Don
B. Reynolds was a graduate of West Point.
He joined the United States Army Airforce
(USAAF) and after the Second World War he served
as a U.S. consular official in Berlin.
On
his return to the United States he established
a company called Don Reynolds Associates in Silver Spring, Maryland.
Reynolds was a friend of Bobby Baker,
who was at this time working for Lyndon
B. Johnson. In 1957 Reynolds was asked to arrange Johnson's life
insurance policy. Baker also introduced Reynolds to Harry
S. Truman and Jimmy Hoffa.
In
1963 Senator John
Williams of
Delaware
began investigating the activities of Bobby
Baker. As a result of his work, Baker resigned
as the secretary to Lyndon
B. Johnson on
9th October, 1963. During his investigations Williams met Reynolds
and persuaded him to appear before
a secret session of the Senate Rules Committee.
Reynolds
told B. Everett Jordan and his committee
on 22nd November, 1963, that Johnson had demanded that he provided
kickbacks in return for him agreeing to this life insurance policy.
This included a $585 Magnavox stereo. Reynolds was also told by Walter
Jenkins that he had to pay for
$1,200 worth of advertising on KTBC, Johnson's television station
in Austin. Reynolds had paperwork for this transaction including a
delivery note that indicated the stereo had been sent to the home
of Johnson.
Reynolds
also told of seeing a suitcase full of money which Bobby
Baker described
as a "$100,000 payoff to Johnson for his role in securing the
Fort Worth TFX contract". His testimony came to an end when news
arrived that President John
F. Kennedy had
been assassinated.
As
soon as Johnson became president he contacted B.
Everett Jordan to see if there was any chance of stopping this
information being published. Jordan replied that he would do what
he could but warned Johnson that some members of the committee wanted
Reynold's testimony to be released to the public. On 6th December,
1963, Jordan spoke to Johnson on the telephone and said he was doing
what he could to suppress the story because " it might spread
(to) a place where we don't want it spread."
Abe
Fortas, a lawyer who represented both Lyndon
B. Johnson
and Bobby
Baker,
worked behind the scenes in an effort to keep this information from
the public. Johnson also arranged for a smear campaign to be organized
against Reynolds. To help him do this J.
Edgar Hoover passed
to Johnson the FBI file on Reynolds.
On
17th January, 1964, the Senate Rules Committee voted to release to
the public Reynolds' secret testimony. Johnson responded by leaking
information from Reynolds' FBI file to Drew
Pearson and Jack Anderson. On 5th
February, 1964, the Washington Post
reported that Reynolds had lied about his academic success at West
Point.
The article also claimed that Reynolds had been a supporter of Joseph
McCarthy and had accused business rivals of being secret members
of the American Communist Party. It
was also revealed that Reynolds had made anti-Semitic remarks while
in Berlin in 1953.
A
few weeks later the New York Times
reported that Lyndon
B. Johnson
had
used information from secret government documents to smear Reynolds.
It also reported that Johnson's officials had been applying pressure
on the editors of newspapers not to print information that had been
disclosed by Reynolds in front of the Senate Rules Committee.
John
McClellan, the chairman of the Senate subcommittee investigating
the TFX contract said that he wanted to interview Don Reynolds. However,
for some reason the subcommittee did not resume its investigation
until 1969, after Johnson had left office.
Don Reynolds also testified
before the Senate Rules and Administration Committee on 9th January,
1964. This time Reynolds provided little damaging evidence against
Johnson. As Reynolds told John
Williams after
the assassination: "My God! There's a difference between testifying
against a President of the United States and a Vice President. If
I had known he was President, I might not have gone through with it."
Maybe there were other reasons for this change of approach.
Reynolds also appeared
before the Senate Rules and Administration Committee on 1st December,
1964. Before the hearing Reynolds supplied a statement implicating
Bobby Baker and Matthew
H. McCloskey (Treasurer
of the National Democratic Party at the time) in financial corruption.
However, the Democrats had a 6-3 majority on the Committee and Reynolds
was not allowed to fully express the role that Johnson had played
in this deal.
In
December, 1966, Edward
Jay Epstein
wrote an article for the Esquire Magazine
where he claimed that Reynolds had given the Warren
Commission information
on the death of John
F. Kennedy.
Reynolds said that Bobby
Baker
had
told him that Kennedy "would never live out his term and that
he would die a violent death." Baker had also said that "the
FBI knew that Johnson was behind the assassination".
Open
Debate on the Kennedy Assassination
Namebase: Don B. Reynolds
(1)
Walter
Jenkins, telephone conversation with
Lyndon
B. Johnson
(27th January, 1964)
Walter Jenkins: "I've got considerably more detail
on Reynold's love life."
Lyndon
Johnson: "Well, get it all typed up for me."
(2)
Lyndon
B. Johnson,
telephone conversation with Pierre Salinger (8th February, 1964)
Al Friendly
(of the Washington Post) is in this thing pretty deep and he's been
pretty much misled by Reynolds and it's going to look bad that he's
tied up with a McCarthyite and a McCarranite and they're trying to
smear the President and Walter Jenkins and everybody else. About what?
About a $500 stereo set and $1,200 insurance advertising policy. So
he and the Post are awfully upset now about somebody leaking something
on Reynolds...
We've never seen the FBI
file. We have seen a narrative based on the file which points up some
bad things and shows that he's a no-good character, a page and a half
which says he's a no-good son of a bitch... Pearson wanted us to look
at the file and try to tell Zuckert to allow him to quote from it...
We told him we wouldn't do it. He got mad as hell. We've got a recording
of his conversation. He said, "By God, the President won't cooperate.
The President's no god-damn good. I'm trying to help the President."
. . . The Times and the Post are upset because of a personnel file,
that people have information on it. They're not a goddamn bit upset
about my personnel.
(3)
Merle Miller, Lyndon: An Oral Biography (1980)
The Senate
investigators that day agreed that since Reynolds' testimony was so
fascinating, they
would not adjourn for lunch, and thus they did not learn until late
afternoon that Jack
Kennedy had been assassinated and Lyndon Johnson had become president,
which changed things considerably. It is, or was then, one thing to
look into the affairs
of a vice-president, and quite another to examine those of a president,
particularly when
he had become president under such adverse circumstances.
Before they learned they
had a new president, however, the investigators were told by Reynolds
that he had sent the Johnson family a $585 Magnavox stereo set chosen,
he said, by Mrs. Johnson. And he had a copy of a receipt - he kept
a copy of everything, as men of his kind often do - which showed that
the set had in fact been charged to him and
had been shipped in a government car to 4921 Thirtieth Place, where
the Johnsons had
lived.
Naturally, all of Reynolds'
testimony was leaked to the press, but it might have made larger
headlines had Lyndon Johnson still been a largely powerless vice-president.
Now most newspapers
were inclined to play down the stories.
Most of the new president's
advisers told him to ignore Reynolds, but Abe Fortas counseled
him to tell his story to the public. So Johnson called a press conference
in which he said
that the Baker family had given the Johnson family the stereo. He
said the families
frequently exchanged gifts; he said further that he and Lady Bird
had used the stereo
for a period. What happened after that was rather vague; apparently
the set had been
given to some other friendly family. Who, why, and whether or not
the Baker family
often sent such expensive gifts to the Johnson family would forever
remain a mystery.
(4)
Bobby
Baker,
Wheeling and Dealing: Confessions of a Capitol Hill Operator
(1978)
As an official in
the Reynolds insurance firm, I received a $4,000 loan from profits
the firm made on the D.C. Stadium transaction. This was not the only
business I had brought Don Reynolds. I had placed with him insurance
on myself, the Carousel, the Serv-U Corporation, and had directed
LBJ, Carole Tyler, and Fred Black to him for insurance coverage.
Not satisfied with having
told the truth with respect to the LBJ insurance policy and kicking
back a stereo set to the Johnsons, and on the DC Stadium deal, Reynolds
now launched wilder and more inventive tales. Among these was that
I'd once flashed a black bag full of cash reportedly $1,00,000 - and
had indicated it was payoff money from General Dynamics to buy the
TFX contract. I never took a dime for myself, for LBJ, or anyone else
in connection with that contract. And, if I had done so, I certainly
would not have gone around flashing the cash and bragging about it
like a schoolboy. The test of credibility here, I think, is that no
one ever saw me exhibit that kind of conduct before or since. Reynolds
also claimed that he'd paid me $140,000 over the years; this was simply
preposterous. For years, however, IRS agents tried to find these nonexistent
funds. Only within the past few months has the IRS conceded that they
never existed.
As Reynolds continued to
make charges, one of which was that Lyndon Johnson had misused foreign
counterpart funds during his government travels, it irritated the
new president. Johnson then did a dumb thing. He leaked to his friend
columnist Drew Pearson, and to other favored newsmen, FBI and Pentagon
reports which accused Reynolds of having been forced out of West Point
for improper conduct, of having dealt in the black market while overseas
in the army, of having brought unfounded charges against others in
the past, and of a general instability. This not only was illegal
and improper, it also created sympathy for Reynolds - One Man takes
on the Establishment - and provided fodder to Scott, Williams, Curtis,
Karl Mundt, and other Republican senators eager to prove White House
meddling and a whitewash in the Baker case.
It was amusing, however,
to note that at a given point Senator Hugh Scott began to soft-pedal
criticism of me and to sing hosannas to the new president: "I
have so much desire not to damage the Republic. I think Lyndon Johnson
is a fine, can-do president, a man of action. I believe he is sincerely
advancing a program he believes is in the best interest of this country."
There was good reason for Senator Scott's conversion, as I learned
through the White House grapevine: LBJ had threatened to close down
the Philadelphia Navy Yard unless Senator Scott closed his critical
mouth.
(5)
Edward
Jay Epstein,
Esquire Magazine (December, 1966)
In January of 1964 the Warren Commission learned that Don B. Reynolds,
insurance agent and close associate of Bobby Baker, had been heard
to say the FBI knew that Johnson was behind the assassination. When
interviewed by the FBI, he denied this. But he did recount an incident
during the swearing in of Kennedy in which Bobby Baker said words
to the effect that the s.o.b. would never live out his term and that
he would die a violent death.
(5) Carl T. Curtis, Forty Years Against the Tide (1986)
When Bobby Baker began as a page in 1943, his salary was $1,460 a year. Yet he soon became a wealthy man. The minority report of the committee that investigated his activities (filed on July 8, 1964) had this to say about Baker's amassing of wealth:
"According to financial statements submitted by Baker, he had a net worth of $11,025 as of May 3, 1954. As of February 1, 1963, Baker claimed a net worth of $2,166,886. It is agreed, however, that this latter figure carried errors and exaggerations. After the known errors are taken into account, Baker's claimed net worth would be $1,664, 287. However, it may well be contended that Baker over-valued his Serv-U Corporation stock, with its very lucrative contracts in plants having huge government defense contracts, as well as his stock in the Mecklenburg enterprises and his land near Silver Springs, Maryland. If these assets are carried at their actual cost, Baker still would have a net worth of $447,849. It is obvious that these three assets were very valuable and their value had increased considerably over Baker's initial investment."
The Committee's records show that between January, 1959, and November, 1963, Baker and his associates had borrowed $2,784,338 from lending institutions. These loans had come from twenty-four banks and other lending institutions. The Committee's investigator also reported that Baker's share in approximately six different loans was $1,704,538.
All the time that Baker was making himself a man of wealth, he continued to serve as a most important and influential employee of the United States Senate.
Fred B. Black, Jr., a management consultant whose clients included North American Aviation and Melpar, Inc., and who was associated with Baker in several business ventures, said that the late Senator Robert S. Kerr, of Oklahoma, had told him that outside of his sons and his wife, he never knew and loved a person so much as he did Bobby Baker; that there was nothing Kerr would not do for Baker if he would ask him. Later Black said that he and Baker and the Serv-U Corporation had borrowed over half a million dollars from Kerr's Oklahoma City Bank.
Baker's operations became a subject of some discussion, raising questions in the minds of several senators and Senate employees. Eventually, on September 9, 1963, a law-suit was filed by Ralph L. Hill, president of the Capitol Vending Company, which alleged wrongdoing and the use of governmental influence in Baker's business dealings.
In his suit, Hill alleged that Baker had employed political influence to obtain contracts in defense plants for his own vending-machine firm, called Serv-U Corporation. Hill also charged that Baker had accepted $5,600 for securing a vending-machine franchise for Capitol Vending with Melpar, Inc., a defense plant in Virginia. Hill stated that after Capitol had secured the contract with Melpar, Baker had tried to persuade Capitol Vending to sell out to the Serv-U Corporation; and that when Capitol refused to sell its stock to Serv-U, Baker had conspired maliciously to interfere with Capitol's contract with Melpar. The suit contended that Baker had told Fred B. Black, Jr., that he, Baker, was in a position to help obtain contracts with the government. Hill said that in return, North American (to which Black was a consultant) entered into an agreement to permit Serv-U to install vending machines in its Californian plants.
The filing of this suit brought to light many unpleasant facts, reflecting not only on Bobby Baker but on those men about him and on the Senate generally.
At this point, Senator John Williams, of Delaware, began to take an active part. Williams was a man beyond reproach, sincere and intelligent and dedicated. During his service in the Senate he was rightly referred to as "the conscience of the Senate." He was an expert investigator, tenacious and courageous. Senator Williams became the prime mover in bringing about the investigation of Baker.
On October 3, 1963, Williams went to Senator Mike Mansfield, the majority leader, and to Senator Everett McKinley Dirksen, the minority leader, and arranged for them to call Baker before the leadership at a closed meeting on October 8. It was Senator Williams' plan to confront Baker with questions about his activities. Bobby Baker never appeared before the Senate's leadership: the day before his scheduled appearance he resigned his post with its salary of $19,600.
Senator Mansfield, announcing Bobby Baker's resignation, said that "Baker has discharged his official duties for eight years with great intelligence and understanding. His great ability and his dedication to the Majority and to the Senate will be missed." Developments during recent weeks, however, Senator Mansfield continued, had made it apparent that it would be best if Baker withdrew from office. "I deeply regret the necessity for his resignation and the necessity for its acceptance."
Senator Williams introduced a resolution calling upon the Committee on Rules and Administration to conduct an investigation of the financial and business interests and possible improprieties of any Senate employee or former employee. On October 10, 1963, the Senate adopted this resolution by voice vote.
The Committee on Rules and Administration was made up of nine members, six Democrats and three Republicans. The Committee's chairman was B. Everett Jordan, Democrat, of North Carolina. The other Democratic members were Carl Hayden, of Arizona; Claiborne Pell, of Rhode Island; Joseph Clark, of Pennsylvania; Howard W. Cannon, of Nevada; and Robert C. Byrd, of West Virginia. The Republican members were John Sherman Cooper, of Kentucky; Hugh Scott, of Pennsylvania; and Carl T. Curtis.
This Committee held its first meeting for the Baker investigation on October 29. Senator Williams, testifying in closed session, recommended that the Committee investigate the FBI files of a deported East German woman, a Mrs. Ellen Rometsch (otherwise known as Elli Rometsch), who had been identified in news stories as a "party girl" associating with lobbyists and members of Congress. He urged also that the Committee look into Baker's transactions with the Mortgage Guaranty Insurance Corporation; into the large sums of cash given by Bobby Baker to Mrs. Gertrude Novak, wife of a business partner of Baker; into the vending contract referred to in Hill's suit against Baker.
Additionally, Williams recommended that the Committee investigate circumstances surrounding the rapid growth of the Serv-U Corporation, Baker's company; charges against Baker with reference to irregularities connected with the Senate payroll of pages and other employees working under Baker; Baker's brokerage-fee from the Haitian-American Meat Provision Company. The Committee should look into the transactions between Baker and Don Reynolds connected with Reynolds' selling of insurance to Senator Lyndon B. Johnson, Williams continued. The Committee should check the performance-bond for the building of the stadium at Washington.
Having heard Senator Williams, the three Republicans on the Committee requested that the Committee hire outside counsel to conduct the investigation. This move was opposed by the six Democrats on the Committee. Chairman Jordan, presently yielding to public pressure, announced on November 13 that L. F. McLendon, a lawyer from Jordan's home state of North Carolina, was appointed outside counsel.
The Committee on Rules and Administration needed to agree on some procedures. In this the Committee received considerable help from the Subcommittee on Investigations of the Government Operations Committee, headed by Senator John McClellan, of Arkansas. McClellan had followed a procedure of first calling a witness-particularly a controversial witnessin a closed session of the Committee, to inform the Committee what to expect and how to frame their questions. Later the witness would be called in public session. In the investigation of Baker, this rule was not followed, as we shall see later in this account of the great cover-up.
Bobby Baker was a highly successful contact-man. During and after the Second World War, on either side of the Atlantic, the contact-man loomed large. Contact-men existed primarily to obtain for their clients and themselves some share of the vast pool of riches in the possession of swollen centralized political bureaucracies. The more impressive a contact-man's political connections, the better he and his clients would fare. Professor W. L. Burn, in England, well described this international phenomenon:
"One may imagine the stage festooned with forms, applications for licenses, refusals of licenses, checks that failed to command confidence and agreements that failed to produce the desired result. Music is supplied by the ringing of the telephone, the prelude to ambiguous and improbable conversations; and through the half-lit jungle, from public dinner to government department, from government department to sherry party, glides the contact-man, at once the product and the safety-valve of this grotesque civilization."
In Washington, Bobby Baker had become a principal actor in such tragi-comic dramas.
Baker was called as a witness early in the investigation, appearing both in a closed session and in a public session. He had received a subpoena directing him to appear and to produce certain documents. Senator Curtis requested him to submit the required records. Baker refused. The following extracts from the Committee's hearings may suffice to suggest Baker's response. (It should be remembered in this connection that a witness's refusal to answer on the ground that he might incriminate himself raises a legitimate presumption that indeed the witness has committed some act which might subject him to a criminal prosecution.)
Replying to Senator Curtis, Baker refused to produce the desired records. He declared that he had so informed the committee earlier, and therefore should not have been called back to repeat his position.
"Today's proceedings are an unconstitutional invasion by the legislative branch into the proper function of the judiciary," Baker argued. "I do not intend to participate as a defendant witness in a legislative trial of myself, when my counsel has no right to cross-examine my accusers, or summon witnesses in my defense, and when the testimony has been taken both in secret and in the open."
Baker continued that the records were not "pertinent to any bona fide legislative purpose." A case pending in the U. S. District Court of the District of Columbia, he mentioned, in volved some of the documents called for. "I am presently being investigated by two agencies of the executive branch, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Internal Revenue Service. To force production of these records against this background would be to do indirectly for these agencies what they cannot lawfully do direct. " Moreover, his "privacy of communication" had been invaded by government personnel, so he was refusing to provide any additional information to government agents. Baker concluded by invoking "the protection of the first, the fourth, the fifth, and the sixth amendments of the Constitution, and I specifically invoke the privilege against selfincrimination."
So it went through the questioning of Bobby Baker. Altogether, he "took the Fifth" in response to a hundred and twenty questions.
Senator Curtis asked him, "Will you advise the committee whether or not you acquired the cash referred to by Mrs. Novak in the course of your duties as secretary to the Majority of the U. S. Senate?" Baker "stood on his previous answer" that is, refused to answer the question.
Later, Curtis inquired, "Mr. Baker, a previous witness, Mr. Hill, testified under oath that he paid to you the sum of $250 for a number of months for the purpose of securing and keeping a contract which his company, the Capitol Vending Company, had with a government-contracting defense plant. Will you advise us whether or not Mr. Hill's testimony is true?"
Baker refused. Still later, Curtis told him: "Now, Mr. Baker, I hope that you will consider this question carefully, and the rights of all people involved. The witness, Mr. Don Reynolds, has testified that he gave to one Lyndon Johnson a hi-fi set costing something over five hundred dollars. Statements have been made elsewhere that you were the giver of the gift. Will you tell this committee whether or not you made that gift?"
Baker refused. Then came a related key question from Senator Curtis:
"Mr. Baker - Mr. Reynolds, while under oath, testified before this committee concerning this hi-fi gift. He produced certain canceled checks and invoices. He also testified that he purchased $1,200 worth of television time on a TV station in A-astin, Texas. My question is: did you have any part in that transaction?"
Baker refused to answer that question, too, and many more.
It became clear in the course of the investigation that Baker's secretary, Nancy Carole Tyler, had assisted Baker in business transactions handled in his office and during his travels; and that she had handled funds involved in these transactions.
Subpoenaed, Tyler was asked by McLendon, the Committee's counsel, certain important questions. Counsel inquired about trips made by Baker to Los Angeles in connection with the business of the Serv-U Corporation; and when Tyler had resigned her position with Baker, secretary to the majority. Tyler refused to answer on the ground that she might incriminate herself.
The Committee learned no more from Carole Tyler; before the investigation ended, Tyler died suddenly and somewhat mysteriously in an airplane crash on the beach near the Carousel Motel, owned by Bobby Baker.
The key witness in the investigation was Don Reynolds, an insurance agent in the Washington area. He and Baker had been friends, and Baker was an officer in Don Reynolds, Inc., although Baker had not supplied any money for the forming ot that company. Reynolds had been associated in, or was familiar with, many of Bobby Baker's transactions that were under investigation. After consulting with his wife and with Senator Williams, Reynolds decided to testify in full, under oath, whenever called upon by the Committee.
Reynolds said that he had sold insurance on the life of Lyndon Baines Johnson in the amount of two hundred thousand dollars; and that he had to make a "kickback" on the premium he received. The transaction with Johnson had been conducted through Walter Jenkins, a close aide to Johnson. (Jenkins later was disgraced by his arrest for soliciting homosexual acts in the men's room at the YMCA, late in 1964.) Baker had arranged Reynolds' appointment with Jenkins. Facing competition, Reynolds had bought $1,208 in advertising on Johnson's television station in Austin; Reynolds had re-sold this advertising contract, losing $1,100 on the deal. (This "kickback" arrangement had occurred while Lyndon Johnson still was senator from Texas.)
"Why did you purchase the television time?" Senator Curtis asked.
Mr. Reynolds: "Mr. Jenkins, in his discussion with me, showed me a letter from Mr. Huff Baines, indicating that if he had the privilege of writing. . .that he would purchase so much advertising time on the local- station, KTBC."
Under more questioning from Curtis, it turned out that Station KTBC, in Austin, was owned by the LBJ Company. Reynolds went on: "And I told him that although I might not be able to do the same as far as dollar volume, that I would do the best I could, consistent with the fact that the contract I had offered him was the most favorable, if you exclude any question of advertising, sir."
Curtis proceeded to obtain from Reynolds the testimony that Walter Jenkins had informed him he was expected to buy advertising from Lyndon Johnson's television station if he wanted the insurance contract. He had sold the contracted advertising time to Albert G. Young, president of Mid-Atlantic Stainless Steel, "because I saw no use whatsoever for Don Reynolds, who was unknown in Texas, sir, to get people to listen to something they had no interest in, nor could they." Walter Jenkins had confirmed this deal by telephone to Young, whose firm sold pots and pans. After Jenkins had called him, Young went to Austin and utilized the advertising facilities of KTBC; this was corroborated by Young's canceled checks, invoices, and correspondence, shown to the Committee.
This testimony obviously alarmed the majority members of the Committee and the Committee's counsel. At the time of this investigation, Lyndon Baines Johnson was President of the United States; Walter Jenkins was one of the President's aides in the White House, handling much of Johnson's private business. Lyndon Baines Johnson had entered Congress a man of very modest means; but by the time he assumed the presidency, he was a very rich man.
A principal source of Johnson's wealth appeared to be the television station he had acquired in Austin. KTCB was the only television station licensed in Austin; and every other city in the United States, the size of Austin, had at least two television stations. Such licenses were issued by the Federal Communications Commission, upon which political influence might be exercised by persons in power not overly scrupulous. How had Johnson and his family obtained a monopoly of Austin television? To what additional awkward testimony about KTCB might the statements of Reynolds and Young lead if this subject should be pursued?
Therefore, in an effort to prevent Walter Jenkins - former Senate employee, now a White House aide-from being called before the Committee to give sworn testimony, Counsel McLendon had Jenkins sign an affidavit: an affidavit unique in that Jenkins swore to the truth of a memorandum which was written by the Committee's chief counsel and chief investigator. This curious memorandum, referring to Jenkins, stated, "Nor does he have any knowledge of any arrangements by which Reynolds purchased advertising time on the TV station. "
Unimpressed by this remarkable document, Senator Curtis further questioned Reynolds. "Well, then," he asked the witness, "do you agree or disagree with this statement of Jenkins that Mr. McLendon, our counsel, has put in the record, as a statement, not of oral testimony but sworn to before a notary public: `Nor does he have any knowledge of any arrangements by which Reynolds purchased advertising time on the TV station.' You would disagree with that?"
Reynolds disagreed completely with the statement. In further testimony, it was learned that Huff Baines, of Austin, Reynolds' alleged competitor for the sale of insurance to Lyndon Baines Johnson, was a cousin of Johnson, and had sold a number of policies on the lives of people connected with the LBJ Company. Even though Reynolds had offered a better insurance contract than Baines had, it appeared, he had been required to provide advertising revenue to the Johnson station and the gift of a high-fidelity set as sweeteners, lest the contract be awarded to kinsman Baines. And Baker had made the deal.
Throughout these hearings, the Republican members of the Committee-Cooper, Scott, and Curtis-repeatedly endeavored to have Walter Jenkins called as a witness. Jenkins had been employed by Johnson for years. It was well established that he had handled many of Johnson's business concerns. The information given to the Committee by Reynolds clearly conflicted with the memorandum to which Jenkins had subscribed.
This could be resolved only by calling Jenkins as a witness. On March 23, 1964, occurred a roll call on the question of calling Jenkins; the vote went along party lines. Why did these six prominent Democratic senators, several of them leaders of their party, vote against hearing and cross-examining Jenkins? After all, this elusive Jenkins had been an employee of the Senate; he enjoyed no senatorial immunity, nor was he the beneficiary of the usual "senatorial courtesy" tradition. The determined and successful fight by the Committee's majority to prevent the receiving of Jenkins' testimony may have been waged not to protect Walter Jenkins or Bobby Baker, but rather Jenkins ' principal - Lyndon B. Johnson.
The purchase of time on the LBJ broadcasting station was not the only kickback required of Don Reynolds for selling insurance on Lyndon Johnson, for Reynolds was requested to provide a hi-fi set for Senator Johnson. Reynolds, questioned by McLendon, stated that he had bought a Magnavox stereo set, costing him $584.75, and installed it in Senator Johnson's Washington residence (also paying for the installation) in 1959. But Mrs. Johnson had found the set unsatisfactory: it did not fit the space for which she had intended it. In response to questioning from two Democratic senators, Reynolds made it clear that Bobby Baker had told him to give the set to Senator Johnson, and that Johnson knew Reynolds to be the donor.
At a news conference, Johnson had told a reporter that the set was a gift from Bobby Baker. There were two witnesses who might clear up the questions as to whether the set was given by Baker or whether it was an obligation put upon Reynolds for his opportunity to sell life insurance to Johnson. Those two witnesses were Baker and Jenkins. Baker took the Fifth Amendment, refusing to testify on the ground that he might be incriminated. Walter Jenkins, protected by the Committee's majority, was not called to testify.
Later that year, in the closing days of the JohnsonGoldwater race for the presidency, television technicians in Los Angeles wore a large round button, on which was inscribed the legend, "Johnson, Baker, Jenkins. The family that plays together stays together. "
(5) Seymour Hersh, The Dark Side of Camelot (1998)
There were two brutal ironies on November 22.
That Friday started as a great day for Bobby Kennedy, and a potentially ruinous one for Vice President Lyndon Johnson. At ten o'clock in the morning, Donald Reynolds, a Washington insurance broker, walked with his lawyer into a small hearing room on Capitol Hill and began providing Burkett Van Kirk, the minority counsel of the Senate Rules Committee, with eagerly awaited evidence of unreported gift-giving to Johnson. Van Kirk had learned about Reynolds independently, but he and Bobby Kennedy had been secretly working together for weeks, through intermediaries, to accumulate evidence of payola against Johnson and Bobby Baker, Johnson's former Senate aide. Reynolds told Van Kirk and a Democratic staff member of the Rules Committee how he had listed Bobby Baker as a vice president of his insurance agency, and he claimed to have funneled off-thebooks cash to Baker - subsequently written off as a "business expense:' Reynolds told of making payoffs to Democratic Party officials, arranged through Baker's office in the Senate, in return for being allowed to handle the insurance on a large federal construction project. He told what little he knew of Ellen Rometsch and her associations at Baker's Quorum Club, the private club on Capitol Hill where senators and lobbyists shared drinks and other pleasures. And, finally, he told of selling life insurance to the vice president and being pressured in return to buy unnecessary advertisements on Johnson's television station in Austin, Texas - no one in Texas would be interested in buying insurance from a broker in suburban Maryland, 1,500 miles away. Reynolds also told of being compelled to provide Johnson with a stereo record player, as a kind of bonus. Bobby Baker had given the Johnson family a catalog, Reynolds testified, and Lady Bird Johnson had picked out the stereo she wanted. Reynolds was still being questioned at 2:30 P.m. when a secretary burst into the hearing room with the news from Dallas. Lyndon Johnson was now president of the United States, and no one was going to challenge his legitimacy because of a stereo set and a few thousand dollars' worth of television ads.
Burkett Van Kirk remains convinced that Johnson would have been fighting for political survival had he remained vice president. "There's no doubt in my mind," Van Kirk told me in an interview, "that Reynolds's testimony would have gotten Johnson out of the vice presidency."
Available from Amazon
Books (order below)
