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Busing - Presidential Statements (4)
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Busing - Presidential Statements (4)
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James M. Cannon Files (Ford Administration)
James Cannon's Issues Files
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Busing for school integration
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The original documents are located in Box 7, folder "Busing - Presidential Statements (4)"
of the James M. Cannon Files at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library.
Copyright Notice
The copyright law of the United States (Title 17, United States Code) governs the making of
photocopies or other reproductions of copyrighted material. Gerald Ford donated to the United
States of America his copyrights in all of his unpublished writings in National Archives collections.
Works prepared by U.S. Government employees as part of their official duties are in the public
domain. The copyrights to materials written by other individuals or organizations are presumed to
remain with them. If you think any of the information displayed in the PDF is subject to a valid
copyright claim, please contact the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library.
Digitized from Box 7 of the James M. Cannon Files at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library
June 1, 1976
INTERVIEW OF THE PRESIDENT
BY
DON WAYNE
WHIO-TV
DAYTON, OHIO
THE OVAL OFFICE
2:07 P.M. EDT
MR. WAYNE: Mr. President, the American voter
today listens to the candidates discuss the issues and
the American voters exclaims when it is all over in
November nobody will remember or do anything about the
issues they talked about simply because, the voter says,
as long as there is a difference in politics between the
Executive Branch and the Legislative Branch, nothing
concrete can be accomplished.
Now, you were not elected to this office, but do
you feel as the President elected by the people --- will that
give you any stronger power or authority to work with
Congress to enact your legislative programs?
THE PRESIDENT: Don, I think it would. I became
President under the most unusual circumstances. For the
last 22 months I have been forced to deal with a Congress
that had a margin of better than two to one in the opposition
party. Many of them are my friends on both sides of the
aisle, but it was not like I had gotten a mandate from the
people.
I got a very strong vote from the House and the
Senate, among both Democrats and Republicans, but it was such
an unusual circumstance that if I were to win in November,
certainly that would be a mandate from the people, and I think
also it would result in a changed ratio of Democrats and
Republicans in the House as well as in the Senate.
So, an election by the people in November would be
helpful in getting a legislative program through the Congress.
FORD & 076830 LIBRARY
Page 2
MR. WAYNE: You don't think the Republicans could
regain control of Congress, however?
THE PRESIDENT: I think the odds, Don, are against
that, but I believe that the odds can shift. Instead of
better than two to one against us I think they might be
somewhere between three to two or at least something better
than it is today.
MR. WAYNE: Your opponent, Governor Ronald Reagan,
has had a campaign theme he has been hammering away at. It
is "cut Federal bureaucracy, cut Federal bureaucracy." How
much importance do you attach to that issue?
THE PRESIDENT: I would like to set the record
straight first, Don. Since I became President, there has
been no increase in Federal employees. As a matter of fact,
one of the first acts I took was to cut back on a projected
40,000 increase in Federal employment that my predecessor
had authorized, so since I have become President we have
held the line.
I don't agree that we cannot cut back more in the way
of Federal employees, but that is something that takes a
little time. As we try to control Federal spending -- and I
recommended a reduction of 50 percent in the growth of Federal
spending -- inevitably you are going to have a tightening of
the belt in Federal employment.
I think my record in this regard is a responsible
one, and at the same time it permits the Federal Government to
carry on those duties that it must, such as defense and the
other domestic programs that are essential to the health and
welfare of the people.
MR. WAYNE: Do you feel it is necessary and
essential that more responsibility be transferred from
Washington to State and local Governments? I ask you this
primarily because the argument arises that Washington is
what it is today because State and local Government did not
have the energy nor did they have the sensitivity to provide
to the people what they wanted and what they needed.
Do you agree with that argument?
Page 3
THE PRESIDENT: I don't. I think you have to look
at it this way -- and this is a very essential difference
between myself and Mr. Reagan --- I believe that the
Federal Government, through such programs as general revenue
sharing, can collect the money and then turn the money back
to the States and to the local units of Government in States
like Ohio and then let the locally elected officials make
the decisions as to how that money should be spent.
This is a program that I fought very hard for in
1972, and it has provided to the State of Ohio and to the
many cities and towns and communities in Ohio good sums of
money so they can help their police force, their fire
departments, their health departments. But, the decision
as to how that money ought to be spent is made at the local
level.
Now, Mr. Reagan says, "Do away with general
revenue sharing," and then you either have to increase local
taxes or you have to do away with these local services that
are supported by general revenue sharing. This is a very
honest difference. I think the best way to do it is by
general revenue sharing, and all local officials in Ohio as
well as Governor Rhodes strongly support my position and
they don't think the position taken by my opponent is very
practical.
MR. WAYNE: Do you think there is too much Federal
interference in education, too much Federal regulation?
THE PRESIDENT: It has been, to some extent, but it
is not as bad as some of the opponents of Federal aid to
education alleged at the time that legislation was enacted
in the first instance. What I would do, however, is absolutely
avoid any Federal interference in local education by what I
call block grant funding by the Federal Government of a
portion of local education.
For example, under the present law the Federal
Government has about 26 categorical grant programs. These
are very rigid, and there is some control at the Federal level
of local educational policy. Under my proposal the same
amount of money, or even greater in some instances, would go
from the Federal Government to the school districts in Ohio,
and the local school board would make the decision as to how
that money should be spent.
Page 4
I think this is the way to avoid Federal inter-
ference and, at the same time, provide Federal support for
local education. Again, my opponent, Mr. Reagan, doesn't
believe in any Federal aid to education. Again, I think
that is the wrong approach. I think mine is the responsible
one.
MR. WAYNE: Boston, Louisville, even in my own
community of Dayton, Ohio --
THE PRESIDENT: My hometown, Grand Rapids, Michigan,
too.
MR. WAYNE: -- school busing is an issue. We know,
I think, fairly well where you stand on the school busing,
but you keep talking about alternatives. The American voter
is not sure what alternatives you are talking about. Are
you talking about legislation, constitutional amendment?
Can you clarify it?
THE PRESIDENT: First, let me re-emphasize my total
opposition to court ordered forced busing to achieve balance
in the school system. I think court ordered forced busing
is the wrong approach to achieve quality education. The
question then is how do you achieve quality education if you
don't go along with court ordered forced busing. My answer
is that we can improve, through some additional Federal money,
school facilities.
I think we can improve the equipment that is avail-
able to make educational opportunities better available to
the students. I believe that we can inaugurate what they
call cluster schools or neighborhood schools in place of cross-
town busing. There are a number of alternatives that were
written by the Congress when I was in Congress, and subsequently
signed by me when I became President, in what we call the
Equal Educational Opportunities Act.
It lists seven alternatives, six of them ahead of
busing, and if the courts would follow those guidelines, I
think we could avoid most of the busing that would take place.
Now, in addition to that, the Attorney General has drafted
some legislation which would be an additional guideline to
the courts that they should follow in these desegregation
cases.
Page 5
What it provides is that if there is segregation,
then the court should take cognizance of those instances
where there is segregation, but it would limit the courts
remedy to just those areas rather than taking over a whole
school system, cas the courts did in the case of the Boston
case and several others.
So, between the present law and that legislation
which I am recommending, I think we can minimize to a sub-
stantial degree busing and, at the same time, achieve better
educational opportunities.
MR. WAYNE: You have opposed most public works
legislation, public jobs, what is your program to reduce the
unemployment rate? Do you expect to do this by continued
economic recovery?
THE PRESIDENT: Let me clarify one thing. In the
budget that I submitted for the fiscal year that begins
October 1, I increased the expenditures for public works,
river, harbor and flood control projects throughout the
United States, and in addition I recommended more spending
for local water and sewer projects throughout this country.
Now, what I opposed are these make-work projects,
projects that are put together just to make work to meet an
emergency. I strongly believe in building America by more
highways, by more river, harbor and flood control projects
and water and sewer projects, but these make-work projects
I strongly disapprove of.
Now, five out of six jobs, Don, in this country are
in the private sector. What we have to do really is to
stimulate the private economy of this country because if it
comes back like it is coming back at the present time, there
are many, many more job opportunities than just make-work
jobs that would hurt the treasury and add to inflationary
costs.
MR. WAYNE: Can I go back to the people again.
People say, "Well, you know the economic recovery has been
good and it will probably remain this way at least through
the election and then it is just going to go to pot.
BERALD FORD LIBRARY
Page 6
THE PRESIDENT: That is a most unfair and, I think,
politically motivated allegation by some people. We are in
the process of the best, most sustained economic recovery at
any time since the end of World War II. We are getting
inflation under control. We have cut it by 75 percent. When
I became President, it was over 12 percent per year inflation.
It is down to 3 percent or less at the present time. We
have gained 3,300,000 jobs in the last 12 months, since the
bottom of the recession, and every economist that I talked
to, whether they are liberal or whether they are conservative,
all agree that our recovery today is in good shape. It is
moderate in its approach and yet it is very, very solidly
based.
So, if we don't get a lot of trouble from the
Congress, I am absolutely convinced that we can look forward
to a long stretch of good economic times.
MR. WAYNE: Considering your policy on the economy,
how about Social Security? People are putting money into
Social Security and they are saying, "When I retire I bet
there isn't any Social Security. I put all this money in for
nothing."
THE PRESIDENT: Don, here is another case where Mr.
Reagan and I differ. I believe that the Social Security
system, if properly funded, is a good insurance policy for
the American working man. But, we have to make sure that the
funds are there so that those now retired and those working
and who will retire have enough income coming from the funds.
I have recommended some reforms in Social Security that will
guarantee the security of the Social Security Trust Fund.
Some of the suggestions by my opponent are less than
enthusiastic I think for Social Security. But, I think this
country made a commitment when it undertook the Social
Security program and I intend to keep that Trust Fund solvent,
and those that are now retired and those about to retire
will have no worry if President Ford is elected.
MR. WAYNE: There is great distress still about the
Washington establishment. It is not easy for people who have
to eek out a living from day to day to read and hear about
elected officials who indulge in immoral affairs and mis-
conduct and try to charge it off to the taxpayer.
Page 7
I am talking about the incident recently of Ohio
Congressman Wayne Hays, and it seems when one story breaks
about one rotten apple, or supposedly or alleged rotten apple,
there are other stories that break and the public says there
is no credibility in Washington.
THE PRESIDENT: It is my judgment that the over-
whelming majority of Members of Congress, Democratic or
Republican, are honest, hard working people and individuals
of high moral character. I knew such members for 26 years,
almost. Inevitably there are individuals in public life,
like in other occupations, who don't live up to the accepted
moral standards of this great country.
I can only say in my own case, my record was
scrutinized by 400 FBI agents and approved by the Congress,
the Democrats as well as the Republicans, so I have got some
credibility there.
I have tried in this office where we are sitting
today to conduct myself at a high moral level. I think I
have. I have restored public confidence and trust in the
White House.
Page 8
MR. WAYNE: I know I am probably putting you on the spot
here but in the case of Congressman Hays, now he has laid forth
his story in the House. He has apologized to these people back
home. After issuing an apology should we forgive the Congressman?
I mean, is this the way it should work?
THE PRESIDENT: I think that is a decision that each
individual has to make. None of us individually, I would hope,
would condone such things, and whether we forgive or not is a
matter of individual judgment, and since the Congress is a
corps and a branch of the Federal Government I don't think
I should involve myself at this stage certainly in passing
judgment on a member of the corps branch of the Federal
Government.
MR. WAYNE: I am sure you have had to make some painful
decisions as President on the scope of American defense spending.
Do you have specific established priorities as to whether more
money should be spent on air power, more money on sea power or
nuclear conventional weapons?
THE PRESIDENT: Don, last November and December when
I was working with the budget people on the Federal budget for the
next fiscal year I made all those decisions -- all the tough
ones anyhow -- and the net result was we added about a billion
and a half for next year over this year in strategic forces,
the production items for the B-1 bomber. I think the B-1 bomber,
assuming it passes its final test -- and I think it will -- is a
very, very important weapon system for our strategic arms capability.
So I am all for the B-1.
In the budget presentation to me I had to make some
decisions on conventional forces. I recommended about four and
a half billion dollars more for conventional forces including an
acceleration of our tank production that had slowed down and
now we are hoping to double or triple the production of tanks
for the Army and for the Marine Corps.
GERALDO FORD LIBRARY
Page 9
Research and Development is another area where the
United States must keep ahead. So I recommended about a billion
dollars more for next year in order to have our scientists come
up with both offensive and defensive weapons that would make our
national security more certain.
So these are the general areas where I have recommended
increases.
MR. WAYNE: As you well know, the B-1 bomber project
office is located at Wright Patterson Air Force Base. You are
not worried about --- do you think the B-1 is an aircraft that
this country needs despite its tremendous cost?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes. We are now flying roughly 400
B-52s, some of them 20 years old, most of them between 10 and
20 years of age. If we don't build the B-1 bomber -- and I
strongly support the purchase of the B-1 bomber -- but if we
don't buy it we will ask our young men to be flying in the
next ten years planes that are getting older and older and older
by the day. I don't think that is fair to the young pilots and
the co-pilots, and, secondly, the B-52 in another ten years will
not be an effective weapon system.
So the B-1 bomber which is a follow on to the B-52 --
and we expect to buy about 255 of them -- will be a very important
add on to our strategic forces.
MR. WAYNE: Are you happy with the United Nations,
Mr. President? Do you foresee any major changes of the
American role or policy in that world organization?
THE PRESIDENT: About a year ago, Don, I appointed
Ambassador Moynihan as our UN Ambassador. He went to the
United Nations and really took some strong, affirmative stands
and called a spade a spade. I think Pat Moynihan, as our
Ambassador to the UN, did a good job. He retired and we now have
a good successor to him in Bill Scranton. Bill has a little
different technique but Bill is also a very strong advocate of
new policy of strength at the United Nations.
Page 10
So between Moynihan and Scranton I think we have been
most forceful in presenting the American position. In addition,
Secretary Kissinger went up there last fall and at the seventh
Special Session made some very, I think, constructive recommendations
in handling some of the problems in the under-developed countries,
so overall our policies are good. We are, unfortunately,
occasionally outvoted. I don't like that because I think what
we are trying to do is right but we are making some headway
and I think basically if we keep the pressure on we can do a
better job and the United Nations can, too.
MR. WAYNE: Mr. President, voters seem to be somewhat
disturbed over the cost, besides the mismanagement of certain
anti-poverty programs, food stamps, Medicaid, model cities.
There seems to be a feeling of uncertainty and anger over
whether Washington and the expenditure of billions of dollars
can ever really cure the Nation's social ills. What is Washington's
role? What should Washington do on these programs?
THE PRESIDENT: I believe that Washington has to be
compassionate but at the same time it should not be wasteful.
We can run some of these welfare programs -- and I use that in
the broadest sense -- better than we have in the past. For
example, the food stamp program has gotten way out of hand.
In ten years it grew from expenditures of roughly $200 million
a year until this year we are spending approximately $18 billion.
The growth has been way out of proportion to the I think
responsible management of a food stamp program. We are trying
to cut back on the food stamp program, those that don't need
it. At the same time, we expect to increase the benefits to the
individuals who are deserving of extra food stamp care.
But by balancing it better than it is at the present
time, we can save about a billion two hundred million dollars.
What I am saying in using that illustration is that we can be
compassionate with the poor who are deserving but we ought to
get rid of those who are undeserving and should not be on
welfare roles, food stamp roles or any of the others.
Page 11
MR. WAYNE: Where do you stand at the present time on
the energy situation and do you think we should build more
nuclear reactors?
THE PRESIDENT: I firmly believe we have to build
more nuclear reactors. We have 58 operating nuclear reactors in
this country today. If we are going to become energy independent
in the United States by 1985 we have to build approximately
250 nuclear power plants. The process is slow and there are
some who are concerned about safety and reliability. But
the safety record of nuclear power plants is better than most
industrial plants in this country. The reliability has to be
improved but they are very reliable compared to other methods
of producing energy.
In order to improve safety and reliability, I recommended
in the next year's budget substantial amounts of research and
development so that our scientists and technicians can build
better, safer, more reliable nuclear plants. If we were to
stop nuclear plant construction we would become more and more
dependent on foreign oil and that is I think too big a gamble.
At the present time we buy 40 percent or more of our
crude oil from overseas and if you cut out nuclear power, it
would have a serious adverse impact on our energy independence.
MR. WAYNE: Do you really expect to go to Kansas City
with enough delegates to get the nomination on the first ballot?
THE PRESIDENT: We are optimistic, Don. It will be
close but our best projections -- depending on the six primaries
that are yet to be held on June 1st and June 8, plus the various
conventions that will be concluded by the latter part of June --
I think we will have enough to get a first ballot.
MR. WAYNE: How much importance do you attach to the
Ohio primary? Is it now critical to your campaign?
Page 12
THE PRESIDENT: Very critical, Don. I am spending some
extra time in Ohio because I think it is very critical. I
believe that we can make some headway in Ohio because their
interests are much like those of my home State Michigan and
we did well in Michigan. I would hope that we could do well in
Ohio.
MR. WAYNE: Do you think the American election process
is still a valid process? Is there a necessity for reform in
our election process?
THE PRESIDENT: I think the primaries are wholesome.
I wish we c-uld develop a regional primary system so that you
would maybe have five or six regions and all of the States in
each region would have their primaries on the same day. That
would be very helpful to candidates. And I might add I think
it would be helpful to the public as a whole. That is the
principal recommendation that I would propose.
MR. WAYNE: That is bothersome to the public, the
expenditure of funds for primary campaigns, the efforts, the time
spent by a President and by the other candidates. They worry
as it gets to convention time it is going to be brokered,
everything is going to be done in the back room.
THE PRESIDENT: I don't think the Republican Convention
will be brokered in the back room. I think it will be right out
in front of the public on that first ballot. My Democrat
friends have a little different situation. They have morethan
two candidates and I don't think any one candidate is going to
have a majority on the first ballot. When you have that
situation you are quite likely going to have a brokered
convention.
MR. WAYNE: You served in office 21 months?
THE PRESIDENT: Almost 22.
Page 13
MR. WAYNE: It may be hard for you to spot one
singleoaccomplishment since you have been in office.
THE PRESIDENT: It is not hard. I would like to pick
two, however. I inherited an economic mess. Inflation was at
12 percent or more. We have cut it to under 3 percent. We
were on the brink of a recession. I think we have turned the
economy around. We have added to the job force and the net
result is we are on the road to a healthy economy. That to me
was the major accomplishment of my 22 months plus the
restoration of trust and confidence, through my openness,
through my candor, through my forthrightness. This was
important in the White House and I think I have done that.
MR. WAYNE: I think in your appearance before a
committee prior to your taking the oath of office you said that
you really would not run for President. What has changed
your mind? Why do you want another four years here?
THE PRESIDENT: I have found that in the 22 months I
have done the things that I mentioned, improved the economy,
restored confidence and trust and achieved and maintained the
peace. If I can have four more years as President of this great
country, I believe that I can solidify those gains that I have
been able to make in the last 22 months.
MR. WAYNE: You have mentioned some names of prominent
individuals that you might find acceptable as a running mate.
Governor Reagan has refused to mention any names. He claims
that it is his belief it is in violation of the Federal Election
Laws.
THE PRESIDENT: I would differ with him on the latter
point. We have a wealth of talent in the Republican Party for
potential Vice Presidential candidates. I don't like to mention
one by name, although I have, because then you inevitably
leave out some other very talented individuals, but you could
take any one of a number of Governors, Governor Ray of Iowa,
Governor Rhodes of Ohio, Governor Bond of Missouri, Governor
Evans of Washington.
Page 14
You have got members of the Senate, Senator Howard
Baker, John Tower. You have got former Governor John Connally.
You have got members of the Cabinet. We have got a lot of first
class talent and I am not reluctant to mention how many good
people we have in the Republican Party.
MR. WAYNE: But you have removed Ronald Reagan's name
from your list?
THE PRESIDENT: I have not excluded anybody. Now,
Mr. Reagan, I understand, has said he would not accept, but
I have not excluded anybody, including him.
MR. WAYNE: Thank you, Mr. President.
END
(AT 2:40 P.M. EDT)
INTERVIEW OF THE PRESIDENT BY NICK CLOONEY
WKRC-TV, Cincinnati, Ohio, The Map Room, June, 1, 1976
MR. CLOONEY: Mr. President, it has been charged in
at least one political column that I read recently and else-
where that you deliberately brought busing into the primary
campaign as an issue and since Cincinnati, as other communities,
is going to be a court test, we have great interest in that.
What is your response?
THE PRESIDENT: I have been against court ordered
forced busing to achieve racial balance since the mid-1950s,
so that is almost 20 years. I don't think court ordered
forced busing is the way to achieve quality education.
So, any allegation that this is a new thought on my part is
totally without foundation. Last November I asked the
Attorney General, as well as the Secretary of HEW, to come
forth with some new approaches or new programs that might
either alleviate the problems caused by court ordered forced
busing or any other solution that they might find beneficial.
It was something done way last year, plus my long-
standing record of being against court ordered forced busing,
that I think certainly knocks in the cocked hat these alle-
gations about my comments on busing being involved in the
primaries. It is not true.
MR. CLOONEY: But Mr. President, do you support
busing as a last measure in integration?
THE PRESIDENT: Under the Equal Educational Oppor-
tunities Act, which was passed in 1974, which I signed,
court ordered forced busing is the last resort in order to
protect constitutional rights, but there are six other approaches
that a court can take before it gets to busing. In addition,
the Attorney General has recommended to me some legislation
which would limit the remedy of a court when it finds segre-
gation, to correcting those areas of a community where there
is segregation instead of giving the court the authority to
come in and take over a whole school system, as some Federal
district courts have done.
So, the combination of the proposal made to me
by the Attorney General and the legislation which was passed
in 1974 would severely limit and, in some cases, eliminate
court ordered forced busing.
INTERVIEW OF THE PRESIDENT BY DON WAYNE
WHIO-TV, Dayton, Ohio, The Oval Office, June 1, 1976
MR. WAYNE: Boston, Louisville, even in my own
community of Dayton, Ohio --
THE PRESIDENT: My hometown, Grand Rapids, Michigan,
too.
MR. WAYNE: -- school busing is an issue. We know,
I think, fairly well where you stand on the school busing,
but you keep talking about alternatives. The American voter
is not sure what alternatives you are talking about. Are
you talking about legislation, constitutional amendment?
Can you clarify it?
THE PRESIDENT: First, let me re-emphasize my total
opposition to court ordered forced busing to achieve balance
in the school system. I think court ordered forced busing
is the wrong approach to achieve quality education. The
question then is how do you achieve quality education if you
don't go along with court ordered forced busing. My answer
is that we can improve, through some additional Federal money,
school facilities.
I think we can improve the equipment that is avail-
able to make educational opportunities better available to
the students. I believe that we can inaugurate what they
call cluster schools or neighborhood schools in place of cross-
town busing. There are a number of alternatives that were
written by the Congress when I was in Congress, and subsequently
signed by me when I became President, in what we call the
Equal Educational Opportunities Act.
It lists seven alternatives, six of them ahead of
busing, and if the courts would follow those guidelines, I
think we could avoid most of the busing that would take place.
Now, in addition to that, the Attorney General has drafted
some legislation which would be an additional guideline to
the courts that they should follow in these desegregation
cases.
What it provides is that if there is segregation,
then the court should take cognizance of those instances
where there is segregation, but it would limit the courts
remedy to just those areas rather than taking over a whole
school system, tas the courts did in the case of the Boston
case and several others.
So, between the present law and that legislation
which I am recommending, I think we can minimize to a sub-
stantial degree busing and, at the same time, achieve better
educational opportunities.
INTERVIEW OF THE PRESIDENT BY WJW-TV, Cleveland, Ohio
The Map Room, June 1, 1976
QUESTION: Mr. President, as you know, in the City of
Cleveland there is pending a decision by a Federal District
Judge following a suit by the NAACP, the outgrowth of which when
this decision comes, perhaps this summer, might be forced
busing to achieve racial integration in the public school system
in Cleveland. At this point what would be your advice to the
City of Cleveland if this comes about?
THE PRESIDENT: My feeling is, number one, they have
to obey the law. Because whether they like it or not, in this
country the President and everybody else must obey the laws as
decided by the Congress on the one hand or the courts on the
other.
Number two, if it is a decision to have busing,
I think that leadership in the community must make a maximum
effort to try and do it in an orderly fashion. Now, I happen to
e against court ordered forced busing to achieve racial balance
because I think there is a better way to achieve quality
education. But, at the same time, I fully believe in protecting
the Constitutional rights of people, that there should not be
segregation in our school system. That is unconstitutional
according to the decisions of the Supreme Court. But I think
there is a way in which the courts can get quality education by
using a remedy that does not just take over a whole school
system but takes the position that where there is segregation
they ought to correct that but not destroy the whole school
system.
QUESTION: As you indicate, Mr. President, for approximately
the last 25 years segregation has been unconstitutional in this
country. What remedies are there to get around busing, if any at
all?
THE PRESIDENT: I think there are several remedies.
I strongly am opposed to segregation. It is unconstitutional
but I think other remedies can be utilized to improve education
to achieve what we call quality education. We have what we call
the Educational Equal Opportunities Act which lists six things
prior to busing that the courts can utilize, neighborhood
schools and other constructive devices, and in addition the Federal
courts don't have to take over a whole school system in order
to eliminate segregation in a part of the school system so
either by using more judicious action by the courts on the
one hand or the courts following the guidelines on the other,
you can get the Constitutional rights protected and at the
same time improve the opportunity for quality education.
QUESTION: Yet in a city like Cleveland there is a
situation, the east side of Cuyahoga River is basically predominantly
black and the west side is very predominantly white. What do you
do in a situation like that?
THE PRESIDENT: This is where I think the school
officials have to sit down with the court and with the leadership
in the communities to try and work out the necessary remedies
so you get a minimal amount of busing. This can be done.
It has been done in a number of communities and if it is done
properly what it achieves is the court orders being upheld without
violence and at the same time you are able to get what you want
really as quality education without violation of anybody's
Constitutional rights. It can be done.
I could cite several communities where, with the
proper leadership, sitting down with the court, with the
Board of Education and handling it, we have avoided the violence
that has taken place in several other places.
INTERVIEW OF THE PRESIDENT BY NEW JERSEY NEWS
MEDIA REPRESENTATIVES, East Room, June 2, 1976
QUESTION: Mr. President, you said you are concerned
about the busing legisIation that is being drafted. What is
the theory behind this legislation?
THE PRESIDENT: The legislation seeks to achieve
a clarification of the various decisions that have been made
by the Supreme Court on the extent of the remedy that local
courts can utilize when they find a violation of constitutional
rights. There have been some cases where the local district
court has found a violation of a constitutional right, segre-
gation. The court has then gone in and taken over the whole
school district rather than trying to remedy the limited
area where there was segregation within a school district.
Now, the proposed legislation seeks to limit the
authority of the local district courts to remedy the precise
problem and not to become a school board in every case.
QUESTION: Mr. President, won't that still be
segregation in some school districts where busing is taken
away from them?
THE PRESIDENT: Not according to the information
that has been given to me by the Department of Justice.
EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE
JUNE 5, 1976
UNTIL 11:30 A.M., SUNDAY
JUNE 6, 1976
OFFICE OF THE WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY
THE
WHITE
HOUSE
INTERVIEW WITH THE PRESIDENT
BY
HELEN THOMAS, UPI
BOB SCHIEFFER, CBS
AND
GEORGE HERMAN, CBS
ON
FACE THE NATION
11
50
A.M.
EDT
5
QUESTION: President Ford, you say you are not
making the assumption that Fonald Reagan will get the
nomination or be elected, but the problem lies ahead of you
now for Tuesday in California. Some political experts think
you are going to have a really tough time at the convention
if you don't win a good hunk of California's votes -- say
45 percent. Can you do it?
THE PRESIDENT: We are very encouraged by the last
three days. I talked to some people in California and I have
gotten reports from our people in California and we think we
are coming from an underdog position with new momentum and we
believe we are closing the gap, and we think that there is an
opportunity to win California. That, of course, would be the
ultimate, but we think we will do quite well in California.
QUESTION: Mr. President, how many delegates do you
think you will have when you 00 to Kansas City and do you
still think you will win on the first ballot?
THE PRESIDENT: Miss Thomas, I think we will win on
the first ballot. At the present time we have 805 delegates.
We expect to win a good share of the delegates on Tuesday.
That will put us quite close to the necessary 1130 and if
we do well on Tuesday, then I think we only need about 40
percent of the uncommitted delegates, SQ the opportunities
look I think very good for us in Kansas City on the first
ballot.
QUESTION: Mr. President, do you feel that you will
have the delegates before the convention actually opens or
do you feel as Vice President Rockefeller does that you
probably will be 20 or 30 votes short, but you will have them
by the time the first ballot comes around?
MORE
OVER
CERALD FORD LIBRARY
Page 2
THE PRESIDENT:
believe we will have them by the
time the first ballot comes around. There are always those,
you know, Mr. Schieffer, who play a little cozy and have not
quite made up their mind, but if we add up the committed
and those that we think are honestly leaning our way, I tbink
by the first ballot we will have the 1130.
QUESTION: But you won't necessarily have them by the
time the convention opens.
THE PRESIDENT Well, I am not going to argue about
whether we have them by the time the convention opens or not,
the most important time is when they actually cast their
vote in that first ballot.
QUESTION: Mr. President, let me get back just for a
moment to Ronald Reagan. One of the most interest things,
I think, that has been found by the CBS-New York Times polls
is a statistic that came up the other day that said if the
race were Ford versus Carter, 41 percent of those who call
themselves Ronald Reagan people would defect and vote for
Jimmy Carter. It also says 23 percent of those who call
themselves Ford voters would defect to Carter if Reagan is
the nominee. In light of that, aren't you going to have to
put Ronald Reagan on the ticket if you are going to have the
backing of your party and you have got to have the solid
backing of the Republican Party?
THE PRESIDENT: I have said that I would not
exclude any Republican that I have looked at or we have heard
about that might qualify as being a Vice Presidential candidate
and that would include Ronald Reagan. Now he has himself
indicated he would not be interested in being Vice President
but as far as I am concerned I would not exclude him.
Now we will have to take a look at the two people
that the Democratic Party nominates in their July convention
in New York City. We will have to see how the convention turns
out in Kansas City, how we can best heal any wounds that the
party might have as a result of the many primaries, Of course,
the main thing is, is the person who is going to be nominated
for Vice President fully qualified to be President in case
something should happen to the President? Now all of those
things have to be put into this formula and we will look at the
kind of data you have indicated, but I think it is premature
to make any commitment at this time.
QUESTION: But are you seriously saying that the choice
of the Democratic Convention would really influence the man
that you want for your Vice President?
THE PRESIDENT: It certainly is a factor in the formula.
That has been the tradition in conventions over the years in
our Presidential races. You can't ignore it. Democrats have
done it, Republicans have done it and I suspect it will be
a factor. not the controlling factor, but it will be a factor.
MORE
Page 3
QUESTION: I this is probably something you
can't tell us in some detail. You usually give a list of the
people that you are interested in that has been well published.
Do you have Lone favorite yourself, in your bosom as they
say in the dhurch T-S- who you would like as your Vice
President? nisigne UOV
I en
TO THE PRESIDENT I haven decided on one person,
Mr. Herman. I have several that P think fit a very good
category of the kind of people, but it is very premature to
make any final decision at' this point.
%
QUESTION: Mr. President, you have said several
times on several occasions that Peagan's statements on
Panama were irresponsible, Yet you say all that would belo
forgotten when he gets into the White House he would be
responsible. Are you saying that Reagan is only making
campaign rhetoric now and does not truly believe in the
things he says? You also implied there would be guerrilla
warfare if Reagan became President and stopped the Panama
Canal negotiations:
to
enolatosh
THE PRESIDENT: Sometimes in the height of a political
,ampaign statements are made that on cool reflection candidates
wish they hadn't said.
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careful, in what he says and how he says it and when he says it,
and I think when you get in that Oval Office, Miss Thomas,
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Page
QUESTION: You know in a recent interview you
volunteered or in answer to a question, I guess
some information about your plans for alternatives to
court ordered school busing. Could you explain them in
somewhat more detail than they were explained, as I
read them. They seemed a little indefinite to me, or
are they still in that stage?
THE PRESIDENT: I think there are three points
we have to make before we discuss busing.
Number one, this Administration will uphold all
constitutional rights of any individual in this country,
including the rights under the Fourteenth Amendment.
Number two, this Administration is totally
dedicated to quality education.
Number three, this Administration will carry out
the decisions of the Supreme Court.
took an oath of office to do so, and I will
continue to do SO.
Now, we have found, or I believe, that court
ordered forced busing to achieve racial balance is not
the best way to necessarily protect individual rights
on the one hand or to achieve quality education on the
other. Therefore, starting back in November of 1975, I
asked the Attorney General and other members of my
Cabinet to see if we couldn't put together something that
would be better than the remedy that has been used by some
district courts in trying to solve the very difficult
problem of protecting constitutional rights and, at the
same time, achieving quality education.
Within the last two weeks the Attorney General
has decided not to intervene in the Boston case for good
reasons that he, as Attorney General, decided, and I
support him. On the other hand, the Attorney General
is seeking a particular case where we can get a clarifi-
cation or a modification of some of the previous Supreme
Court decisions in this very complex area.
Now, in the interim, the Department of Justice
has prepared -- or is in the process of preparing --
legislation which I will submit to the Congress in the
very near future which would seek to limit the courts of
this country to the direction of the areas where the
local school board, by its act, has violated the
constitutional rights of individuals -- in this case
students -- and not to permit the court to go beyond
the instances where rights have been violated.
MORE
Page 5
Now, in some cases the court has taken an
illegal act of a school board -- relatively small part of
a total school system -- and taken over the whole school
system, and the court, in effect, has become the school
board. I think that is wrong. The Attorney General
agrees with me.
The legislation that we will propose will seek
to limit, to minimize the corrective action or the
remedy by the court to the actual instances where there
is a violation of a person's constitutional right. That
will minimize in many cases to a substantial degree the
amount of court ordered forced busing.
QUESTION: Mr. President, the courts have already
ruled on that point, if I understand it, in 1973 in the
Denver case.
THE PRESIDENT: Are you talking about the Keyes
case?
QUESTION: Yes, sir. Have they not, when they
said that was not a remedy? You could not just remedy
it in a specific area rather than the whole system.
THE PRESIDENT: The Attorney General and his
associates informed me that that has not been totally
clarified, and that is the purpose of actually seeking a
case where the Department of Justice can go into a
subsequent case and get a clarification.
That is why we are going to propose legislation,
so that there is a legislative direction given to the
court to make sure that we protect constitutional rights
where there has been a violation and, at the same time,
preclude the courts from becoming in effect the school
board in a local community.
QUESTION: Let me ask you just a somewhat
broader question, and you are the attorney and I am not,
so maybe you can explain it to me. If the courts have
already ruled that busing is a permissible way to achieve
integrated schools and they have already ruled that
integrated schools are a constitutional right
--
THE PRESIDENT: A permissible remedy to correct
an injustice.
QUESTION: -- how can you pass a law to limit
that remedy if the courts have already ruled it is
constitutional? Don't you need a constitutional amendment?
MORE
Page 6
THE PRESIDENT: The Constitution permits the
legislative body to give guidelines in certain court
cases--and according to the Attorney General he believes
that this proposed Iegislation is constitutional--it will
simply limit the remedy to the instance where there has
been a violation of a constitutional right. According
to him, that is constitutional.
QUESTION: Then it is your interpretation that
the Keyes case did not invalidate
THE PRESIDENT: As I understand it, it was a
dictum, not a final judgment.
QUESTION: To cut through some of the legal
niceties which are a little hard on us, it seems to me --
perhaps I misunderstand it -- the final impact of this
is to leave in place all de facto school segregation
which has happened without the breaking of a law?
THE PRESIDENT: The courts already decided that.
QUESTION: So, that this is the direction which
you wish to encourage law and legislation to continue?
THE PRESIDENT: We would recommend, as the
court has said, we correct the violations but we only
correct the violations, not make a Federal district court
a local school bcard.
QUESTION: Mr. President, what chance do you
think such legislation would have of passing, and
what constitutional right is violated by being bused?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, the Congress, I think,
would be responsive to some legislation of this kind
because I think the public --
QUESTION: This year?
THE PRESIDENT: I would hope SO. I can't
promise it because I don't control the Congress, but I
do believe there is a great public sentiment for a
limitation or a minimization of the court in the remedies
that they have pursued.
What was the second?
MORE
Page 7
QUESTION: The second is, what constitutional
right is being violated by being bused?
THE PRESIDENT: Busing is simply a remedy to
achieve a correction of an alleged act by a school
board to violate somebody else's constitutional rights.
Busing itself is not a constitutional right, nor is it
a lack of a constitutional right. It is only a remedy.
OUESTION: But isn't it the law of the land
to desegregate the schools in this land?
THE PRESIDENT: Where there has been'a specific
violation of a person's constitutional right. It is not
beyond that, and that is the real point at issue.
QUESTION: On another subject, Mr. President --
QUESTION: Before you change the subject, before
you abandon schools altogether, just to explore one further
item, private schools, the private white academies that
have been founded in parts of the South, would you leave
those as being perfectly legal?
THE PRESIDENT: That case is now before the
Supreme Court. I think that the individual ought to have
a right to send his daughter or his son to a private
school if he is willing to pay whatever the cost might
be.
QUESTION: But a segregated private school, if
that should be his choice?
THE PRESIDENT: I think in a private school a
person ought to have an individual right.
QUESTION: What if those schools get some kind
of Federal aid?
THE PRESIDENT: they get Federal aid, Mr.
Schieffer, that is a totally different question and I
certainly would not, under those circumstances, go along
with segregated schools, under no circumstances.
QUESTION: That would include any kind of tax
break, Federal tax break?
THE PRESIDENT: That is right.
QUESTION: Would you approve of a private
school turning someone away on the basis of color?
MORE
Page 8
THE PRESIDENT: Individuals have rights. I
would hope they would not, but individuals have a right,
where they are willing to make the choice themselves,
and there are no taxpayer funds involved. Now, this is a
matter before the courts at the present time, and I think
there will be a Supreme Court decision probably in this
term or the next term, certainly, but individuals have a
right where there are no Federal funds available.
I would hope they would not, and our own
children have always gone to public schools, which were
integrated, and they have gone to private schools where
thev were integrated. So, my own record is onecof our
children and my own belief in integration.
But, I think individuals do have some rights,
where they are willing to make the choice and Day the
price.
QUESTION: Are you working for a Middle East
conference this year? You said you were talking
actively to the Israelis and other Governments to move
off dead center the status quo. Is there a possibility
that there could be a Geneva conference this year?
THE PRESIDENT: It is not likely that there
would be a Geneva conference this year. I don't rule it
out entirely, but it is not likely. We are, however --
I am talking to the heads of Government when I see them,
as I did with Prime Minister Rabin of Israel when he was
here. We are talking with foreign secretaries. We
think momentum has to keep going beyond the Sinai II
agreement.
If we stop the momentum, the pot begins to boil
again, so we are trying to deal bilaterally, urging other
nations to get together to move forward. But the prospect
of a Geneva conference in 1976 I think is somewhat remote.
QUESTION: Does the Syrian intervention in Lebanon
have your blessing?
THE PRESIDENT: We have objected to any foreign
intervention in Lebanon. We don't believe that military
intervention is the right way to solve Lebanon's political
problems. About eight weeks ago I sent Ambassador Dean
Brown as my special emmissary to Lebanon, andhe was very
helpful in trying to bring some of the parties together,
and I think we made a significant contribution in seeking
a political settlement without any military intervention.
I repeat, the United States Government is opposed
to any military intervention in Lebanon. I think it
could be destabilizing, even though thus far it has been
done with restraint.
MORE
Page 9
QUESTION: Are you doing anything about it?
THE PRESIDENT: We have let all parties know
that we oppose any military intervention.
QUESTION: Mr. President, in almost every
campaign speech it seems to me you say something about
the economy which goes along the lines that everything
that should be going up is going up and everything that
should be coming down is coming down.
THE PRESIDENT: That is true, and it is getting
better every week.
8.
OUESTION: Then that gives point to my question,
which is that the CBS-New York Times polls of voters have
repeatedly shown a very strange phenomenon. Only about
a third of the people we have queried in various States
around the country expect their economic state to be
better a year from now. The rest think it is going to be
the same and a very large proportion -- in some places,
more than half the people -- think they are going to be
worse off in a year.
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Page 10
THE PRESIDENT If you look at other surveys you
find that consumer confidence has been going up and up
every
month
on
whenever
QUESTION: Until recently.
THE PRESIDENT There was a slight drop in recent --
I think the last week or so but for the last nine months it
has been going up very steadily and over the last year it has
gone up 100 percent.
Now, I think there was a little apprehension that
developed because we had a wholesale price index figure that
went up .8 percent for the month of April. But now that we
had the good news of Friday where the wholesale price index
went up 3 then I also saw, as you did, that we had good
unemployment news and we added some 300, 000 more to our
employment figures so I believe public confidence after that
just 30-day setback will again start climbing and if
continues all of us think it will, we will have a
continuous process of economic growth and stability.
QUESTION: Mr. President, could I just for a tiny
minute get back to politics. I must say I am struck by how
nice you are being to Ronald Reagan today At the beginning of
the broadcast you talked about how you thought he would grow
in office if somehow he wound up there at the White House.
You talked about how you have obviously taken note of some of
the statistics I cited about how many Reagan voters were
going over to Carter. Would it be fair to say that you are
not just including him, and you are not excluding him as a
Vice Presidential possibility, but you are giving serious
consideration to Ronald Reagan as your running mate?
THE PRESIDENT: I am giving serious consideration to
him like I am to all of the other Republican potentials.
I think we have to have an open mind about all of, say, 10
to 15 individuals, including him.
QUESTION: Mr. President, one of the last times we had
you on this broadcast when you were Congressman Jerry Ford we
asked you about the Warren reports on the assassination of
President Kennedy. A great deal more information has come out
about motives in the case of the assassination of President
Kennedy, information which was not obviously available to you
as a member of the Warren Commission at the time. Do you
agree with those who say that, therefore, the Warren Commission
report should be reopened, the thing should be restudied?
THE PRESIDENT: I think in the very limited area a
reopening might be desirable. The Warren Commission did make
a massive effort to try to find a motive, and we had
academicians, we had lawyers, we had all kinds of people
trying to find out.
QUESTION: Everything but the information --
MORE
Page 11
THE PRESIDENT: And we never were able to find a
motive. And if there is some additional, I think,
constructive information available, I think it cught to be
reopened in that very limited area.
QUESTION: You say "if," do you not think that there
is?
THE PRESIDENT: I have not had an opportunity to
examine the detailed information and until I have personally
examined it I don't think I ought to pass judgment on it.
QUESTION: Mr. President, you said repeatedly that
yours is an open Administration, anybody can come in and talk
to you. Has anybody come in and talked to you about getting
rid of Secretary Kissinger as a means of improving your
chances.
THE PRESIDENT: Absolutely not.
QUESTION: Nobody in the Administration?
THE PRESIDENT: Nobody in this Administration has come
to me asking that I fire Secretary Kissinger. I happen to think
he has done a first class job towards peace and that is the
responsibility of the Secretary, to carry out my foreign policy.
It has been successful, so I want him to stay.
QUESTION: Thank you very much, President Ford.
for being our guest on Face the Nation today.
END
(AT 12:15 P.M. EDT)
INTERVIEW WITH THE PRESIDENT BY HELEN THOMAS, UPI
BOB SCHIEFFER, CBS AND GEORGE HERMAN, CBS ON
FACE THE NATION
June 5, 1976
QUESTION: You know in a recent interview you
volunteered -- or in answer to a question, I guess --
some information about your plans for alternatives to
court ordered school busing. Could you explain them in
somewhat more detail than they were explained, as I
read them. They seemed a little indefinite to me, or
are they still in that stage?
THE PRESIDENT: I think there are three points
we have to make before we discuss busing.
Number one, this Administration will uphold all
constitutional rights of any individual in this country,
including the rights under the Fourteenth Amendment.
Number two, this Administration is totally
dedicated to quality education.
Number three, this Administration will carry out
the decisions of the Supreme Court.
I took an oath of office to do so, and I will
continue to do so.
Now, we have found, or I believe, that court
ordered forced busing to achieve racial balance is not
the best way to necessarily protect individual rights
on the one hand or to! achieve quality education on the
other. Therefore, starting back in November of 1975, I
asked the Attorney General and other members of my
Cabinet to see if we couldn't put together something that
would be better than the remedy that has been used by some
district courts in trying to solve the very difficult
problem of protecting constitutional rights and, at the
same time, achieving quality education.
Within the last two weeks the Attorney General
has decided not to intervene in the Boston case for good
reasons that he, as Attorney General, decided, and I
support him. On the other hand, the Attorney General
is seeking a particular case where we can get a clarifi-
cation or a modification of some of the previous Supreme
Court decisions in this very complex area.
Now, in the interim, the Department of Justice
has prepared -- or is in the process of preparing --
legislation which I will submit to the Congress in the
very near future which would seek to limit the courts of
this country to the direction of the areas where the
local school board, by its act, has violated the
constitutional rights of individuals -- in this case
students -- and not to permit the court to go beyond
the instances where rights have been violated.
Now, in some cases the court has taken an
illegal act of a school board -- relatively small part of
a total school system -- and taken over the whole school
system, and the court, in effect, has become the school
board. I think that is wrong. The Attorney General
agrees with me.
The legislation that we will propose will seek
to limit, to minimize the corrective action or the
remedy by, the court to the actual instances where there
is a violation of a person's constitutional right. That
will minimize in many cases to a substantial degree the
amount of court ordered forced busing.
QUESTION: Mr. President, the courts have already
ruled on that point, if I understand it, in 1973 in the
Denver case.
THE PRESIDENT: Are you talking about the Keyes
case?
QUESTION: Yes, sir. Have they not, when they
said that was not a remedy? You could not just remedy
it in a specific area rather than the whole system.
THE PRESIDENT: The Attorney General and his
associates informed me that that has not been totally
clarified, and that is the purpose of actually seeking a
case where the Department of Justice can go into a
subsequent case and get a clarification.
That is why we are going to propose legislation,
so that there is a legislative direction given to the
court to make sure that we protect constitutional rights
where there has been a violation and, at the same time,
preclude the courts from becoming in effect the school
board in a local community.
QUESTION: Let me ask you just a somewhat
broader question, and you are the attorney and I am not,
so maybe you can explain it to me. If the courts have
already ruled that busing is a permissible way to achieve
integrated schools and they have already ruled that
integrated schools are a constitutional right --
THE PRESIDENT: A permissible remedy to correct
an injustice.
OUESTION: -- how can you pass a law to limit
that remedv if the courts have already ruled it is
constitutional? Don't you need a constitutional amendment?
THE PRESIDENT: The Constitution permits the
legislative body to give guidelines in certain court
cases--and according to the Attorney General he believes
that this proposed legislation is constitutional--it will
simply limit the remedy to the instance where there has
been a violation of a constitutional right. According
to him, that is constitutional.
QUESTION: Then it is your interpretation that
the Keyes case did not invalidate -
THE PRESIDENT: As I understand it, it was a
dictum, not a final judgment.
QUESTION: To cut through some of the legal
niceties which are a little hard on us, it seems to me --
perhaps I misunderstand it -- the final impact of this
is to leave in place all de facto school segregation
which has happened without the breaking of a law?
THE PRESIDENT: The courts already decided that.
QUESTION: So, that this is the direction which
you wish to encourage law and legislation to continue?
THE PRESIDENT: We would recommend, as the
court has said, we correct the violations but we only
correct the violations, not make a Federal district court
a local school bcard.
QUESTION: Mr. President, what chance do you
think such legislation would have of passing, and
what constitutional right is violated by being bused?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, the Congress, I think,
would be responsive to some legislation of this kind
because I think the public --
QUESTION: This year?
THE PRESIDENT: I would hope SO. I can't
promise it because I don't control the Congress, but I
do believe there is a great public sentiment for a
limitation or a minimization of the court in the remedies
that they have pursued.
What was the second?
QUESTION: The second is, what constitutional
right is being violated by being bused?
THE PRESIDENT: Busing is simply a remedy to
achieve a correction of an alleged act by a school
board to violate somebody else's constitutional rights.
Busing itself is not a cónstitutional right, nor is it
a lack of a constitutional right. It is only a remedy.
QUESTION: But isn't it the law of the land
to desegregate the schools in this land?
THE PRESIDENT: Where there has been a specific
violation of a person's constitutional right. It is not
beyond that, and that is the real point at issue.
QUESTION: On another subject, Mr. President -
QUESTION: Before you change the subject, before
you abandon schools altogether, just to explore one further
item, private schools, the private white academies that
have been founded in parts of the South, would you leave
those as being perfectly legal?
THE PRESIDENT: That case is now before the
Supreme Court. I think that the individual ought to have
a right to send his daughter or his son to a private
school if he is willing to pay whatever the cost might
be.
QUESTION: But a segregated private school, if
that should be his choice?
THE PRESIDENT: I think in a private school a
person ought to have an individual right.
QUESTION: What if those schools get some kind
of Federal aid?
THE PRESIDENT: "If they get Federal aid, Mr.
Schieffer, that is a totally different question and I
certainly would not, under those circumstances, go along
with segregated schools, under no circumstances.
QUESTION: That would include any kind of tax
break, Federal tax break?
THE PRESIDENT: That is right.
QUESTION: Would you approve of a private
school turning someone away on the basis of color?
THE PRESIDENT: Individuals have rights. I
would hope they would not, but individuals have a right,
where they are willing to make the choice themselves,
and there are no taxpayer funds involved. Now, this is a
matter before the courts at the present time, and I think
there will be a Supreme Court decision probably in this
term or the next term, certainly, but individuals have a
right where there are no Federal funds available.
I would hope they would not, and our own
children have always gone to public schools, which were
integrated, and they have gone to private schools where
they were integrated. So, my own record is onecóf our
children and my own belief in integration.
But, I think individuals do have some rights,
where they are willing to make the choice and Day the
price.
EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE
JUNE 5, 1976
UNTIL 11:30 A.M., SUNDAY
JUNE 6, 1976
OFFICE OF THE WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY
THE WHITE HOUSE
INTERVIEW WITH THE PRESIDENT
BY
HELEN THOMAS, UPI
BOB SCHIEFFER, CBS
AND
GEORGE HERMAN, CBS
ON
FACE THE NATION
11:50 A.M. EDT
QUESTION: President Ford, you say you are not
making the assumption that Ronald Reagan will get the
nomination or be elected, but the problem lies ahead of you
now for Tuesday in California. Some political experts think
you are going to have a really tough time at the convention
if you don't win a good hunk of California's votes -- say
45 percent. Can you do it?
THE PRESIDENT: We are very encouraged by the last
three days. I talked to some people in California and I have
gotten reports from our people in California and we think we
are coming from an underdog position with new momentum and we
believe we are closing the gap, and we think that there is an
opportunity to win California. That, of course, would be the
ultimate, but we think we will do quite well in California.
QUESTION: Mr. President, how many delegates do you
think you will have when you go to Kansas City and do you
still think you will win on the first ballot?
THE PRESIDENT: Miss Thomas, I think we will win on
the first ballot. At the present time we have 805 delegates.
We expect to win a good share of the delegates on Tuesday.
That will put us quite close to the necessary 1130 and if
we do well on Tuesday, then I think we only need about 40
percent of the uncommitted delegates, so the opportunities
look I think very good for us in Kansas City on the first
ballot.
QUESTION : Mr. President, do you feel that you will
have the delegates before the convention actually opens or
do you feel as Vice President Rockefeller does that you
probably will be 20 or 30 votes short, but you will have them
by the time the first ballot comes around?
MORE
LIBRARY GERALD FORD
Page 2
THE PRESIDENT: We believe we will have them by the
time the first ballot comes around. There are always those,
you know, Mr. Schieffer, who play a little cozy and have not
quite made up their mind, but if we add up the committed
and those that we think are honestly leaning our way, I tbink
by the first ballot we will have the 1130.
QUESTION: But you won't necessarily have them by the
time the convention opens.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I am not going to argue about
whether we have them by the time the convention opens or not,
the most important time is when they actually cast their
vote in that first ballot.
QUESTION: Mr. President, let me get back just for a
moment to Ronald Reagan. One of the most interest things,
I think, that has been found by the CBS-New York Times polls
is a statistic that came up the other day that said if the
race were Ford versus Carter, 41 percent of those who call
themselves Ronald Reagan people would defect and vote for
Jimmy Carter. It also says 23 percent of those who call
themselves Ford voters would defect to Carter if Reagan is
the nominee. In light of that aren't you going to have to
put Ronald Reagan on the ticket if you are going to have the
backing of your party and you have got to have the solid
backing of the Republican Party?
THE PRESIDENT: I have said that I would not
exclude any Republican that I have looked at or we have heard
about that might qualify as being a Vice Presidential candidate
and that would include Ronald Reagan. Now he has himself
indicated he would not be interested in being Vice President
but as far as I am concerned I would not exclude him.
Now we will have to take a look at the two people
that the Democratic Party nominates in their July convention
in New York City. We will have to see how the convention turns
out in Kansas City, how we can best heal any wounds that the
party might have as a result of the many primaries. Of course,
the main thing is, is the person who is going to be nominated
for Vice President fully qualified to be President in case
something should happen to the President? Now all of those
things have to be put into this formula and we will look at the
kind of data you have indicated, but I think it is premature
to make any commitment at this time.
QUESTION: But are you seriously saying that the choice
of the Democratic Convention would really influence the man
that you want for your Vice President?
THE PRESIDENT: It certainly is a factor in the formula.
That has been the tradition in conventions over the years in
our Presidential races. You can't ignore it. Democrats have
done it, Republicans have done it and I suspect it will be
a factor, not the controlling factor, but it will be a factor.
MORE
Page 3
QUESTION: I know this is probably something you
can't tell us in some detail. You usually give a list of the
people that you are interested in that has been well published.
Do you have one favorite yourself, in your bosom -- as they
say in the church -- who you would like as your Vice
President?
THE PRESIDENT: I haven't decided on one person,
Mr. Herman. I have several that I think fit a very good
category of the kind of people, but it is very premature to
make any final decision at this point.
QUESTION: Mr. President, you have said several
times on several occasions that Reagan's statements on
Panama were irresponsible. Yet you say all that would be
forgotten when he gets into the White House he would be
responsible. Are you saying that Reagan is only making
campaign rhetoric now and does not truly believe in the
things he says? You also implied there would be guerrilla
warfare if Reagan became President and stopped the Panama
Canal negotiations.
THE PRESIDENT: Sometimes in the height of a political
campaign statements are made that on cool reflection candidates
wish they hadn't said.
OUESTION: Are you referring to yours or his?
THE PRESIDENT: I am referring to several that have
been made by my opponent in recent weeks. Certainly if a
person becomes President he has to be more judicious, more
careful, in what. he says and how he says it and when he says it,
and I think when you get in that Oval Office, Miss Thomas,
it does make you far more responsible than you are when you
are out on the political hustings.
MORE
Page 4
QUESTION: You know in a recent interview you
volunteered -- or in answer to a question, I guess --
some information about your plans for alternatives to
court ordered school busing. Could you explain them in
somewhat more detail than they were explained, as I
read them. They seemed a little indefinite to me, or
are they still in that stage?
THE PRESIDENT: I think there are three points
we have to make before we discuss busing.
Number one, this Administration will uphold all
constitutional rights of any individual in this country,
including the rights under the Fourteenth Amendment.
Number two, this Administration is totally
dedicated to quality education.
Number three, this Administration will carry out
the decisions of the Supreme Court.
I took an oath of office to do so, and I will
continue to do so.
Now, we have found, or I believe, that court
ordered forced busing to achieve racial balance is not
the best way to necessarily protect individual rights
on the one hand or to achieve quality education on the
other. Therefore, starting back in November of 1975, I
asked the Attorney General and other members of my
Cabinet to see if we couldn't put together something that
would be better than the remedy that has been used by some
district courts in trying to solve the very difficult
problem of protecting constitutional rights and, at the
same time, achieving quality education.
Within the last two weeks the Attorney General
has decided not to intervene in the Boston case for good
reasons that he, as Attorney General, decided, and I
support him. On the other hand, the Attorney General
is seeking a particular case where we can get a clarifi-
cation or a modification of some of the previous Supreme
Court decisions in this very complex area.
Now, in the interim, the Department of Justice
has prepared -- or is in the process of preparing --
legislation which I will submit to the Congress in the
very near future which would seek to limit the courts of
this country to the direction of the areas where the
local school board, by its act, has violated the
constitutional rights of individuals -- in this case
students -- and not to permit the court to go beyond
the instances where rights have been violated.
MORE
DERALD FORD LIBRARY
Page 5
Now, in some cases the court has taken an
illegal act of a school board -- relatively small part of
a total school system -- and taken over the whole school
system, and the court, in effect, has become the school
board. I think that is wrong. The Attorney General
agrees with me.
The legislation that we will propose will seek
to limit, to minimize the corrective action or the
remedy by the court to the actual instances where there
is a violation of a person's constitutional right. That
will minimize in many cases to a substantial degree the
amount of court ordered forced busing.
QUESTION: Mr. President, the courts have already
ruled on that point, if I understand it, in 1973 in the
Denver case.
THE PRESIDENT: Are you talking about the Keyes
case?
QUESTION: Yes, sir. Have they not, when they
said that was not a remedy? You could not just remedy
it in a specific area rather than the whole system.
THE PRESIDENT: The Attorney General and his
associates informed me that that has not been totally
clarified, and that is the purpose of actually seeking a
case where the Department of Justice can go into a
subsequent case and get a clarification.
That is why we are going to propose legislation,
so that there is a legislative direction given to the
court to make sure that we protect constitutional rights
where there has been a violation and, at the same time,
preclude the courts from becoming in effect the school
board in a local community.
QUESTION: Let me ask you just a somewhat
broader question, and you are the attorney and I am not,
so maybe you can explain it to me. If the courts have
already ruled that busing is a permissible way to achieve
integrated schools and they have already ruled that
integrated schools are a constitutional right --
THE PRESIDENT: A permissible remedy to correct
an injustice.
QUESTION: -- how can you pass a law to limit
that remedy if the courts have already ruled it is
constitutional? Don't you need a constitutional amendment?
MORE
Page 6
THE PRESIDENT: The Constitution permits the
legislative body to give guidelines in certain court
cases--and according to the Attorney General he believes
that this proposed legislation is constitutional--it will
simply limit the remedy to the instance where there has
been a violation of a constitutional right. According
to him, that is constitutional.
QUESTION: Then it is your interpretation that
the Keyes case did not invalidate --
THE PRESIDENT: As I understand it, it was a
dictum, not a final judgment.
QUESTION: To cut through some of the legal
niceties which are a little hard on us, it seems to me --
perhaps I misunderstand it -- the final impact of this
is to leave in place all de facto school segregation
which has happened without the breaking of a law?
THE PRESIDENT: The courts already decided that.
QUESTION: So, that this is the direction which
you wish to encourage law and legislation to continue?
THE PRESIDENT: We would recommend, as the
court has said, we correct the violations but we only
correct the violations, not make a Federal district court
a local school board.
QUESTION: Mr. President, what chance do you
think such legislation would have of passing, and
what constitutional right is violated by being bused?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, the Congress, I think,
would' be responsive to some legislation of this kind
because I think the public --
QUESTION: This year?
THE PRESIDENT: I would hope SO. I can't
promise it because I don't control the Congress, but I
do believe there is a great public sentiment for a
limitation or a minimization of the court in the remedies
that they have pursued.
What was the second?
MORE
GERALD FORD LIBRARY
Page 7
QUESTION: The second is, what constimutional
right is being violated by being bused?
THE PRESIDENT: Busing is simply a remedy to
achieve a correction of an alleged act by a school
board to violate somebody else's constitutional rights.
Busing itself is not a constitutional right, nor is it
a lack of a constitutional right. It is only a remedy.
QUESTION: But isn't it the law of the land
to desegregate the schools in this land?
THE PRESIDENT: Where there has been a specific
violation of a person's constitutional right. It is not
beyond that, and that is the real point at issue.
QUESTION: On another subject, Mr. President --
QUESTION: Before you change the subject, before
you abandon schools altogether, just to explore one further
item, private schools, the private white academies that
have been founded in parts of the South, would you leave
those as being perfectly legal?
THE PRESIDENT: That case is now before the
Supreme Court. I think that the individual ought to have
a right to send his daughter or his son to a private
school if he is willing to pay whatever the cost might
be.
QUESTION: But a segregated private school, if
that should be his choice?
THE PRESIDENT: I think in a private school a
person ought to have an individual right.
QUESTION: What if those schools get some kind
of Federal aid?
THE PRESIDENT: If they get Federal aid, Mr.
Schieffer, that is a totally different question and I
certainly would not, under those circumstances, go along
with segregated schools, under no circumstances.
QUESTION: That would include any kind of tax
break, Federal tax break?
THE PRESIDENT: That is right.
QUESTION: Would you approve of a private
school turning someone away on the basis of color?
MORE
Page 8
THE PRESIDENT: Individuals have rights. I
would hope they would not, but individuals have a right,
where they are willing to make the choice themselves,
and there are no taxpayer funds involved. Now, this is a
matter before the courts at the present time, and I think
there will be a Supreme Court decision probably in this
term or the next term, certainly, but individuals have a
right where there are no Federal funds available.
I would hope they would not, and our own
children have always gone to public schools, which were
integrated, and they have gone to private schools where
they were integrated. So, my own record is onecóf our
children and my own belief in integration.
But, I think individuals do have some rights,
where they are willing to make the choice and Day the
price.
QUESTION: Are you working for a Middle East
conference this year? You said you were talking
actively to the Israelis and other Governments to move
off dead center the status quo. Is there a possibility
that there could be a Geneva conference this year?
THE PRESIDENT: It is not likely that there
would be a Geneva conference this year. I don't rule it
out entirely, but it is not likely. We are, however --
I am talking to the heads of Government when I see them,
as I did with Prime Minister Rabin of Israel when he was
here. We are talking with foreign secretaries. We
think momentum has to keep going beyond the Sinai II
agreement.
If we stop the momentum, the pot begins to boil
again, so we are trying to deal bilaterally, urging other
nations to get together to move forward. But the prospect
of a Geneva conference in 1976 I think is somewhat remote.
QUESTION: Does the Syrian intervention in Lebanon
have your blessing?
THE PRESIDENT: We have objected to any foreign
intervention in Lebanon. We don't believe that military
intervention is the right way to solve Lebanon's political
problems. About eight weeks ago I sent Ambassador Dean
Brown as my special emmissary to Lebanon, andhe was very
helpful in trying to bring some of the parties together,
and I think we made a significant contribution in seeking
a political settlement without any military intervention.
I repeat, the United States Government is opposed
to any military intervention in Lebanon. I think it
could be destabilizing, even though thus far it has been
done with restraint.
MORE
Page 9
QUESTION: Are you doing anything about it?
THE PRESIDENT: We have let all parties know
that we oppose any military intervention.
QUESTION: Mr. President, in almost every
campaign speech it seems to me you say something about
the economy which goes along the lines that everything
that should be going up is going up and everything that
should be coming down is coming down.
THE PRESIDENT: That is true, and it is getting
better every week.
OUESTION: Then that gives point to my question,
which is that the CBS-New York Times polls of voters have
repeatedly shown a very strange phenomenon. Only about
a third of the people we have queried in various States
around the country expect their economic state to be
better a year from now. The rest think it is going to be
the same and a very large proportion -- in some places,
more than half the people -- think they are going to be
worse off in a year.
What is going on?
MORE
Page 10
THE PRESIDENT: If you look at other surveys you
find that consumer confidence has been going up and up
every month or whenever --
OUESTION: Until recently.
THE PRESIDENT: There was a slight drop in recent --
I think the last week or so but for the last nine months it
has been going up very steadily and over the last year it has
gone up 100 percent.
Now, I think there was a little apprehension that
developed because we had a wholesale price index figure that
went up .8 percent for the month of April. But now that we
had the good news of Friday where the wholesale price index
went up .3 -- then I also saw, as you did, that we had good
unemployment news and we added some 300,000 more to our
employment figures, so I believe public confidence after that
just 30-day setback will again start climbing and if it
continues, as all of us think it will, we will have a
continuous process of economic growth and stability.
QUESTION: Mr. President, could I just for a tiny
minute get back to politics. I must say I am struck by how
nice you are being to Ronald Reagan today. At the beginning of
the broadcast you talked about how you thought he would grow
in office if somehow he wound up there at the White House.
You talked about how you have obviously taken note of some of
the statistics I cited about how many Reagan voters were
going over to Carter. Would it be fair to say that you are
not just including him, and you are not excluding him as a
Vice Presidential possibility, but you are giving serious
consideration to Ronald Reagan as your running mate?
THE PRESIDENT: I am giving serious consideration to
him like I am to all of the other Republican potentials.
I think we have to have an open mind about all of, say, 10
to 15 individuals, including him.
QUESTION: Mr. President, one of the last times we had
you on this broadcast when you were Congressman Jerry Ford we
asked you about the Warren reports on the assassination of
President Kennedy. A great deal more information has come out
about motives in the case of the assassination of President
Kennedy, information which was not obviously available to you
as a member of the Warren Commission at the time. Do you
agree with those who say that, therefore, the Warren Commission
report should be reopened, the thing should be restudied?
THE PRESIDENT: I think in the very limited area a
reopening might be desirable. The Warren Commission did make
a massive effort to try to find a motive, and we had
academicians, we had lawyers, we had all kinds of people
trying to find out.
QUESTION: Everything but the information --
MORE
FORD LIBRARY
Page 11
THE PRESIDENT: And we never were able to find a
motive. And if there is some additional, I think,
constructive information available, I think it cught to be
reopened in that very limited area.
QUESTION: You say "if," do you not think that there
is?
THE PRESIDENT: I have not had an opportunity to
examine the detailed information and until I have personally
examined it I don't think I ought to pass judgment on it.
QUESTION: Mr. President, you said repeatedly that
yours is an open Administration, anybody can come in and talk
to you. Has anybody come in and talked to you about getting
rid of Secretary Kissinger as a means of improving your
chances.
THE PRESIDENT: Absolutely not.
QUESTION: Nobody in the Administration?
THE PRESIDENT: Nobody in this Administration has come
to me asking that I fire Secretary Kissinger. I happen to think
he has done a first class job towards peace and that is the
responsibility of the Secretary, to carry out my foreign policy.
It has been successful, so I want him to stay.
QUESTION: Thank you very much, President Ford.
for being our guest on Face the Nation today.
END
(AT 12:15 P.M. EDT)