Rendezvous with Destiny: Ronald Reagan and the Campaign that Changed America (89 page)

The real action of Labor Day involved a firestorm of words between Reagan and Carter. Appearing at the Michigan State Fair in Detroit, Reagan departed from his prepared remarks to tell the crowd that Carter was “opening his campaign down in the city that gave birth to and is the parent body of the Ku Klux Klan.”
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Reagan was mistaken: though the city had been made the national headquarters of one of the vile organization's largest factions, the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, the birthplace of the Klan was actually fifty miles away in Pulaski, Tennessee.
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Carter, when told of Reagan's erroneous comments, said, “Anybody who resorts to slurs and innuendo against a whole region of the country based on a false statement and a false premise isn't doing the South or our nation a good service.” He said the Gipper's comments were “uncalled for” and added that “as an American and a southerner, I resent it.”
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Reagan knew immediately that he had made a giant mistake. As soon as he was alone with his staff after his Detroit speech, he said, “I blew it.”
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A worried Ed Meese confirmed Reagan's instincts when he called the traveling party to warn about the criticism the comments had already sparked. The candidate issued an apology of sorts, one that clumsily tried to make the controversy about Carter: “I am greatly disturbed about efforts to make the Ku Klux Klan an issue in this campaign. I also regret that certain remarks I made … are being misinterpreted to mean something that was never intended.”
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But it was too late.

On the plane after the Michigan event, Lyn Nofziger had gotten into a rancorous shouting match with reporters over the accuracy of Reagan's comments. Several days later, campaign manager Bill Casey yanked Nofziger's stripes, turning communications over to Bob Gray, a Washington P.R. executive.
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Some friends worried that Nofziger was drinking too much of his favorite Bombay gin, but within a short time, he pulled himself together.

Over the previous weeks, Carterites had frequently made allegations of racism against Reagan. Andrew Young, Carter's controversial former ambassador to the United Nations, was one of those who went after Reagan for appearing at the Neshoba County Fair. Young penned a scathing op-ed that as much as said Reagan was a racist for using so-called code words such as “states' rights.” He wrote, “One must ask: Is Reagan saying that he intends to do everything he can to turn the clock back to the Mississippi justice of 1964?”
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Patricia Harris, Carter's secretary of Health and Human Services, had repeatedly assaulted Reagan because the Klan had endorsed him—an endorsement Reagan had repudiated. Secretary Harris said, “When I hear Reagan's name, I see the spectre of white sheets.”
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Reagan had put up with smears much of his adult life, but the racist charge stung more than anything else. He found the Ku Klux Klan repugnant, beyond
contempt, and became furious when anyone tried to suggest that he was a racist. But now the attacks from some black leaders intensified. Congressman Parren Mitchell of Maryland said that Reagan was “a clear and present danger to black America.” Aaron Henry of the Democratic National Committee charged, “When you say Reagan to the black community, you might as well say Hitler in terms of the turn-off you get.”
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Seven Democratic southern governors sent Reagan a telegram demanding an apology. Pat Caddell chortled to Hamilton Jordan, “If Reagan keeps putting his foot in his mouth for another week or so, we can close down campaign headquarters.”
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Carter didn't let up for a moment. Here was the blowtorch his aides had promised. Carter practically ran to every microphone to blast Reagan over the Klan comment. Evans and Novak, who had observed Carter for years and knew him for the political street fighter he was, wrote in their column that “the president engages in hyperbole when attacking his opponent that has been his political trademark.”
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Reagan was furious with Carter, as the Republican made clear when he phoned both the mayor of Tuscumbia and the governor of Alabama to express his regrets over the incident. Reagan later called on the president to disavow the ruthless comments made by Secretary Harris and Andrew Young, but Carter merely took it under advisement.
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Desperate political need was driving Carter to go after Reagan so intently. The South had comprised 40 percent of Carter's electoral votes four years earlier, and in order to defeat Reagan he needed to hold on to what was his.
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Secretly, Hamilton Jordan had already put Texas, Florida, Louisiana, Tennessee, Mississippi, and Alabama, all states that Carter carried in 1976, in the “marginal/ minus” column.
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Carter saw Reagan's Klan comment and his campaign's subsequent mishandling of the situation as an opportunity to revile the Republican as a carpetbagger below the Mason-Dixon Line. Because Reagan had spoken out about states' rights and because many liberals harbored doubts about conservatives' position on race, Carter was able to get traction with his attacks.

The president turned up the pressure on Reagan the day after Labor Day in a town hall meeting at Truman High School in Independence, Missouri.
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Carter's “give 'em hell” rhetoric was hotter than anything Truman had ever said and even hotter than the day before.
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After refraining from mentioning Reagan in his Alabama speech, the president now made frequent stinging references to his GOP opponent.

Carter charged Reagan with wanting to start a “massive nuclear arms race.” He implied that Reagan's position on increasing national defense was “one of the
most serious threats to the safety and the security and the peace of our nation and of the world that is being dramatized in this 1980 election.”
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Carter elaborated: “I believe in peace. I believe in arms control. I believe in controlling nuclear weapons. I believe in the rights of working people of this country. I believe in looking forward and not backward. I don't believe the nation ought to be divided one region from another. In all these respects, Governor Reagan is different from me.”
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T
HE
K
LAN CONTROVERSY WAS
doubly problematic for Reagan because it obscured what should have been a powerful kickoff to his fall campaign.

The setting that the campaign had chosen for the Labor Day launch provided a striking visual. With the Statue of Liberty in the background and the wind tousling his hair, Reagan looked virile and in command. The day was hot and humid, and Reagan shucked his tie and jacket, undid the top two buttons of his shirt, and rolled up his sleeves, but not before giving his cufflinks to an unknown man in the crowd who had complimented them.
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Mrs. Reagan was presented with flowers “by children in ethnic dress,” according to Colin Clark's advance schedule.
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This event was about more than good stage management. Reagan's speech was a biting commentary on the failures of the Carter presidency. While Carter did not mention Reagan in Tuscumbia, the Gipper had no compunction against tearing into Carter. On this Labor Day he scored the president for having “betrayed” the working men and women of America. Gesturing to the statue behind him, he said, “The Lady standing there in the harbor has never betrayed us once.” Then, referring to the criticism he had provoked by using the term “depression,” Reagan proclaimed: “Let it show on the record that when the American people cried out for economic help, Jimmy Carter took refuge behind a dictionary. Well, if it's a definition he wants, I'll give him one. A recession is when your neighbor loses his job. A depression is when you lose yours. Recovery is when Jimmy Carter loses his!”
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The crowd went wild.

At the conclusion, Reagan led the crowd—which featured many ethnics who waved the flags of multiple nations—in singing “God Bless America.” Then he embraced Stanislaw Walesa, the father of Polish labor leader Lech Walesa, to the cheers of the audience.
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One of the few problems Reagan encountered was heckling from a handful of protesters. But Lou Cannon, in his coverage for the
Washington Post
, had a different spin on the event. Cannon had been covering Reagan for the better part of fifteen years, and though there was a mutual fondness, the reporter was now bristling over the increasingly limited press access the campaign had imposed.
In his piece, he pettily pointed out that while Reagan referred to the “great lady looking on,” in fact the crowd was viewing the back side of the statue.
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Cannon also wondered—oddly—how it was that Reagan could make an open appeal for ethnic voters when his two lead advancemen were Irish Americans.
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That would be Rick Ahearn and Jim Hooley, both of whom had the map of Ireland all over their faces. Burly, effective, tough, well respected, these two Irishmen loved the Irishman they were working for and handled all of his important trips over the years (including his last, in June 2004).

Reagan went to Detroit after the Liberty State Park event. The ill-considered remark about Carter and the Klan was the obvious lowlight of the Detroit visit but not the only difficulty he encountered in the Motor City. Reagan seemed to suggest that he would favor some sort of restrictions on the importation of Japanese cars until Detroit got back on its feet, though he had previously said that the automakers' problems were the result of excessive government regulations. When he toured the Chrysler plant the workers gave him a lukewarm reception, some booing and some cheering. While there he indicated that he had come around on the loan guarantee for Chrysler, of which he had previously been dubious.
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Blue-collar voters were not the only traditionally Democratic bloc that Reagan was targeting. He was also attempting to take advantage of Carter's problems with American Jewish voters. Reagan traveled to New York to address B'nai Brith. Speaking to an audience of 1,500 under the theme “A Covenant with Tomorrow,” Reagan leveled Carter over the administration's refusal to veto a resolution which criticized Israel for enunciating that Jerusalem was the capital of the Jewish state.
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He also assailed Carter for refusing to call the Palestine Liberation Organization a terrorist organization. “They are terrorists and they should be identified as such,” Reagan said bluntly.
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Al Spiegel, head of the coalition of Jewish Americans supporting his candidacy, introduced Reagan. He told the audience that “long before he was a candidate for public office,” Reagan had tendered his resignation from the Lakeside Country Club in Los Angeles because of its policy against Jewish members.
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Carter also spoke before the organization, but comments like “cracker” and “I doubt that Carter knew any Jews in Plains, Georgia,” were overheard. One attendee resignedly said, “I guess I'll vote for Reagan. I'm not a flaming liberal anymore.”
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C
ARTER'S CAMPAIGN FILED A
complaint with the Federal Communications Commission to prohibit independent conservative groups from running television ads in an attempt to aid Reagan. The groups and their commercials were legal, but
the complaint and the attendant publicity, the Carterites knew, would have the effect of intimidating local station owners. The “equal-time” argument was used, but that law did not apply to independent groups, only to federal candidates.
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The Carter team had already filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission charging collusion between the official Reagan-Bush campaign and the independent groups.
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The FEC didn't weigh in on that complaint, but it did, by a vote of 5–1, decide to give John Anderson's campaign federal funds, just as it had already released funds for Carter and Reagan. This was a boon for Anderson, who needed an infusion of money. The bad news was that he would not actually receive the federal funding until
after
the election, based on a complicated formula involving percentages and vote totals.
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Nevertheless, simply knowing that some money was guaranteed by the FEC meant that he now could get bank loans.

I
NCUMBENCY HAS ITS PRIVILEGES
. In Philadelphia, Carter announced that the USS
Saratoga
would be dry-docked for refitting, this saving 9,000 shipyard jobs and adding as many as 2,600 more. He picked up the endorsement of the feared American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees union, one million strong.
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Reagan also pushed onto Philadelphia. There he gave a speech to a senior-citizens group, organizing under the awkwardly alliterative “Super Senior Sunday.”
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Carter accused Reagan—falsely—of wanting to make the federal retirement system “voluntary,” a code word to the oldsters that Reagan wanted to throw them out into the snow. Reagan, he said, “would destroy the system.”
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In fact, Reagan had mused publicly years before about a system whereby individuals, if they demonstrated they had already made plans to fund their own retirement, might be “excused” from participating in the poorly managed program. Though Reagan told the seniors organization that he pledged to “defend the integrity of the Social Security system,” he received only a halfhearted response.
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