Nixon Today
Reagan Echoes Nixon’s Anti-Busing Position
Throughout his administration years of 1969-74 President Richard Nixon time and again voiced his opposition to the compulsory busing of school children as a means to counteract segregation. The tax burden of mass busing, the dehumanizing act of reducing school...
The Manila Communiqué: Nixon’s Comeback
In late October of 1966, LBJ met with leaders of several different Pacific nations to begin negotiating new policy goals for the Vietnam War. The result of this summit was The Manila Communiqué: a document that laid out specific policy goals to try to achieve peace in...
Insights from the Oval Office: Taking the Helm on Desegregation
A document directed to the Staff Secretary from Bryce Harlow outlines the details of a meeting held in the Oval Office by President Nixon. The meeting also included the Attorney General, Bob Finch, and Ed Morgan, and made clear the position held by President Nixon...
The Push for Anti-Busing Legislation
During a press conference on April 29, 1971, a reporter asked President Nixon if he approved of “the mandatory use of busing to overcome racial segregation” ruled by the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Swann v. Charlotte Mecklenburg. An unmarked provisional Q &...
The Challenge of Peaceful Desegregation
An excerpt from a 1969 statement by both Robert H. Finch, Secretary of the Department of Health Education and Welfare, and John N. Mitchell, Attorney General, gives us a perspective on the challenges still facing the nationwide integration of schools since the...
Reforming The Selective Service
Today the Selective Service system is on stand-by. Every male in America between the ages of 18 and 25 must register with the Selective Service System, but never has any individual since the Vietnam War era been conscripted into service. The first and last experience...
Nixon, The Supreme Court, and Busing
The two terms of President Nixon’s administration faced a myriad of issues related to Civil Rights. One among these, which consistently provoked RN’s reaction, was that of busing, a system the Supreme Court mandated throughout the country in order to end racial...
45 Years Later: Nixon and the Gates Commission
President Nixon meeting with future Nobel Laureate Dr. Milton Friedman, distinguished Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago, and the leading voice of the President's Commission on an All-Volunteer Armed Force. On February 21st, 1970, the Gates...
Towards an All-Volunteer Force
The Gates Commission on an All-Volunteer Armed Force, made possible by the works and recommendations of Martin Anderson and Milton Friedman. In April of 1967, Martin Anderson, who served as the research director for the Nixon Campaign of 1968, would go on to write a...
The Path to Ending the Draft
President Nixon signs the amendment to the Military Selective Service Act of 1967 on November 26, 1969. On November 26, 1969, President Nixon signed an amendment to the Military Selective Service Act of 1967 that began the random selection or “draft lottery” for...