On the Record--Literally

By Ed Magnuson

Guess what: Kennedy also taped his Oval Office conversations

When the existence of Richard Nixon's self-destructive, secret taping system was dramatically revealed early one afternoon at the Senate Watergate hearings in July 1973, Democrats rose in righteous wrath to assail the President. "It's an outrage," fumed House Speaker Carl Albert. "It's so fantastic as to be almost beyond belief," stormed AFL-CIO President George Meany. "A violation of privacy," snapped Nixon's defeated 1972 election opponent, George McGovern. And when Nixon's defenders suggested that he was only doing what John F. Kennedy had quietly practiced, Historian Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., a Kennedy friend and onetime aide, found it "inconceivable" that J.F.K. had bugged his visitors. Schlesinger insisted haughtily: "It was not the sort of thing Kennedy would have done." Declared Ramsey Clark, Lyndon Johnson's Attorney General: "I don't believe it happened. It's a shameful thing to do."

To their credit, officials of the Kennedy Library in Boston, which had revealed the existence of the J.F.K. tapes the same week the disclosure of the Nixon recordings was made, announced that they were then storing 68 Dictabelt recordings of telephone conversations and 125 tapes of meetings in which President Kennedy took part. But they did not detail just how the J.F.K. taping worked, tell who had been recorded or reveal the subjects discussed. Last week the Washington Post published most of the library's logs of these tapes, and any real distinction between the Nixon and Kennedy recording practices seemed insignificant.

Once again it was clear that the words of historic figures dealing with both minor and momentous events had been preserved while only the President was aware that every comment, however unkindly phrased or crudely expressed, might one day be revealed. The names on the Kennedy logs evoked an eventful era: General Douglas MacArthur, former Presidents Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower, then Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson, U.N. Ambassador Adlai Stevenson, Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara, Secretary of State Dean Rusk and General Maxwell Taylor, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

The topics they discussed included post-mortems on the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba, the U.S.-Soviet showdown over missiles in Cuba, the building of the Communist Wall in East Berlin and the fateful decisions to send more U.S. military advisers into South Viet Nam. As the tapes ran, Kennedy wrestled with civil rights in the South and worked with his brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, to pressure Mississippi officials into accepting James Meredith as the first black student at the University of Mississippi.

The logs also disclose the curious range of conversations that J.F.K. taped: a meeting about "the gift of two tame deer" and the retirement of two White House policemen; a telephone call to congratulate California's Governor Edmund G. ("Pat") Brown on his election victory over Nixon in 1962; a talk with his brother in 1963 to discuss articles in TIME and Newsweek; even chats with his wife Jacqueline, on topics blacked out in the logs.

Kennedy set up the recording system in July 1962, and it remained in place until his assassination in November 1963, capturing some 600 conversations in that period. So secretly was the system installed and operated that even Theodore C. Sorensen, J.F.K.'s White House Counsel and longtime confidant, did not know it existed. When he was shown a copy of the log, Sorensen said, "I'm dumbfounded."

Hidden microphones installed by the Secret Service could pick up conversations in the Oval Office and in the Cabinet Room. Kennedy's phone calls were recorded separately on Dictabelts. The President could activate either system by pushing a switch in his office that would turn on a red light at the desk of his secretary, Evelyn Lincoln. She would then throw the appropriate switch to start the recording devices. "It was for history," Lincoln explained to TIME. "It was for the memoirs the President intended to write after he left office. He wanted an accurate record. We saved everything. I even saved his doodles."

Kennedy and Nixon were by no means the only Presidents to preserve conversations. Lyndon Johnson could reach under a table in the Cabinet Room and throw a switch among the buttons marked COFFEE, TEA and FRESCA to turn his recorders on and off. So far, only a few transcripts have been made public. Harry Truman is known to have made about ten recordings, and it was revealed only last month that Franklin D. Roosevelt used a mike in his office desk lamp to record at least 14 press conferences and a few other conversations. Eisenhower is known to have taped Oval Office conversations for more more than five years without all of his visitors being aware of the spinning reels. Among those whose voices were captured on the Eisenhower tapes: Richard Nixon.

Such critics of secret presidential recording practices as Schlesinger and Clark refused last week to talk about the extensive Kennedy taping. Senator Edward Kennedy issued a statement saying: "I am confident that after transcripts of the recordings are released, Americans will continue to be proud of the presidency of John Kennedy." An aide to the Senator said Ted would not answer reporters' questions because "he doesn't want to be put in the position of criticizing his brother."

Other old Kennedy hands were uncritical, even though their own off-guard remarks may have been recorded. Conceding that he knew nothing about the taping practice, General Taylor said he was "not in the least" resentful, since "important discussions require accurate records," and "I'm in pretty good company."

Rusk said he had "no forebodings" about what the tapes may reveal, adding: "I doubt that the transcripts will shed very much new historical light." McNamara noted that all important meetings involve the presence of an official transcriber, so "I knew damn well that a record was being made of everything I said." Compared with the Nixon tapes, he predicted, "you won't hear many expletives."

The full content of the Kennedy tapes may not be known for some time. The Kennedy family gave the recordings to the Kennedy Library under a deed banning public disclosure of any transcripts that might embarrass a taped participant about personal matters while that individual remains alive. Thus the library staff is expected to return to the family any tapes unrelated to the "business" of the presidency. What Jack said to Jackie may never be revealed. The tapes dealing with official matters are being transcribed. They will be screened for national security considerations before being released, some of them later this year. Predicts Dan Fenn, director of the Kennedy Library: "I would think they are exciting historical material, but I don't think there is anything that will knock you off your chair."

Surprisingly, some of Nixon's former aides declined the chance to criticize Kennedy supporters for holding a double standard on the Nixon-Kennedy taping practices. "Let's not be naive," said Ron Ziegler, Nixon's presidential press secretary. "Taping takes place all the time, all over the world."

Still, it apparently is not as prevalent as it once was in the White House. Said David Gergen, President Reagan's director of communications, about his boss:

"We are not recording his private conversations. The only conversations that I can detect that are being recorded are conversations with the press." And that, as all White House correspondents know, is done openly, with their full knowledge

With reporting by Hays Gorey

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