Judy Harbaugh
The Nixon White House
Some of the tension I saw between Senator Dole and the Nixon White House,
really came from the fact that almost everyday about noon, a brown envelope
with a little red cardboard square taped to it which meant "urgent" would
arrive in our office. And it would be some remarks that they wanted him to
make on the Senate floor that day. I'd look them over and sometimes just shake
my head. Because Senators don't go on the Senate floor and say things about
each other, against each other. You just don't go on the floor and say certain
things. There are unwritten rules of courtesy as well, in, on the floor. And
the Senator would look at this stuff and say "I can't give this, I'm not giving
this." And sometimes he'd call down there and say, "Don't send this kind of
stuff up to me, I'm not going to give it. "
What I particularly remember -- this was during the Vietnam War-- and
there were a number of doves in the Senate and they were always wanting him to
go after the doves on the War. And that he refused to do. And even because
of his own experience with war, he just wasn't about to do that.
I can remember for instance that Senator Fullbright was one those. Senator
Church. We all remember those hearings that went on and on and on and on.
I don't believe that the Senator ever gave a speech where he had to just
hold his nose. Some of them he would change, some of them he just said, I won't
do this. You know. It's just not fit for the Senate floor. And if it was
something that he agreed with, he would do it, usually with his own changes
though. Never deliver it as they sent it down.
Nixon and Dole
I think it would be fair to say that the Nixon-Dole relationship really began
when Nixon went to Kansas to campaign for Congressman Dole out in Pratt,
Kansas. And Mr. Dole never forgot that, that Nixon would go out there. That's
another small Russell town, out in western Kansas in that big district that he
had. And he was always most appreciative that he would go out and campaign
for him.
And I really think, the people around the President, Mr. Dole didn't care for
at all. And we saw all kinds of really rude treatment. Not only to the
Senator, but to all kinds of other kinds of people too. And I think one of the
things that would be fair to say is that he always attributed a lot of that to
the people around him and not to the President. I know a lot of articles are
written about how Nixon treated him so badly. And yet, it wasn't really the
President doing it, it was the men around him. I witnessed that, saw it
happen. And so I just don't think that the Senator ever really thought that it
came directly from Nixon.
I think that the relationship between President Nixon and Senator Dole was a
growing one and I think particularly, it grew after Nixon left the White House.
I think it was in later years when the Senator would go up and spend a lot of
hours talking to him. And I think that affinity between them that developed
really had to do with the fact that Mr. Dole always realized that they both
came out of similar kinds of backgrounds. And I know that it's been
over-used, this idea of hard work is what gets you where you want to go. But
that's another thing that we learned in Russell. That with hard work and
dedication and if you have the opportunity, you can do anything. And that was
really instilled in all of us. And theme of hard work keeps coming up over
and over. I just recently read a speech that Mr. Dole gave back in 1987. And
the theme in that speech, it was given in Russell, was that he always returned
there for reassurance, ah, for the encouragement that was always going to be
there, the help that he was going to need, it charged his batteries. And it
renewed his commitment to hard work. Those were his words.
FL: Senator Dole is being described as a workaholic, I mean what's his
schedule like?
HARBAUGH
Well, it's always been said how demanding he is to work for. And he is
demanding. And he's demanding of the best of people. He's not a
perfectionist, but he doesn't like mistakes if they are avoidable. The one
thing I always felt, was that he worked harder that the rest of us. He worked
longer hours than the rest of us. And yet he realized it. And I can remember
how fun it would be on Saturday mornings, we all worked. Everybody went to
work on Saturday morning. He would be there the earliest, and he would have
stopped by a bakery and bought a huge box of all kinds of donuts and sweet
rolls, and would have made the coffee by the time we got there. And you know,
that I'm sure would seem out of character to many people, but we didn't mind
doing it because he always worked harder than we did.
The War Wounds
It wasn't something he dwelled on, it wasn't mentioned. And I can say that you
never asked if he needed help, or attempted to help him, unless he asked you
for it. He would let you know if he couldn't do something. And like for
instance, if he were going to a black tie event at the end of the day, he might
call Ward or John, could you come in and put the studs in the shirt, help me
get this tie on, whatever, but he would ask you. And he always signed all of
the mail, every single letter, for many a year. And I'd take the mail in at
the end of the day. And obviously he could only use the one hand to sign, and
so I got in a habit about, it was very awkward at first, not knowing how to do
this, and slide one letter off. But I just got so I'd just put my hand there,
and we'd be talking through all this, and I'd pick it up and slide it away and
put it down and slide it away. And you could do things, but you had to do it
you know very unobtrusively. And I remember saying something to him and he
was signing mail at the time, and I said you know gosh it'd really be fun to go
off and do something or other. That I can't recall. But he said to me, well,
I couldn't do that. And I said, oops, that's right. And he said you know, I
can't get up and paint a picture, a portrait, I can't go out and play sports
anymore, I can't play golf, I couldn't play baseball, softball, like the rest
of the Congressmen do. There are a lot of things I can't do. And so everyday,
I get up, determined to try to do one new thing that I haven't done before.
And I remember that really hit me. Because I had never realized that he woke
up everyday determined to do something he hadn't done before.
And so all of these things that he's telling me he can't do are things that you
do with your hands. And he said "But you know, when you can't use your hands,
then you train your mind and you use your mind." And he said, "And I do that
everyday," with a little smile. And I said, yes indeed you do.
I think that Mr. Dole's need to control things around him, it's not
necessarily controlling people, other than that they you know, do the right
thing. But to control what he, you know, his own decisions, and keeping those
to himself, and not sharing those with others, um, and not necessarily asking
for help in making that decision. I know that's criticized often by others
about him, and yet that's another thing about Russell, that's another thing
about the Methodist church, and the teachers we had. It was always
ingrained in us that you do for yourself and you don't ask for help. You
do as much as you can. The other side of that is that you as a person should
see what the other person needs, and reach out your hand to help. But for
heavens sake, don't ever ask for it. And it's that stoicism, reliance on
yourself. And as long as you have that confidence that you are right,
that's the way that you, you live. And, I have the same thing. I can never
ask anybody for help. No matter what it is. And he is like that. Not on
everything, but I think on the big things in his life, yes.
You know I truly think it was the people in Russell, who accepted him so
warmly and genuinely when he returned home. From the hospitals. And all that
was done for him. You know people in those days didn't have much themselves.
And yet everybody was willing to do whatever they could. It's like the cigar
box story and the people dropping in their nickels and their quarters and
that may not seem like much, but it was to a lot of people then. And so I
really think the fact that people, it was people who in reaching out and being
willing to help and not only to help him personally, but who help the whole
Dole family, his parents and his sisters and his brother, that has always
played a big part in his life.
I think it has always made him very sensitive to other people's, whether it be
a handicap, whether it be some kind of sorrow, any kind of tragedy, or it could
even be something very small that you're worrying over. And he's very
sensitive to that. He was always very kind about giving people time to get
that worked out, to take time out if you needed to. To spend with a family
member. And he would be the one to suggest it. I had an uncle dying of
cancer, and he could have died any time, it was just a matter of time. And
one day he said to me, "Why don't you go home and see your Uncle Bud. You need
to go see him." And I had only been working for him like 3 months, and he said
"No, you go. Take a few days and go." And I saw him do that over and over with
people.
You know, regarding the war wound, I can remember one Sunday afternoon
when we were in Russell, campaigning in the 1966 re-election for the House.
And I was over at his parents' working, answering some of the mail. And his
mother and I got to talking. And she was telling me about when he came back on
the train and she had gone down to the little train station to meet him. And
as she got in there, as I recall it, she saw that people on the train had
actually gone by and put their cigarettes out in this crevice in his body cast.
And you know, I mean to me that's just the most appalling thing to think that
after all he'd gone through and then to be treated like that it's just it's so
inhumane. And his mother was so appalled by that, and the fact that she told
me that years, many many many years later, you know, that must have stayed with
her forever.
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