“NEW FORCES and new nations stir and strive across the earth,” Eisenhower declared in his Second Inaugural Address. “From the deserts of North Africa to the islands of the South Pacific one-third of all mankind has entered upon an historic struggle for a new freedom: freedom from grinding poverty.” Across this world, he said, “the winds of change” were blowing. The Communists were trying to get those winds blowing their way, in order to exploit the Third World. The great battleground of the Cold War had shifted away from Europe and Korea and Formosa, where the situation was relatively stable, to Africa, the Middle East, and the Indian subcontinent, where the situation was in active ferment. Suez was only the most spectacular event in the process of the breaking up of European colonialism. New nations were emerging, or struggling to emerge, from the wreckage. Most had not been prepared by their rulers for independence. Many had raw materials unavailable elsewhere, particularly oil and minerals that were crucial to the Western industrial system. All of the new nations appeared to be more or less in danger of falling to the Communists.
Suez made Eisenhower almost painfully aware of the importance of the Third World to the United States, which was why he made it not only the theme of his second inaugural but of much of his second term. “No people can live to itself alone,” he told the American public. If living conditions were not improved in the Third World, it would go Communist. “Not even America’s prosperity could long survive if other nations did not also prosper.”1 Even before the inaugural, Eisenhower had set his Administration to work on a searching review of the U.S. foreign-aid program. When the reports came in, two months later, they concluded—as Eisenhower already had—that economic assistance to the Third World would lead to economic development, which would lead to political stability and the evolution of democratic societies.
Convincing the American people was the trick. Over the next four years, Eisenhower would try every form of persuasion at his command to demonstrate to his countrymen the importance of the Third World to the United States. It was one of the most frustrating experiences of his life. He could not convince the people; he could not convince the Republican Party; he could not even convince his own Secretary of the Treasury. Humphrey opposed independence for Third World colonies, on the grounds that with European managers they would get richer, faster. He opposed loans to independent Third World countries on the grounds that they would never be paid back and would unbalance the American budget. Citing his own experiences in the Philippines, Eisenhower explained the obvious to Humphrey, that through national independence people obtained “fierce pride and personal satisfaction.”
Eisenhower wanted Humphrey to understand “that the spirit of nationalism, coupled with a deep hunger for some betterment in physical conditions and living standards, creates a critical situation in the underdeveloped areas of the world.” He pointed out that “Communism is not going to be whipped merely by pious words, but it can be whipped by . . . a readiness on the part of ourselves . . . to face up to the critical phase through which the world is passing and do our duty like men.”2
Eisenhower’s exhortation to Humphrey to be a man did not succeed. The President himself, agreed with one part of Humphrey’s position. On July 2, at a leaders’ meeting, the Republicans told Eisenhower that Senator John F. Kennedy was going to make a long speech on Algeria, and propose a resolution in support of Algerian independence. They wanted to know how to reply. Eisenhower, citing Humphrey, admitted that “the people of Algeria still lacked sufficient education and training to run their own government in the most efficient way.” Eisenhower was also concerned about the effects on relations wth France if the Senate supported Algerian independence.
But strong as those arguments were, the President continued, they had to give way to even stronger ones. “The United States could not possibly maintain that freedom—independence—liberty—were necessary to us but not to others.” Therefore, the Republicans could not argue against the Algerian cause. “Perhaps,” the President concluded, “Republicans might best just chide Mr. Kennedy a bit for pretending to have all the answers.”3
Eisenhower put his time, prestige, energy, and persuasive powers into the effort to get his foreign-aid package through Congress. He met interminably with the Republican leaders, with the Democratic leaders, with groups and associations interested in the subject. He made speeches. He devoted nearly every one of his stag dinners to convincing his guests to become missionaries for foreign aid. But he could not get the money. Time and again, Congress cut his requests. It left Eisenhower furious.
To Swede, he wrote, “I am repeatedly astonished, even astounded, by the apparent ignorance of members of Congress in the general subject of our foreign affairs.” He realized that congressional penny-pinching “reflects abysmal ignorance” among the general public as well. Each congressman, he said, “thinks of himself as intensely patriotic; but it does not take the average member long to conclude that his first duty to his country is to get himself re-elected,” a conviction that led to a “capacity for rationalization that is almost unbelievable.”
“Again and again,” he said, he had patiently explained to congressmen that foreign aid represented America’s “best investment.”4 It helped keep down the cost of the American military establishment and provided consuming power in recipient nations. Most of the foreign-aid money was spent in the United States to provide goods and services for the Third World countries. It was a program that, to the President, was so obviously good for America that he could not understand how anyone could be opposed. But opposed Congress was, and his virtual one-man attempt to push through an adequate foreign-aid program failed.
• •
Fortunately for Ike, as he battled with Congress over his budget, foreign aid, and other problems, he was able to get away most weekends to Gettysburg. There he could relax, check on his cattle, oversee the planting of his vegetable garden, play golf and bridge with the gang, and take pleasure in Mamie’s happiness as she put the finishing touches on the place. Ike enjoyed everything about the farm, even the drive from Washington to Pennsylvania.
Invitations to spend a weekend with the First Family at the farm were rare and precious. Ordinarily, only Eisenhower’s closest personal friends received one. Field Marshal Montgomery solved that problem by inviting himself. He arrived in June. Ike took Monty on a tour of his favorite battlefield. As the two old generals scrambled over the rocks on Little Round Top, or studied the lay of the land from Cemetery Ridge, Ike explained the action to Monty, reporters trailing behind recording every word.
“As you know,” Eisenhower later told a friend, “Monty can never resist a newspaper reporter nor a camera.” Finally, Ike said, “I got a bit tired of Monty raising his voice, knowing well that he was doing it for the benefit of eavesdroppers.” So Ike walked over to the car, while Monty kept talking. Monty called over the heads of the crowd, “Both Lee and Meade should have been sacked.” He added something about incompetence, then called out, “Don’t you agree, Ike?”
Eisenhower merely replied, “Listen, Monty, I live here. I have nothing to say about the matter. You have to make your own comments.”5
Nevertheless, the story got page-one space on Sunday, the reports claiming that Ike had agreed with the field marshal that Lee and Meade should have been sacked. At his Tuesday press conference, Ike was asked about it. He would not comment directly, but he did point out that he had the portraits of four men on his Oval Office wall—Franklin, Washington, Lincoln, and Lee—and insisted on his great admiration for Lee.
Monty gave Ike a set of the galley proofs of his memoirs, indicating passages that discussed Ike. The President read the marked sections, then told Whitman that Monty “is pretty clever . . . He says I am so loving and kind that I let him have his own way and he really planned the war.” When he read that “Ike reached his greatest heights as President of the United States,” Eisenhower grunted and said, “He doesn’t want to say I was responsible for winning the war.”6
Eisenhower could hardly have expected praise from Monty, but he did receive that year some high praise from an unexpected source. Henry Wallace, the Progressive Party candidate for President in 1948 and a leading critic of American policy in the Cold War, sent Eisenhower a copy of the talk he had given in which he said he found certain similarities in the characters of Presidents Washington and Eisenhower. Eisenhower was quite sincerely flattered. He wrote Wallace, “My sense of pride is all the greater because I’ve never been able to agree with those who so glibly deprecate his [Washington’s] intellectual qualities.” Subconsciously describing himself as well as Washington, Eisenhower went on: “I think that too many jump at such conclusions merely because they tend to confuse facility of expression with wisdom; a love of the limelight with depth of perception.” Speaking directly of himself, Eisenhower concluded, “I’ve often felt the deep wish that The Good Lord had endowed me with his [Washington’s] clarity of vision in big things, his strength of purpose, and his genuine greatness of mind and spirit.”7
• •
On every possible occasion, Eisenhower told the press, the politicians, and the public that the only way to reduce the budget, stop inflation, and cut taxes was through disarmament. So long as the arms race went on, the United States would be putting $40 billion or so, nearly 60 percent of the total budget, into what Humphrey had called the “dump heap.” Even at those levels, however, the JCS were unhappy and demanding more; indeed they had originally requested $50 billion for 1958. In December of 1956, while the budget was being written, Eisenhower told Dulles he was going to “crack down on defense people,” and complained that “I am getting desperate with the inability of the men there to understand what can be spent on military weapons and what must be spent to wage the peace.”8
With no disarmament treaty in sight, Eisenhower concentrated on making savings where he could. Personnel was a major item; he ordered the armed forces, especially the Army, to make even further cuts in their manpower. Wilson and the JCS protested. Eisenhower told his Cabinet, “I think I know more about this subject than anyone else. What would we do with a large Army if we had it? Where would we put it?” Eisenhower told Wilson to reduce, and where to do it. The President wanted to streamline the forces in Germany, saving thirty-five thousand men there; he ordered a reduction of forty thousand in Japan and another twenty-five thousand elsewhere.9
As difficult as Congress had been for Eisenhower to deal with on such issues as the budget, it was worse when the subject was civil rights. In his State of the Union address on January 10, Eisenhower had again submitted Brownell’s civil-rights bill. It was a multifaceted bill, but Eisenhower put his own emphasis on the right to vote. He was “shocked” to discover that out of 900,000 Negroes in Mississippi, only 7,000 were allowed to vote. He investigated and found that the registrars were asking Negroes attempting to register such questions as “How many bubbles are there in a bar of soap?” In Louisiana, the registrars had closed their doors in the face of five thousand Negroes lined up to register; a local grand jury found “no case” against the state officials.10
Through the late winter and early spring, the House debated the civil-rights bill. Eisenhower gave it public and private support. He pushed the bill in his meetings with Republican leaders. He met with Arthur Hays Sulzberger of The New York Times to urge him to support the bill. (Sulzberger “shamefacedly admitted, for private use only, that even he would not want his granddaughter to go to school with Negro boys.”)11 On June 18, the House passed the bill, which then went to the Senate. Lyndon Johnson warned Eisenhower over the phone that “the Senate is going to fight on the civil-rights issue—tempers are flaring already and will be worse.” Eisenhower protested that what he was asking for was the mildest civil-rights bill possible—he stressed that he himself had lived in the South and had no lack of sympathy for the southern position. He said he was a little struck back on his heels when he found this terrific uproar.12
But uproar there was. On July 2, Senator Russell of Georgia described the bill as “a cunning device,” designed not to guarantee the right to vote, but to use the power of the Justice Department and “the whole might of the federal government including the armed forces if necessary, to force a commingling of white and Negro children.”
At a news conference the following day, James Reston asked Eisenhower to comment. The President was mild and hesitant in his reply. Certainly his own desire was only to protect and extend the right to vote, “simple matters that were more or less brought about by the Supreme Court decision, and were a very moderate move.” Now, he said, he discovered that “highly respected men” were making statements to the effect that “this is a very extreme law, leading to disorder.” Eisenhower confessed that he found such a reaction “rather incomprehensible, but I am always ready to listen to anyone’s presentation to me of his views on such a thing.”
Reston asked if Eisenhower was willing to rewrite the bill, so that it dealt only with the right to vote. Eisenhower said he did not want to answer, because “I was reading part of that bill this morning, and there were certain phrases I didn’t completely understand. So, before I make any more remarks on that, I would want to talk to the Attorney General and see exactly what they do mean.”13
It was a stunning confession of ignorance. Eisenhower had been pushing the bill for two years, had managed to get it through the House and considered by the Senate, and yet now said he did not know what was in it. Eisenhower’s admission was an open invitation to the southern senators to modify, amend, emasculate his bill, and they proceeded to do just that. They offered an amendment that would assure a jury trial to anyone cited for contempt of court in a civil-rights case. Insofar as the jury lists were made up from the voting lists, which were virtually all white, the amendment would have the practical effect of nullifying the bill, since it was unlikely, indeed almost unthinkable, that a southern white jury would convict another white man of violating the rights of a Negro. But the right of an accused to a trial by a jury of his peers was so deeply ingrained in the American tradition, and so sacred, that the amendment attracted support from such northern liberals as Joseph O’Mahoney of Wyoming and Frank Church of Idaho. Eisenhower appealed to Republicans to resist the amendment, and Knowland said on the Senate floor that a vote for jury trial “will be a vote to kill for this session . . . an effective voting-rights bill.” Lyndon Johnson replied, “The people will never accept a concept that a man can be publicly branded as a criminal without a jury trial.”14
On July 10, in the Oval Office, Eisenhower had an hour-long meeting with Russell. Ann Whitman wrote in her diary that Russell, “while emotional about the matter, had conducted himself very well.” Then Whitman, always loyal to Eisenhower and nearly always unquestioningly on his side, noted that the President “is not at all unsympathetic to the position people like Senator Russell take.” Eisenhower was “far more ready than am I, for instance, to entertain their views.” Whitman chided him for supporting segregationists. “I have lived in the South, remember,” the President reminded his secretary. She hoped, and believed, that “he is adamant on the fact that the right to vote must be protected.” Then, speaking for millions of Americans, Negro and white, Republican and Democrat, North and South, liberal and conservative, Whitman declared, “It seems so ridiculous to me, when it has been in the Constitution for so many years and here at last we get around to believing it might be possible for some of our citizens to really have that right.”15
On July 22, as the Senate debate continued, Eisenhower wrote Swede, who had lived in North Carolina for two decades. “I think that no other single event has so disturbed the domestic scene in many years,” the President said, “as did the Supreme Court’s decision of 1954 in the school segregation case.” In his view, “Laws are rarely effective unless they represent the will of the majority.” Further, “when emotions are deeply stirred,” progress must be gradual and take into account “human feelings.” Otherwise, “we will have a . . . disaster.” The South had lived for three score years under Plessy as a law-abiding area; it was therefore “impossible to expect complete and instant reversal of conduct by mere decision of the Supreme Court.”
In the next paragraph, Eisenhower gave Swede the most eloquent and concise statement on the role of the Supreme Court in American life that he ever delivered. “I hold to the basic purpose,” he began. “There must be respect for the Constitution—which means the Supreme Court’s interpretation of the Constitution—or we shall have chaos. We cannot possibly imagine a successful form of government in which every individual citizen would have the right to interpret the Constitution according to his own convictions, beliefs, and prejudices. Chaos would develop. This I believe with all my heart—and shall always act accordingly.” 16
That was a private letter to a private citizen. The day he wrote it, the President received a letter (already made public) from Governor Jimmy Byrnes of South Carolina, supporting the sacred right of trial by jury. In response, Eisenhower said that “as I read your letter, it seems to me that what you are really objecting to is the giving of authority to the Attorney General to institute civil actions.” Eisenhower told Byrnes that the right to vote was what was really sacred. Although “the last thing I desire is to persecute anyone,” Eisenhower told Byrnes that “the right to vote is more important to our way of life” than anything else.17
Taken altogether, the President’s various statements on civil rights, whether made in private, or in meetings, or in letters to southern governors, or in news conferences, confused more than they clarified. As southern politicians chose to hear what he was saying, the President had a firm commitment to the Constitution, but it was more ritualistic than active. What came through to them was Eisenhower’s sympathy for the white South, and his extreme reluctance to use force to insure compliance with Brown. The President’s moderation, the southerners felt, gave them license to defy the Court, and to emasculate the civil-rights bill.
At a July 17 news conference, Eisenhower as much as said so directly. Merriman Smith asked the first question. Was the President aware that under laws dating back to Reconstruction, he had the power and authority to use military force to put through integration? Yes, Eisenhower said, he was aware that he had such power. But, he added, “I can’t imagine any set of circumstances that would ever induce me to send federal troops into any area to enforce the orders of a federal court, because I believe that [the] common sense of America will never require it.” Few paid any attention to his qualification, because after further questioning he said, “I would never believe that it would be a wise thing to do in this country.”18
For Eisenhower, the whole experience was one of the most agonizing of his life. He wanted to uphold the Supreme Court, but he did not want to offend his many southern friends. He wanted to enforce the law, but he did not want to use force to do so. He did not want to antagonize anyone, but “anyone” always seemed to turn out to be white southern segregationists. He had waged two successful campaigns to become the nation’s leader, but he did not want to lead on the issue of civil rights. The upshot of his conflicting emotions and statements was confusion, which allowed the segregationists to convince themselves that the President would never act.
In his letter to Swede, Eisenhower had concluded, “Possibly I am something like a ship which, buffeted and pounded by wind and wave, is still afloat and manages in spite of frequent tacks and turnings to stay generally along its plotted course and continue to make some, even if slow and painful, headway.” But to many observers, it appeared that the ship of state was in fact caught in a storm without a rudder, without power, without a captain; that it was, if the truth be told, drifting aimlessly in unknown and uncharted waters.
• •
In August and September 1957, the efforts by southern segregationists to resist Brown and its implications reached a peak. The climax began on August 2, in the wee hours, after an exhausting session of Senate debate over Eisenhower’s civil-rights bill, when the Senate voted, 51 to 42, to adopt the jury trial amendment to the bill.
Eisenhower, told of the vote when he woke, was furious. At a 9 A.M. Cabinet meeting, he opened by saying the vote was “one of the most serious political defeats of the past four years, primarily because it was such a denial of a basic principle of the United States,” the right to vote. Eisenhower said he could not find much forgiveness in his soul for those Republicans who had voted with the South (twelve had done so, including Barry Goldwater of Arizona). In a statement issued later that morning, the President declared that the jury-trial amendment would make it impossible for the Justice Department to obtain convictions of southern registrars who refused to enroll Negroes. He spoke of how “bitterly disappointing” the result of the Senate vote had been to the millions of “fellow Americans [who] will continue . . . to be disenfranchised.” 19
Despite the President’s relatively strong words, the Senate proceeded, on August 7, to pass the emasculated civil-rights bill, 72 to 18. It then went to a Senate-House Conference (the House had earlier passed the bill Eisenhower wanted), where the differences would be worked out.
He was unsure of what he should do if the House agreed to the crippling jury-trial amendment. He was getting conflicting advice. The White House mail mainly urged him not to sign a “phony” bill. Prominent Negro leaders joined the chorus. Ralph Bunche wrote, “It would be better to have no bill than one as emasculated as that which has come out of the Senate.” Jackie Robinson, the baseball player, wired to state his opposition. “Have waited this long for bill with meaning,” Robinson said, “can wait a little longer.” Robinson was one of the newest civil-rights leaders; one of the oldest leaders, the grand old man of the movement, A. Philip Randolph, joined him in opposition. “It is worse than no bill at all,” Randolph declared. But the NAACP concluded that half a loaf was better than no bread at all, and therefore wanted Eisenhower to sign it. So did Martin Luther King, Jr.20
The bill that came out of the conference satisfied no one. It gave the judge the right to decide whether a defendant should receive a jury trial; it created a Civil Rights Commission with a two-year life; it set up a Civil Rights Division in Justice; and it empowered the Attorney General to seek an injunction when an individual was deprived of the right to vote. But the penalties for violation were so relatively light, and the obstacles in the way of the Attorney General so relatively heavy, that the final bill was a long way away from providing the guarantees of basic civil rights that Eisenhower had insisted were the birthright of all Americans. Some civil-rights leaders blamed the southern senators for this outcome, but others said it was Eisenhower’s responsibility, because of his failure to speak forcefully and clearly on the issue.
The battered and bruised bill was hardly Eisenhower’s exclusive fault, but the bill’s confused and hesitant approach to the problem of civil rights did symbolize the President’s own confusion and hesitancy. He still could not make up his mind whether to sign it or not. By the time he did decide, on September 9, to sign, events in Little Rock had overshadowed the bill, and its enactment into law passed virtually unnoticed. Nor can it be said that its enforcement ever attracted much attention, or much action. Essentially, Eisenhower passed on to his successors the problem of guaranteeing constitutional rights to Negro citizens.
• •
On September 4, weary from his battles with Congress, Eisenhower and Mamie flew to Newport, Rhode Island, to spend their summer vacation at the naval base there. Upon their arrival in Newport, Eisenhower said a few words at a reception by the mayor and other local dignitaries. “I assure you no vacation has ever started more auspiciously,” he said.21
Actually, no vacation had ever begun more inauspiciously, because the previous day the governor of Arkansas, Orval Faubus, had presented Eisenhower with exactly the problem he had most wished to avoid, outright defiance of a court order by a governor. Faubus had called out the Arkansas National Guard, placed it around Central High School in Little Rock, and ordered the troops to prevent the entry into the school of about a dozen Negro pupils.
After various legal maneuverings, a federal judge on September 20 enjoined Faubus and the Arkansas Guard from interfering with the process of integration at Central High. Faubus read a statement questioning the federal court’s authority. That afternoon, Eisenhower called Brownell, who told him of Faubus’ action, then said that the governor might withdraw the Guard, turning over the streets around Central High to a racist mob, or he might follow a path of “straight defiance.” In either case, Brownell said, the President was going to have to make some difficult decisions, including the possible use of the U.S. Army to enforce the court orders.
Eisenhower said he was “loath to use troops.” He feared that the “movement might spread—violence would come.” He had no doubt whatever about his authority to call out the troops, but said again that he hated to do it. Then Eisenhower expressed his deepest and most persistent fear. He asked Brownell, “Suppose the children are taken to school and then Governor Faubus closes the school? Can he do that legally?” Brownell said he would look it up. Eisenhower feared that the federal government would be helpless in the event the South abolished its public school system, and that the precedent thereby set for defiance of constitutional authority could have devastating results, for Negroes, for poor white southerners, and for the nation.22
Monday morning, September 23, a howling racist mob gathered around Central High, screaming protests against integration. Variously estimated at from five hundred to “several thousand” strong, the mob rushed two Negro reporters. As the mob knocked down and beat up the newsmen, nine Negro pupils slipped into the school by a side door. The mob, learning of this development, grew even more enraged. It rushed the police barricades and fought to get into the school, vowing to “lynch the niggers.” On orders from the mayor of Little Rock, the police then removed the Negro students. Integration at Central High had lasted three hours.
In his four and one-half years as President, Eisenhower had gotten through many a crisis simply by denying that a crisis existed. His favorite approach was to conduct business as usual, stick as close to a routine as possible, speak and act with moderation, and wait for the inevitable cooling down of passions. Moderation and deliberation, however, were hard to find in Little Rock that morning. There the mob, now swollen in size to many thousands, again took control of the streets. The mayor, Woodrow Wilson Mann, sent Eisenhower a frantic telegram: “The immediate need for federal troops is urgent . . . Situation is out of control and police cannot disperse the mob . . .”23
Eisenhower realized immediately that his entire policy had broken down. By allowing events to run their course, by attempting to negotiate with Faubus, by failing to ever speak out forcefully on integration, or to provide real leadership on the moral issue, he found himself in precisely the situation he had most wanted to avoid. His options had run out. Mayor Mann’s telegram gave him no choice but to use force.
He did have a choice as to what type of force he would use. At 12:08 P.M., he called Brownell to say that he finally agreed, force would have to be used. He said he wanted to use the U.S. Army. He accepted Brownell’s suggestion that he simultaneously call the Arkansas National Guard into federal service and use it side by side with the regulars.24 At 12:15 he called General Taylor and gave the order. He wanted Taylor to move quickly in order to demonstrate how rapidly the Army could respond. Within a few hours, Taylor had five hundred paratroopers of the 101st Airborne Division in Little Rock; another five hundred were there by nightfall.
Throughout the South, white segregationists were outraged by the “invasion.” Marching protestors carried banners that played on the words of the Army’s recruiting slogan: “Join the Army and See the High Schools!” Lyndon Johnson proclaimed: “There should be no troops from either side patrolling our school campuses.” Senator Eastland said that “the President’s move was an attempt to destroy the social order of the South.” Senator Olin Johnston boldly proclaimed, “If I were a governor and he came in, I’d give him a fight such as he’s never been in before.”25
The following morning, the 101st Airborne dispersed the mob, with only minor incidents (one man was pricked by a bayonet), while nine Negro students entered Central High and, under Army guard, sat through a full day of classes. Central High was integrated. That was the result the segregationists had vowed to prevent, and that Eisenhower’s orders had made possible. Faubus had forced Eisenhower to face one ultimate question: Could the southern governors use the state’s armed forces to prevent integration? But because Faubus had been forced to pose the question within the context of outright defiance of the orders of the federal court, he gave Eisenhower no choice but to act. He could not have done otherwise and still been President. Eisenhower had to be pushed to the wall before he would act, but at the critical moment, he lived up to his oath of office. In the process, he convinced most white southerners that they could not use force to prevent integration.
Slowly, the crisis faded. Faubus continued to shout defiance, but by October 14 the situation was stable enough for Eisenhower to withdraw half the Army troops and to defederalize 80 percent of the Guardsmen. The next week, Brownell carried out his long-standing intention of resigning, to return to private practice, an act that helped cool passions, as many southerners saw Brownell as the villain in the piece. By October 23, Negro students entered Central High without military protection. In November, the last of the 101st left. The Guard remained, under federal control, until the end of the school year, in June 1958. In September of that year, Faubus did what Eisenhower had so feared—he closed Central High altogether (it was reopened on an integrated basis in the fall of 1959).
Little Rock had been, for Eisenhower, “troublesome beyond imagination.”26 By the time the crisis ended, however, it had become little more than an irritant, because by then it had been eclipsed by another crisis in American education, this one brought on by the Russians.
• •
Eisenhower had endured many a discouraging autumn. In 1942, he was stuck in the mud of Tunisia, in 1943 in the mud of Italy, in 1944 along the West Wall. In 1954, he lost control of Congress in the fall elections. In late September 1955, he had suffered his first heart attack. In October 1956, it was Suez, and in September 1957, Little Rock. That should have been enough for any man, but still the dreary list grew. On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union fired into orbit the world’s first man-made satellite, named Sputnik (“traveling companion”). This impressive achievement came as “a distinct surprise” to Eisenhower and his Administration. But as Eisenhower confessed in his memoirs, “Most surprising of all . . . was the intensity of the public concern.”27
He had no excuse for being surprised by the near-hysterical reaction of the American press, politicians, and public to Sputnik. He himself had said repeatedly, when discussing the American missile program, that the ICBMs were far more important in terms of psychological factors than as military weapons. He had predicted that the achievement of operational ICBMs by the Russians would throw the American people into a fright bordering on panic, because the idea that the enemy could send nuclear warheads across the oceans to obliterate American cities was certain to create uncontrollable anxieties. But predicting and experiencing were two distinct things, and Eisenhower was indeed almost overwhelmed by the intensity of the American response to Sputnik.
Eisenhower had anticipated the fear that Sputnik engendered; what really surprised him was the way in which Sputnik swept away certain basic American assumptions and caused a crisis in self-confidence. For a dozen years, since the victory in the war, Americans had taken for granted that theirs was not only the richest and freest and most powerful nation in the world, but also the best educated and most technologically advanced.
Most commentators, then and later, linked this remarkable self-satisfaction to President Eisenhower. “Trust Ike” was the watchword. He was so comforting, so grandfatherly, so calm, so sure of himself, so skillful in managing the economy, so experienced in insuring America’s defenses, so expert in his control of the intelligence community, so knowledgeable about the world’s affairs, so nonpartisan and objective in his above-the-battle posture, so insistent on holding to the middle of the road, that he inspired a trust that was as broad and deep as that of any President since George Washington. Even southern Democrats could not bring themselves to dislike Ike, and the Democratic Party as a whole never hated Eisenhower as the Republicans hated FDR and Truman, or as the Democrats later hated Nixon. Thus Eisenhower is praised—or blamed—for the complacency and consensus of the fifties.
Actually, Eisenhower was given far too much credit—or blame—for the character of the fifties. In large part, it was plain good luck. The economic boom would have taken place even if Taft or Stevenson had won in 1952. America’s preponderant position in military and financial power was a legacy Eisenhower inherited. Eisenhower had been a participant in the process of changing the isolationist America of 1939 into the world colossus of 1952, but not the maker of that policy. His task as President was one of managing America’s rise to globalism, not bringing it about. As Eisenhower himself was always first to point out, it was plain silly to give all the credit, or blame, to one man.
Similarly, the complacency had always been fragile, as was demonstrated when one Russian satellite, weighing less than two hundred pounds and carrying no scientific or military equipment, broke it down. Democrats cashed in on the shame, shock, and anger Americans felt, as they blamed the Republicans for various “gaps”—in education, in missiles, in satellites, in economic growth, in bombers, in science, and in prestige. Almost all Americans wanted to be “number one” in everything, which helped explain the overreaction to Sputnik and gave the Democrats the rallying cry that would carry them to victory in the 1958 and 1960 elections—Let’s get the country moving again. “If we do have to stress party differences,” Eisenhower had told the Democratic leaders at the beginning of 1957, “let us do it on relatively small matters.” But after Little Rock and Sputnik, the differences were over big matters, civil rights and national defense, as complacency and consensus disappeared.
• •
Eisenhower’s first response to Sputnik was to call a meeting to review American missile development and find out how the Russians had won the race to space. The backbiting and blame fixing had already begun, the day after Sputnik, when two Army officers said that the Army had a rocket, Redstone, that could have placed a satellite in orbit many months ago, but the Eisenhower Administration had given the satellite program to the Navy (Project Vanguard), and the Navy had failed.
Sputnik not only set the services to bickering among themselves; it had a remarkable effect on the White House press corps, usually so friendly to Eisenhower. On October 9, five days after Sputnik, Eisenhower held a news conference that was one of the most hostile of his career. Merriman Smith, ordinarily a great admirer of Eisenhower, set the tone in his opening question. Reading from a note card, Smith began, “Russia has launched an earth satellite. They also claim to have had a successful firing of an intercontinental ballistic missile, none of which this country has done.” Raising his eyes, Smith looked directly at the President. “I ask you, sir, what are we going to do about it?”
Eisenhower began by denying that there was a link between a satellite and the ICBM. He gave a brief history of American involvement in a satellite program. He denied that there ever was a race to get into space first. He promised to have an American satellite in orbit before the end of 1958. As to the Russian ICBM, Eisenhower said that Sputnik had certainly proved that “they can hurl an object a considerable distance.” It did not prove that the ICBMs could hit a target. American missile research was going forward full speed, and the United States had a lead in the ICBM race.
Eisenhower was asked if the B-52 was “outmoded,” as Khrushchev claimed. Absolutely not, the President replied. Robert Clark wanted to know how the Russians had gotten ahead in launching an earth satellite. Eisenhower replied that “from 1945, when the Russians captured all of the German scientists in Peenemunde . . . they have centered their attention on the ballistic missile.” Eisenhower then downplayed the Russian achievement, although he admitted that they had gained a “great psychological advantage.”
May Craig wanted to know if the Russians could use satellites as space platforms from which to launch rockets. “Not at this time, no,” Eisenhower replied. “There is no . . .” he went on, but paused, smiled, and commented, “Suddenly all America seems to become scientist, and I am hearing many, many ideas.”
Hazel Markel of NBC then asked the question all of America was asking. “Mr. President,” Markel said, “in light of the great faith which the American people have in your military knowledge and leadership, are you saying at this time that with the Russian satellite whirling about the world, you are not more concerned nor overly concerned about our nation’s security?” Eisenhower spoke to the whole nation in his reply, in an attempt to calm a jittery public. “As far as the satellite itself is concerned,” he said, “that does not raise my apprehensions, not one iota. I see nothing at this moment, at this stage of development, that is significant in that development as far as security is concerned.”28
Later that day, Eisenhower met with Lyndon Johnson. Senator Symington was beginning an investigation into the American missile program, with the obvious purpose of putting the blame for the loss of the space race on the Republicans. Eisenhower hoped to keep the whole subject out of partisan politics. He told Johnson that Symington and his friends should be aware “that the Democrats could be blamed.” Truman had spent literally nothing on missile research before 1950, and only a pittance after that. Eisenhower promised that the Republicans “would not be first to throw the stone.” Johnson said he had been urged to call a special session of Congress; Eisenhower said “he saw no need of it now.” After Johnson left, Eisenhower told Whitman that he had “said all the right things. I think today he is being honest.”29
Having faced the Chiefs, the press corps, and the politicians, Eisenhower met next with the scientists. On October 15, he called fourteen of the leading scientists in America to the Oval Office. It was his first meeting with so broad-gauged and representative a group. Strauss had always managed to control the access of scientists to the President, and brought him only such men as Drs. Lawrence and Teller. (Teller, incidentally, had called Sputnik a greater defeat for the United States than Pearl Harbor, which was exactly the kind of talk Eisenhower deplored.)
The meeting was a long one. Eisenhower began by asking “whether the group really thought that American science is being outdistanced, and asked for an expression of the state of mind of the members.” Dr. Isidor Rabi, a Columbia physicist whom Eisenhower knew and admired, spoke first. He said that he, and all the group, wanted federal support for scientific research and training, not because America had fallen behind, but because the Soviets “have picked up tremendous momentum, and unless we take vigorous action they could pass us swiftly just as in a period of twenty to thirty years we caught up with Europe and left Western Europe far behind.” Then Dr. Land, who had developed the camera equipment for the U-2, “spoke with great eloquence.” He said that science “needs the President acutely.” The Russians were in a pioneering stage and frame of mind. They were teaching Russian students basic sciences and beginning to reap the rewards. “Curiously, in the United States we are not now great builders for the future but are rather stressing production in great quantities of things we have already achieved,” Land said, while the Russians looked to the future. Land wanted the President to “inspire the country—setting out our youth particularly on a whole variety of scientific adventures.” He complained that “at the present time scientists feel themselves isolated and alone.”
Eisenhower disagreed with Land’s analysis. He said that the Russians had “followed the practice of picking out the best minds and ruthlessly spurning the rest.” Nor did he think that he alone could give a new spirit to scientific training and research in America. He did agree that “perhaps now is a good time to try such a thing. People are alarmed and thinking about science, and perhaps this alarm could be turned to a constructive result.” Rabi pointed out that Eisenhower lacked a scientific adviser. Eisenhower admitted that such an individual could be “most helpful.”30 Soon thereafter he appointed Dr. James Killian, the president of MIT, to the post, making the widely popular Killian the head of the President’s Science Advisory Committee (PSAC).
Shortly thereafter, Eisenhower met with Nathan Twining to discuss ways and means of cutting down costs in the nuclear development field. The President wondered why the AEC and JCS wanted so many bombs. He asked, “What is going to be done with this tremendous number of enormous weapons?” With an existing arsenal of thousands of weapons, Eisenhower said, “we are certainly providing for elaborate reserves, and making very pessimistic estimates as to what can get to the target.” He thought the B-52 had “great penetrating power.” Twining confirmed that assumption, but then said that “the Air Force will not be happy until they get one [hydrogen bomb] for every aircraft plus a sizable reserve.”31
Costs were very much on Eisenhower’s mind. Sputnik had stimulated almost unmanageable demands for more spending, on space and missile research, for conventional forces, for federal aid to colleges and universities, for fallout shelters, and a myriad of other projects. But the economy was slipping; 1957 was a recession year, federal income was down as a result, and the balanced budget of the previous two years was about to become a deficit budget. At a November 1 meeting, the Cabinet bombarded Eisenhower with proposals. “Look,” the President finally exploded, “I’d like to know what’s on the other side of the moon, but I won’t pay to find out this year!”32
National sentiment was otherwise. Eisenhower was getting advice from individuals, groups, organizations, all centering around the theme that “security is more important than balanced budgets.” Ike said he knew he could get whatever he asked for from Congress in the way of defense spending in the next session, but the suggested expenditures were “unjustifiable.” He admonished one committee that “we must remember that we are defending a way of life, not merely property, wealth, and even our homes . . . Should we have to resort to anything resembling a garrison state, then all that we are striving to defend . . . could disappear.”33 Eisenhower refused to bend to the pressure, refused to initiate a fallout shelter program, refused to expand conventional and nuclear forces, refused to panic.
It was one of his finest hours. If in September 1957, at Little Rock, he had failed to exercise leadership and consequently suffered through one of the low moments of his Presidency, then in October and November 1957, in his response to Sputnik and the uproar it created, he reached one of the highest points.
It is doubtful if any other man could have done what Eisenhower did. The demands for shelters, for more bombers, for more bombs, for more research and development of missiles and satellites, was nearly irresistible. Only Ike could have gotten away with saying no. His unique prestige among his countrymen made his unassailable on the question of national defense. The Ford Foundation, the Rockefeller brothers, the JCS, Congress, indeed almost all of what would be called in the sixties “the Establishment,” clamored for more defense spending.
But Eisenhower said no, and kept saying no to the end of his term. He thereby saved his country untold billions of dollars and no one knows how many war scares. Eisenhower’s calm, common-sense, deliberate response to Sputnik may have been his finest gift to the nation, if only because he was the only man who could have given it.