The Nation: Mr. Cox Takes a June Bride

ALL afternoon the skies above the White House Rose Garden were a dull pewter gray. The 400 guests arrived at the East Gate, had their credentials checked so that crashers could be spotted, and walked quickly through intermittent drizzle to shelter under the South Portico. It was not an auspicious beginning. Many guests thought that Tricia Nixon should move her wedding indoors to the East Room.

In a fairly impressive display of her stubborn cool, Tricia decided that her wedding to Edward Finch Cox would go just as she had planned it. Attendants with white towels mopped the rain water from the gazebo just outside the Oval Office and peeled the protective plastic sheeting from the white carpet spread down the aisle between the gilt guest chairs arranged in the Rose Garden. At 4:30 p.m., after a half-hour delay, the rain stopped, and perhaps the loveliest of all the 16 weddings held at the White House began.

If the Nixon Administration has acquired a reputation for somewhat gray formality, it appeared for this day to have taken on something like opalescence. The President was more relaxed and charming than he had ever seemed. When George Shultz, Director of the Office of Management and Budget, sympathized with the President over the rainy afternoon, Nixon summoned up a mellow, almost Irish line: "No, no. A soft rain caresses the marriage." Pat Nixon, in a bright dress decorated with appliqued orange, pink and yellow flowers, was vivid and proud.

New Image. On her father's arm, Tricia followed her attendants—including Matron of Honor Julie Nixon Eisenhower and Ed Cox's sister Mary Ann, the maid of honor—down the steps from the Blue Room balcony and into the garden, where the President gave his daughter away before the small wrought-iron gazebo painted white. Her gown, by Priscilla of Boston, was an elegant white silk organdy. The all-lace bodice was molded to show her tiny waist and scalloped at the wide V neckline. Altogether, the gown was striking and sophisticated, a departure from the little-girl fashions for which Tricia has sometimes been criticized.

The Rev. Dr. Edward Gardiner Latch, a Methodist and long a pastor of the Nixon family, led the couple through a ten-minute ceremony that Tricia had prepared with Ed's approval. "To love," he began, "is to appreciate and cherish our beloved as a unique person, deep, extraordinary, exceptional. It is to visualize him or her as an equal yet complementing individual." As Eddie placed the diamond wedding band on Tricia's finger, she promised to "honor and comfort"—the "obey" was omitted. Eddie kissed his bride gently on the cheek. The rain started again just as the ceremony ended.