I Never Knew There Was Such A Thing

By Ed Magnuson

Washington agog: Who took Carter's briefing book ?

The New York Times called Ronald Reagan "evasive and sanctimonious about the ethical issues." The Washington Post concluded that "something not quite cricket happened." Even the conservative New York Daily News complained that Reagan had "bobbed and weaved and waffled."

The episode that inspired such editorial dudgeon last week was the notice given to an anecdote offered in passing in a book on the Reagan presidency by TIME White "House Correspondent Laurence Barrett. He recounted that advisers had prepared Reagan for his Oct. 28,1980, debate with Jimmy Carter by using a position book assembled for Carter's use. At his prime-time TV press conference last week, Reagan was peppered with twelve questions about the incident, more than half of all the queries he received. By week's end the affair had ballooned into a criminal investigation by the Justice Department and a congressional probe also was under way.

Even some veteran Washington reporters protested that the story was being vastly overplayed. They blamed the yearning of their colleagues for excitement during a summertime news lull and one of the less attractive residuals of Watergate afflicting too much of the press: the fear of underplaying--and being beaten on--a scandal. The decisiveness of Reagan's election victory made the possession of a debate crib sheet seem irrelevant to the outcome. Said House Speaker Tip O'Neill about Carter: "We had an extremely unpopular candidate who would have lost, debate or no debate, briefing book or no briefing book."

Still, the Administration's handling of the miniscandal did much to feed the inquisitiveness of reporters. Reagan had first dismissed the fuss as "much ado about nothing." Budget Director David Stockman, who had used the papers while playing the role of Carter to rehearse Reagan for the debate, claimed that he did not know how the documents had been acquired. Chief of Staff James Baker readily admitted having seen the book and said he got it from CIA Director William Casey, who was then Reagan's campaign manager. Casey said he had "no recollection" of having seen it. Communications Director David Gergen, who had also helped prepare Reagan for the debate, similarly could not remember ever possessing such Carter papers.

Last week, however, a stack of Carter campaign documents was found by Gergen in his own files, in a section labeled "Afghanistan." They were released by the White House to Washington reporters just two hours before Reagan's press conference, along with the final briefing book presented by the Carter people, Reagan's final briefing book and a few memos. The surprising quantity of the material helped prompt the flurry of questions. Reagan remarked later to aides that he had fumbled his answers about the ethical implications of using an opponent's confidential papers.

Appearing nervous and defensive, Reagan said, "I never knew until you people made it public in the press a few days ago that there ever had been such material in possession of any people in our campaign organization. I never saw anything of the kind." Reagan asked what difference the Carter book made, "since it never got to the debater." He suggested that the material might have come from "a disgruntled worker in the Carter campaign." Even if it had been stolen, he said, "it probably wasn't too much different from the press rushing into print with the Pentagon papers, which were stolen." Still, Reagan said, he deplored the tendency of "people who are otherwise totally honest" to apply a "double standard" to politics.

Whether Reagan saw the Carter brief or the research materials for it was hardly a key point; his aides admitted using it, and Reagan failed to say clearly that he found anything wrong in that. Whether he knew that he was benefiting from information secured from his opponent's camp did not affect the possibility that he had gained an unfair advantage in the debate. The Pentagon papers analogy also was faulty. Reporters could argue that the public interest was served by publishing an official history, even if classified, of U.S. involvement in Viet Nam; the only beneficiaries of using the Carter book stolen or not, were Candidate Reagan and his party.

Reagan's failure to attempt to settle quickly the question of how his aides got the Carter papers seems likely to prolong the affair. Clearly, someone on his staff must know how the material was acquired and might even be expected to step up and say so. Instead of demanding an answer from his aides, Reagan ordered a search for all relevant Carter papers in staff files and promised they would be sent to the Justice Department to "monitor" the situation for any illegality. Pressed by reporters, he conceded that such monitoring could be considered an "investigation." The Justice Department announced that FBI agents would question the appropriate Carter and Reagan aides so that it could determine whether any laws were broken. Reagan also promised cooperation with an investigation by a House subcommittee headed by Democratic Representative Donald Albosta of Michigan.

Understandably, many Democrats were exploiting Reagan's predicament for all it was worth. Reagan's personal integrity has rarely been questioned, but some Democrats felt that if he tried to avoid any responsibility for the campaign actions of his aides, it might be.

Former Carter aides, including Pollster Pat Caddell and Press Secretary Jody Powell, met in Washington to fan the flames and also to try to pin down responsibility for what looked, at least, like a serious leak in the Carter White House. They studied the papers found in Gergen's files and concluded that they must have come from three staffs of the White House: those of the National Security Council, Vice President Walter Mondale and Domestic Adviser Stuart Eizenstat. Contended Caddell: "It was not simply one disgruntled person throwing something over the wall. There seems to have been a continuous flow of information." No one person could gain access to all these papers, Caddell theorized, "unless he was well trained in pilfering."

There was no evidence that the papers had been deliberately solicited by anyone in the Reagan campaign, although Barrett had surmised in his book that "a mole" had been planted in the Carter White House. Carter aides doubted the possibility that a White House secretary, hoping to curry favor with the possible new Administration, had sent the papers to the Reagan staff. Asked again about the briefing book while traveling in California later in the week, Reagan repeated: "We don't know how any of that happened, and I never knew there was such a thing, so we'll have to wait and find out."

The affair immediately put new pressure on a few key Reagan advisers. Stockman's candid observations about the Administration's juggling of budget statistics, quoted in the Atlantic in December 1981, had nearly cost him his job. Now he not only admitted talking to Barrett about the "pilfered" Carter debate book but conceded that he boasted on the very day of the debate about having used it. In a story buried on page 15 of the Elkhart, Ind., Truth newspaper, Stockman, then a Congressman from Michigan, was reported to have told a luncheon audience in Cassopolis, Mich., just what Carter would say in the debate and how Reagan would answer. He was quoted as saying he had used a "pilfered copy of the briefing book" to rehearse Reagan. Stockman pointed out last week, "If I was talking about it openly back then, I couldn't have considered it to be a very serious matter " The fact remains that to his detractors in the Administration, Stockman was once again cast as a one-man Freedom of Information Act.

CIA Director Casey had survived past probes of his finances and his choice of a relatively unqualified official as a top deputy of the CIA. Now he had been named by Baker as a conduit for the Carter papers. The Washington Post reported that in 1980 Casey had set up what he called an "intelligence operation" to keep the Reagan staff informed of any attempt by Carter to spring a much feared "October surprise" in the campaign, such as gaining freedom for the U.S. embassy hostages held captive in Tehran. The Post claimed that Casey had used retired military officers who favored Reagan's election to report any unusual U.S. troop movements that might signal a dramatic move by Carter abroad. Indeed, Carter's failure to secure the release of the hostages probably contributed more to his loss to Reagan than did the debate. Most polls had the election extremely close at the time of the debate, just a week before the vote. Though Carterites claimed the President had won the debate, polls afterward showed that most viewers thought Reagan had prevailed, but not decisively. Obviously, if the papers were purchased by Reagan campaign aides, or taken surreptitiously out of White House offices by someone working for them, the act might be not only unethical but, in the view of a court or jury, illegal as well. Apart from whoever took them, anyone in the Reagan camp who used the papers could conceivably be found guilty of receiving stolen goods. If any evidence of theft or bribery develops, the Justice Department will presumably determine whether it will prosecute or recommend the appointment of a special prosecutor

But if a White House employee voluntarily gave the Reagan staff the Carter papers the question of whether they should have been used becomes fuzzier. Not even former Carter aides could say with certainty what they would have done if similar Reagan material had reached them. Indeed, trying to find out about an opponent's campaign strategy is a political commonplace.

"Ethics are low in this town, says John Merriam, publisher of a newsletter about the Washington media. "There just ain't no political standards." Debate positions normally are taken from the previous public stands of the candidates. Says Ben Wattenberg, a political analyst at the conservative American Enterprise Institute: "Maybe the person who turned over the papers saved a Reagan research team an awful lot of trouble."

Still, there is little doubt that it is an advantage for one candidate to get an advance look at just how his opponent intends to answer various questions. It is true as Reagan noted in his press conference, that reporters determined what questions would be asked in the 1980 debate. But the candidates also could say whatever they wished in their opening and closing statements; that could make for some very prescient targeting if one man could anticipate the other's themes.

Whether the latest Washington flap was as big a deal as the Democrats, certain newspapers and the TV networks made it appear, however, was highly doubtful. It will depend in large part on how the briefing papers were acquired. Columbia History Professor Henry Graff put the episode in perspective by noting, "This is not something that has struck a lot of people in the solar plexus." A Columbia colleague, Political Scientist Alan F. Westin, criticized the tendency of many journalists thoughtlessly to dub the affair "briefingate" or "debategate. Said he: "I find myself just bored to tears by someone sticking 'gate' after every little foible." His point was well taken: the briefing book dispute did not remotely resemble a Watergate-class scandal. --By Ed Magnuson.

Reported by Douglas Brew with Reagan and Hays Gorey/Washington

Reported by Douglas Brew with Reagan and Hays Gorey/Washington

With reporting by Douglas Brew, Reagan, Hays Gorey/Washington This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.