Remarks by

DEAN BURCH

Counsellor to the President

Before

THE REPUBLICAN NATIONAL COMMITTEE

Washington, D. C.
April 26, 1974

This is the third time that one Republican National Committee or another has had Dean Burch to contend with -- which says more about the Committee's endurance than its instinct for self-preservation. The first time we met, I walked out of the room as your new Chairman, and a few months later the Republican Party took its worst shellacking of the century. The second time I walked away unemployed, and the Party promptly pulled up its socks and began to rebuild. From that point on, it's been mostly roses.

A lot of people were involved in that rebuilding job, and many of them are in this room today Ray Bliss, for example, and such consummate political pros as AB Hermann and Jo Good. And while they were tending the store, there was another consummate pro out on the hustings, establishing and re-establishing his credentials as a prime architect of our Party.

That fulltime Party loyalist was Richard Nixon of course. I would simply submit to you that his powers of regeneration and his skills of leadership are in superb working condition, and I'd remind you that wherever and whenever we needed him most any time, any place, to charge up the faithful or to convince the undecided -- he has always been right there. It's time, I think, to return loyalty for loyalty.

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For myself, I want all of you to know how sweet it is to be back in political harness again after four years of forced nonpartisanship as Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. And I want to reassure George Bush that I am not muscling into his territory. One of my assignments is to maintain White House liaison with this Committee, with Bob Michel's on the House side and Bill Brock's in the Senate, and with the Party generally. But the organization has never been in abler or more experienced hands. My job will be to help as best I can, and to make sure that my boss knows how the troops are doing and what's going on in the trenches and vice versa. I'm going to be available.

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Talking about the Republican Party as if it consisted of three national committees, of course, is to turn the political process on its head. This year we have a House of Representatives to elect, and one-third of the Senate. But there are also 37 governorships at stake 14 of them with Republican incumbents and literally thousands of other State and county and local offices to be filled. Not a one of these offices can be conceded to the Democrats. Every one of them is essential to good and effective government. And winning our share is the ultimate measure of our Party's strength which is another way of saying that you can never

build an enduring Republican majority from the top down.

Every member of the RNC knows this. If you didn't you'd never have gotten here in the first place, and you wouldn't hold your jobs very long. I'm really reminding myself, and everyone who operates at the national level, that political reality does not begin with each morning's Washington Post and end with the CBS Evening News. "Liberal chic" is not where this country's at, and it does not represent the convictions of the nascent Republican majority.

I deeply believe that the convictions of most Americans are indistinguishable from the principles of our Party and from the programs and policies of this Republican Administration. I'm not going to play chicken-and-egg they're simply indistinguishable. By the same token, I submit to you that Richard Nixon is our President and the leader of our Party, and that these two roles are indistinguishable: our hopes and our goals and our fortunes are as one. His record of accomplishment is our record. And I say this with intense pride it is a record solidly based in Republican principle. The President's record is a platform for Republican candidates to grab hold of and to run on.

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Clearly, the Republican Party did not invent peace. But the fact remains,

this Republican President did inherit the bngest war in our country's history and he brought that war to an end. He ended it with honor、-honor to the men who fought there, and to those who died there, and with honor to our POW's who came home with heads high.

And this is but one foundation stone. President Nixon is building a
structure of peace that promises future generations a condition we've
not known for generations past a world in which conflict has given way
to dialogue, and confrontation to negotiation. There is no need for me
to recite every detail of this long, arduous, continuing process. You know
the record as well as I do. But never forget, and never let the opposition
forget, that this is the record of a Republican President and that's our
Party I'm talking about.

On the domestic side, if I had to put a single conceptual stamp on the
Nixon record, it would be this -- central to every major proposal and
running through every domestic initiative, there is the determination to
stem the tide of centralization and to return power and resources to the
people. Where they live. And I mean that in both the literal and
figurative sense: power to define their own needs, and adequate resources
to do something about meeting those needs.

The New Federalism is not just a slogan, and Revenue Sharing is no gimmick. They go to the heart of scores of Administration proposals most of them gathering dust in Congress I might add -- that would represent a virtual revolution in American government and a return to first principles. They would spell an end to the discredited notion that unmet needs and unresolved problems will just go away if we throw enough Federal dollars at them.

The thrust of both the New Federalism and of Revenue Sharing is reliance
on self-governing States and local communities, on free markets, and on
free people conducting their own business as they see fit -- but I very
much doubt that this audience requires more convincing. These are the
first principles of this free Republic. They are the guiding principles
of the Nixon domestic record. And they are the fundamental principles of
our Party. Out of them, there is a new Republican majority to be built.
Does this mean that every Republican candidate in every race in every State
and every Congressional District has to embrace every element of the Nixon
record? No, of course not. There is room within the four walls of Republican-
ism for local variations and for differences of emphasis. It does mean that
the President's programs and leadership, and his preeminence in the councils

of the world, are incomparable strengths. And it means that our candidates can run as Nixon Republicans and they can win as Nixon Republicans.

Let me be very candid about this. It would be fatuous to stand here and simply disregard the currents of discontent that also are running wherever Republican gather. There are such currents, and they have to be faced. I don't have any perfect answers for you just some thoughts for your consideration.

For one thing -- and a major thing it is -- the country is gripped with
an unacceptable rate of inflation. It is unacceptable to the American
people, and to the President. In principal part, it is a reflection of the
energy crunch and a hangover as well. And just as we have turned the
corner in controlling the energy shortage, so too there are solid indications
that the worst of inflation will be behind us by the end of the second quarter
and the beginning of the third. It is no time for complacency but, just as
important, it's no time for panic, or for extreme remedies that would
predictably make the situation worse, not better.

In any case, it's a long long way from April to November, and the
situation can change dramatically. Think back to 1966, for example,
and the rebuilding process that I mentioned at the outset. In the spring
of that year, almost no one was predicting a great Republican resurgence.
By November, the incumbent Democrats could no longer keep the Vietnam
war hidden from the voters, and we did rack up substantial gains in
Congress and across the country. (I said almost no one was able to
predict that victory but there was one notable exception. Richard Nixon
was virtually on the money. He said we'd gain 40 House seats -- and we
gained 47!) I have no objection to running scared. But it's hardly good
politics to run for cover.

Nor should we run away from Watergate or the impeachment inquiry.
These are facts of life. They deeply affect the leader of our Party and
they deeply affect all of us, and we'd be foolish to pretend otherwise.
Indeed, we simply will not be given the luxury of pretending otherwise.
If I were planning strategy for the Democrats, the scenario would
practically write itself. I would in the first place pile charge on
charge and innuendo on innuendo, in hopes that sooner or later some-
thing would stick -- and my bets would be on later rather than sooner.
Because, in the second place, I would bend every effort to stretching
out the inquiry through the summer and into the fall, possibly even
beyond November. It would be good if not particularly responsible
politics to do just that.

I earnestly

I am not suggesting that any such strategy is under way. hope and trust it is not, because on the bottom line of this Constitutional inquiry there must be two entries. One is the truth. And the other is justice justice for the President and justice for the embattled institutions of our government and justice, ultimately, for the American people.

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