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bjbj The following is a transcript of an Oral History Interview conducted by Timothy Naftali
with Dorothy Landsberg on November 7, 2011 in Sacramento, CA. Naftali: Hi, I m Tim Naftali.
I m director of the Richard Nixon Presidential Library Museum in Yorba Linda, California.
It s November 7th, 2011. We are in Sacramento and I have the honor and privilege to be interviewing
Dorothy Landsberg for the Richard Nixon Oral History Program. Dorothy thank you for doing
this. Landsberg: Good afternoon. It s a pleasure to be here. Naftali: s go back to 1964, the
summer of 1964. You get an internship. Landsberg: I came to work as a clerk typist actually
in the Department of Justice, the Civil Rights Division because those were job descriptions
that already existed and I was assigned to Bob Owen, who worked primarily in Mississippi
and I had the great pleasure to spend the summer working with him and some of the fine
attorneys that worked with him. And I got to know John Doar in that context. And then
a year later, when I graduated from college, I came back and worked permanently for John
Doar for two years. So I got to know him pretty well in that time period. Naftali: s talk
a little bit, just for a moment, about 1964. You write a paper about the ***. Landsberg:
The Civil Rights Division only had a small number of attorneys and they were primarily
assigned to do litigation, voting rights, and there was a lot of information coming
from the FBI, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and as a clerk typist, I had a security clearance.
And so the second day that I was there, Bob Owen, of course I called him Mr. Owen at the
time, gave me a large amount of material that had come from the FBI, that was what we would
call raw data. There was a cross burning here, there was a *** rally there, there was a
beating here, there was a church burned there and it covered Mississippi and the department
was very concerned about violence. And there were other people who are analyzing and looking
at it, too, but Mr. Doar always believed in doing things himself and in making sure that
he had some control over the process. So they asked me to start analyzing it and I said
to Bob Owen, What should my work product be? And he said, Well, I guess some sort of a
report. I was a history major. So I went and got some index cards. I went to one of the
attorneys in the Mississippi section, Nick Flannery, and I asked for a map of Mississippi.
And over the next week or 10 days maybe, I generated a short report, 21, 19 pages about
the Ku Klux *** and the white citizens council in Mississippi that had some general information
but also was divided by geography. Naftali: And Mr. Doar was impressed by this? Landsberg:
Well, he actually wasn t initially. I learned later that he had read the draft, Bob Owen
had given it to him, and he thought there was a mistake or maybe even two or three in
the first page and a half. So he put it down and Michael Schwerner, Mr. Chaney and Mr.
Goodwin, three civil rights workers, were killed in June of 1964. And the president
was going to send Allen Dulles, the former director of the CIA, to Mississippi. And I
learned all of this after the fact but John was collecting material, some of these FBI
reports, and other things into a notebook. And Bob Owen was standing there and he said
to John Doar, You should stick in that report that Dorothy wrote, that summer employee I
ve told you about. And John says, Oh, it has a mistake or two in the first page. And Bob
Owen says, Yeah, it does but they re not glaring mistakes and the rest of it is really pretty
good. So as John Doar tells the story, he wrote draft in large letters across the top
of it and punched it in to the back of the notebook and then he was called up to the
attorney general s office and he gave it to Mr. Dulles and Mr. Dulles took it home. And,
again, this is all the story that John tells and he actually wrote it up in a document
that he made part of a notebook for my 60th birthday, and the next morning the attorney
general asked Mr. Doar to go with Mr. Dulles to Jackson, Mississippi for some investigation
and I m sure it was also to calm the waters and various other reasons. So Mr. Doar said
to Mr. Dulles, do you want to take this notebook and he said, No, I don t think I need it but
I will take the very excellent, preliminary draft that s at the back of the notebook.
So that s the story that Mr. Doar tells. Naftali: And you come back a year later and what are
your responsibilities then? Landsberg: Well, I come back a year later. Actually, the last
day of my summer work, Bob Owen and I and several other people went to lunch and Bob
Owen said, Mr. Doar told us that we should write a job description so we could hire people
like you when they graduate from college who can come and work for us full-time. And it
was basically a paralegal but we didn t call it that. We called it a research analyst.
So there were several other research analysts who were hired before I came back but I came
back in June and I had a desk right outside John s office and I was had a combination
of support responsibilities and substantive responsibilities. I had a lot of responsibilities
for the voting rights act when it passed in 1965. And I actually helped a little bit with
the closing argument that John gave. There was a federal trial that was held in 1967
for the Klansman and the law enforcement officials who had been some of them were convicted but
they had been accused of the *** of these three civil rights workers in 64. It took
three whole years to bring it to justice, but, eventually they were convicted by an
all white Mississippi jury. It was really the most remarkable thing and another indication
of John s tremendous impact that he had on events, but I helped a little bit with the
closing argument that he gave and I helped him find a speech that had been given by Mr.
Justice Jackson in the Nuremberg Trials and he incorporated an aspect of it. It had to
do and I really can t do justice to it. I regret, but it had to do with I think it was
from Richard III, but it had to do with a comment that was made about people that had
been murdered and somebody the murderer actually was begging for mercy and said, these I did
not slay these people. And basically John quoted it as Mr. Justice Jackson had and I
regret that I didn t review so I could do it better but basically John said, but the
men are dead and so if you say if you don t convict these law enforcement officials
and these Klansmen, it s as if to say there was no white there were no murders, there
was no Ku Klux ***, and the law of Neshoba County, which is where they were killed, becomes
the law of Mississippi. And I urge anybody who s listening to this to please go back
and find the real quote because I ve totally butchered it but I hope you get the essence
of the fact that John was so careful about his preparation that he sent a research analyst
up to the spend a lot of time seeing if she could find a great speech that he could use
and actually I found it in a book that my husband had at home. Naftali: So you he didn
t ask you to find that particular speech? Landsberg: No, no. He asked me to find good
closing arguments or good arguments and that tells you a lot about Mr. Doar. And, if you
go on You Tube, apparently, there s a film of John Doar describing this incident and
a reading from the closing argument, reading those lines from Shakespeare that I ve totally
butchered and then the You Tube film immediately has the same argument that was given by Mr.
Justice Jackson in the Nuremberg Trials. So, again, it s an example of a historical time
when Mr. Doar called on people to really work very hard to try to do something that was
important and of course we all always wanted to do our very best for him. Naftali: Now,
you ve told me that language mattered a lot to Mr. Doar, to John Doar, and because if
not careful, language can connote partiality, what did he try to drum into you about the
role of language? Landsberg: Well, he was a fact man and he was a fact man in many ways.
Before he came to the Civil Rights Division, the way investigations, I mean, voter discrimination
was very widespread in the south in the 60s. He came to the Civil Rights Division in 1960.
Civil rights lawyers were basically Washington desk lawyers and John believes that if you
were going to prove up a case and if you were going to find out what happened, you need
the facts and this connects up with words. So people were sent and he went himself always,
to Mississippi and Alabama and traveled the dusty roads to get the facts. Well, the question
is, once you have the facts and of course they re in many different forms. We did voting
cases, we did public combinations, we did school desegregation, how do you present the
facts to the court? And there are many things that have been written by many people over
the years since then about the fact that he didn t like adjectives. You couldn t use adjectives.
I mean, something either was it wasn t. You never said it clearly was. He didn t like
adverbs either or adjectives that he nouns and verbs. He wanted to describe things the
way they were. And I think there was a very subtle reason why that was so important, is
that I think he believed the fact finder, whether it was a federal judge or whether
it was a member of the house judiciary committee, it was always much more persuasive if it was
undersold and the reader could reach conclusions for themselves. And so he edited with a very
tight style and you never oversold your case, and you never could say anything to a court
or, again, to a congress person that you re not a 100 percent confident of. Naftali: You
mentioned to me that there was a concern what was the Civil Rights Division worried when
they were concerned that people would view the Civil Rights Division as partial, partial
to what or to whom? Landsberg: Well, I think it has to do with the issue of role and the
role of the Civil Rights Division was that we were to be to find the facts and argue
for impartial application of the law to those facts. The civil rights movement, which we
had a great deal of admiration for, the students from SNCC, the Student on Violent Coordinating
Council, Dr. King and SCLC, they had a particular perspective but we needed to be independent
of them. We needed to be independent actors. We were both trying to achieve the same things
which was fair and equal enforcement of the laws but our credibility with the American
people, our credibility with federal judges, our credibility with the southern politicians
that we were negotiating with before we file lawsuit, it was critically important that
we be independent and that our words don did not reflect a bias. Naftali: s going to be
so important to the impeachment inquiry story so let s ask let s talk about this now. Tell
us a little bit about the relationship between Burke Marshall and John Doar as you observed
it. Landsberg: Oh, it was an amazing relationship. Burke Marshall was a very brilliant man. Had
the ability to articulate things and see things legally and was a very thoughtful lawyer.
John Doar was more the field general. The person who tried big cases, who developed
the facts. They had utmost admiration for each other and they worked as a team. They
complimented one another. I believe that the progress that was made in civil rights, from
1961 when Burke Marshall became Assistant Attorney General, and Joan stayed on as first
assistant from the Eisner Administration, until Burke left in 1965 and then John of
course continued as Assistant Attorney General for two years, I think the progress that was
made was in large measure because of the two of them. The worked well as a team, they had
absolute trust and confidence in each other and they brought both a practical common sense
and a theoretical imagination that just worked well in harmony. And you saw the two of them
together and they were just if there were talking about a particular strategy or talking
about a particular action, you could just see the reliance and the trust and the respect
that they had for each other. We were blessed to work with them both. Naftali: Dorothy,
by the time you leave the Civil Rights Division, what s your title? What s your Landsberg:
My title was always research analyst. But because I was part of John s immediate staff,
I helped significantly with the first jury discrimination case that was brought in Lowndes
County. I didn t stand up in court but I did an awful lot of the work. I had major responsibility
in the voting rights area. I was sent several times to Louisiana and Mississippi when there
were jobs to be done that involved facts and law enforcement people. after James Meredith
was shot, not killed, but shot in 1967 and there was the Meredith March that all the
civil rights leaders came to, I helped with the coordination of that, dealing with the
Mississippi Highway Patrol. John had confidence in me and he also knew that I would that if
I had any questions I mean, that he could rely on me because I was always I knew it
well, we worked well together and he would have confidence that I would not overstep
and that I would always come back and check with him. So it s interesting. The closer
in harmony you could work with him, the more confidence he could have in you because he
couldn t do anything himself but John Doar believed in control. And he believed that
the way to get a job done was to have a team that worked as a team, but there was no question
that there was only one leader. And I never had any problem about that and I think it
may have been harder for some of the other attorneys. I was not an attorney at the time,
I am now, I ve been for several decades, but at the time, I was a paralegal. And so I think
that he didn I didn t have any ego and I didn t have any question but that John Doar was
leader and so I think it may have been easier for in some cases, to have me do things because
he had confidence that I would do them the way he wanted. Naftali: How many other women
were there in that group working around him? Landsberg: Well, there were probably up to
10 research analysts by the time I left. Almost all of us married attorneys in the Civil Rights
Division. John Doar used to say there was romance in records by which he meant that
if you went, for example, to the voting records, you would find out that very little blacks
were discriminated against and illiterate whites were able to vote and you ve prove
that because there were little checks where the registrar would help them. So he would
say there s romance in the records and by that he meant you could really find a story
there. And he often said that. He also was sort of a justification for why we should
all spend these long hours with him. But we jokingly said, well, there may not be romance
in the records, but there are romances between lawyers in the Civil Rights Division. He did
not allow not a lot of women attorneys were hired but some very good ones were. Battle
Rankin, she s now Battle Rankin-Robinson, was in the Mississippi field office. There
were some views that maybe women weren t entirely treated as equals. I never felt that way at
all. I felt he did he treated me entirely with respect and confidence, even though I
was a woman, and even though I didn t have a law degree. Naftali: Did you intend by the
way, when you started, did you intend to get a law degree? Landsberg: Well, actually, I
was admitted to the University of Michigan and The University of Pennsylvania when I
graduated from college and my father was annoyed at me because I didn t go to the University
of Michigan Law School where he had gone to undergraduate. And I just felt that in June
of 1965 that the most interesting career move that I could make was to go and work for John
Doar and I got married and had three kids, actually, I had kids that were five, four
and two when I was working for John Doar in the Impeachment Inquiry and I didn t go back
I graduated from law school in 87 so it took a while before I did but I never regret for
a moment that I delayed it. Naftali: Tell us, what did you do between the Civil Rights
Division and your joining the Impeachment Inquiry? Landsberg: I took a couple years
off to have some kids. I wrote a paper with John Doar about the FBIs role in civil rights
enforcement that was presented at a conference that a number of very progressive liberals
organized in New York. Probably oh, no, that was after the Impeachment Inquiry. I think
I ve gotten my time I worked as a paralegal for a fine law firm, Shane Gardner in Washington,
D.C. That s what I did. Naftali: Tell us when you hear that Mr. Doar has been selected as
majority council. Landsberg: Well, there had been some speculation in the press that he
had been sleeted and one night the or that he was under the consideration. Pardon me.
There was some speculation in the press that he was under consideration in The Washington
Post. And one night the phone rang, I think it was late, around 9:00 or 9:30 and I answered
it and he said, Dorothy, and I instantly knew and I said, Oh, John, he said, Dorothy, I
m not confirming anything but if you will come to the house building I think it was
the House Rayburn Building, but I m not sure, tomorrow at 10:00, there will be a ticket
for you and the House Judiciary Committee will be meeting that day. So obviously he
knew that evening that he d been selected but he, true to his word, wasn t going to
say a word to anybody about it but he thought that I would like to be there the next morning,
and of course, I did. So I did exactly as he suggested. I went to the I can I believe
it was the House of Rayburn Building and I said who I was and there was a ticket for
me and I was immediately taken to a seat, not in the front row, but and so I got to
hear the announcement that he had been selected as by Chairman Rodino and by the Judiciary
Committee, to be the council for the Impeachment Inquiry. Naftali: Tell us a little bit, please,
about how he pulled together his staff. Landsberg: Well, I did not go to work for him, formally,
until April but during the period of time in early January, somehow the date January
7th sticks in my mind as the first date that I did. I was asked to come and spend some
time pulling together Maureen Barden it came to be known as the library crew. They were
the non-lawyers who would be helping do the chronology cards and the other things that
were so important. Some of those people I interviewed by phone, some of them I interviewed
in person, I was not the only person who interviewed them but John had confidence in my judgment.
And periodically we would talk about things. He, like, many of us needs someone to bat
things around with and I often played that role with him in person or on the phone. And
he particularly, I recall his talking to me about the importance that anybody who come
to the staff have taken no position with respect to President Nixon and whether there had been
any possible wrongdoing. And he was very insistent on that. And he wanted to make sure in the
interviews that I conducted and in the interviews that I was aware of, that that strong directive
be complied with 100 percent. So there were a number of people who had great skills but
because they had signed a petition or said something publically or had attended an event,
were not considered. I knew John said that he would be relying on some of the people
from the Civil Rights Division. He didn t hire many of them as permanent employees.
George Rayburn, a wonderful southern Mississippian, among the people that he hired permanently,
but there were others of us, Bob Owen, who John Doar had the same regard and respect
for Bob Owen that Burke Marshall had for John Doar, and I did, too. We called him Bobby.
He was wonderful. And Burke Marshall and Owen Fiss and I, maybe one or two others, were
people I think maybe you used the term, Kitchen Cabinet, but we were people that John had
come to have confidence with in the Civil Rights Division and so we would often on weekends
particularly because Burke Marshall and Owen Fiss and Bob Owen had full-time jobs and were
not located in Washington. They would come down on a Friday evening or a Saturday and
there would be various things that needed to be done and one of my tasks was to serve,
when I could, Phyllis, John s secretary, did the most of it but to serve a coordinating
function with that group, check in with people and John I think John s thinking this or John
s going to want help on that. So that was a lot of the role that I played. Naftali:
On the weekends, would they Caucus? Landsberg: Well, we would come people had offices. I
mean, there were enough offices so people often Owen Fiss and who loved pizza. We always
had to go and get him this fabulous pizza from a pizzateria on New York Avenue, Owen
and Burke would sometimes be in the same office but there would be you would just walk into
an office and there would be a desk there and whatever, there was enough room. And sometimes
there would be a draft, often there would be a handwritten for John, often there would
be a note that I had written that I would Xerox and so caucus, there would be communication.
And sometimes the group would get together and I wouldn t be aware of it. I know there
are times when he talked, separately, or collectively, particularly to Burke and Bob Owen. I mean,
those are the that s his core. That s John s inner sanctum, if people are really going
to help him decide things. Naftali: Do you remember a discussion over whether to pursue
more investigation beyond what the Senate Watergate Committee had achieved and of course
what the Watergate Special Prosecution Force had provided? Landsberg: I don t recall a
specific conversation. I was very aware that the scope of the work and how the work was
to be accomplished was a subject of ongoing discussion. There was a John was the council
for the Majority and of course there was a council for the Minority and John was always
very concerned that they work in harmony so there was that dynamic that had to be dealt
with and there was Congressman Rodino s staff and that had to be dealt with. And then if
you have a large group of very bright lawyers who are on the staff, that had to be dealt
with so I would say that I m not really a good witness about specifically specific conversations
but I was very, very much aware of the m going to say the desire of particularly some of
the staff attorneys to have the scope be very broad, both in terms of subject areas and
in terms of doing independent investigations. Naftali: Can you be a witness for some of
the issues are you a witness for some of the issues that the Kitchen Cabinet considered
to help Mr. Doar think through things? Landsberg: Well, there was certainly the issue of how
do we organize the existing facts and documents that we have. And Maureen Barden s library
staff basically we used the same chron cards, these multiply cards that we had used during
the Civil Rights Division era to analyze voting records. And there was a great belief that
things need to be organized chronologically, that if you know what s going on in one set
of documents you get from one of the players and another set of documents or facts from
the other players, that the only way to bring [inaudible] and that was really the genesis
of what became the statements of information. So that s one very major agenda item. Later
on, there was Renata Adler, insistent that the transcripts be analyzed and I think that
was actually the there was some discussion about that that I was aware of with the Kitchen
Cabinet. I think whether John himself should take a position on anything and when, was
a subject that was dealt with. The actual work, in terms of the scope of the investigation,
was not something that I was directly involved in. So I think there were a number of those
items or some items, Tim, that I just don t have any personal knowledge of. Naftali:
ll go back to the transcript issue, talking about the April 30th The White House s April
30th, 1974 transcripts and the ones that the staff worked on beforehand. But I d like to
ask you this question of Mr. Doar taking a position. Was he as reluctant to take a position
as been described in various books? Landsberg: Yes. I think that s an absolutely I think
it was a core m going to use the word value for him, and it goes back to first of all
letting the facts speak for themselves. I think that s one component of it. Secondly,
he doesn t see himself as a political speaker or a political actor. He sees himself as a
law enforcement person, he sees himself as a fact person. And he s also, in addition
to those two very important phenomena that I think led to it, is that I think that it
made good political sense even though he doesn t see himself as a political animal. You might
see some contrast or tension there but I don t really and I and also I just and with respect
to that, I just think he had a sense that the timing wasn t right for him to do anything.
I think that he he wasn t saying I m never gone speak, he was saying I m not going to
speak until the timing is right. Naftali: And then did he agree with the others that
the timing was right, he ultimately did speak? Landsberg: Well, actually, he said in a thank
you note that he sent to me that, I, along with Bob he called him Bobby, Bob Owen, were
among those that urged him, as he put it, to bite the bullet and that he did bite the
bullet. He gave a powerful set of comments and I think that it helped with the momentum
and it came at the right time. He s a very smart man and he knows people very well. And
he his management job, in both the Civil Rights Division and in the Impeachment Inquiry, in
terms of managing, all the forces that were within his control and then trying to impact
on all the forces that were not under his direct control, in both cases, it required
a man of enormous integrality but also a man of enormous judgment and that s really one
of the reasons why he s my hero is because I think he has tremendous judgment and I think
he knew that he needed to hold his power until the right time. Naftali: Could you tell us
what you observed of his relationship with Burt Jenner? Landsberg: I think it was always
respectful. I think that it was respectful because one of the things about John is he
always is able to see things about John is he s always is able to see things from the
other persons perspective and I think that he treats people general how he would like
to be treated and I think he recognizes s not an easy thing to be the Minority Council.
So I think that he treated him with respect because I think that was he felt that was
the right thing to do on a human level and I also think he also knew it was damn good
politics to do that. And among the things that all of us, Phyllis and Maureen Barden
who ran the you know, we call it the library staff. I mean, if ever there was a misnomer
about a group of people, to call them the library staff, I mean, in a way it was part
of the heartland of the operation but Maureen Barden and I and Phyllis and a whole bunch
of other people, we knew that if Burt Jenner wanted something, that that had the highest
priority. And we d check in with him, I d always say hi to him and Phyllis just treated
him with great respect. Now, was there tension, obviously because of the it goes back again
to role, you know, there was going to be some tension but and I don t have a clue. All I
can speak to is Mr. Doar s intention as he articulated to us in terms of the way we were
to deal with Mr. Jenner. Naftali: Did you have occasion to observe Mr. Doar s relationship
with Leon Jarowski? Landsberg: I didn t but my brother, Bob Shelton, who I recommended
and who John hired, a lawyer from the Venable Firm in Baltimore, I think might have some
information with respect to that. Naftali: What caused you to join as a full-time staffer?
Landsberg: He gave me a special project. He periodically during the period of time from
January to I think it was late April, I know it was late April because it was after April
30th, you know, those transcripts that you refer to, they re what we call the blue volume
and they of course are the transcripts that were released by the White House so it was
after that so it must have been in May, maybe even late May. John would call periodically,
sometimes I would go and have dinner with him, sometimes I d go have a cup of coffee
with him but he called and he said to me, I d like for you to come see me and I said
fine. He said I have a project for you and I think it s an important project. I said
fine. So I went either that day or the next day. I was working as a paralegal for Shane
Gardner and Steve Pollack, who had been John Doar s first assistant and then became assistant
attorney general who was my boss at Shane Gardner was always very respectful of my time
to work with John. And John described that Renata Adler believed that the blue volume
contained significant edits, distortions, changes, use of intelligible and other techniques
that were part of the cover up and so when the president released this blue volume on
television, he had them stacked up there. There s great and said that he was leveling
with the American people, in fact his attention was to do exactly the opposite. And she I
think believed that. It d be interesting to ask her but my recollection, Tim, is that
she believed that just after reading the blue volume of the transcripts, I don t think we
yet had the other transcripts. So I think her first impression that these had been edited
was came from reading the blue volume, not from the sort of comparison that we eventually
did. But I m uncertain about that. Naftali: You mean that you think the Kitchen Cabinet,
of which the two of you were members, hadn t yet seen what the staff s eight transcripts?
Landsberg: I don t think we d seen all of them or seen them in the same way. And, again,
I don t have an exact recollection of when they came, although there s a picture of my
brother, Bob Shelton and John Doar carrying the briefcase with the transcripts and the
tapes that came from the grand jury. So I can s like many people, I m not a good witness
of all things so I can see that and I remember seeing the president s speech with this big,
blue volume dated April 30th. And I think the transcripts came first and then I think
we got the white version, but I don t think that they I don t think that people were focusing
on the fact that people understood that the transcripts of the tapes had came from the
grand jury, that they were pretty damning, but I don t think that anybody had really
focused on the fact, except Renata Adler, that this the transcripts in this blue volume
had been doctored and were part of the continuing cover-up and I think she did that without
comparing them to the original transcripts. I think she is a very, very smart woman. She
knows words and I think that she and she d been very much involved and she knew the role
of John Dean and the role of Haldeman and the role of Ehrlichman and some of the other
people on the tapes and I think she said, These have been doctored. Now, whether she
first had a glimpse of that and then she asked to see the transcripts, I can t tell you that
but I do know that John Doar called me and the both of them existed and he said to me,
Renata thinks that the transcripts in the blue volume, and that s what we called them,
have been edited and that it s part of the continuing cover-up and I have asked other
people here about that in the course of this conversation that we had subsequently, not
all on the phone, and they ve tended to poo poo it but I d like you to do some analysis
of that. And I think that Maureen Barten could free up one or two people from her library
staff to help you. And so I, and several other people, sat about to compare the transcripts
and a lot of it is very nuanced, Tim, and it s only when you go over them again and
again and again that you can see the level of the editing that have been done. And it
comes in all different forms. And so, A, we had to figure out what we had and, B, we then
had to figure out how to present it, right? That s what you always have to do as a lawyer
or probably as a historian. You have to figure out the facts and you have to decide how to
present it. We had to show what it was. We had to demonstrate what it was. So I ll take
an example, if I may. Naftali: Sure. Landsberg: I took this is the all of the things were
done originally, just like they are in any operation, and these are the original comparison.
This is my copy that I ve saved and then after the end of the Impeachment Inquiry it was
all put into printed version and this was done, I think in the fall of 1974 and the
spring of 1975, but I went through it last night to try to find a couple of examples
because I think it might illustrate better than my poor description of it. This is Page
43. It s a March 22nd, 1973 tape and on this left-hand side we have the house judiciary
committee transcripts and I always saw them as the tapes that had came from the grand
jury and then we made them and I know you ve interviewed people who helped made these.
And then this is The White House transcript, what I call the blue volume. So there and
it gives you the exact pages and the members of the house judiciary committee both and
eventually the members of the house of representatives could go and listen to the tapes so they could
take this or take whatever. And so here s an example of where in The White House transcripts,
the ones that were doctored, I m going to use that word now but we always use the word
edited then, the president is quoted as saying, Well, all along John Mitchell is arguing that
is how we use flexibility in order to get off the cover-up plan. So he puts the words
in John Mitchell s mouth but he says in order to get off the cover-up plan. If you go to
the house judiciary committee version, the president says but now what all that John
Mitchell is arguing then is that now we use flexibility, John Dean says that s correct,
and the president says, in order to get on with a cover-up plan. Now, if that s buried
in a transcript, you re never going to see that. A lot of people would argue that well,
in order to get off the cover-up plan is pretty damning, even in John Mitchell s mouth he
puts the words. But this is much more damning and so what we did and you can see in this
version, we released it like this, and so it was perfect for television. So they were
released on 7/9/1974 and the news on 7/10/1974, the reporters took all this and they made
demonstrations exhibits, were able to do that. Should I give you one more or Naftali: Sure,
go ahead. No, go ahead. Landsberg: do you have another question? Naftali: Please. Landsberg:
Unintelligible. Some of the words were unintelligible but it ll come as no surprise to you that
the word unintelligible was used when to it was very clear on the tape what the word was
and it was a damning word. This one is from March 21st, so the day before, and it s on
Page 22nd of these comparisons. And the president is said, in The White House version, the doctored,
edited version, if it really comes down to that, we would have to unintelligible some
of the men. Doesn t mean anything. If you go over here to the correct version. Well,
if it really comes down to that, we cannot, maybe, we d have to shred it in order to contain
it again. So the difference between those two versions is really quite striking. And
so it s the skillful use of the word unintelligible and my believe, Tim, is that Renata Adler
figured that out from just looking at this version. Naftali: Do you remember Mr. Doar
s reaction when you showed him some of these comparisons? Landsberg: Well, we had some
missteps. First of all, it you don t get from a conversation to this without some little
back and forth. One of the missteps is that I had secretaries type the whole transcripts.
You know, I knew they had to be you know, I mean, I always pretty early on I had this
vision in my mind that there needed to be a comparison but I started out by having the
secretaries type. I think it was one of the March 21st tapes, there s two tapes of March
21st, and John was not pleased with that. He thought that was not a good use of their
time and he thought it was too much and he was right. But my experience with John has
always been that when he says something like that, that what you have to do is you have
to stop and think about it and why it was that he said that. And at first I was irritated
because I thought I was it was not the product that I was going to produce but I thought
it was a necessary first step but I kept thinking about what he told me, that it was too much
and it was because of that conversation that I came up with this idea of lining it up so
in that example that I just gave to you about the cover-up plan, the difference jumps out
at the page. You don t have to say, oh, this is awful or the president is engaged in a
cover-up and it s always more effective if the reader figures it out themselves than
if you hit them over the head with it. Naftali: Do you think that Mr. Doar was a little bit
skeptical about Renata s finding? Landsberg: Well, I think she my recollection, and I ve
just looked at it, at something again at that thing he wrote for my birthday and he said
that the first time she said it he sort of didn t immediately pick up on it and she had
to push him a second time. And I don t know but that would be the fact that he told us
and from that, I might draw the conclusion that, yeah, initially, he was a little skeptical.
Naftali: You were did you stay with the staff right through the resignation of the president?
Landsberg: I stayed with the staff right through of the resignation and one of the most enjoyable
dinners of my life was I think on August 8th, 1974, maybe August 9th, the day the president
resigned. Do I have the dates more or less right? Naftali: On August 8th is when he announces
that he would resign at noon the next day. Landsberg: Yeah, well, I think it was the
night of August the 8th and a small group of us went to dinner. John took us to dinner.
One of the great things about John, you could never get a restaurant to check from him.
I mean, he always he was very generous to us all. He made these gifts that he gave to
a number of us, this is a seal of the house judiciary committee and it says Impeachment
Inquiry on the bottom. That s a little side but he took us all to dinner. I don t know
where. It was someplace on Capitol Hill I think. My recollection is Bob Owen was there,
my recollection is that Maureen Barden was there, my recollection is that one or two
other close people from the staff and it was not a night of gloating, not a night of patting
ourselves on the back, but really a night of mutual respect and a night where we thought
that the work of a group of people made a difference. And it was an important occasion
for me. Naftali: Did he have a sense at all that the process had ended too soon? Landsberg:
He never indicated that. It goes beyond your question but he thought that the pardon was
correct. He said that to me. I think that John s devotion is to the role of law and
I think that he believed that by the resignation of President Nixon that the role of law had
prevailed. And I don t think he I never heard him articulate the view that it ended too
soon. I think that I ve heard him say that Articles of Impeachment and I think it was
seven republicans, that that speaks volumes. Naftali: Can you recall, since you were there
at the time, can you recall whether A, he ever showed confidence this would happen,
but if this his confidence in the fragile coalition as it was called at the time, that
does he was he confident that a number of republicans would make it a bipartisan majority?
Landsberg: I don t know that he was confident throughout the process. I think there was
a period of time when he was presenting those statements of information week-after-week-after-week
when it was tedious work and I think he kept going because he d been in a lot of tedious
work before, Tim, and he had great belief in facts. And there was sort of a the president
resigned not just because of the smoking gun of those tapes, but there had been a whole
press of events, the transcripts, the statement of information and so I think during that
time period there was a momentum is the word I m looking for and I think during that time
period John had increased confidence but I don t, by my answer, want to ever suggest
that he lost confidence because I don t know whether he did or not. I can t speculate what
goes on but he never indicated it to any of us. Naftali: That s what I meant, whether
he had ever talked to you and said Landsberg: No, no. He would talk about the tasks that
have to be done. We have to work harder. And that was true in the Civil Rights Division,
when we d lose a case and we lost a lot of cases with federal southern judges but then
they would be reversed on appeal, he always his view was well, we just have to work harder.
We have to find better facts, we have to prove our cases better, we have to work a little
more and a little harder and I think that s again the measure of the man. Naftali: Do
you remember how he felt about how the committee was taking the statements of information because
the committee was I mean, I ve read that the committee, at some point, was starting to
lose patience and this is there needed to be some side seminars to [inaudible] for some
example, *** Cate s participated in seminars to try to give additional information Landsberg:
Right, right. Naftali: to the members of congress to help them understand what was going on.
Landsberg: I was aware that *** Cate s was doing that. I wasn t involved in any of that.
John talked about the difficulty of plowing through the work that needed to be done. That
was what he talked to me, the difficulty of doing. He never suggested it needed to be
done differently, he never suggested he lost faith in it, he just said it was tough s a
tough go in here, Dorothy. Naftali: You mean because it took six weeks Landsberg: Yes.
Naftali: to present all this material. Landsberg: Yes, and there was a lot of criticism. You
ve read the newspaper accounts. There was a lot of criticism. The view that he had perhaps
lost his way or was going to slow or various criticism but he thought that that was important
to be done that way. Naftali: ve heard that he occasionally would go to the library late
at night because, everybody was working late, and just spend time with young people in the
library. Landsberg: Yes, and he loved the chron cards and he d sit there with them and
he d look at White House logs. I mean, I don t remember the details now but we got an enormous
number of White House logs of various named visitors in and out, you know, for various
people so there was an enormous amount of paper and it was all put on these chron cards
and John would go and sit there and I sometimes sat with him because I often would work, because
I had these little kids and I had a husband who was the head of the appellate section
in the Civil Rights Division, and I had, you know, a couple good babysitters but I still
so I would often work at night. Naftali: And did he do this in the Civil Rights Division?
Landsberg: Oh, yes, he was always and one of the reasons he says there s romance in
the records is because we all knew that he was looking at the records himself. He has
this expression, we re never going to be second story men, we always need to get down on the
first story and find the facts ourselves and that s the essence. Naftali: And he did it.
Landsberg: Of course. He never did anything that he didn he never expected us to do anything
that he didn t do extra himself in terms of the hours that we worked, in terms of the
sometimes going in dangerous places in Mississippi and Alabama, in terms of pushing ourselves.
He was always working harder than anybody. Naftali: So just so we have a sense of what
that meant in the civil rights period. Would he actually put together the help assemble
the facts for a case to be brought to trial? Landsberg: He wouldn t maybe help well, he
would go and interview witnesses, he would go and look at voter registration documents,
he wouldn t look at them a lot but, yes, initially, he did a lot of the work himself. Later on,
as we got bigger and we had more lawyers and more cases, he would be more apt to look at
briefs and whatever but if there was a footnote, he wanted to see the underlying documents.
But in 1960 and 1961, it was John Doar who was traveling the dirt roads of rural Tennessee,
Mississippi and Alabama. Naftali: Would he tell you stories? Landsberg: Oh, yes. He said
that s what you did when you were a lawyer in New Richmond, Wisconsin, the small town
that he came from. He said, you know, this is no different. You have to get out and find
the facts yourselves and he has wonderful stories about the people that he worked with,
Tim. There s a lot of film that s been done. He s made a number of presentations and there
s a lot of film where he tells stories about the sharecroppers and his witnesses and they
re wonderful stories. And he tried major cases himself. He tried the Klansmen who were responsible
for killing Mrs. Liuzzo after the Solemn Montgomery March. He got a conviction on December 3rd,
1965. It was his birthday. It happened to be the first date I had with my husband in
Montgomery, Alabama so I remember it well. He tried that case himself. He got a conviction.
He was in his 40s and then he tried the Neshoba County case and he argued cases. He argued
cases with the 5th Circuit, he argued other I mean, he was a trial lawyer, he was an appellate
lawyer, he was a a field general and he managed all these crisis. In addition to all of the
litigation that we were doing, there was, you know, James Meredith getting admitted
to Ole Miss. John was there. Marshal McShane is one side, John Doar is on the other side.
And then there s the wonderful story that was told after the funeral of Medgar Evers
where he prevented that riot where he worked behind the law enforcement, out into the middle
of the street, held up his hand and said, My name is John Doar, D-O-A-R, you can t win
this way. People know that what I stand for here is right, and then he turned to several
of the African American and civil rights people, come along, help me move these people along.
He prevented a riot and he got a presidential award for it. So he s a man of great courage
and bravery but I guess I think the challenges of moving back and forth between this law
enforcement and then needing to deal with these crises, he s just s one of a kind, Tim.
Naftali: Can you recall what role Burke Marshall may have played in shaping the Articles of
Impeachment? And what role the Kitchen Cabinet in general played. Landsberg: Well, I was
aware because I managed the drafts of various things and I learned very early on that you
had to date things and you had to put times and there were several times when a particular
draft there would be a complaint about it that there were changes that hadn t been incorporated
and when you had multiple drafts running around, you had significant problems. So I would keep
the drafts and I would date them. And I think it was the Articles of Impeachment but I m
not certain where there was a concern. I think it was between Burke Marshall and Bob Owen
but I m not certain about whether any changes had been incorporated and I basically found
the drafts and demonstrated that in fact it wasn t a typing mistake, it was an editing
mistake that had been made in the middle of the night. So it was it had a great impact
on me because I was responsible for getting drafts from Owen and getting drafts from Bobby
and getting drafts from Burke and getting them to the typist and getting them to the
right typist and then proofing them afterwards and so which was critically important if you
have multiple people editing things and if they re tired. And I think that Burke Marshall
had a big role but I cannot describe it to you substantively. Naftali: But so this is
an instance where both of them are making edits on the same? Landsberg: Yes. Well, on
the yes, they on the same. Naftali: On the same article and some of the edits were not
hadn t gotten through. Landsberg: Well, that was the belief. In fact, they were edits that
had been made and then crossed out because people were tired. But I m sure there may
have been other edits that didn t get through to them but that one is I have a very clear
recollection on it because but for the fact that I d saved the drafts, and nobody made
a big thing about it, I just demonstrated you know, I just went back and said, well,
this is crossed out. s my understanding that you would like it put back in now so I didn
t make a big thing of it but it was very important to me because it was my responsibility. In
the middle of the night, it s very hard to mange multiple drafts with people and multiple
secretaries. Naftali: Now, the people watching this are in an era where obviously you ve
got iPhones and email and what have you, that didn t exist then and you didn t even have
fax machines then, Landsberg: That s correct. Naftali: So these drafts were being worked
on at the office. Landsberg: Oh, yes, and again Naftali: They were that was on a weekend
then? Landsberg: It was on a weekend. Well, I don t know if it s a weekend. People may
have stayed over. My recollection is the Articles of Impeachment were finalized in the middle
of a week but I may be wrong about that. But it may have been the weekend before and the
process went on for a long period of time. And there were different Articles of Impeachment
and of course the ones for Watergate were the ones that were the most important to John.
I mean, he the others needed to be done but it was the Watergate one that was the most
important. Naftali: You mean the first article? Landsberg: Yes. Naftali: The second being
about abuse of power. Landsberg: Yes. Naftali: And why was that the most important to him?
Landsberg: I just think that he thought that was the game changer. I think he thought that
was the core. Naftali: Did you observe any tension between the regular staff and the
Kitchen Cabinet? Landsberg: Well, I want to be clear that the Kitchen Cabinet may have
varied and that there may have been one or two people in the regular staff who were also
participating fully in the process. It s very hard, Tim, to manage a group of people and
to get a final document or a final product and not include everybody who s worked very
*** it. And there are always issues about that and there were issues in the Civil Rights
Division. There was the inside group and the outside group and I think that that comes
with the territory. I really do. Whether it was particularly and I m not a good person
to ask because I m of course by your terminology, I guess I m a member of the Kitchen Cabinet
but I was certainly somebody who John had known and I ve described to you, I had a mix
of substantive and support functions and that was true in both the Civil Rights Division
and Impeachment Inquiry. So I think that the people that John really relied on were a mixture
of people that he had known before and I think he came to have enormous confidence in Evan
Davis. Enormous confidence. And I can t begin to speak for what Evan would say about perceptions
of that so I I think I guess, in summary, some of its inevitable, but, yes, there were
tensions. Naftali: Let me ask you about other relationships. Did you observe the relationship
between Joe Woods and Mr. Doar? Landsberg: I knew that they had known each other for
a long time before and I knew that John always treated him with respect. And I never really
particularly saw any reaction any interaction beyond that. Naftali: I think they were also
roommates for a period. Landsberg: Yes. Naftali: So that s what I was referring to. Did you
ever meet Hilary Rodham? Landsberg: Yes. Yeah, I did. My recollection is that she didn t
work on Watergate, that she worked on one of the other related investigations. By Watergate,
I mean the break-in and she had long hair, she put a very colorful wall hanging by her
desk, which caused some comment, and Bill would be around periodically and I guess they
maybe they were fianc s then, her fianc , I don t know. She had gone to Yale, well, they
both had and had met John I think the story is that when he was up there to give a presentation,
maybe to Burke s class, maybe to Owen s class, and she was hard working, she those are my
recollections. I remember at the picnic, we had a picnic I think it must have been later
in August out at a park in North probably in Maryland, maybe Northwest Washington and
actually there s some pictures floating around of that as well, some that were taken at the
office and there s a picture of her I think there and she was having fun. Naftali: Let
me ask you about the story of Peter Rodino s speech. Landsberg: Well, I can only tell
you a little bit about it, Tim. John had great faith in Renata s ability to write or abil
Naftali: Where did she come from? How did she Landsberg: Renata Adler was a New Yorker
who was I would call her a literary type, she worked for the New Yorker Magazine. I
think she first came to John s attention and to all of our attention during the Meredith
March which would ve been, I think in 66, maybe 67, when I said Meredith was shot and
there were a group of reporters and in addition to the highway patrol about various things,
there was some support provided for the press and she wrote an article about the Meredith
March, I believe, Tim, that John Doar thought she got it right. That would be an expression
that John would use. Well, you got it right. And he thought Renata got it right. And he
then lived in New York and sort of new her professionally and she was a friend of Burke
s and he had great confidence in her and in her ability to write and her ability to figure
out that there was something fishy with this transcript, these transcripts. So she my recollection
is that she wrote a draft of the speech for Rodino and then it was edited in Rodino s
office. And she had a commitment in Sardinia and the edits were federal expressed I guess
it was federal express, whatever international because there were no Xerox machines and certainly
no email and pdf s or whatever, to her in Sardinia and she was not happy with the edits.
So my responsibility was to get a draft and it took that was acceptable to Renata but
that would accept at least some of the edits from Rodino s office. And it took some sensitivity,
and I liked Renata. She s a unique individual but I ve always liked her and actually I saw
her about 10 days ago. We had this presentation in the Civil Rights Division Reunion and Program
called Voices of the Civil Rights Division, Then and Now. And John Doar was interviewed,
my husband was involved and Renata came to that and I saw her. And it was my job to deal
with her with the sensitivity and the diplomacy and the respect that she was entitled to but
that I also bring to bear some of my own strength because we had to have a draft. And John I
mean, he didn t say all this to me, I knew. He just said, You have to deal with Renata.
She s in Sardinia. She doesn t like these edits. If we have good reasons for not accepting
them if we want to make changes, we have to be able to articulate why. So I spent hours
in the middle of the night on the phone with Renata in Sardinia getting her edits of the
edits. And then it went back to then John looked at it and he generally agreed and then
it went back to her and I my recollection is that I carried it over to Rodino s office
and said that these that we really appreciated the comments that had come but that these
were the edits that John Doar would like to see made to this speech before it was given
and it carried the day, they were made. Naftali: Did he see them before you did John Doar see
them you sent them to Rodino? [Inaudible]. Landsberg: Oh, yeah, I went yes, again, it
s a critical thing that if you have to know how is that they were Renata s edits but I
had to get John to look at them and to have John agree that these were going to I wasn
t going to sell them to Rodino s office based without his stamp of approval. Naftali: Did
he change any of them to your recollection? Landsberg: I don t rec going to I don t have
going to not to my recollection. Not to my recollection. And I m not sure in the greater
scheme of things that they were major substantive changes, Tim, you know, people who are involved
in word going to you re a historian, you know that, people who are involved in words, nuance
matters, context matters, tone matters and these were nuanced changes that Renata thought
needed to be made and John, they were run by John and then they went back. And, my belief
is, it d be fascinating if one could ever find any of those but my belief is that the
changes that Renata had proposed going to, it was her speech, and I think that her second
set of edits, Rodino s being the first set, I think they were largely accepted. Naftali:
Dorothy, we re going to stop for a moment and change cards. Landsberg: I want to talk
about Maureen Barden. I think she s just a prince. She s just remarkable. Naftali: And
if there are any other, you know, Bernie or any of the others that you mentioned, Evan,
I asked you about Joe Woods. If there are other members of going to we talked about
Cates of the sort of senior team that you interacted with. I asked you about Hilary
Rodham and that makes sense given that she become Secretary of State eventually. And
we re doing fine in terms of time. Landsberg: Okay. Naftali: Actually doing really well.
Landsberg: m not talking too much? Naftali: Oh, no, no, no, please. No, no, no this is
going to no, no, no, no, it s impossible actually to talk too much. Landsberg: Yeah. Naftali:
And going to Landsberg: Now, see, he says in this. You stepped in and locked up the
introduction to this summary of information. I don t remember that but I sure do remember
the chairman s July 26th speech. Male Speaker: Okay. Well, we have speed so going to Naftali:
So we were talking about Chairman Rodino s July 26th speech and after that I asked you
if there were some anecdotes that you would like to preserve and you said that I ought
to ask you about one involving your husband and children. Landsberg: My husband is Brian
Landsberg. He graduated from Bolt Law School where John graduated from at the University
of Berkeley and he came to work going to he actually flew to Washington the day of President
Kennedy s killing in Dallas and he came to work for the Civil Rights Division in January.
And he and I met and dated there and he got, we got married, I left the Civil Rights Division
when we got married because he stayed. I knew I couldn t have any semblance of a decent
relationship in time because we all worked seven days a week and when John called to
talk to me about this project involving the analysis of the transcripts, I came back from
my meeting with John and I said to Brian that , I told Brian what John had talked about
and I said to him, I really want to do this. Steve Pollack will give me a leave of absence
from Shane Gardner I m sure. And he said to me, you know, Dorothy, he said I support your
working for John anytime but he has no bounds in terms of the amount of the work. And he
said, we have three kids, Elizabeth, Rachel, and Joshua, they re 5, 4, and 2 and he said
how on each are you going to work for John Doar and maintain any responsibility for the
family? And he had a very important job as head of the Civil Rights Division, Appellate
Section. And I said to him, Well, maybe I could work part-time. And he just started
laughing. He said, John Doar doesn t know what part-time is, but of course within 24
hours he said fine. But he did everything that any reasonable person would do to get
me to control the amount of time. And I did work part-time, unfortunately, most of the
part-time was during the night and I would often go at 3:00 or 4:00 in the afternoon,
after I d spent some time with the kids, they d come home from nursery school or whatever
and then I would go and I d often come home at 5:00 or 6:00 or sometimes even later in
the morning. And so my husband is a very smart man so the kids would ask, well, where is
mommy, where s mommy, how come she s gone all the time, and Brian said, Well, mommy
has to help figure out whether the president is a good man or a bad man. And when they
figure it out, then maybe she ll come home and we ll see more of her. So, kids being
kids and my husband being very smart, the kids would run up to me when I d come home
and they d say, Mommy, mommy, when will you stay home? Haven t you figured out yet whether
the president is a good man or a bad man? And Brian tells this story to the kids but
the gloss that I would put on it is that I got enormous support from him. He had a very
responsible job and he tried very hard to be there when I needed it and we were very
fortunate that we had a circle of friends who also helped. And going to but I spent
a good part of late May, June, July and early August working part-time for John Doar 50
or 60 or 70 hours a week. Naftali: What did you do after the comparison was finished?
Landsberg: Oh, I did a variety of things. I worked with Maureen Barden and her staff.
I was part of the kitchen cabinet. I don t think the comparison was finished until July
9th, Naftali: Yes. Landsberg: So there was only a couple of weeks between then and the
start of the hearings, I mean of the consideration. That s the word that I want. And that was
during the period of time that I described earlier Tim, when the momentum was building.
And it was at that period of time that I was managing drafts and I was in and out of John
s office alot. Naftali: After the votes and three articles of impeachment are passed,
what did you think that you were going to do next? Landsberg: Well, my husband had accepted
a speaking engagement at Hilton Head that was scheduled to start on I think the 11th
or 12th of August and we were having this enormous debate about was I going to go or
were the kids going to go or what we re going to do. And so when the vote came and then
the president resigned, and we had this dinner that I described, I remember going in the
next day and telling John that Brian was giving a speech about civil rights at Hilton Head
and he just said to me, re done, Dorothy. He said you don t need I didn t have to even
ask. He said, you re done. You don t have to do anything more. He said if I need you
for one particular thing, he says I ll call you but he says you re done, you I mean, he
knew how hard I d worked and of course all of them had worked hard, too, but he said
you re done. And I saw him a fair amount over the next months, he was still in town and
we would have him for dinner or I would go and have dinner with him. But I officially
ended and I did a couple of other things. And I went back to Shane Gardner as a paralegal
where I had a terrific job working for Steve Pollack. Naftali: But before the president
before it was clear the president was going to resign, did you anticipate working on the
trial? Landsberg: I anticipated staying, yes. By that time, I was not only did I have what
I think was a role that made a difference but I was invested. I mean, you didn t work
on this, Tim, and not get invested in wanting to make sure that the facts were presented.
And I had enormous respect for Maureen Barten. She was somebody who d known John before and
she put together some help for me but with her own good judgment and some help from other
people, a terrific library staff. She was one of the hearts of the organization. She
had capacity. She would do anything and she was going to have an important factual role
in presenting the facts and developing the checking, I mean, things are checked and checked
and checked and it s [inaudible], I mean, you got to get it right and I worked very
closely and well with her so I knew that there would be a role there and I knew that any
time there were something where there needed to be something drafted or edited or whatever,
that John had confidence that I could help manage that process. Naftali: ve shared with
me notes that you took on a conversation with Mr. Doar on Tuesday, July 23rd, which is the
day before consideration before and also the day before the supreme court hands down its
decision. Landsberg: Yes. Naftali: It mentions here that Maureen is to correct Mr. Doar s
Friday speech. Landsberg: Which is an example where my recollection from that, Tim, is that
John gave me a speech with some corrections or some edits and that I would work with Maureen
to make sure that was finalized. That would be fairly typical. He had a small group of
people he had confidence in. Maureen Barten is an example of someone he had enormous confidence
in. She hadn t worked in the Civil Rights Division but Naftali: Do you recall Renata
having worked on that speech, the Friday speech? That was that important speech, wasn t it?
Landsberg: That the was the Bite the Bullets one that he called. Naftali: Yeah. Landsberg:
Yes, it was. I have no recollection one way or another. I don t know. She might not have
been around. Although I don t think so. I think she was around during that time. I have
no specific recollection. Naftali: So what do you recall of your own reaction to the
pardon? Landsberg: Initially, I was furious. I was outraged that somebody could just walk
away, in my opinion, just walk away from this terrible, difficult time that the president,
the people around him had put the country through. And I knew that John felt differently.
He didn t feel I probably did feel a little vindictive, a little bit people should pay
for what happened. I really didn t think of it in the larger context, Tim. I think John
Doar did and I actually think President Ford and the people around him did, too. So I ve
come to believe that it was absolutely the right thing. Naftali: Now, you recalled Mr.
Doar s opinion of the pardon, did he actually say this to you directly? Landsberg: Oh, yes,
oh, yes. Naftali: Did you have a discussion about why you disagreed with him at that time?
Landsberg: I probably did. I probably did but I I was probably a little more measured
than I was just now with you. I think I know John awfully well and as soon as I said a
word, too, I could probably tell that he disagreed and so I probably but he was very clear that
he thought it was the right thing for the country. Naftali: Jeff Banchero, who worked
on the transcripts, told us a story that at one point, this is around just after the president
s resignation, he showed a little bit of disappointment to Mr. Doar about the that the process hadn
t gone a little further and Mr. Doar said, was not very happy with that opinion and he
pointed to the statements of information and he said that s our we did our work. Landsberg:
Yes. Naftali: That s our achievement. It didn t have to go further. Landsberg: Right. Well,
you asked me that question. I wasn t aware that Jeff was the person that said it and
I focused on the articles but I think it s the same point, is that John had confidence
that the work that had been done would stand up, and of course it has, it has stood up,
there s really, I don t think, any debate in the country about the abuse of power and
the cover-up that was done by President Nixon. Naftali: What was the lesson for you of this
experience? What did you take from it? Landsberg: Well, I guess I would say the same lesson
that I took from the Civil Rights Division, which is a wonderful lesson, and that s the
institutions can be effective and the rule of law can prevail and that a group of people
who take their responsibilities seriously, who have the good fortune to be in the right
place at the right time, can make a difference and I felt extraordinarily fortunate to have
had, not one, but two opportunities where I thought just through good fortune, especially
the first one, that I was in the right place at the right time, Tim. And I m going to quote
from something that John said. He wrote it to my daughter Elizabeth because I think it
speaks really better about him. It s dated 4/3/03. It was eight years ago when I was
celebrating my 60th birthday and my daughter Elizabeth put together a lovely photograph
album and asked various people to write things about and she was the daughter who was five
years old at the time and asked people to write things about me and John wrote something
both about the Civil Rights Division and the Impeachment Inquiry and there s a cover note
in his very distinctive writing. I mean, it s hard to read. Oh, that s the other thing
is that I can read his writing pretty well so when he has these edits and secretaries
can t read them, I not a 100 percent but I can do it pretty well. Elizabeth, I here with
hand in my assignment. Your father kindly extended the deadline. Brian gave him an extension
in time. Your mother has had quite a life, an enviable life and it s barely half over.
From the time I first knew her, your mother appreciated the maxim about life that you
can t repeat the class next summer. This course is only offered once. Best to you, all. John.
And if ever there was a person who lived that maxim was John Doar and he gave it his all.
And I was so blessed to have served not once, but twice with him, in matters involving the
rule of law and the public interest. Naftali: Let me ask you about did you find having watched
him and learned from him in both instances, did you get a sense that he was under more
pressure atop the Impeachment staff than he had been in the Civil Rights Division? Did
you get a sense? Landsberg: You know, Tim, I actually think that the pressure in both
jobs was beyond belief. I really do. And I sat outside his office in the Civil Rights
Division and one of the and I was single and I lived on Capitol Hill and he had a family
and we d both get in very early, but I was often there at 7:30, he was often there at
quarter of eight when he was in town and he would often leave at 11:30. And he would ve
worked that entire time, went back and forth to the attorney general s office, on the phone
about the use of fire hoses and dogs in Birmingham, the Freedom Riders getting James Meredith,
trying to hold the country together, he was under enormous pressure. Every civil rights
worker who was beat, every sharecropper who they refused to gin his cotton, was a matter
of importance and real pain to John. And there were many other actors in the civil rights
period. I mean, there was the president, there were the civil rights groups, there were local
law enforcement officials, there was the judiciary and there was the congress, but I truly believe
that in 1960, there was this legal caste system, 1961, and no belief as to how we were going
to get through what was really a terrible time for us diplomatically and everybody else
because of the severe legal discrimination and by the time he left in 67, that cast system
had not been entirely m not saying discrimination was in it but that legal caste system John
Doar, I believe, more than President Kennedy, more than Attorney General Kennedy, more than
Burke Marshall, was the reason for that change and I think that was an enormous pressure.
Naftali: Why do you say that? Landsberg: Because I think that there were so many opportunities
for things to have gone wrong and because I think that in order he was the person that
brought the congress along. He and all the people that worked with him and all the structure
but I think he was the core of that. I see a great analogy to the Impeachment Inquiry.
And he, in many ways, there are many other forces, I mean, the seven Republicans, the
existence of the tapes, the role of the grand jury in subpoenaing the tapes, endless numbers
of things and yet the core actor, that s the word I m looking for, the core actor I believe
was John Doar. Now you asked a slightly different question which I m also going to answer which
is about the pressure. I think being the core actor is either one of those incredible, what
was the most important thing that was going on? And one of the most important things that
was going on during the civil rights period, from 61 to 67, was the need to change this
caste system, and the same thing during the period of time in 74 in Watergate. So I can
t distinguish between those, maybe somebody else who has a better perspective can. Naftali:
What was the caste system in the second Landsberg: The caste system in the second, oh no, only
in the 60s. Naftali: Of course, in the 60s Landsberg: No, there was no caste system.
It was just that there had been an abuse of power, the rule of law was threatened, the
political process was threatened. I mean imagine what would have happened if the cover-up had
prevailed? Right? I mean that s the alternative. I m inarticulately trying to say what was
the alternative in both cases and who is the core actor. It doesn t diminish the fact that
there are other core actors Tim. Naftali: I think for the viewer, and you knew and know
Mr. Doar so well, I think people would say well, what did the difference of one individual
make? He the say all right, he was certainly at the core, what difference did his particular
personality and character make at the core? Landsberg: Integrity, judgment, strength,
leadership, the ability to inspire and maintain coalitions and actors, great respect for individuals,
commitment to the rule of law and some modesty. He never over emphasized his own abilities
and his own sense of who he was. He believed in team work, he inspired people and so I
think that sense of modesty was one of the things that made him the great leader that
he was, Tim. Naftali: Did you see him take advantage of the make sure of the alliances
that he had with some people in congress that he developed when he was at the Civil Rights
Division? Did you see those come into play at all in the Impeachment Inquiry? Landsberg:
I didn t but I was totally unaware of that. I think some of that may have he may have
dealt with people in Rodino s office or made his own personal contacts, it wouldn t surprise
me, but I have no knowledge. Naftali: And then the other just to know, did he ever talk
to you about Martin Luther King Landsberg: Yes. Naftali: and the role that Landsberg:
Well, yes, and he had great regard for Dr. King and he had great regard for SCLC. He
had enormous regard for Andy Young, who was one of Dr. King s lieutenants. Great respect
for CORE, Congress For Racial Equality, but and he said it 10 days ago. His greatest respect
and devotion was for the students from the student non violating coordinating council
and Bob Moses, Robert Moses, but we always called him Bob Moses, maybe to distinguish
him from Robert Moses the New York builder/developer, great leader. Bob Moses went into Mississippi
in 1961 and came up with a strategy, a voter registration and carried that through leading
to the COFO, Mississippi Summer of Voter Registration, that that was what the three civil rights
workers were there for and eventually it lead to the delegation that went to the democratic
convention. And John Doar had enormous respect for Bob Moses, Ella Baker, so many other people
whose names I should be able to recall and I can t, and what they did, the change would
not have come without the enormous courage, strategy and vision of people like Bob Moses
and the other students of the SNCC. Naftali: Do you recall his opinion of Robert Kennedy?
Landsberg: Oh, he thought that Attorney General Kennedy was just a dedicated lawyer, leader,
politician, worked very hard. They had a close relationship. Never heard him refer to him
as anything other than Attorney General Kennedy or General Kennedy. And he had great faith
in his leadership, Attorney General Kennedy s leadership. Naftali: Did he talk to you
do you remember his reaction to the assassination of then Senator Kennedy? Landsberg: I don
t have a specific recollection. Naftali: And was he close at all to Senator Ted Kennedy?
Landsberg: Yes, he was. At Burke Marshall s funeral in New York that was held memorial
service probably, memorial service that was held six or seven years ago, I lose track
of the time, Tim, Senator Kennedy spoke and I saw John Doar and Senator Kennedy engaged
in a close conversation and you could just tell there was a feeling of respect and devotion.
You know, Mr. Doar had this profound effect on people who worked with him in the Civil
Rights Division. This reunion that we had, Voices of the Civil Rights Division, Then
and Now, in October 28th and 29th, people talked about it over and over again, both
formally and informally, about how important it was in their development as a lawyer, as
a person, Bob Moses spoke at that event. He began his speech by saying how many people
in this room worked for John Doar, stand up. Probably 200 people there, Tim, and a large
group of people stood up. And then he said how many people worked for the movement? A
little smaller group of people but a lot of people stood up. Julian Bond was there, Clarence
Jones, Dr. King s lawyer was there and as you were asking me sort of these, what I assume
are concluding questions, causing me to perhaps think back a little bit, I just think that
the impact that these two events had on my life, not only helping me understand that
the rule of law can make a difference and law can bring about change, but I now the
director of the legal clinics at Pacific McGeorge and I work with indigent clients and with
students and I think back to those days and how much my own legal ability has influenced
and my personal character was influenced by John Doar in both of these worlds and I feel
blessed. Naftali: As a concluding question, what influence and affect do you think the
civil rights work that John Doar did had on the Impeachment Inquiry? Landsberg: I think
there were a number of commonalities in terms some of which many of which we ve talked about,
including the need to develop the facts and to have an unbiased presentation and to have
not only impartiality but the perception of impartiality, reliance on a small group of
people. I think that he had a sense of confidence in who he was and, again, I sort of want to
go back to the fact that I think in some ways he s a very modest man but he has a sense
of confidence of what he could accomplish, and I think that that sense of confidence,
after having been such a leader in 1967, I wonder if that didn t give him the strength
to go through so far we ve talked about those difficult times, about knowing that a lawyer
who believes in the rule of law and believes in justice and thinks that legal problems
need to be addressed, whether that didn t have a great deal of influence in his ability
to sort of bob and weave and do everything that he needed to do, I guess it s really
in a nine month period of time from later December until August 1974. PAGE PAGE Dorothy
Landsberg Oral History Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum PAGE Filename Speakers
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