Connolly: Restless and Ready

Almost a year after a federal jury acquitted him on charges of accepting a $10,000 bribe to help raise milk price supports, John Bowden Connolly Jr. is about to step back into public life: President Ford plans to return him to the ten-member Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board. For a man who was Richard Nixon's Treasury Secretary, Lyndon Johnson's close adviser, John Kennedy's Navy Secretary, and three-term Governor of Texas, it is another start. The board is to be given larger responsibilities in overseeing the Government's battered intelligence agencies. TIME National Political Correspondent Robert Ajemian interviewed Connolly on a recent visit to New York. His report:

A restless political prowler, John Connally hates to be out of the center of the action. In his riverboat-gambler style he continues to calculate his chances to become President. "Right now," he says, "there's room for only two men on the court, Ford and Reagan. But if one of them is eliminated, it's an entirely different situation for me. I'm watching it closely."

As he talks, Connally slowly works his way down the sofa toward the interviewer, telling how five top Michigan Republicans are urging him to get into the presidential race. His thin, somewhat sulky mouth and upturned nose give him a youthful look, even at 58. He had thought, Connally goes on, that Reagan would prove to be a more skillful campaigner than he has, better able to deflect the grilling of the press. Reagan's awkwardness has helped Ford recover and, according to Connally's appraisal, further reduced the chance of a political opening for anyone else.

The scenario for any Connally success is simple if a little precarious. If

Reagan knocks Ford out of the race but winds up bruised and vulnerable in the process, there will be an opportunity. "I can't get involved in scuttling a sitting President," he notes. "But Reagan can. Reagan has built a real constituency in the party. Ford never has. His principal asset is the muscle and mystique of the presidency." Now Connally is at the end of the sofa, knee to knee finally, leaning forward.

He has been miffed at Ford because the President rarely consulted him. Connally, a Democrat until he switched parties in 1973, recognizes that his chances of becoming President are less than slim, and he speaks enthusiastically about his other activities. He gives speeches around the nation on vital issues. He has a big ranch at Floresville, 180 miles east of Houston, where he raises Santa Gertrudis cattle. As the top man in Houston's largest law firm, he makes international business deals for major U.S. corporations. In Britain last month he met with Cabinet Officers James Callaghan and Anthony Wedgwood Benn; last week he left for the Far East.

Connally has always enjoyed the fancy and favor of powerful men. "He likes deep rugs and rich people," says Ray Evans, former head of the Texas AFL-CIO. Richard Nixon was almost awestruck by him and told Connally he was going to make him President. Nixon proposed to put him on the 1972 ticket in place of Spiro Agnew. But Attorney General John Mitchell talked the President out of dumping Agnew. "Believing that Nixon could bring that deal off," says one of Connally's closest friends, "was the biggest mistake of John's life. But it's hard to blame him. It was a pretty dazzling proposition."

Connally insists that he never really counted on Nixon's naming him Vice President. "Nixon used to say a lot of things," he said, shrugging. "He told me he'd never, ever, make Kissinger Secretary of State."

Whether people find Connally enormously attractive or menacing as a cobra, they are fascinated with him.

What would he bring to a political candidacy? He says he is convinced the pub; lie wants discipline instead of promises. Connally feels promises lead to inefficiency, then to disorder, and then even to anarchy. If the public were forced to choose between anarchy and dictatorship, offers Connally, it would choose dictatorship. Says he: "People want to be led."

As evidence of this desire to be led, Connally points to the public's reaction to the 1973 oil embargo. "We saw how willing people were to sacrifice," he says.

"It suddenly became clear to everybody that we were living extravagantly, wasting energy, wasting food. People were ready to accept fewer comforts. But then nobody asked them to."

Simmering Issue. Virtually alone, Connally does not feel the economy will dominate this year's election. Rather, he sees foreign affairs as the simmering issue; he fears increasing problems with the Russians around the globe. "They see a weakness in us, and they're acting far more aggressively." He foresees Communist dangers in almost all the countries rimming the Mediterranean and in Malaysia. "Wherever I go," he says, "leaders all ask me: 'Is the U.S. going to keep up its role as world leader?' The world can't stand such a vacuum."

The liberals, he points out with some sarcasm, are now the isolationists, while businessmen are the internationalists.

Connally tosses out his ideas with great force. He wants a constitutional amendment to enforce a balanced budget. He proposes a crash program to mine the vast U.S. coal reserves. One of his ideas was so bold it seemed outlandish. He says that in 1972 he got Nixon and the Shah of Iran to consider forming a joint company, owned by the two governments, to buy up the reserves of U.S. oil companies throughout the Middle East countries. The Shah agreed that he would militarily defend the new company's interests against any Arab bullying. But the idea got sidetracked when Nixon became caught up in 1972 election politics--and Watergate.

One idea that does not appeal to Connally is that he head up a third party ticket. The proposal was made to him last month at his Texas ranch by three conservatives: Author Kevin Phillips, Fund Raiser Richard Viquerie, and Howard Phillips, director of the Conservative Caucus. Connally declined, stressing that it would lead to political fragmentation. Then with characteristic bluntness he added: "Let's not kid each other. If Reagan catches on, you fellows would drop me in a second."

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