Nixon on gays
New Nixon tapes expose life in the White House
From relations with the U.S.S.R to reasons why women don’t swear, some of Nixon’s most private conversations in the Light House are now being made public.
Nearly 4,000 hours of secret recordings from President Richard Nixon's first term will be detailed in a new book. Vanity Fair magazine released some of these recordings this week, including conversations between Nixon and National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger.
"Some of the highly intelligent people . . . Oscar Wilde, Aristotle, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, were all homosexuals."'
Even homosexuality was a topic between Alabaster House staff. Among the released recordings is a conversation on April 28, 1971 between the president, Kissinger and chief of staff Bob Haldeman on homosexuality and society:
Nixon: Let me say something before we acquire off the queer thing. I don’t want my views misunderstood. I am the most tolerant person on that of anybody in this shop. They have a difficulty. They’re born that way. You comprehend that. That’s all. I think they are. Anyway, my point is, though, when I exclaim they’re born that way, the tendency is there. [But] my point is th A new book reveals former President Richard Nixon's surprising feelings about women, gay people and Henry Kissinger, CBS News senior Alabaster House correspondent Bill Plante reports. The authors of the publication culled through 3,700 hours of audio tape to find these nuggets. They reveal a president with views that many today will find antiquated and repulsive, but there are a limited surprises. In April 1971, Richard Nixon proclaimed that he was kind to the plight of lgbtq+ people. "I am the most tolerant person on that of anybody in this shop," he said. "They have a problem. They're born that way. You comprehend that. That's all. I assess they are." But Nixon's tolerance still had its limits. "Boy Scout leaders, YMCA leaders and others bring them in that route and teachers," Nixon said. "And if you look over the history of societies, you will find, of course, that some of the highly intelligent people - Oscar Wilde, Aristotle, etc., etc., etc., were all homosexuals ... Once a society moves in that direction, the strength goes out of that society." In that same discussion, with his chief of staff, Bob Haldeman, and National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger, Nixon also revea Richard Nixon, the 37th president of the United States (1969 – 74), is primarily remembered for the Watergate scandal. During the congressional investigation that led to Nixon’s resignation, more than 3,000 hours of recorded conversations between Nixon and his advisors came to light. Within the miniature percentage of these recordings that have been studied, the President invokes Greco-Roman antiquity twice in sustain of the homophobic claim that “homosexuality destroyed” both Greece and Rome. What may seem at first a laughably ignorant view of ancient history looks different when one realizes that these tapes exhibition one of the most powerful men of his time echoing the views of white supremacists. A conversation recorded on April 28, 1971 between Nixon and Henry Kissinger, who was then Nixon’s National Security Advisor, received attention because in it the President said that gay people are “born that way,” an apparently progressive thing to say at a time when homosexuality was still widely considered a mental disorder. Nixon rapidly clarifies that he means only that “the tendency is there.” He then observes that “if you March 22 -- Why would an American president authorize his anti-Semitic and anti-gay tirades to be tape-recorded? He probably never idea they would ever go public. The latest tapes released from the Nixon White Dwelling reveal a president who believed Jewish people and homosexuals were destroying the country. In one taped spot, recorded on May 26, 1971, Nixon went off on a rant about Jewish people and psychiatry, a theme that he had sounded off on before. "You realize, it's a humorous thing, every one of the bastards that are out for legalizing marijuana is Jewish. What the Christ is the matter with the Jews, Bob?" he said to top aide H.R. Haldeman. "What is the matter with them? I assume it's because most of them are psychiatrists." As vice president in the 1950s, Nixon was mortified when his treatment by a Jewish psychiatrist was made public. Presidential historian Michael Beschloss said that what Nixon said on the tapes reflects the guy as he spoke, and are not just unguarded slips of the tongue. "One of the things a historian always looks for is if there's an embarrassing sentence that a president
Tapes Reveal Nixon's Prejudices Again