Advise and Consent (102 page)
Read Advise and Consent Online
Authors: Allen Drury
Tags: #Literature & Fiction, #Contemporary, #Genre Fiction, #Political, #Contemporary Fiction
Chapter 4
The joint resolution of support for the President, as the Majority Leader had predicted, went through the Senate in jig time, was sent promptly to the House, and by two-thirty had been passed there. A brief period of tense waiting ensued, while the galleries and chamber stirred restlessly expecting the Chief Executive’s arrival. Then there was a sudden stir in the hall, the sergeant-at-arms came in and announced to Senator Cooley in the Chair, “Mr. President, the President of the United States!” And looking a little nervous but smiling about him in a friendly way, the President returned to the friends he knew so well, who thought they knew him so well.
Just before he began to speak, while they were all standing and applauding wildly, he took a pencil from his vest pocket, scratched out the word “peril” in the first line of his text and wrote in firmly “concern.” Then he began. “Mr. President,” he said, “my dear friends of the Senate: I come before you in this hour of our beloved country’s concern to make a brief statement of my plans and purposes for the government. I
expect when I return from Geneva to appear before both houses in joint session and talk more fully about what I have in mind. I appear in the Senate this afternoon because here rests the most immediately pressing problem that faces”—and he said the next two words with a little air of pride that they found quite touching—“my Administration: namely, the selection of a Secretary of State.
“I think,” he said, and he spoke with a deliberate slowness that held them absolutely silent, these men who thought they knew Harley Hudson and were suddenly beginning to wonder if they did, “that before I give you my nomination for that office, I should make a clear, unequivocal, and final statement of my own plans.”
He paused and there was a tensing through the room, on the floor, along the walls, in the public galleries and in the press gallery, where reporters stood poised to dash up the steps and file their bulletins.
“I did not,” he said quietly, “wish to be President of the United States. There was a time when I did, but that had long since passed. But now that the burden has been laid upon me in this tragic fashion, I expect to bear it to the best of my ability. I expect to bear it to the end of the present term. Then,” he said, “I shall lay it down.”
At this there was an excited stirring through the chamber, quickly stilled. Oh, Harley, the Majority Leader told him silently in his mind, my boy, I expect you are about to be very clever, very, very clever indeed.
“I shall not, in other words,” the President said, “be a candidate for election to the Presidency next year. This announcement is final. I make it now so that you may act upon what I shall now ask you to act upon with no thought of partisan politics whatever, but only in the thought of what is best for our dear country. For it is in that spirit that I stand before you now.”
He stopped and slowly took a sip of water as the first relays of wire-service reporters rushed out to file their FLASH. PRESIDENT WON’T RUN NEXT YEAR.
“I am well aware,” the President went on quietly, “as are all of us in this Senate—more aware than anyone outside could be, for this has been our testing and our travail and our unhappiness here in this chamber, in a way no one who has not been directly involved in it could understand—of all the somber aspects surrounding the nomination upon which you voted Thursday night.
“On that nomination you rendered your final decision. You decided, by an irreversible vote, that you did not wish Robert A. Leffingwell to be Secretary of State. In that decision I concur. “Yet”—and he looked slowly and directly across all the chamber, all the tensely waiting faces of the colleagues he knew so well
—“
I must tell you that I do not wish to lose the abilities of Robert A. Leffingwell, which are great, or the services of Robert A. Leffingwell, which are many and worthy. I must tell you that I wish him to be a part of my Administration.”
Again there was a stirring, uneasy and almost hostile, but he went firmly on.
“I say this because he is a valuable man within the sphere of his own competence. The reasons for his defeat yesterday were complex, and not all of them bore directly upon his abilities. I hope that having done what, under the circumstances, it had to do, the Senate will now reappraise this man, understanding that he has great support in many sections of the national community, understanding that national unity at this time is imperative, understanding that he, too, perhaps, may have paid in full, in his way, for his errors; and trusting”—and his voice became solemn with a note they had never heard from him before
—“
that you will have faith in your President, a man whose integrity as well as his frailties I hope you have all had occasion to note over the years, when he asks you to give this man another chance.
“I have decided,” he said, “to create a special commission, somewhat similar to the Hoover Commission, to study and overhaul the administrative side of the government, something which has not been done for some years and which I think badly needs doing. To the post of executive director of this commission, a post for which I think his administrative abilities amply qualify him, I should like to appoint Robert A. Leffingwell. It is not a post which requires Senate confirmation, and I shall not submit his name to you for confirmation; neither is it a policy post, for I take it the Senate does not want him in such a post. But it is a post where I think he can be of real assistance to the country, and I should like to think that you will understand my reasons and will not criticize them too harshly.
“I feel that I can use him. I feel the country can use him. I had a long talk with him yesterday afternoon, after he had submitted to me his resignation from the government, which he felt he should do in the light of your vote, and I am satisfied that he will justify your confidence if you will give it to him. I will say to you, too,” he added thoughtfully, “that I have the assurances of the man I have decided to nominate for Secretary of State that he too is willing to give him a second chance in this post which will in no way impinge upon policy, foreign or domestic. I would hope, now that the heat of controversy has died a little, that you would understand and support this particular solution for this particular problem.”
He paused, and in the little private conversation Bob Munson was carrying on in his mind he paid tribute to the unexpected and surprising shrewdness of the man before them. For this of course was by no means an ideal solution for anything, but rather an astute and practical move to both mollify and win the active support of the many vocal and powerful elements that had backed the nominee. In this it was both politically perceptive and quite symbolic of the government in which it occurred. In a way, he thought sardonically, this was a perfect democratic solution, not wholly satisfying anybody, not wholly antagonizing anybody, not white, not black, not good, not bad; pragmatic, realistic, sensible within the context and climate in which the President, any President, must operate if he would lead his widely diverse land; and gratifying completely neither the idealistic who had opposed Robert A. Leffingwell nor the idealistic who had supported him.
At these thoughts, wry and half-amused and filled with the wisdom of many years experience with the government of his country, the Majority Leader glanced at Orrin Knox with a quizzical grin and shook his head in mock wonderment; but the senior Senator from Illinois did not seem amused. Instead he looked back with a strange expression Senator Munson did not understand, and nodded absently. The Majority Leader wondered in some alarm if Orrin were going to raise more hell at this late date. He hoped not. Surely he wouldn’t if Harley asked him not to. Harley, after all, was the President.
“I come now,” the President said, “to the nomination for Secretary of State. I shall say little on this score, because I do not need to. I shall say only that I hope you will speedily confirm his nomination, for I must leave tomorrow morning for Geneva and the time is short.”
He paused and slowly gathered up the sheets of his speech, looking down upon them thoughtfully and placing them neatly back in their folder before he spoke. Then he looked up again, directly and strongly out across the room, once again meeting their eyes squarely all around the Senate.
“I nominate,” he said quietly, “for the high office of Secretary of State my old colleague and dear friend, the senior Senator from the State of Illinois.”
Into the pandemonium that followed UPI looked dazedly at AP.
“But—but—but—” He said.
“God damn it, man,” AP shouted, clapping him on the back, “don’t stand there and gibber. Get up there and
write!
”
And so they did.
***
Chapter 5
Long before the presidential party started at 9 a.m. Sunday from the White House out across Fourteenth Street Bridge and over the Potomac, the crowds had begun to gather at National Airport, coming up from Maryland, over from the District, in from nearby Virginia. By eight-thirty, when the presidential plane and the accompanying plane for the State Department delegation to the conference were wheeled slowly out on the apron, there were an estimated 175,000 people massed about the field entrance to the MATS terminal; and shortly before nine-twenty, when amid screaming sirens and the usual accompaniment of motorcycle outriders the President’s limousine and the four cars following arrived at the field and drove out on the apron with a flourish, police and press estimated that the figure had grown close to 300,000.
To this great gathering, covered by every means of press, television, and radio, carried throughout the nation and overseas, the President’s words were brief as he stood on a platform facing them in the bright blue day. Flanked by the leaders of the Senate, the new Secretary of State, the Speaker, and the President Pro Tempore of the Senate, he looked wind-blown, kindly, earnest, and unperturbed.
“My countrymen,” he said in a clear voice that boomed across the field in the waiting hush, “I am leaving now for Geneva. I go on your behalf, and I think,” he said, “that I go with your love.”
At this there was a great roar from the crowd and he paused, obviously touched.
“Apparently,” he said, “I do. I hope this will be noted in certain places where it will do the most good.”
There was a burst of laughter and applause.
“I cannot promise you,” he said soberly, “that the United States will emerge from this conference with all her objectives in the cause of peace achieved.” A deep silence suddenly fell. “But I can promise you,” he said, and his voice rang out firmly and emphatically, “that she will not come home with any of her objectives abandoned, or any of her principles yielded, or any of her courage diminished.” And a great roar came again.
“The United States and her President,” he said, “are unafraid. We go in good faith, pledged to do our honest best, striving always for a decent and lasting peace. From this purpose we cannot be intimidated or diverted. Humanity knows it can trust us. We will not let humanity down.” And the roar came again.
“Now,” he said, almost conversationally, “it is time to say good-by—or, rather,
au revoir
. In these brief hours that I have been your President, you have been more than kind to me. Your love has sustained me in all I have done for you so far. I know it will sustain me until I return, bringing safely home to you the dignity, the future,
and the honor
of the United States of America—intact.
“God bless you all. Thank you so much for coming out to see me off.”
He waved and turned, and while the roar of shouts and applause grew and swelled again, the members of his party also waved and began to enter the planes.
He held out both hands, one to the Speaker and one to the President Pro Tempore, and gripped them firmly.
“Take care of things,” he said, and they both smiled in a fatherly fashion.
“Don’t you worry, Mr. President,” the Speaker said. “Old Seab and I, we’ll mind the store.”
“Yes, sir,” Senator Cooley said, and he gave the President’s hand an extra squeeze. “Now just you don’t worry about a thing, Harley. Just
you don’t worry. After all,” he grinned sleepily and poked the Speaker, “Bill and I, here, we’ve wanted to be President too, you know, from time to time. Now’s our chance to show our stuff.” He chuckled. “Yes, sir, now’s our chance to show our stuff.”
“God bless you both,” the President said seriously. “I only wish you could be with me.”
“Keep us advised,” the Speaker suggested, and the President nodded.
“Daily,” he said.
And then with one last wave to the crowd he entered his plane, the door closed, the great silver machines began to taxi slowly down the runway, turned at the far end and came back, faster and faster and faster until suddenly they were airborne and on their way.
The crowd followed them intently, in utter silence, until they were no more than little silver dots. Then suddenly they were lost, and over all the great field a curious, profoundly moving sigh went up before the throng began to disperse and go home.
Sitting silently in the forward plane as it passed over Baltimore and moved up the spring-green Maryland countryside, the presidential party was lost in its thoughts. There seemed little need for conversation and for a while there was none.
Senator August read a magazine or stared out the window. The President, appearing perfectly calm, leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes. The Majority Leader, feeling comforted by this homely sight, tossed a quick, kindly glance of amusement at the Minority Leader, and did the same. Only the new Secretary of State seemed wide awake and unable to doze.
He that would bring home the wealth of the Indies
, it had said,
must carry the wealth of the Indies with him.
Well, he had gone forth—the country had gone forth—now they in this plane were going forth, hoping to bring home, not the wealth of the Indies, perhaps, but only, if they possibly could, a little pinch of accommodation with this enemy so hostile to every human decency in the world; and not necessarily carrying the wealth of the Indies with them, but only a few scraps of things, the memory of a meeting in Philadelphia, a speech at Gettysburg, a few fragments of valor still echoing down the American wind from distant battles and far-off things, Chancellorsville and The Wilderness, the Alamo and San Juan Hill, Belleau Wood and the Argonne, Bataan and Corregidor, Omaha Beach and Salerno, Midway, Iwo Jima, Guadalcanal; a certain way of looking at things, a certain way of living, a form of government that might or might not turn out to be all it was cracked up to be, when all was said and done: on that the final judgment had not yet been rendered.
And what of his own pilgrimage stretching back down the years to Springfield and ahead to—what? He couldn’t say—he would have to wait and see—time would have to tell. It would be just his luck, he thought with a wry inward smile, for the President to stumble in his good-hearted innocent way upon some utterly unexpected triumph that would bring him home a hero, cancel out his determination not to run next year, and so once more foreclose his own chances
....
And if he did, so what? He would not fret over that, Orrin thought. It would probably be for the best in a greater design than his.
Who knew? Who could tell? At least he was no longer so restless, at least he was beginning to find a reasonable equanimity, at least in the rushing events of the past three days, beginning with the shattering revelation of what he had done to himself at the convention and culminating in his appointment as Secretary of State, he had begun to take things as they came, without too much impatience and too much anguish and too much regret. And that, perhaps, was wealth enough of the Indies for him.
So they rode on, old friends from the Senate together carrying their country’s hopes, while below America sped away, the kindly, pleasant, greening land about to learn whether history still had a place for a nation so strangely composed of great ideals and uneasy compromise as she.
Washington‒Orlando‒Sanibel
October, 1957‒November, 1958
***