Ford on the Offensive

Amid growing criticism that he was drifting and avoiding hard decisions, President Ford took the offensive on several political fronts last week.

He made extensive, energetic preparations for his economic message to the nation this week (see cover stories, THE ECONOMY). He beat back an attempt by the Senate to undercut his foreign policy. He made a startling offer to go before Congress to explain why he had pardoned Richard Nixon. He met with 22 of the nation's mayors and pledged to sign an $11.8 billion mass-transit bill. He reorganized his fumbling White House staff. Though he was obviously distracted by his wife's bout with cancer and visited her every day at the hospital, he also dined with congressional friends, threw a party for retiring members of Congress and was host at a white-tie-and-medals reception for the Washington diplomatic corps. It was a brisk display of a Chief Executive in action and, despite all his troubles, enjoying it.

The Senate revolt was directed not so much against Ford as against his predecessor and at what many regard as the clandestine tactics of Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. Still angered by the disclosure of the CIA's intervention in Chilean politics, Senators saw a chance to strike back when a resolution authorizing a temporary continuation of foreign aid came to the floor last week. A majority voted an amendment banning military aid to Chile. Then, by a much larger margin, the Senate voted to cut off military assistance to Turkey on the ground that U.S. weaponry had been used in the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. Finally, the Senate voted to stop shipments of fertilizer to South Viet Nam.

Ford was especially alarmed that the U.S. would lose leverage in the Cyprus crisis if aid to Turkey was halted. He sent staffers to Capitol Hill where they persuaded House-Senate conferees to eliminate the objectionable amendments from the resolution. Now the Senate must decide whether to accept the revised measure.

Confronted with a list of questions from Congress about the Nixon pardon, Ford could have supplied written replies or none at all. Instead, in the interest of an open presidency and in the hope of putting the issue to rest, he volunteered to testify before a subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee this week.* The probe will be televised. Said the delighted Democratic subcommittee chairman, William Hungate: "It is consistent with the frankness and openness he displayed as a Congressman."

Unique Occasion. Even some critics of the "imperial presidency" worry that Ford may be weakening his office by testifying before Congress. But he feels that he is giving nothing away since he is going voluntarily. As Ford explains it, since a presidential pardon of a former President is such a unique occasion, it deserves a unique explanation.

Ford moved to solve his staff problems by instructing all of his aides, who tend to take up too much of his time on less than crucial matters, to report to Donald Rumsfeld, 42, his newly named "coordinator of White House operations." For someone of Ford's democratic disposition, it was a tough order to give, but it had to be done. Observers feared that he was spread too thin, and had not yet made a successful transition from the leisurely politicking of Capitol Hill to the continual decision-making grind of the White House.

Open and personable, Rumsfeld has the task of giving the President the protection he needs without sealing him off. A Ford ally when he served in Congress from Illinois, Rumsfeld was even considered for the vice presidency before Nelson Rockefeller was chosen. Though Rumsfeld held some high-ranking posts in the Nixon Administration--director of the Office of Economic Opportunity, director of the Cost of Living Council, Ambassador to NATO--he was not tarnished by Watergate. Once when H.R.

Haldeman, Nixon's chief of staff, tried to shift him to a smaller office, he resisted: "Listen, I didn't resign a first-class seat in Congress to take a second-class office in the White House." Now he has Haldeman's office, though without the title and imperial trappings.

Rumsfeld's arrival coincided with the long-overdue departure of some hard-core Nixon holdovers, who were finally eased out last week. Among the resignations announced: Father John McLaughlin, a Jesuit priest who had offended his own order by so tenaciously defending Nixon's morals; Richard Moore, a presidential counsel who is reportedly to be added to the list of unindicted co-conspirators in the Watergate cover-up trial; Bruce Herschensohn, an assistant who was in charge of coordinating public support for Nixon.

Good Humor. Bolstering Ford throughout his busy week was his wife Betty's encouraging recovery. Because cancer cells were found in two of the 30 lymph nodes removed in the operation, she will have to undergo further treatment to prevent the spread of the disease. But she appeared to be in good humor. She was surrounded with cards, letters and bouquets from well-wishers.

Particularly heartening were hundreds of messages from women who had undergone the same operation. One notable correspondent: Alice Roosevelt Longworth, 90, who had two mastectomies years ago.

Despite the First Lady's progress, her illness inevitably stirred speculation about her husband's plans for 1976. "He is greatly influenced by his family," says a presidential adviser who believes that Ford would bow out if his wife was not well. The leading contender for the G.O.P. nomination would then be Vice President-designate Nelson Rockefeller, a dismaying prospect for Democrats, who think he would be the toughest man to beat. Rocky is already filling in for the President at speaking engagements in Utah and California. But Ford will soon join him on the hustings. This week he is scheduled to begin a series of trips through 18 states in behalf of Republican candidates.

*Though the record is somewhat murky, Ford will apparently be the first President to testify on a formal basis before a congressional committee. Abraham Lincoln made a few trips to Capitol Hill to confer informally about his war policies.

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