An Interview with Ronald Reagan

By Laurence I. Barrett

Ready to go, the President-elect outlines policies for home and abroad

As he looks ahead to his Administration, Ronald Reagan concedes that the worsening economy might delay his timetable for balancing the budget, but he still intends to cut taxes as well as spending. He wants to negotiate a new arms control pact with Moscow, but warns that an invasion of Poland could lead to a trade and diplomacy "quarantine" against the Soviet Union. On other subjects, from welfare to the environment to human rights, he maintains his basic firm, conservative line. Shortly before Christmas, Reagan discussed his views in a lengthy interview with TIME Senior Correspondent Laurence I. Barrett, who covered his campaign throughout the election year of 1980. During their session, Reagan lounged comfortably in an easy chair in his Pacific Palisades home, obviously at ease in his new starring role. Highlights:

Q. Sir, you have picked most of your Cabinet, conferred with President Carter, received scores of task force reports and explored the Washington Establishment. Have your views of the presidency and its challenges changed since the election?

A. No, I think I have always been well aware of the enormity of it, the difficulties, the fact that you cannot undo in a minute and a half what it has taken quite a long time to build up. I suppose if there is anything that has changed at all, it has been the deterioration of the economy, which makes the problem even more acute.

Q. Do you agree with a number of economists who are predicting that we are in for yet another downturn?

A. We have been on a downward slide for several weeks now. But that just strengthens my belief that this is the time for what we have been advocating, which is a totally different policy. And I would think that even if some people question that different policy or are not in complete agreement with my own faith in it, and others' faith in it, that at least they would recognize it is time for a change, tune to try something different. I think that [the problems with the economy] will just mean that it will probably take a little longer for the effects to be seen.

Q. Do you still hope that you will be able to balance the budget by fiscal 1983?

A. I'm hoping, but you have got to remember that every percentage point of additional unemployment adds billions of dollars to the cost of Government and reduces Government revenues because of people no longer paying taxes.

Q. So it is much more difficult to reach that balance?

A. Yes.

Q. David Stockman, your choice to run the Office of Management and Budget, and Congressman Jack Kemp are talking about declaring a national emergency on the economic front. Have you decided to do that?

A. No final decision has been made. The only purpose that it would really serve would be not only to focus attention on the Government, but to convince people of the seriousness of our economic crisis. It does not mean that if you did that I would suddenly have fabulous powers, or I could go ax-wielding in every direction.

Q. How would you try to reduce social welfare programs?

A. There is no question about maintaining the level of support for those people truly in need. But there can be a tightening up of regulations that make it legitimately possible for people of rather fair income to continue getting certain social welfare grants.

Q. Do you have any plans to back away at all from your intention to cut personal income taxes 10% a year for three years?

A. No.

Q. Or the attack on regulations?

A. No.

Q. You have said that you were opposed only to environmental "extremism." What precisely do you mean by that?

A. When I use that term extremism, I mean a kind of literal translation of some of the regulations. For instance, you may find a demand for 100% purity of water. Now the streams you are turning that water into are not 100% pure, and in many instances the cost of getting up to 100% may be several times greater than the cost of getting to 95%. I think you have to have some realism about looking at something of that kind and saying wait a minute here.

Q. It is your desire to make the margins of these regulations more rational?

A. That's right. I prize clean air and clean water as much as anyone else. And certainly from the standpoint of preserving beauty, I am an environmentalist.

Q. But you are also an advocate of the so-called sagebrush rebellion that would turn federal lands in the West back to the states.

A. Yes. Because there I think the Federal Government has gone against the very principles of the Constitution. You must remember that the Federal Government was created by the states, not the other way around. And now [laughing] this monster the states have created is acting as the master over the states.

Q. But doesn't your experience as a Governor tell you that if a lot of acreage were turned back to the states, it would be much more vulnerable to rapid development because state governments are less able than Washington to withstand all of the pressure from business interests?

A. But are they? Just look at your own area. Look at California. Look at how easily even neighborhoods can stop a development. What makes us think Americans are more environmentally minded at the national level than they are at the state level? I just don't believe that. Now I also believe, however, that the Federal Government [has a role to play] with national parks and certain wilderness areas that are unique. They're not part of the sagebrush rebellion. I think there is a happy medium in which you preserve beauty, but to have a state in which 80% of the land belongs to the Federal Government does not make much sense.

Q. Are you worried that the Thatcher government in Britain has adopted measures similar to your proposals to try to curb inflation and revive a stagnant economy, and yet has had to modify some of its policies?

A. No. England is about 15 years ahead of us in going down that road of intervention and outright nationalization of industries. I think Prime Minister Thatcher has a monumental task.

Q. Moving on to foreign affairs, what do you think a Warsaw Pact invasion of Poland would do to East/West relations?

A. I think that the Soviet Union has got to be convinced that the results of such an action would be very severe. Now, you can ask yourself, how would the free world quarantine the Soviet Union with regard to trade and so forth? You have to ask yourself, can the Soviet Union exist on its own? It never has. The Soviet Union, with all its boastfulness about its system, could not live without support and help by way of trade and so forth from capitalist nations. If their system is so great, how come they're not self-sufficient? They are probably richer in minerals and fuel supplies than any other nation.

Q. So you think a quarantine might be one repercussion of an invasion?

A. It shows the possibilities. The Soviet Union is not as rich industrially as the rest of Europe. It has a smaller population than the rest of Europe. Maybe it's time for us to get out of this syndrome, if that's the proper word ... to stop thinking of the Soviets as being ten feet tall. They're not all that invulnerable.

Q. If the Soviets do not move on Poland, do you now have in mind even a rough timetable for arms control talks? Are you getting any signals from Brezhnev?

A. There is no way for me to outline a timetable on that. I have made it plain that I believe in legitimate negotiations that are aimed at reducing the strategic nuclear weapons in the world. I just think you cannot sit down at the negotiating table and ignore the policies of the Soviet Union, when you're talking disarmament, while they're carrying on as they are in Afghanistan and Africa and so forth.

Q. President Nixon introduced detente with the Soviets. As a Republican, do you think that in the eyes of the American public you would also have more leeway than a Democrat to deal with Moscow?

A. No, I don't think so. I could sum up in one sentence, I think, what I feel the attitude toward Russia should be. The Soviet empire should know that there will be no further concessions from us unless there is a concession in return.

Q. Do you have any sense of their view of you from whatever you have been able to learn since the election?

A. Oh, I have just read some of the things that are quoted in the press and how they are looking forward and all that, and that is fine. Why, what else can they say?

Q. President Nixon has been in touch with you occasionally since the election. Do you expect to be discussing foreign policy with him periodically once you are in the White House?

A. I have not made any plans, but I would not rule it out. I think there is no question, if you look back at the record, about his knowledge of world affairs and world figures.

Q. Concerning the Middle East, do you plan to follow President Sadat's recommendation to call for a new summit meeting with yourself, Sadat and Prime Minister Begin?

A. Obviously, I don't want any retreat there on the part of our country. I wa.nt to make it plain to both Sadat and Prime Minister Begin that the United States does have an interest in the Middle East. We should not try to dictate a settlement, but be as helpful as we can in arriving at a settlement.

Q. Have you developed any further your belief that the U.S. should establish a military presence in the Middle East?

A. The idea of a "presence" is not that you're going to try to build up an army big enough to stop the Soviet Union if it moves that way. That is not what is necessary. What is necessary is to indicate to them that by taking any reckless moves they would be facing a possible confrontation.

Q. You are referring to the so-called trip-wire effect?

A. Yes

Q. You have expressed a good deal of interest in improving relations with Central America. What specifically should the U.S. be doing to help restore stability in the latest trouble spot, El Salvador?

A. I think that with regard to all of our neighbors to the south, we have been somewhat insensitive to our size and our power. We have gone at them with plans and proposals and with good intentions, but it appears to them that this is something in the nature of an order. Here is a plan. Accept it. I think it is time for us to approach them only with the idea that I think we all share, and that is that there must be a more practical and better relationship than we have had because of [a common] interest in freedom. Maybe our first approach should be to find out their suggestions. How can we mutually benefit each other? I look forward to trying that. Concerning El Salvador, I think that there is one thing you have to say about the situation there: it is almost a kind of civil war. When that is happening, and if reforms are needed --and admittedly reforms are needed--you do not try to fight a civil war and institute reforms at the same time. Get rid of the war. Then go forward with the reforms.

Q. Some foreign governments consider you to be less concerned than the Carter Administration about their handling of protest movements. How strongly should the U.S. push nations like those in Central America on human rights?

A. Well, first of all, of course, I'm for human rights. And I think that is an American position, and I do not think we will ever retreat from it or ever should. But I think we have to balance better than we have. We should not carry our campaign for human rights to some small country we can pressure to the point where a government that, let's say, partially violates human rights in our eyes is succeeded by a government that denies all human rights. For example, Cuba. There was no question about Batista, and violations there of human rights in our eyes. But can we say the people in Cuba are today better off than they were before? In no way. There are no human rights under Castro. There are no human rights under the Soviet Union, as we see them. Now how can we justify making every concession in the world to have detente with the Soviet Union at the same time that we use the mailed fist, you might say, against some smaller country that in some instances, faced with dissent, violates human rights? What I believe is that we do our utmost to bring about [improvement in human rights] in those countries that are aligned with us, but not at the expense of helping an overthrow by a [faction] that is totalitarian. Take South Korea as an example. The South Korean government is doing things that we do not support. We wish they could be different. Do we take an action that opens South Korea up to possible conquest by North Korea where, again, there are no human rights?

Q. How do you see Sino-American relations evolving? Do you anticipate eventually selling "lethal" as opposed to "nonlethal" military equipment to the Chinese?

A. This is a subject that is going to take a great deal of study. I would like to envision a China that could eventually be a legitimate ally of the free world. I think there has to be a certain degree of caution, remembering that this is a country whose government subscribes to an ideology based on a belief in destroying governments like ours. I will meet them with an open mind and in an honest attempt to improve friendly relations, but I am also going to keep in mind that I do not want to go so fast that some day weapons we might have provided will be shooting at us.

Q. Do you envision even the dim possibility of a military alliance with the Chinese if they maintain their present form of government?

A. I don't know.

Q. You have often talked about what the Federal Government should not attempt to do. Yet you have also urged a return to "traditional values," to use your phrase. What role do you see yourself taking in the area of traditional values or social questions?

A. Well, I suppose that is in the context of what Teddy Roosevelt said about the White House being a bully pulpit. I think that all of our leaders, whether state, local or national, can have an impact by setting examples themselves, and trying to see that government is as high-principled as it can be, ending if possible this concept that most people in America now accept that there's a double standard--that you can accept things in politics that you would not accept in private business or your own dealings.

Q. Does use of the bully pulpit include using the President's prestige to promote constitutional amendments outlawing abortion in most circumstances and sanctioning prayer in public schools and that sort of thing?

A. Long before I ever sought this job, I believed that the outlawing of prayer, nonsectarian prayer, in public schools was not a defense of the First Amendment but was actually against the Constitution, which says that the Congress shall make no laws concerning the establishment of religion or the restriction of it or its practice and so forth. I just think [the restrictions] went too far. This is a nation under God. It is still on our coins: in god WE TRUST. The Divine Providence is mentioned in our most important documents, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. As for abortion, I think it is a constitutional question. The [advocates] of the right of abortion speak of the right of a mother or a prospective mother and her own body. We are talking of two bodies.

Q. The President can have a lot to say about these controversial issues, or he can stand back and let political nature take its course. Do you plan to speak out?

A. Yes, because I think what you say about letting political nature take its course means that the advocates of one position are supposed to remain silent while the advocates on the other side can be as vociferous as they want to be. Some of the exponents of atheism--and I do not challenge anyone's right to believe or not believe--but some of them do not realize that in effect they have created almost a religion of their own in that belief and are demanding things for their religion that they would deny others.

Q. Senator Strom Thurmond and some of your other Senate supporters want to reinstitute the death penalty in the federal criminal code. There has also been talk about either repealing or substantially altering the Voting Rights Act. What are your views on these two issues?

A. I was opposed to the Voting Rights Act from the very beginning, but not because I was opposed to the right to vote. I was opposed to the act being applied only to several states. I say make it apply to everybody. As to capital punishment, so long as it is confined to those crimes for which the Federal Government has the authority to act, I am in favor of it. I think that capital punishment is a deterrent. [Reagan implied that he would not involve himself in the capital punishment issue at the state level, though he felt the same way about the question in that context.]

Q. How do you react to criticism from the far right of your party that your Cabinet selections do not represent the rightward edge of your original constituency?

A. I do not think they know the people I have appointed very well, because I think the appointees do have a "rightward edge." One of the most important considerations I have had is that they agree with what I have enunciated as the policies of this Administration; we have picked people on that basis. I said also that I wanted people who were not necessarily seeking a job in Government but would have to be persuaded to take one and would even have to step down from achievements that were far greater in their own careers. I think I have followed that. The sacrifice that has been made by some of those Cabinet appointees is more than just stepping down. It's jumping off a bridge.

Q. One thing that set your campaign apart from many others is that you always seemed to maintain a very healthy sense of humor out there on the road. Even when things were not going well. Are you going to continue to do that?

A. Yes. I think I'm very fortunate that I can find occasion to laugh even when the situation may not warrant it.

Q. Or, perhaps more important, help your audience, which is now the whole country and the whole world, to laugh?

A. You know, you can quote Lincoln on that. Lincoln said that if he had lost the ability to laugh during the terrible times in which he presided, he could not have gone on--that the job would have been intolerable. I think one of the great compliments to Americans was given by Winston Churchill in the dark days of World War II when he said of American soldiers that they seemed to be the only people who could laugh and fight at the same time.

Q. And you're going to do the same thing?

A. Yes.

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