THE PRESIDENCY: Richard Nixon Stumbles to the Brink

(7 of 10)

On Thursday, Cox wrote to Wright, detailing eleven objections to the procedure. He wanted clearer standards spelled out as the basis for omitting any "slippery" national security matters. He urged that any agreement must include presidential papers as well as the tapes, and cover other, Watergate-related crimes in addition to the Watergate wiretapping and its concealment. But most basically, he said the matter could not be entrusted to "any one man operating in secrecy, consulting only with the White House."

Getting no reply, Cox left his office at 6:30 p.m. to visit a brother. He was sitting on the floor at his brother's house, surrounded by excited children, when Wright called from the White House. Wright rather coldly declared: "You won't agree with these." Then he cited several stipulations, which Cox took as an ultimatum. They included the insistence that Nixon be allowed to name a single tapes auditor—and, indeed, he had already selected Stennis—that under no circumstances would any portion of the tapes be given to any court, and that Cox must agree not to seek any additional tapes or documents. Richardson's proposal for supplying transcripts had been definitely changed to allow only Nixonian summaries. The Attorney General later contended that his plan had not precluded Cox from pursuing more tapes in court. Cox asked Wright to put it all in writing.

On Friday morning, Cox dispatched a letter to Wright, declaring that to agree to the conditions would be to break his public pledges to pursue all evidence of "criminal wrongdoing by high White House officials." Wright replied bluntly in another letter that any further discussions would be futile and declared ominously: "We will be forced to take the actions that the President deems appropriate." Turning restless in the afternoon, Cox wandered over to Brentano's to browse in search of a book for the weekend. But he had forgotten his glasses and returned to his office. By 6:30 p.m. Cox still had no idea what the White House was planning. "The President is going to fire you," said one aide. Cox shrugged and went home.

Cooperative Attitude. Earlier Stennis had been telephoned by Presidential Counsel Buzhardt, who had said that he and Haig would like to come to the Senator's office to see him. Stennis gave them 20 minutes, in which they outlined Nixon's plan. "My attitude," Stennis explained later, was "one of cooperation." Stennis said that he would never personally verify "the authenticity" of the tapes, however; if he found any signs of tampering he would have to "seek some technical advice."

As negotiations with Cox continued, Stennis was consulted three more times by Haig and Buzhardt. But he later said that he had not been told that Cox was objecting to the entire plan; he knew only that Cox had not yet accepted it. Stennis insisted that he would not agree either unless the Senate Watergate committee's Ervin and Baker also approved. Since the Ervin committee's suit for the tapes had been thrown out of court by Sirica (on the narrow ground that the committee had not demonstrated a legal standing to bring the suit), Stennis thought the Nixon offer might be the best the Senate could obtain.