little while I’ll be speaking to a group of very nice people in a banquet hall.
Right now however I’m looking down on a busy city at rush hour. The streets below are two colored twin ribbons of sparkling red & white. The colored ones Tail lights on the cars moving away from my vantage point provide the red and the headlights of those on the opposite side of the street those coming toward me the white. It’s logical to assume all or most are homeward bound at the end of the a days work.
I wonder why some social engineer hasn’t tried to get them to trade homes. The traffic is equally heavy in both directions so if they all lived in the end of town where they worked it would save a lot of travel time. Forget I said that or & dont even think it or some burocrat will try do it.
But you I wonder about the people in those cars, who they are, what they do, what they are thinking about as they head for the warmth of home & family. Come to think of it I’ve met them–oh–maybe not those particular individuals but still I I feel I know them. Some of our social planners refer to them as "the masses" which only proves they dont know them. I’ve been privileged to meet people all over this land in the special kind of way you meet them when you are campaigning. They are not "the masses," They are individuals. or as the elitists would have it–"the common man." They are very uncommon. individuals who make this system work. Individuals each with his or her own hopes & dreams, plans & problems and the kind of quiet courage that makes this whole country run better than just about any other place on earth.
Now By now, thinking of their homecoming I’m counting how many more hotel room windows I’ll be looking out of before I’m in the rush hour traffic heading home. And yes I’m feeling a little sorry for myself and envious of the people in those cars down below. There have been It seems I’ve said a thousand goodbyes, each one harder than the one before.
Someone very wise once wrote that if we were all told one day that the end was coming; that we were living our last day, every road, every street & all the telephone lines would be jammed with people trying to reach someone to whom they we wanted simply to say, "I love you."
It seems kind of foolish to wait for such a final day dosen’t it? I’ll have to stop now–I have a phone call to make.
This is RR Thanks for listening.
But dosen’t it seem kind of foolish to wait for such a final day and take the chance of not getting there in time? And speaking of time I’ll have to stop now–I have to make a phone call. operator i’d like to make a phone call–long distance.
This is RR. Thanks for listening.
Free Enterprise
April 16, 1979
It isn’t unfair to say that today the world is divided between those who believe in the free mkt. place & those who believe in govt. control & ownership of the economy.
I’ll be right back.
Our free mkt. system is usually termed capitalism and by that definition capitalism has hardly been around long enough to deserve all the evil for which it is being held responsible.
Most of us aren’t really conscious of how recently the capitalist system came into being. Possibly we look back & think of the extravagant luxury of kings & emperors & see that as capitalism. We have a modern counterpart today in the rulers of Marxist nations. The ruling hierarchy of the Soviet U. live on a scale more akin to royalty than do the heads of capitalist countries.
Maybe our trouble is caused by the term capitalist itself. Actually all systems are capitalist. It’s just a matter of who owns & controls the capital–ancient king, dictator or private individual. We should properly be looking at the contrast between a free mkt. system where individuals have the right to live like kings if they can have the ability to earn that right and govt. control of the mkt. system such as we find today in socialist nations.
We have a very visible example of the contrast between the free mkt. & govt. ownership in a household necessity we take for granted. The invention of Alexander Graham Bell–the telephone offers us irrefutable proof of the superiority of the free mkt.
As recently as 1880 there were only 34,000 miles of telephone wires on the whole N. American Continent. There were dozens & dozens of small telephone companies using several different kinds of equipment and there was no inter-connection between these different count companies. The same situation prevailed in all the other so called advanced nations.
If someone had openly advanced a plan to put a phone in every home, on every farm, in every hamlet & city and hook them all together I’m sure someone would have said, "only govt. has the resources to do that."
Now strangely enough in most other countries govt. did take over the telephone system and to this very day the telephones in a great many countries are part of the postal system. In America the govt. wasn’t bulldozing it’s way into the free mkt. place as it is today. For that we can be grateful. The scattered, competing phone companies were left to the magic of the mkt. place. And that magic worked as it always does.
We take the phone so much for granted it’s hard to realize things weren’t always this way. We can dial directly to virtually any point in the world country and to a great many outside the country.
With int no intention of insulting anyone it I have to say it only takes a few days trip in many of those other countries to where the telephone is a govt. service to realize there is a difference. Getting A long distance call there can be quite an adventure–so can getting a phone installed.
But here we have them in our cars if we like, in private or corporation owned executive planes & on boats. We bounce long distance calls off privately owned satellites and use telephone lines for network radio & remote broadcasts of sporting & special events.
And all of this came about because private individuals wanting to make a profit for themselves kept thinking of better ways to serve us, services to offer, confident that we’d want that better service.
This is RR Thanks for listening.
Goodbye
Click on the images to view Ronald Reagan's handwritten pages.
October 25, 1979
. . . This is my final commentary.
I’m going to miss these visits with all of you. I’ve enjoyed every one. Even writing them has been a a lot of fun. I’ve scratched them out on a yellow tablet in airplanes, riding in cars, and at the ranch when the sun went down. W
Whenever I’ve told you about some mis-fortune befalling one of our fellow citizens you’ve opened your hearts & your pocketbooks and gone to the rescue. I know you have because the individuals you helped have written to let me know. You’ve done a great deal to strengthen my faith in this land of ours and it’s people. You are the greatest.
Sometime later today if you happen to catch me on television you’ll understand why I can no longer bring you these commentaries.
This is RR. and from the bottom of my heart–thanks for listening.
Reprinted from Reagan, In His Own Hand: The Writings of Ronald Reagan That Reveal His Revolutionary Vision for America, edited by Kiron K. Skinner, Annelise Anderson, and Martin Anderson, published by the Free Press.
Ronald Reagan's former Senior Policy Advisor Martin Anderson was interviewed by Stephen F. Knott, Ph.D., Jim Young and Allison Asher on December 11 & 12, 2001 for the Oral History series at The Miller Center. Anderson talked about working with Reagan in the mid to late 1970s when he had his syndicated newspaper columns and his popular daily radio commentary that aired from 1975 to 1979. An excerpt of that lengthy interview follows:
Because in the ’70s, from ’75 to ’79, he had to make money. He was out of work, left the Governorship. Deaver and Hannaford took over the management of this and they set up speaking engagements for him. He was making money giving speeches. He also agreed to do a twice a week newspaper column. Peter Hannaford wrote most of them, and he edited them. Did that, and then they found this radio program. It was suggested by Efrem Zimbalist to a guy named Harry O’Connor. They were talking one day about they wanted a radio program and Efrem Zimbalist talked to Reagan and Reagan sent Deaver down and they worked this out.
Around the same time, Walter Cronkite came to Reagan and offered Reagan twice a week to be on the evening news with Cronkite, have a commentary. Deaver was ecstatic, said, My God, we’ve got 40 percent of the listening audience of the United States. This is wonderful.
And Reagan said, No, I don’t want to do that.
The reason was that he said, Well, Michael, they’ll get tired of me and I don’t want to do that. I want to do radio.
I’m sure Michael was thinking, You’ve got to be kidding. We’ve got no radio, we’ve got no stations. But he did radio. This comes back to what I said about his being—
It’s also solo.
Solo?
With Walter Cronkite—
That’s exactly right.
—you’re not solo.
I think that’s the key thing. Not only that, but if you do it with Walter Cronkite, then you’re at the mercy of the network. If they don’t like what you’re saying, you can get fired or whatever. It’s not guaranteed.
Or there has to be—
Yes, back and forth.
It has to be back and forth. That’s not the venue—
So the initial idea was that Hannaford would draft these things and Reagan would speak them. Well, after a very short period of time, like maybe one, maybe even the first one—Reagan loved radio. He had done radio before. And right away, we have the first draft he wrote. He gets a yellow pad and he writes the whole thing out and at the bottom he says, Pete, I thought I’d try one.
From there on, of the 1,040 commentaries that he gave, we have found 670 handwritten drafts he wrote himself. Maybe a couple of hundred were written by Hannaford. I even wrote one of them, and he would edit them and work them, so he didn’t write them all. But he wrote 670. And when you look at these, they’re incredible.
I remember I used to sit next to him when he would write them out and the way he would work—for example, when we first started taking turns traveling with him, he’d go out on a plane. We’d fly commercial. He’d get on the plane and he would sit—he always had first class seats—he’d sit next to the window and you would sit on the aisle, sort of as a blocker to him. And then he’d be friendly and talking to the stewardesses and the people coming down the aisle and laughing and talking and as long as you were talking to him he’d be talking back, he liked people. However, I discovered that if you stopped talking to him, even for ten seconds, doing something else, BANG, he would pull up his briefcase, put it in his lap, open up the little briefcase, get his little glasses on and he would focus on the briefcase. He would read articles, he would read books, and then after a certain period of time, he’d get out the yellow pad and then he’d get out his pen and he’d just start to write.
It was fun to watch him write because he didn’t—you know, most people write and they cross out—he would just write, just steady, just purring along, total concentration. If it was a long flight he’d do this for hours, totally oblivious to everyone else, very happy being by himself. I’ve said in print, he was a loner. He had a wonderful time by himself.
He acted just like a professor.
That’s what he did. Those documents have survived and now we are finding many, many more documents. We’re finding all kinds of speeches, we’re finding all kinds of things that he wrote, all kinds of instructions he was giving. We’ve just signed a contract for a new book on his letters. We’ve found literally thousands of letter drafts he wrote to other people. In fact, when we’re through in here, when we break for lunch, I want to show you. Up next to Shultz’s office there’s one, as an example of what he was doing. I’m going ahead.
Toward the end when we’re writing this book on the things that Reagan had done, two things. One, we couldn’t figure out when he had done all this stuff, because nobody seemed to know. We finally figured it out and we went and we talked to people like David Fischer and a guy named [Dennis] LeBlanc, and Elaine Crispin. Do you know who they are?
I don’t know who they are.
Nobody knows. They were the people during the ’70s who were his secretary. They were the people who traveled with him. For example, when he left the Governorship, he hired a—one was a young California state trooper and an older state trooper and they were sort of protection, drove him around, helped with his ranch. We talked to them. They said, Yes, well sure,
and they told the same story that happened to me when I went out with him. For example, Dennis LeBlanc, young state trooper. He said, Yes, in ’75 we used to go over 7:30, 8:00 o’clock in the morning and pick him up at his house.
They would drive up into the ranch, into the mountains in the Santa Barbara area. He said, We had a red station wagon, because he said red was Nancy’s favorite color. He would always sit in the back and all the way up—which is about a two and a half, three hour drive—he wouldn’t talk to us. He would write.
Then we’d get up in the ranch and then he’d work all day, he’d be building fences and building the roof, and doing all those things they’ve got pictures of.
Then he said, We’d pile back in the car, drive back down to L.A., and again, he’d sit in the back and get out his pad of paper and read and write, all the way home.
Now, we talked to David Fischer and he told the same story about traveling in the ’70s, ’78, ’79, on the plane, he was doing the writing. And we talked to Nancy and she said, Oh, yes, well, you know.
So when we said, When he comes home, what does he do? Take off his shoes, have a beer and watch television?
She said, Oh no, no, no. Never does that, doesn’t watch television. He has a desk in his bedroom and he reads and works.
We found, there must have been eight or nine different people that nobody has ever heard of, but they were with him at the time when he was doing this stuff.
The picture that emerges is that he was writing and working, most of his time in private, and nobody knew.
Preparing.
Yes. Just getting ready and doing things.
Getting his thoughts.
Ronald Reagan's former top advisor Michael Deaver was interviewed by Stephen F. Knott, Ph.D., Jim Young, Chuck Jones, Erwin Hargrove and Russell Riley on September 12, 2002 for the Oral History series at The Miller Center. Deaver talked about working with Reagan in the mid to late 1970s when he and Peter Hannaford managed Reagan through their public relations firm Deaver & Hannaford. An excerpt of this interview follows:
It’s during this ’76 to ’80 period, I believe, when Governor Reagan is making these—I think they were weekly—radio addresses? Could you tell us about that?
That’s an interesting story. When he left the Governor’s office, Walter Cronkite had called me, which impressed me, and said that he would like to have Reagan do a twice-weekly five-minute commentary on the CBS Evening News, and that [Eric] Sevareid would do it on two other nights. Well, I thought this was incredible. The CBS Evening News, at that point, was 30 or 40 million people a day. Then, this old guy from Hollywood named Harry O’Connor, who was a radio producer who didn’t have any active
clients at the moment, had come in and seen Reagan and told him he could get him on the radio, a five-minute radio show a day.
So, the hour of decision came, and I thought this was going to be a slam-dunk. And Reagan said, I’m going to do the radio show.
I said, What? You’re not going to do the CBS?
No, I’m not going to do the CBS Evening News.
I said, I don’t believe this. I can’t believe this.
He said, Mike, people will tire of me on television.
Absolutely right, but I didn’t know it. He said, They won’t tire of me on the radio.
At the end of that, when we finally had to give it up when he announced, we were speaking to about 50 million people a day on the radio. In the key cities, New York, L.A., we were speaking to them twice a day, both commute times, morning and evening.
Walter Mondale came up to me one night, after he was elected President, at some party here in town and said, I think that, plus I loved it. I loved the visual part of it. I always wanted to be in advertising. I loved the idea of being able to persuade people by the use of visuals. So this was, sort of, my poor man’s way of doing what I wanted to do anyway. Have you ever reflected much on what difference it makes? No, I haven’t. I think with Reagan it probably wouldn’t have made a lot of difference. You could have put him anyplace. As long as the camera concentrated on his head, you would probably have been all right. One of the interesting things about Reagan to me is—and most people don’t realize this—look at political speakers over your lifetime. Reagan never moved anything except his head. Occasionally, his shoulders. He never gestured with his arms or his hands, and for somebody to be that persuasive, simply using his voice, is pretty remarkable. That’s why he knew he would be better on the radio. He would last longer if he didn’t stay on television all the time. He was not a theatrical speaker, in spite of the fact that he was an actor. I guess he learned that. ...Other people don’t think that he decided to run then, but I think he was so buoyed up by that experience that it’s likely that he thought he could do it right then. He came back real strong on his radio addresses September 1st, taping the first batch. He’d tape ten, of which he wrote seven, or something like that. They were terrific, enthusiastic, and supportive, and they talked about the platform and about the convention and what a wonderful experience campaigning had been, how great the press was. He campaigned out of the box strongly after that loss. The talk to the convention that he gave—I think it was pretty dicey there for a moment as to whether Ford would call him down or what, but his speech was entirely extemporaneous, he hadn’t prepared for this, is that correct? Peter Hannaford tells a story. Maybe you should ask him. We asked Peter Hannaford about this because one of Reagan’s radio addresses after September 1st, after the loss at the convention, is very similar to what he said at the convention. Shaping the world for 100 years to come is the topic of it, and he tells of riding down the Pacific Coast Highway and being asked to provide something for a time capsule. Peter Hannaford said to Reagan, probably the morning when the vote was to occur, said, So he had a little something in mind. To that extent he’d thought about it. Pete Hannaford, who was in charge of making sure he had what he needed for speeches said, ...You know, he’d [Reagan] been speaking for a long time and he’d been giving radio addresses. From ’75 to ’79 he’d given 1,050 radio addresses. He wrote 670 in his own hand and another six or eight that didn’t get used on the air in the end. These were all short essays on issues. So he’d basically been talking about these things for a long time. He knew what he thought. He had positions on the issues. Now, what do you focus on as main points in a campaign, or what do you develop in terms of advertising strategy or something like that? And opposition research. Reagan wasn’t running against anybody when he was writing those radio addresses— No, he wasn’t. He was developing, articulating his own positions— In fact, when he was an announced candidate he didn’t do the radio addresses or the newspaper columns. He immediately gave them up. The timing of his announcement, especially the November 13th, 1979, announcement, was fairly late. He could have announced earlier, he knew he was going to run. As soon as he announces, he has to quit doing the newspaper columns and the radio addresses, and he gives up the income from that as well. So until then, he’s speaking on issues. He may criticize a policy but he’s not running against a candidate. I was wondering if you might talk a bit about the changes, if any, in your perceptions of Ronald Reagan—the Reagan that you knew and worked for, and the Reagan that you found in the last few years doing your research on the first book and the book that will be out in late 2003. Has your understanding of Ronald Reagan changed as a result of your research? I think so. I’ve been absolutely amazed at the amount of the radio addresses that he was writing in the ’70s, the speeches. We have his file from the White House of speeches that he wrote as well as earlier speeches that he wrote himself, like the first inaugural address and several other speeches. He got back from Reykjavik and there’s a draft of that speech, four pages or something like that, then they type it up and it gets edited and some people say you should include this, but basically he wrote his address to the nation after the Reykjavik summit. I’m amazed at the range of issues on which he has a defined and sophisticated position, not only in speeches and radio addresses but also in the correspondence that he answers himself. There are thousands and thousands of letters and there are three or four hundred letters handwritten or dictated by him during the Presidency every year that are not staff-drafted. There are a huge number where there’s a reply in his name that has been previously written as a standard answer. But these are things where he writes the message himself. The range of people that he keeps in touch with in the press, old friends from Des Moines from his radio days and from college, from Hollywood, from the Governorship and the people who supported him early on for that. Other people, family, you know, quite a few letters to his brother, Neil Reagan. There are other letters that we haven’t seen, a lot of letters to somebody like Walter Annenberg. But there are also letters that we don’t see unless we obtain the collection from the recipient, which we did. We got copies of all the Annenberg correspondence from him before he died. Because Reagan wrote him and put it in an envelope and sealed it and addressed the envelope and said, So I’m amazed. I knew when we did the first book and we found the radio addresses and a few things from early stories that he wrote up through the Alzheimer’s letter, which is the last public writing, but he was a writer. Then we found out things. For instance, when he was announcing sports in Iowa he also wrote stories for the newspaper. When he went to Hollywood he wrote stories back about becoming an actor in Hollywood. He writes all the time. Then there was a book of love letters to Nancy. So I think that the sophistication and detail on policy issues, and the sophistication in politics in terms of people’s motives and so forth that comes through this is a surprise to me, just the sheer volume of it. When he found the time to do this and how important it was. The other thing you realize that he’s doing is that probably from the time that he decides to run for Governor, even after the Governorship and straight on through, he’s kind of running for President. Any idea that Nancy’s the driver and the one who wants to get ahead is completely not true. I mean, I think she supported him, but I think he was interested. He is systematically, consciously, keeping in touch with all the people, even fans from Hollywood who are supporting him, spreading the word. He’s working on it all the time. Could you say that Reagan was studying for the Presidency in ways, studying by thinking and by expressing himself and his views to other people, or studying for leadership or whatever you want to call it? How did this man come to—I mean, this is an extraordinary career. Yes it is. Good evening. I am here tonight to announce my intention to seek the Republican nomination for President of the United States. I'm sure that each of us has seen our country from a number of viewpoints depending on where weve lived and what we've done. For me it has been as a boy growing up in several small towns in Illinois. As a young man in Iowa trying to get a start in the years of the great depression and later in California for most of my adult life. I've seen America from the stadium press box as a sportscaster, as an actor, officer of my labor union, soldier, officeholder and as both Democrat and Republican. Ive lived in an America where those who often had too little to eat outnumbered those who had enough. There have been four wars in my lifetime and Ive seen our country face financial ruin in depression. I have also seen the great strength of this nation as it pulled itself up from that ruin to become the dominant force in the world. To me our country is a living, breathing presence, unimpressed by what others say is impossible, proud of its own success, generous, yes and nae, sometimes wrong, never mean and always impatient to provide a better life for its people in a framework of a basic fairness and freedom. Someone once said that the difference between an American and any other kind of person is that an American lives in anticipation of the future because he knows it will be a great place. Other people fear the future as just a repetition of past failures. Theres a lot of truth in that. If there is one thing we are sure of it is that history need not be relived; that nothing is impossible, and that man is capable of improving his circumstances beyond what we are told is fact. There are those in our land today, however, who would have us believe that the United States, like other great civilizations of the past, has reached the zenith of its power; that we are weak and fearful, reduced to bickering with each other and no longer possessed of the will to cope with our problems. Much of this talk has come from leaders who claim that our problems are too difficult to handle. We are supposed to meekly accept their failures as the most which humanly can be done. They tell us we must learn to live with less, and teach our children that their lives will be less full and prosperous than ours have been; that the America of the coming years will be a place where because of our past excesses it will be impossible to dream and make those dreams come true. I dont believe that. And, I dont believe you do either. That is why I am seeking the presidency. I cannot and will not stand by and see this great country destroy itself. Our leaders attempt to blame their failures on circumstances beyond their control, on false estimates by unknown, unidentifiable experts who rewrite modern history in an attempt to convince us our high standard of living, the result of thrift and hard work, is somehow selfish extravagance which we must renounce as we join in sharing scarcity. I dont agree that our nation must resign itself to inevitable decline, yielding its proud position to other hands. I am totally unwilling to see this country fail in its obligation to itself and to the other free peoples of the world. The crisis we face is not the result of any failure of the American spirit; it is a failure of our leaders to establish rational goals and give our people something to order their lives by. If I am elected, I shall regard my election as proof that the people of the United States have decided to set a new agenda and have recognized that the human spirit thrives best when goals are set and progress can be measured in their achievement. During the next year I shall discuss in detail a wide variety of problems which a new administration must address. Tonight I shall mention only a few. No problem that we face today can compare with the need to restore the health of the American economy and the strength of the American dollar. Double-digit inflation has robbed you and your family of the ability to plan. It has destroyed the confidence to buy and it threatens the very structure of family life itself as more and more wives are forced to work in order to help meet the ever-increasing cost of living. At the same time, the lack of year growth in the economy has introduced the justifiable fear in the minds of working men and women who are already over extended that soon there will be fewer jobs and no money to pay for even the necessities of life. And tragically as the cost of living keeps going up, the standard of living which has been our great pride keeps going down. The people have not created this disaster in our economy; the federal government has. It has overspent, overestimated, and over regulated. It has failed to deliver services within the revenues it should be allowed to raise from taxes. In the thirty-four years since the end of World War II, it has spent 448 billion dollars more than it has collection in taxes 448 billion dollars of printing press money, which has made every dollar you earn worth less and less. At the same time, the federal government has cynically told us that high taxes on business will in some way solve the problem and allow the average taxpayer to pay less. Well, business is not a taxpayer it is a tax collector. Business has to pass its tax burden on to the customer as part of the cost of doing business. You and I pay the taxes imposed on business every time we go to the store. Only people pay taxes and it is political demagoguery or economic illiteracy to try and tell us otherwise. The key to restoring the health of the economy lies in cutting taxes. At the same time, we need to get the waste out of federal spending. This does not mean sacrificing essential services, nor do we need to destroy the system of benefits which flow to the poor, the elderly, the sick and the handicapped. We have long since committed ourselves, as a people, to help those among us who cannot take care of themselves. But the federal government has proven to be the costliest and most inefficient provider of such help we could possibly have. We must put an end to the arrogance of a federal establishment which accepts no blame for our condition, cannot be relied upon to give us a fair estimate of our situation and utterly refuses to live within its means. I will not accept the supposed wisdom which has it that the federal bureaucracy has become so powerful that it can no longer be changed or controlled by any administration. As President I would use every power at my command to make the federal establishment respond to the will and the collective wishes of the people. We must force the entire federal bureaucracy to live in the real world of reduced spending, streamlined functions and accountability to the people it serves. We must review the functions of the federal government to determine which of those are the proper province of levels of government closer to the people. The 10th article of the Bill of Rights is explicit in pointing out that the federal government should do only those things specifically called for in the Constitution. All others shall remain with the states or the people. We havent been observing that 10th article of late. The federal government has taken on functions it was never intended to perform and which it does not perform well. There should be a planned, orderly transfer of such functions to states and communities and a transfer with them of the sources of taxation to pay for them. The savings in administrative would be considerable and certainly there would be increased efficiency and less bureaucracy. By reducing federal tax rates where they discourage individual initiative especially personal income tax rates we can restore incentives, invite greater economic growth and at the same time help give us better government instead of bigger government. Proposals such as the Kemp-Roth bill would bring about this kind of realistic reductions in tax rates. In short, a punitive tax system must be replaced by one that restores incentive for the worker and for industry; a system that rewards initiative and effort and encourages thrift. All these things are possible; none of them will be easy. But the choice is clear. We can go on letting the country slip over the brink to financial ruin with the disaster that it means for the individual or we can find the will to work together to restore confidence in ourselves and to regain the confidence of the world. I have lived through one depression. I carry with me the memory of a Christmas Eve when my brother and I and our parents exchanged modest gifts there was no lighted tree as there had been on Christmases past. I remember watching my father open what he thought was a greeting from his employer. We all watched and yes, we were hoping for a bonus check. It was notice that he no longer had a job. And in those days the government ran radio announcements telling workers not to leave home looking for jobs there were no jobs. Ill carry with me always the memory of my father sitting there holding that envelope, unable to look at us. I cannot and will not stand by while inflation and joblessness destroy the dignity of our people. Another serious problem which must be discussed tonight is our energy situation. Our country was built on cheap energy. Today, energy is not cheap and we face the prospect that some forms of energy may soon not be available at all. Last summer you probably spent hours sitting in gasoline lines. This winter, some will be without heat and everyone will be paying much more simply to keep home and family warm. If you ever had any doubt of the governments inability to provide for the needs of the people, just look at the utter fiasco we now call the energy crisis. Not one straight answer nor any realistic hope of relief has come from the present administration in almost three years of federal treatment of the problem. As gas lines grew, the administration again panicked and now has proposed to put the country on a wartime footing; but for this war there is no victory in sight. And, as always, when the federal bureaucracy fails, all it can suggest is more of the same. This time its another bureau to untangle the mess made by the ones we already have. But, this just wont work. Solving the energy crisis will not be easy, but it can be done. First we must decide that less is not enough. Next we must remove government obstacles to energy production. And, we must make use of those technological advantages we still possess. It is no program simply to say use less energy. Of course waste must be eliminated and efficiency promoted, but not an energy policy. At best it means we will run out of energy a little more slowly. But a day will come when the lights will dim and the wheels of industry will turn more slowly and finally stop. As President I will not endorse any course which has this as its principle objective. We need more energy and that means diversifying our sources of supply away from the OPEC countries. Yes, it means more efficient automobiles. But it also means more exploration and development of oil and natural gas here in our own country. The only way to free ourselves from the monopoly pricing power of OPEC is to be less dependent on outside sources of fuel. The answer obvious to anyone except those in the administration, it seems, is more domestic production of oil and gas. We must also have wider use of nuclear power within strict safety rules, of course. There must be more spending by the energy industries on research and development of substitutes for fossil fuels. In years to come solar energy may provide much of the answer but for the next two or three decades we must do such things as master the chemistry of coal. Putting the market system to work for these objectives is an essential first step for their achievement. Additional multi-billion dollar federal bureaus and programs are not the answer. In recent weeks there has been much talk about excess oil company profits. I dont believe weve been given all the information we need to make a judgement about this. We should have that information. Government exists to protect us from each other. It is not governments function to allocate fuel or impose unnecessary restrictions on the marketplace. It is governments function to determine whether we are being unfairly exploited and if so to take immediate and appropriate action. As President I would do exactly that. On the foreign front, the decade of the 1980s will place severe pressures upon the United States and its allies. We can expect to be tested in ways calculated to try our patience, to confound our resolve and to erode our belief in ourselves. During a time when the Soviet Union may enjoy nuclear superiority over this country, we must never waiver in our commitment to our allies nor accept any negotiation which is not clearly in the national interest. We must judge carefully. Though we should leave no initiative untried in our pursuit of peace, we must be clear voiced in our resolve to resist any unpeaceful act wherever it may occur. Negotiations with the Soviet Union must never become appeasement. For the most of the last forty years, we have been preoccupied with the global struggle the competition with the Soviet Union and with our responsibilities to our allies. But too often in recent times we have just drifted along with events, responding as if we thought of ourselves as a nation in decline. To our allies we seem to appear to be a nation unable to make decisions in its own interests, let alone in the common interest. Since the Second World War we have spent large amounts of money and much of our time protecting and defending freedom all over the world. We must continue this, for if we do not accept the responsibilities of leadership, who will? And if no one will, how will we survive? The 1970s have taught us the foolhardiness of not having a long-range diplomatic strategy of our own. The world has become a place where, in order to survive, our country needs more than just allies it needs real friends. Yet, in recent times we often seem not to have recognized who our friends are. This must change. It is now time to take stock of our own house and to resupply its strength. Part of that process involves taking stock of our relationship with Puerto Rico. I favor statehood for Puerto Rico and if the people of Puerto Rico vote for statehood in their coming referendum I would, as President, initiate the enabling legislation to make this a reality. We live on a continent whose three countries possess the assets to make it the strongest, most prosperous and self-sufficient area on earth. Within the borders of this North American continent are the food, resources, technology and undeveloped territory which, properly managed, could dramatically improve the quality of life of all its inhabitants. It is no accident that this unmatched potential for progress and prosperity exists in three countries with such long-standing heritages of free government. A developing closeness among Canada, Mexico and the United States a North American accord would permit achievement of that potential in each country beyond that which I believe any of them strong as they are could accomplish in the absence of such cooperation. In fact, the key to our own future security may lie in both Mexico and Canada becoming much stronger countries than they are today. No one can say at this point what form future cooperation among our three countries will take. But if I am elected President, I would be willing to invite each of our neighbors to send a special representative to our government to sit in on high level planning sessions with us, as partners, mutually concerned about the future of our Continent. First, I would immediately seek the views and ideas of Canadian and Mexican leaders on this issue, and work tirelessly with them to develop closer ties among our peoples. It is time we stopped thinking of our nearest neighbors as foreigners. By developing methods of working closely together, we will lay the foundations for future cooperation on a broader and more significant scale. We will also put to rest any doubts of those cynical enough to believe that the United States would seek to dominate any relationship among our three countries, or foolish enough to think that the governments and peoples of Canada and Mexico would ever permit such domination to occur. I, for one, am confident that we can show the world by example that the nations of North America are ready, within the context of an unswerving commitment to freedom, to seek new forms of accommodation to meet a changing world. A developing closeness between the United States, Canada and Mexico would serve notice on friend and foe alike that we were prepared for a long haul, looking outward again and confident our of future; that together we are going to create jobs, to generate new fortunes of wealth for many and provide a legacy for the children of each of our countries. Two hundred years ago we taught the world that a new form of government, created out of the genius of man to cope with his circumstances, could succeed in bringing a measure of quality to human life previously thought impossible. Now let us work toward the goal of using the assets of this continent, its resources, technology and foodstuffs in the most efficient ways possible for the common good of all its people. It may take the next 100 years but we can dare to dream that at some future date a map of the world might show the North American continent as one in which the peoples and commerce of its three strong countries flow more freely across their present borders than they do today. In recent months leaders in our government have told us that, we, the people, have lost confidence in ourselves; that we must regain the spirit and our will to achieve our national goals. Well, it is true there is a lack of confidence, an unease with things the way they are. But the confidence we have lost is confidence in our governments policies. Our unease can almost be called bewilderment at how our defense strength has deteriorated. The great productivity of our industry is now surpassed by virtually all the major nations who compete with us for world markets. And, our currency is no longer the stable measure of value it once was. But there remains the greatness of our people, our capacity for dreaming up fantastic deeds and bringing them off to the surprise of an unbelieving world. When Washingtons men were freezing at Valley Forge, Tom Paine told his fellow Americans: We have it in our power to begin the world over again. We still have that power. Todays living Americans have in our lifetime fought harder, paid a higher price for freedom and done more to advance the dignity of man than any people who ever lived on this earth. The citizens of this great nation want leadershipyesbut not a man on a white horse demanding obedience to his commands. They want someone who believes they can begin the world over again. A leader who will unleash their great strength and remove the roadblocks government has put in their way. I want to do that more than anything Ive ever wanted. And its something that I believe with Gods help I can do I believe this nation hungers for a spiritual revival; hungers to once again see honor placed above political expediency; to see government once again the protector of our liberties, not the distributor of gifts and privilege.Government should uphold and not undermine those institutions which are custodians of the very values upon which civilization is founded religion, education and, above all, family. Government cannot be clergyman, teacher and parent. It is our servant, beholden to us. We who are privileged to be Americans have had a rendezvous with destiny since the moment in 1630 when John Winthrop, standing on the deck of the tiny Arbella off the coast of Massachusetts, told the little band of pilgrims, We shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us so that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a byword throughout the world. A troubled and afflicted mankind looks to us, pleading for us to keep our rendezvous with destiny; that we will uphold the principles of self-reliance, self-discipline, morality, andabove allresponsible liberty for every individual that we will become that shining city on a hill. I believe that you and I together can keep this rendezvous with destiny. Thank you and good night.Do you really think that radio show had any impact on Reagan getting the nomination?
I said, I think it had everything to do with it.
He said, Well, I’m thinking about doing that myself, a radio show.
I said, Well, good. Mr. Vice President, let me just tell you one thing. Ronald Reagan wrote every radio show himself.
Mondale said, You’re putting me on.
I said, No. He wouldn’t let anybody write them. He’d let Pete [Hannaford] write his newspaper, but he always said,
I think I can write the spoken word better.
-----------------
Deaver
Ronald Reagan's former Campaign Associate Annelise Anderson was interviewed by Stephen F. Knott, Ph.D. and Jim Young on December 17, 2002 for the Oral History series at The Miller Center. Anderson talked about working with Reagan in the mid to late 1970s when he had his syndicated newspaper columns and his popular daily radio commentary that aired from 1975 to 1979. Excerpts of that lengthy interview follow:
Hollywood, California: Ronald Reagan wears a smile as he started taping his radio shows here. Since the Republican convention, the former California governor has been relaxing at home, but now, he's back to work.
Governor, just in case lightning strikes, we really ought to have something prepared, and Reagan said,
Well, I’ve been thinking of talking about the time I was riding down the Pacific Coast Highway.
And Pete said, That sounds good.
You know, just in case you’ve got to do it….
*
Here, mail it for me.
And all the White House does then—or before that nobody—is Xerox the outside of the envelope and they say, Sealed Presidential.
So there’s correspondence out there we haven’t seen.
Ronald Reagans announcement for Presidential Candidacy
Source: https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/archives/speech/ronald-reagans-announcement-presidential-candidacy-1979
November 13, 1979
Register of the Ronald Reagan Radio Commentary sound recordings
Source: https://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/tf7c6005hf/entire_text/
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