European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - November 24, 1973, Darmstadt, Hesse What i try to do with some Success is to moderate my by Christopher Lydon new York times at his Best moments in the Senate watergate hearings Howard h. Baker has come on like a senatorial Dick Cavett with a Tennessee Hill country drawl an eager student of motives and character with Akeen ear for theatrical dialogue. I want to know More of the Why he pressed one witness a Junior accomplice in the cover up. In his questioning of the inimitable Anthony Ulasewicz the new York cop turned White House spy who thought you up Baker asked he was the first to see the possibilities for humor. At other times which became frequent As the hearings wore on he could be ponderous and professorial Given to the Orems and Windy a postulating but shy about Tough prosecutor s questioning. What is your perception of the presidency he kept asking John n. Mitchell to Little effect but he chose not explore among other inviting leads Mitchell s testimony that president Nixon had never asked his Campaign manager and former attorney general what he knew of the watergate affair. Overall Baker who is vice chairman of the watergate committee probably merited his own description As the revised Stan Dard version of sen. Sam Ervin s King James version lacking the Majestic Power of the North Carolina Democrat s righteous eloquence but following closely behind the committee chairman on All the fateful Steps toward confrontation with president Nixon s White House. In the second phase of the hearings that have made Baker a National Star a Man inevitably to be considered among the Republican presidential candidates in 1976, he remains a studiously ambivalent figure. It is commonly assumed that Howard Baker wants to be president and almost As widely suspected that he is guarding his watergate judgment accordingly. There Are equally Good hints that he is As puzzled As the rest of us about politics after water Gate and further that his ambivalence is a Conven tial flaw a shortage of passion that does not necessarily fit with presidential ambition. Over and Over Baker has said he will Reserve his watergate conclusions until the committee writes its report next february. His position is exceptional on the committee quite in keeping with his per Sonal style. Every person is at least two persons he commented last Spring in an interview with Myra Mcpherson of the Washington Post the one he appears to be and the one he really the Public Baker hides be Hind words a the real one in t the activist likes to contemplate escapes to the photo dark room his houses in ten Nessee and Washington Are both professionally equipped and makes pictures. The Public person never goes Down and very Little of the private person comes out. It s characteristic of some people to be Public moralists he explained later to express outrage to be enthusiastic and aggressive. My personality tends to be More even even More calculating and i accept that. I make do with what i not he continued that he is without feeling. There Are two distinct parts to emotion Al reaction one the perception the other the reaction Baker mused the other Day Over breakfast in the Senate dining room. What others have commented on is that i Don t exhibit the paraphernalia of rage or enthusiasm in these hearings. But what i try to do with some Success is to Moder ate my emotions so that i express them i Hope appropriately at the Baker s own comments on watergate unlike his cosmic questions to witnesses usually end on narrow political Points. His assignment of r the moment he suggests is to contain the damage to the Republican party and to prevent watergate from Hap pening again. Baker is a Friendly soft sell in Many ways appealingly private Man at Home in a leisurely Tennis game As Well As in the Darkroom. His whole personality not to mention the deftness and understatement of his Politi Cal campaigns makes a civilized contrast to the watergate spirit even when he can t make a Public show of recoiling from the White House scandal. One of his assistants tells a Story that seems convincing and relevant a group of us were at Baker s House last Spring joking about what it would be like when he was president the summer White House at Huntsville Tenn. That sort of thing. He just tolerated us for a while and then he said boys you can joke All you want. It s fun. But if by some Fluke something like that Ever happened we Don t want half the Power those Guys have got Down there right now if i forget everything else about Howard Baker said his Young Friend that s the one remark i la re Mem yet the same aide volunteered that Baker s restraint partakes also of laziness and boredom an impression that is com Mon among Baker watchers. The reason i was anxious to see him get elected Republican floor Leader said the staff Man recalling Baker s narrow loss in 1969, to sen. Hugh Scott of Pennsylvania in a race to succeed the late Everett Dirk sen Baker s father in Law was that i think he s got to be forced to do some hard thinking on Basic issues. He tends to Trust his instincts which is common on Capitol Hill but it s been easier for Baker because he s so glib. If he remains a prominent Republican after watergate hell have to confront some issues and come up with some until the watergate hearings Baker s Senate career still looked dam aged by his losses to senator Scott in 1969 and again in 1971 in bids for the floor leadership. An aggressive Young Star of the class of 1966 and the Model of innovative republicanism in the South had been recast in Public impressions of the leadership con tests As the new front Man for roman Hruska and Barry Goldwater the losing Captain of the Senate minority s conservative minority. His own self image seemed diminished too As he settled into a career of often creative but relatively narrow legislative craftsmanship. Men like former sen. John Sherman Cooper remained Baker s idea of Lincoln republicanism for Baker the phrase connotes a certain boldness of vision and the political skill to sustain it. Yet Baker s own record has Little of Cooper s Union be nationality and Baker did not share Cooper s views on race or the War in Viet Nam. On the Public works committee work ing with sen. Edmund Muskie whom he admires and with Cooper Baker won Marks As a professional legislator a committed environmentalist a Tough negotiator and perhaps an indispensable Man in development of the clean air and water Bills of 1970 and 1972 and the High Way Bill this year that will open the Gaso line tax Trust fund for Public transit projects. Unlike the Commerce committee where the alignments were predictable and Baker lost interest the Public works committee was flexible and almost non partisan the personal chemistry was1 stimulating and Many of the issues were negotiable. Hints of irresolution of an easily bored intelligence keep copping up in conversations about Baker. Perhaps the most striking evidence on the Point is his own indecision when John Mitchell asked him to consider a supreme court appointment to the seat that went eventually to William Rehnquist. It took Baker four Days to de cide that he was t really sure what he wanted in the same time president Nixon decided he did not want a reluctant Candi Date. Certain things stand out in Howard Baker s political career in Tennessee from the losing Senate Campaign of 1964 when he is caught in the anti Goldwater tide through the victories of 1966 and1972. First he has been Lucky the beneficiary of a Long term erosion of democratic Baker relaxing at Home every person is at least two persons strength in the state hurried along by the Rivil rights movement and punctuated by the death of Estes Kefauver in 1963. Sec and he is a politician of the shrewd Bland Libarty building variety likable but never i electric his personality always sub merged to the partisan goal. Third while lie seems to have the conservative instincts that come naturally to mountaineers ind men of property he is a Man without visible emotion on most political issues to has trimmed his sails closely to the changing Breeze. And fourth though his Liepart and mind Are largely hidden from Riew he has convinced most of the men Ivhon watch him closely that he is a specially decent Man an honest and serious Man being. Albert Gore who served four years with 3aker in the Senate Speaks for a lot of influential democrats when he says he is a Man of considerable proportion. To Egin with he is a decent Man. He has an Linde standing of life and Law and lore he Pas a sense of proportion. He s a gentle Lan he s honest he s Bright he s Well Juc ated he has Gore talks readily about their Sharp political differences. Senator Baker is sometimes called a moderate because he s lot a Bland attitude he s a purebred con i Ergative with a Bland attitude which is a betimes mistaken for moderation. We disagreed on the whole Gamut of economic ind foreign policy issues said Gore a Low interest rate populist and a Dove in Vietnam. Still As with other democrats Abor leaders newspapermen and state politicians in Tennessee Gore s remarks j to Baker begin and end on notes of affection and respect. Oward Henry Bakerjr. Was in into the Mountain county courthouse Al tics of Republican East Tennessee i hat Union stronghold where the first takers settled in the 18th Century where Liis Grandfather had been a judge and his father a District prosecutor. The Eastern counties of Tennessee inning from Chattanooga on the Georgia Ine up the appalachian Ridge through Noxville to the mountainous wedge of land tucked among the Borders of Ken Lucky Virginia and North Carolina Are Home to two of every five form a solid bastion of historic republicanism and Frontier Independence Little changed in the election returns by the democratic gifts of the Tennessee Valley authority and the Oak Ridge National lab oratory. Howard Bakersr. Was a congressman 3m the 2nd Tennessee District including Boxville from 1951 until his death in 1964 his second wife Irene Bailey Baker senator Baker s Stepmother filled out his term. Young Howard Baker who spurned an easy Opportunity to run for his father s seat in 1964, Felt As part of his political inheritance a compulsion to break out of the East Tennessee beachhead and raise the Republican Standard All across the state through the tobacco farms and Nashville to Boss Edward Hull Crump s Memphis the Anchor of the old democratic Power Structure. When he Speaks of political roots it is Witch a certain pained sense of his father s doomed but evidently determined races for governor against Prentice Cooper in 1938 and for the United states Senate against Kenneth a Mckellar in 1940. In 1938, at age 12, Baker was making movies of the governor s race he remembers being startled unprepared terrified at the Prospect of a humiliating defeat but then proud despite a two to one loss that his father had run. Baker and his two Sisters grew up Gen try kids among the Hillbillies in Huntsville pop. 374, when the four Bakers Are at Home the seat of Scott county where he was born on nov. 15, 1925. His Mother Dora who died when her Only son was 8, instill remembered warmly around Hunts Ville a Friend of the poorest Hillbillies and the Best contemporaries re Call Howard As a studious kid the Bright est around but regular even then an avid photographer. At 14 he packed up for the Mccallie school in Chattanooga. At graduation he packed up for War. Under the v-12 pro Gram he studied engineering at the University of the South in Sewanee Tenn., and then at Tulane University in new Orleans. Commissioned for it boat duty in the Pacific he got into service just in time for the japanese surrender and to make Dirksen s line about John f. Kennedy during the 1960 Campaign my son in Law served on a it boat Dirksen enjoyed repeating and no one Ever elected him to Baker finished his education at the University of Tennessee and in fact got elected president of the student body. Law school As he tells it was an Accident. Intended to finish engineering school he has said but the line was too Long on registration Day. The line for Law school want so i ended up there. I m ashamed to admit it but it s fresh out of Law school he married Joy Dirksen a school Friend of his sister s whom he d met at a Tennessee wedding before proposing to her 10 weeks later. In 1951 it hardly seemed a major political merger eve Dirksen had been a senator for less than a year Joy Dirksen had Al ready seen enough politics she says now that she wanted to marry a plumber. In 1966, before Howard Baker won his Senate seat his wife and his father in Law both tried to talk him out of running. Baker seems to have been fond of Dirksen at least partly because Dirksen did not try to advise him in the Senate. In any Case Baker does not think of Dirksen As a men torte Way he thinks of his father and of John Sherman Cooper. Joy Dirksen Baker for her part says i thought i was marry ing a country for a decade and More she was quite right. Senatorial soft sell at the courthouse in Huntsville Tenn. Be was not limited of course to trials or even to the Law. In Knoxville he devel oped corporate clients including Coal operators and casualty insurance companies. But Back in Huntsville he also showed a keen entrepreneurial instinct creating clients in the Scott county Woods where business tended to be slow. It was Baker s idea to form the Highland Telephone cooperative inc., the Huntsville Utility District for water and the Scott county Hospital. Each of the projects made Money and All of them used Baker s Law firm for counsel. The Goldwater movement led locally by then congressman William e. Brock had a firm grip on the Republican party in ten Nessee when Estes Kefauver s death and then his father s prompted Howard Baker to make his first move in politics a Long shot run for Kefauver s Senate seat. Baker was not part of the Goldwater drive indeed the friction Between Baker and Brock factions dates from that year. But Baker adapted readily to the conservative Republican tone of 1964 just enough perhaps to bring on his own de feat. Lyndon Johnson won Tennessee with 55 per cent of the vote the first presidential Democrat since Truman to carry the state Howard Baker got More votes than any Tennessee Republican before him but lost by 4 percentage Points to Ross Bass a Liberal congressman from Middle ten Nessee. In the winning Campaign of 1966, when the same old Kefauver seat was up for a full term Baker Clung More nearly to the Middle of the Road. He was Lucky too in his opponents first Ken Roberts an in effective Goldwate rite in the Republican primary and then gov. Frank Clement the fading boy orator who Defeated the More Liberal Ross Bass in the democratic primary that year. It is Clear in the election statistics that conservative republicans flocking belong tradition to the democratic primary helped Clement beat Bass. But then the nomination of Clement brought Baker the support of numerous Black leaders and the sympathy of influential democratic news papers. The Happy irony for Baker was that just As conservative republicans helped Nomi Nate Clement As his opponent Liberal democrats helped Baker beat Clement by 100,000 votes in the election. The larger irony was that Baker s breakthrough the election of Tennessee s first Republican senator was a bold change of labels Only. Politically it was something of a counterrevolution. Baker won re election by an unheard of 276,000 votes in 1972 when once again he was blessed with a democratic opponent who not Only assured his Victory but made it easy for Baker to take a comfortably High Road. Then rep. Ray Blanton a conservative Democrat from Rural West ten Nessee and a populist of the George Wal lace variety accused Baker of All people of favouring busing. Even the Nashville tennessean endorsed Baker and by Baker s count 40 per cent of the Black voters in the state voted for him. The sweep of last year s Victory certainly suggests that Baker can stay in the Senate As Long As he chooses certainly the watergate exposure has helped him at Home even though Nixon too is still a popular figure in East ten Nessee. But for Baker a Long Senate career is not necessarily a satisfying Prospect. I m not sure i have any ambitions beyond the Senate he commented recently. I am sure i Don t intend to stay in the Senate forever. With no disrespect to those who be stayed i keep thinking of the Early Days of the Republic when sessions were Short and when people went Home Between ses Sions and Farmed or quarried Marble or Page 14 the stars and stripes saturday novt a 24, 1973 the stars and stripes Page 15
