005-068
Date: Jun 14, 1971
Participants: Richard Nixon, John Ehrlichman
Location: White House Telephone
Nixon: Hello.
White House Operator: It’s Mr. Ehrlichman calling
you, sir.
Nixon: Yeah, OK.
White House Operator: Here you are.
Ehrlichman: Thanks. Hello?
Nixon: Yeah.
Ehrlichman: Mr. President.
Nixon: Hi, John.
Ehrlichman: —the Attorney General has called a couple
times about these New York Times stories, and he’s advised by his people that
unless he puts the Times on notice.
Nixon: Yeah.
Ehrlichman:—he’s probably going to waive any right of
prosecution against the newspaper. And he is calling now to see if you would
approve his putting them on notice before their first edition for tomorrow
comes out.
Nixon: Hmm.
Ehrlichman: I realize there are negatives to this in terms
of the vote on the Hill.
Nixon: You mean, to prosecute the Times?
Ehrlichman: Right.
Nixon: Hell, I wouldn’t prosecute the Times. My view
is to prosecute the goddamn pricks that gave it to them.
Ehrlichman: Yeah, if you can find out who that is.
Nixon: Yeah, I know. I mean, could the Times be
prosecuted?
Ehrlichman: Apparently so. [Pause.]
Nixon: Wait a minute. Wait a minute. They ... on the
other hand, they’re going to run another story tomorrow.
Ehrlichman: Right.
Nixon: Why doesn’t he just wait until after that one?
Ehrlichman: Well, his point is that he feels he has to
give them some sort of advance notice, and then if they go ahead and disregard,
why then.
Nixon: Yeah.
Ehrlichman: —there’s no danger of waiver. But if he doesn’t
give them notice, then it’s almost like entrapment: We sit here and let them go
ahead on a course of conduct and don’t raise any objection.
Nixon: Well, could he wait one more day? They have
one more day after that. I don’t know. I don’t know.
Ehrlichman: He apparently feels under some pressure to
either decide to do it or not do it.
Nixon: Hmm. Does he have a judgment himself as to
whether he wants to or not?
Ehrlichman: Yeah, I think he wants to. You might want
to give him a call and talk with him about it directly, as I’m not very well
posted on this whole thing.
Nixon: Yeah. Yeah. How do you feel about it?
Ehrlichman: Well, I’d kind of like to have a cause of
action against them in the sock in case we needed it. I’d hate to waive
something as good as that. But I don’t know what the ramifications would be in
terms of the Hill.
Nixon: Oh, hell. It isn’t going to affect the vote,
in my opinion, just ... [long pause]. Mm-hmm.
Ehrlichman: Would you want to take a call from him?
Nixon: Oh yeah, I’ll call him, I’ll call him.
Ehrlichman: All right. Good.
Nixon: OK. Thank you.
No comments:
Post a Comment