Demonstrations of Dignity

By Hugh Sidey

Compared with Moscow's goose-stepping solemnity or the glitter of a Parisian greeting, what the White House produced for the arrival of Britain's Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher last week was really quite modest. And yet it was a splendid tribute to a friend--and indeed to the U.S.

An honor guard ranked the South Lawn, green with spring's first surge. Battle streamers from Lexington to Viet Nam snapped on their staffs in the chill flurries. Trumpets soared and the mellow growl of trombones echoed down the Mall: God Save the Queen. It was a moment of dignity, in a nation that craves it.

Perhaps it is Ronald Reagan's pervasive faith in pageantry that set the stage. Whatever its origins, that sense of dignity is an important part of the new Administration's appeal in these first tender weeks. Dignity is not leadership, but it creates an aura of care and concern.

"The atmosphere in the White House has changed," says Curator Clem Conger. "You can look around and see the difference." He means that literally. "The White House was a mess," Reagan told friends. Budget restraint had led to peeling paint, holes in the plaster and just plain dirt. "They [meaning the Carters] wouldn't let us do anything," said a man from General Services Administration. "That wasn't good. After all, this is the White House." Cleanup, paint-up are under way.

The press has noticed that White House secretaries are pleasant when they answer the phones. That may change, but for now it is a novelty. Secret Service agents have been seen smiling. Their kind of man, both politically and personally, is back. Reagan is just plain courteous to almost everyone. "Too nice sometimes," snapped an aide. One morning the President told his staff firmly that he was getting "impatient" for a certain report. Recalled one: "That is as nasty as I have heard him be so far."

The President one day noted a T shirted camera crewman on the premises. That sparked an order for those around the Oval Office to dress appropriately. The Reagan staff is compiling a code of behavior for all the staff, both on and off the job. "They are," insists Chief Jim Baker, "symbols for the rest of the country."

Reagan has been as meticulous in his dress as he has been with his use of language. David Kennerly, White House photographer for Jerry Ford, spent a day shooting Reagan on the job. His viewfinder assessment of Reagan's bearing: "natural dignity." There is a touch of Hollywood, of course. Reagan's suits now and then get a little beyond the Brooks Brothers stripe, and he sometimes wears shoes with gold hardware. But blue jeans stay out there on the ranch in California.

A magazine noted that the White House was looking for Western art to give the Reagans a whiff of home while they reside back East; that brought a deluge of contemporary works, most of them bad. They have been stored away in a closet. What the President had in mind was great paintings of an earlier West, scenes by the likes of Albert Bierstadt, Thomas Moran and Charles Russell. Reagan wants the Western feel with class. Curiously, Reagan balances this new formality with his own habit of doing things himself. The sight of Lyndon Johnson sticking out his hand and a hovering steward thrusting in a fresh drink is still remembered around the White House. Reagan gets his own glass of water, when he can. "In the White House there is a fellow there to throw the logs on the fire," he complained last week, talking about why he does his own chores on the ranch. "I like to do that myself."

What men of power sometimes forget is that they are creations of other times and other events and other people. Dignity is a demonstration that they understand, and that they pay special tribute to as something beyond themselves.

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