A few days ago in Augusta I had a long talk with Cliff Roberts about the political situation.1 The general tenor of that conversation was very similar to one that I held later with the Vice President, reported below.2 The only point on which Cliff Roberts had a positive conviction, that is not shared by Dick Nixon and me, (and certainly not by the principal members of the White House Staff) is that Meade Alcorn should be removed as Chairman of the Republican National Committee. He also believes an effort should be made to substitute for him Chuck Percy of Chicago.3
I agree without reservation that Chuck Percy is a very unusual and capable young man and in my opinion would, if we could induce him to take this post, make an extraordinarily effective Chairman. Further than this I did not concur with Cliff’s conclusion, for reasons that appear in the following paragraph.
Meade Alcorn has been the best Chairman of the Republican National Committee that I have known. His intelligence, energy, imagination and dedication are exemplary. Cliff, while not well acquainted with Mr. Alcorn, had no reason, he said, to differ with this evaluation. Cliff’s big point is that Meade Alcorn is not a "real figure" in the national scene. He says that Alcorn cannot be effective for the simple reason that people do not pay attention to him. Moreover, Cliff feels that the terrible drubbing that the Republican Party took in the recent election is bound to be laid largely to Alcorn’s door, even if the allegation is unjust and really represents nothing more than the effort of others to alibi their own inefficiencies. He concludes that since Alcorn’s name is connected with failure and since he has not succeeded in establishing himself as a real influence in the Party, we should let him go.
My final remark was that I never thought it wise to fire anybody unless I knew that I had a better person to take over. In addition, I again repeated the list of Alcorn’s good qualities and I pointed out to Cliff that in four attempts to get what he or anyone else would consider a "big" man, (in the sense that he was regarded nationally as an influential figure) I had not been successful. Honesty, courage, intelligence and incessant work, after all, can be of more importance than reputation.4
