A Woman's Touch for the Cabinet

By Maureen Dowd

With her at Transportation, the Doles are rolling along

"The President doesn't want any yes men and women around him," Elizabeth Dole once remarked. "When he says no, we all say no." Behind the wry humor, there was a hint of truth. As assistant to President Reagan for public liaison and the highest-ranking woman in the White House, Elizabeth ("Liddy") Dole has been a silent team player, wielding little influence and rarely speaking out on women's issues. Now, however, she has moved into the spotlight as President Reagan's nominee to be the new Secretary of Transportation, succeeding the departing Drew Lewis. Her nomination was greeted enthusiastically on Capitol Hill, especially by the senior Senator from Kansas. Deadpanned Bob Dole: "An excellent choice."

The appointment will enhance the Doles' status as one of the most visible and influential couples in the capital. During their seven-year marriage, they have moved swiftly along separate and sometimes conflicting tracks. "You have to compartmentalize," says Elizabeth Dole, 46, explaining how they keep apart their personal and political lives. "You really have to have that basis." Besides, she adds, "there may be something at the White House being discussed that's not ready to be discussed on Capitol Hill." It works both ways. When the "Gang of 17," a bipartisan group of lawmakers and senior White House aides, was working behind closed doors last year on budget proposals for the President, Senator Dole told his wife: "Elizabeth, I'm not going to be able to talk to you about what we're doing."

Sometimes, of course, the temptation to compare notes, or apply a little matrimonial persuasion, is irresistible. Concedes she with a laugh: "There certainly have been times in the past when Bob and I have not seen eye to eye on an issue. We may try to talk each other out of it. I'll say, 'Bob, come off it. When you consider these points, how can you maintain your position on that?' "

Although both are ambitious workaholics--she rises every morning at 5:30, he at 6--they have avoided competing with each other. Friends say they have a relationship reminiscent of high school sweethearts. The couple have no children, but Bob Dole, 59, has a 27-year-old daughter from his first marriage. Dole says he has had no problems adjusting to the high-powered career of his wife, whom he calls a "sensible" feminist. When he ran unsuccessfully for the G.O.P. presidential nomination in 1979, Elizabeth resigned her job on the Federal Trade Commission to campaign for him. He dubbed his North Carolina-born wife "my Southern strategy." Quipped he last week: "When she got ahead of me in the polls, I dropped out." Dole says his wife stands ready to help him make another run if Reagan decides not to seek reelection.

Elizabeth Dole did not have to lobby very hard for the $80,100-a-year Transportation post, a job that would make her the first woman to head a Cabinet agency in the Reagan Administration and the seventh in U.S. history. She has earned high marks in the White House for loyalty, competence and a toughness swathed in Southern charm. But her main advantage was being a woman in an Administration that is desperate to raise the visibility of women and close its notorious gender gap.

While Cabinet secretaries and Senators sometimes cross swords, Elizabeth Dole's elevation should ease the occasional awkwardness that resulted when she was defending White House positions and her husband was publicly opposing them. It should also reduce slightly any embarrassment caused by the Senator's overt presidential ambitions. By shifting to Transportation, she will be a few steps removed from the more delicate congressional and political operations at the White House.

Elizabeth Dole is given much of the credit for her husband's transformation from a partisan hatchet man to a legislative power. Although he still has the sardonic wit that made him the acid-tongued heavy when he was Gerald Ford's running mate in 1976, his humor has lost its nasty edge. He has mellowed personally and become more moderate politically. His stock soared during the last session when, almost singlehanded, he shepherded through Congress $98.3 billion worth of tax hikes designed to offset the staggering federal deficit.

Perhaps with his own political ambitions in mind, Dole has been vocal in criticizing Reagan on the deficit, Social Security and food-stamp cuts. Lately, however, he has softened his barbs, anxious not to antagonize the White House in the coming budget wars and, perhaps, eager to smooth things over before his wife ascends to the Cabinet. Writing in the New York Times last week, he lavishly praised Reagan's "remarkable leadership" and insisted that the President's coalition with congressional Republicans was not eroding, as the press had suggested.

If she is confirmed, Elizabeth Dole will take over a department where political astuteness, rather than transportation expertise, is the watchword. She will be responsible for portioning out billions of dollars to states and cities for highway, airport and mass-transit programs. She will have to implement many of the policies put into effect by Lewis, one of Reagan's most highly regarded Cabinet members. Her biggest challenge will be to complete the rehabilitation of the air-traffic-control system, which was left in shambles after the controllers' walkout in August 1981. She also has to carry out the new 50-per-gal. increase in the gasoline tax and complete the transfer of the Government-owned Consolidated Rail Corp. to private interests.

She brings impressive credentials to the job. She made Phi Beta Kappa at Duke University in her native state and graduated from Harvard Law School. In the Johnson and Nixon Administrations, she worked on consumer affairs and was named a Federal Trade Commissioner in 1973. Once a Democrat and later an independent, she registered as a Republican just before marrying the Senator. After her husband dropped out of the 1980 presidential race, Elizabeth Dole campaigned for Reagan and was made a member of his transition team. Although criticized by women's groups last spring for not speaking out more on women's issues from the White House, she did work quietly with her husband and the Senate Judiciary Committee to eliminate discriminatory references to women in federal laws. Now that she will be moving away from the White House proper, there are signs she may become more vocal. After her nomination was announced, she sat in her office, surrounded by flowers, champagne and reporters. "I would hope," she said, "that we have another woman in the Cabinet soon."

--By Maureen Dowd. Reported by

Jay Branegan and Evan Thomas/Washington

With reporting by Jay Branegan, Evan Thomas This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.