The Presidency

By Hugh Sidey

At the Justice Department, a task force has been designing new legislation to ease the liability-insurance crisis, spurred on by what one of the drafters called "President Reagan's 100% endorsement of our ideas." Over at the Pentagon, recommendations by the Packard commission to strengthen the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and tighten up military procurement are, in the words of an eager participant, "moving out." He added, "The President endorsed 99% of our report. He's committed to solving the problems."

At Treasury, Secretary James Baker is managing the dollar's decline in value against foreign currencies with virtually no kibitzing from the White House across the street. "The President trusts Jim," shrugged a Treasury executive. Just a few blocks away at the beleaguered NASA a high official declared, "Without the President's unshakable faith that we can still do the job in space we would have been destroyed by now." Off in the Mediterranean on board ships and carriers of the Sixth Fleet, the words spoken by Reagan during last month's Gulf of Sidra incident were like a surge of adrenaline. Talking of the fleet's commander, Vice Admiral Frank Kelso, the President said, "The man knows what he's doing. Let's let him do the job." The admiral and his men did just that, and a Pentagon officer added, "They'd do even more this week."

When Secretary of Education William Bennett proudly issued a distillation of research about teaching and learning titled What Works, he was panned by professional educators who said much of the pamphlet was "common sense." Bennett hardly noticed. "The President loved it," he said, then galloped off joyously, his briefcase stuffed with copies of What Works. (What does work: parents' reading to young children, memorizing, homework.)

Reagan's trust in and loyalty to the people who work for him are now paying huge dividends. Every week Cabinet officers, agency heads, staff assistants, clerks and G.I.s, wherever they may be, take it on the chin for the chief and seem to love it. That trust almost more than any other thing may be the element that holds Reagan's Government together and keeps it on the march even as the President's power begins to wane in the second term.

Washington's Clark Clifford saw the same thing long ago when he served in Harry Truman's White House. "President Truman had a deep and sincere loyalty to those working for him," said Clifford. "He stood by them from first to last. In a few instances his confidence may have been held too long. But the morale and dedication of the others to him transcended everything else." The same could be said of Reagan.

The pollsters are now pondering the phenomenon of Reagan's personal popularity turning into a rare kind of trust that inspires millions of people all across the nation to take small actions to further the national cause, be it teaching a kid to read or standing up against street crime.

Woodrow Wilson knew about that half a century ago. "The only strength that any man can boast of and be proud of is that great bodies of his fellow citizens trust him and are ready to follow him," said Wilson. The venerated statesman Henry Stimson, who served as Secretary of State and twice as Secretary of War, also knew. "The only way to make a man trustworthy," Stimson used to say, "is to trust him."

It is doubtful that Reagan ever read Wilson or Stimson. But he surely sensed their idea. In his State of the Union address, in a passage too easily dismissed as political soft soap, Reagan said, "The American people brought us back--with quiet courage and common sense; with undying faith that in this nation under God the future will be ours." Trust in, trust out.