(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) Investigations: Bobby's Busyness, Time Magazine (31st December, 1964)

The Senate committee investigation of the affairs of former Senate Majority Secretary Bobby Gene Baker has hardly set a scorching pace. But last week the committee did release closed-door testimony taken earlier this month from Don B. Reynolds, a Maryland insurance man and longtime Baker business associate. It made Bobby out to be a busy, busy boy - from dabbling in abortion to procuring gifts for Lyndon Baines Johnson.

"If Anyone Should Know . . ." Reynolds testified that he had made Bobby a nominal officer of his insurance brokerage, over ten years had paid Baker some $15,000 for putting him in touch with the right people. When other, non-insurable problems came up, Baker was still a good man to know. Once, said Reynolds, a client called him for help in getting an abortion for a friend. Reynolds got in touch with Bobby, who gave him a Capitol number for his concerned client to call. Whether the abortion was actually performed, Reynolds did not know. But, he said, "Some time later, 'Mrs. X' [the client] called and thanked me." Why, asked Committee Counsel Lennox McLendon, had Reynolds turned to Baker for advice about an abortion? Replied Reynolds: "I felt if anyone should know, he should, sir."

Baker also steered Reynolds to Lyndon Johnson. That was in 1957, only two years after Senate Majority Leader Johnson had suffered a heart attack. The Senator was having trouble finding an insurance company that would give him life insurance. Reynolds went looking on Johnson's behalf, talked to three companies, and finally found that the Manhattan Life Insurance Co. would write the policy. Manhattan issued a first policy of $50,000, and shortly afterward, when it had covered part of its risk through a reinsurance company, issued another policy of $50,000 for Johnson.

Out of Gratitude. In the course of those negotiations, Reynolds said, it was suggested to him by Walter Jenkins, then and now a top Johnson aide, that he buy advertising time on Lady Bird Johnson's radio-TV station in Austin. Reynolds said he bought $1,208 worth of advertising on the station.

"Did you buy this advertising time to advertise your insurance business?" asked Nebraska's Republican Senator Carl T. Curtis.

Reynolds: No, sir.

Curtis: Why did you buy it?

Reynolds: Because it was expected of me, sir.

Curtis: Who conveyed that thought to you?

Reynolds: Mr. Walter Jenkins.

Reynolds testified that in 1959 Bobby Baker suggested that Reynolds might further show his gratitude by giving a stereo phonograph to the Johnson family. Again Reynolds went along. "I supplied Bobby with a catalogue," said Reynolds, "and he said he had taken it out for Mrs. Johnson to make a selection." Reynolds told the committee that he purchased a set and had it installed in Johnson's home at a cost of $588. Did Johnson know, asked West Virginia's Democratic Senator Robert Byrd, that the stereo was a gift from Reynolds? Replied Reynolds: "The invoice delivered to Johnson's home showed that the charges were to be sent to Don Reynolds." It was two years later, said Reynolds, that Johnson purchased another $100,000 in life insurance through him (for a total of $200,000).

In answer to all this, White House Aide Jenkins swore in an affidavit that he had no knowledge "of any arrangement by which Reynolds purchased time on the TV station." Press Secretary Pierre Salinger said that the President had assumed the stereo to be a gift from "a longtime employee," not Reynolds. And President Johnson, in the course of an impromptu press conference, brought up the matter himself. Said he: "The Baker family gave us a stereo set. We used it for a period, and we had exchanged gifts before. He was an employee of the public and had no business pending before me and was asking for nothing, and so far as I know expected nothing in return, any more than I did when I had presented him with gifts." With that, Johnson cut off questions and left the press conference.

A Difference. Republicans, understandably, had a field day with the Reynolds testimony. G.O.P. National Chairman William Miller called the stereo gift "an atrocious thing and a travesty of justice." Said Delaware's Republican Senator John J. Williams: "I see no difference in the acceptance of an expensive stereo and in the acceptance of a mink or vicuna coat, a deep freeze or an Oriental rug."

There was, in fact, a difference. On the basis of the record so far, neither Johnson nor Baker was guilty of using his public office for private gain. In the Reynolds deal, Johnson got what he wanted: some personal life insurance. Reynolds also got what he wanted: his insurance commissions.

Still, the Baker probe was just getting started, and Washington was alive with reports that the names of Bobby Baker and Lyndon Johnson would be even more closely connected.

 

(4) Investigations: A Senator's Insurance, Time Magazine (5th March, 1965)

Did Walter Jenkins know of any arrangements whereby Don B. Reynolds, a business sidekick of Bobby Baker's, bought $1,208 in advertising on Lady Bird Johnson's Austin TV station in return for selling two $100,000 insurance policies on Lyndon Johnson's life?

The answer, in a sworn affidavit, was a flat no - but that was back on Dec. 16, 1963, when Jenkins was a top White House aide. Last week Jenkins answered again - and this time his no was a lot less than flat. He had meant on that other occasion that he had not known "of the specifics for the purchase of advertising." But "I did know Mr. Reynolds planned to purchase advertising time, and I have never asserted the contrary."

"No Secret." As before, Jenkins did not appear in person before the Senate Rules Committee, which is investigating the Bobby Baker case. He left the White House last October, after being arrested on a morals charge, and his lawyer and two psychiatrists testified that his appearance before the committee would cause such a strain as to endanger his health. Instead, Jenkins replied on paper, but under oath, to 40 written questions from the committee.

In late 1956 or early 1957, Jenkins recalled, he was treasurer of the LBJ Co., which owned the television station, and "I was seeking an insurance company from which insurance on the life of the then Senator Lyndon B. Johnson might be purchased. I made no secret of this search, and I'm confident that Robert G. Baker knew of it, either from me or indirectly. Mr. Baker told me that he knew Don Reynolds, who represented a company which was beginning to specialize in insurance for former heart attack patients. Mr. Baker did not tell me that he had any interest in Mr. Reynolds' business."

Baker arranged a meeting between Jenkins and Reynolds, and Jenkins later talked to Baker several times about the proposed insurance. But then Jenkins "received word from the LBJ Co. that it would not be necessary to pursue the matter further because a local agent in Austin had become interested in selling the policies and that he not only had been an advertiser on the radio and television stations for many years, but also had always related the amount of his advertising to the amount of his business done with the station." This local agent, it turned out, was Huff Baines, a cousin of Lyndon Johnson's.

Meeting the Competition. Jenkins "communicated this information to Mr. Reynolds," and presumably was pleased to hear "that Mr. Reynolds wished very much to sell the policies and would also like to purchase advertising time in the event he sold them." Jenkins studied Reynolds' "offer to meet the competition," and "it was decided to accept the Reynolds offer."

Jenkins insisted that at no time did he "pressure" Reynolds to buy the television time. But in any event, he certainly got the idea across.

 

(5) Investigations: The FBI Report, Time Magazine (12th March, 1965)

Last Dec. 1, in closed hearings held by the Senate Rules Committee investigating the Bobby Baker case, Mary land Insurance Agent Don B. Reynolds leveled a barrage of charges against Democrats in high office, testified to parties where "beauties and whisky and money flowed freely." Only last week was the substance of Reynolds' testimony made public — along with the release of a 30-page document rebutting Reynolds' charges, one by one, which the Rules Committee chairman, North Carolina's Democratic Senator B. Everett Jordan, pretentiously called "the FBI report."

Among the charges and rebuttals:

* Reynolds said that Bobby Baker had told him that "the leader" - meaning then Vice President Lyndon Johnson - had "interceded" to make sure that the controversial $10 billion TFX fighter-bomber contract was awarded to General Dynamics Corp. The so-called FBI report quoted Defense Secretary Robert McNamara as saying that any claim of official pressure brought to bear about the TFX contract was "definitely and categorically" wrong.

* Reynolds said that a Grumman Aircraft official, anxious to land a fat TFX subcontract, visited Baker's Capitol office, left behind a bulging blue flight bag containing $100,000 in "hundred dollar bills that were bound in brown paper or some sort of thing." The report quoted the Grumman official as saying that he had never been in Baker's office and had never paid Bobby so much as a penny "for any purpose whatsoever."

* Reynolds said that in 1949 Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield, then a Democratic Representative, while on a European junket used counterpart funds - local funds accumulated by the U.S. abroad and often used to meet official Government expenses - to buy "many articles," including a statue called Dawn. The report quoted Mansfield as saying that if he had indeed spent counterpart funds, it was only for such legitimate expenses as hotel bills, and that his wife had bought the controversial statue with $110 of "her own personal funds."

* Reynolds said that in 1961 Vice President Johnson, while in Hong Kong, spent 150,000 Hong Kong dollars in counterpart funds "in a period of 14 hours in buying personal gifts for people." The report says that at the time Johnson was there, the counterpart fund was down to 37,642 Hong Kong dollars.

The Rules Committee's six-man Democratic majority promptly seized upon the report to try to bring an end to the Baker investigation. "I think it's over," said Chairman Jordan, explaining that the report "makes it obvious beyond a doubt that the testimony of Don B. Reynolds is unworthy of belief."

But did it? In fact, the report was not written by the FBI at all, but rather by a team of Justice Department functionaries who boiled down hundreds of pages of raw FBI interviews. Unlike Reynolds, none of the persons interviewed by the FBI were under oath. The only part of Reynolds' testimony that has at any time been tested by a sworn statement from an adversary witness turned out to be true: that was Reynolds' claim that he had purchased advertising time on a Johnson-owned Austin TV station in return for selling insurance on Johnson's life. The claim was recently corroborated in substance by former White House Aide Walter Jenkins.

 

(6) Investigations: Messrs. Clean, Time Magazine (9th July, 1965)

A year ago the Senate Rules Committee's six-man Democratic majority slapped a few coats of whitewash over the Bobby Baker investigation with a final report that was supposed to end the case once and for all. But Delaware Republican John J. Williams, the tenacious Senate watchdog, pointed out a few splotches, and the Democrats were forced to try again. Last week they issued a second "final report" that is as white as can be.

To be sure, there were harsh words for Bobby Baker, the former Senate page who amassed a $2,000,000 fortune as the $19,600-a-year secretary to the Senate's Democratic majority and the loyal friend of then Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson. The report accused Bobby of using "the influence of his public office to feather his own nest," said that on one occasion he had received $5,000 from the Ocean Freight-Forwarder Group for helping to get a bill through Congress. That "flagrant" abuse of his office, concluded the report, "justifies careful consideration looking to an indictment for violation of the conflict of interest statutes."

When it came to a number of other embarrassing aspects, though, the majority got out its brushes. Veteran Democratic Fund Raiser Matthew H. McCloskey, for example, had been accused of deliberately overpaying Maryland Insurance Man Don B. Reynolds $35,000 for writing a performance bond on the $20 million District of Columbia Stadium that McCloskey's firm was building. McCloskey claimed that it was only a bookkeeping goof, but Reynolds testified that $25,000 of the money was illegally channeled into the Democrats' 1960 presidential campaign fund through Baker. Generously, the committee found McCloskey's testimony "candid and convincing," dismissed Reynolds' as "devious and inconsistent."

As for the charge that former Presidential Aide Walter W. Jenkins had pressured Reynolds into buying useless advertising time on Lyndon Johnson's Austin, Texas, television station in return for selling Johnson $200,000 in life insurance, the report said: "This procedure follows business conduct considered legitimate by many reputable American businessmen."

In a sharp dissent, the three-man Republican minority complained: "This whole investigation has been marked by a refusal to investigate, by attempts to cover up and foot dragging generally." The Democrats shrugged off the charges, consider the investigation closed.

 

(7) 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.

 

(8) 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.

(9) 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.

 

(10) Carl 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 Johnson-Goldwater 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. "

 

(11) Seymour Hersh, The Dark Side of Camelot (1997)

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."