Morris’s timeline of the power shifts in the Clinton marriage is compelling. “In terms of getting more power, Hillary’s best year at the White House was 1998,” the year of Lewinsky, he asserted. “Her next best year in [power terms] in the White House was 1993, after Gennifer Flowers…. I believe that it’s a relationship based on mutual enabling. Because she likes what happens when she rescues him…. I think to the extent that he’s capable of loving anybody, he loves her. But it’s a very limited capability in the first place. I think that he sometimes resents her and shakes under her domination. Sometimes he welcomes her and needs her, because he requires her rescuing. And, other times he doesn’t think a whole lot about her at all….
“I think if she left him it would be a big blow to him, not in the sense that he’d miss her, but in the sense that he would find unacceptable the image of himself that he’d see in the mirror: the man that Hillary left. But he’d get over it, and he would go on.”
10
A Downhill Path
We…had to isolate the attacks and focus on the reality of our lives.
—Living History
THE CLINTONS, from their first days after the inauguration, felt they were living in a bell jar. Most of the previous decade they had lived in a governor’s mansion modest in comparison with almost all the other forty-nine, a reasonably private family home. The household staff was small. A few state troopers (all personally vetted for their assignment by Hillary and Bill) remained in a separate wing from the living quarters and were available for errands, appearing only when summoned or for receptions. Mornings, Hillary had driven to work in her Oldsmobile, and Bill had driven Chelsea to school. Their lives were minimally affected by security concerns, or (so they thought) the presence of the troopers.
With their move to the White House, the Clintons inherited a grand personal service staff of dozens—maids, butlers, housekeepers, telephone operators, cooks, ushers, stewards—and were under the constant supervision of the Secret Service. Most members of the White House personal staff had been enamored of the Bushes, whose WASPish, Junior League formality was an easy fit. During the eight years when George and Barbara Bush had lived in the vice presidential mansion on Massachusetts Avenue, they had adjusted readily to the heavy Secret Service presence, and acclimatized themselves contentedly to the privileges of morning-to-night silver-tray service.
Clinton style and Bush style could hardly have been more different. George and Barbara Bush were far more formal, and their daily regime more predictable: they had stuck to a schedule every day, almost rigidly, making it easy for both the Secret Service and the household staff to serve them efficiently. Bush’s aides were decorous and orderly, as had been President Reagan’s. The permanent staff identified personally with both families, regarding the twelve-year Republican epoch almost as a single, uninterrupted regency, subject to their guardianship and service. Increasingly, many also came to identify with its political philosophy.
The Clintons weren’t imagining a lack of appreciation for their Arkansas-influenced ways, following the Hollywood royalty style of the Reagans, and the noblesse oblige of the buttoned-down Bushes. The Clintons liked to kick back. They were used to a thoroughly relaxed atmosphere, even with the troopers, to casual Fridays and late nights out with friends, while the troopers hung back or stayed in the car. The White House Secret Service agents were ever present, trained never to speak casually to the president or first lady, only to respond or lead the way, and they seemed almost hostile in comparison with law enforcement officials assigned to the governor’s detail in Arkansas.
Presidents Reagan and Bush, when they left office, were age seventy-seven and sixty-eight, respectively, with wives who had long before seen sixty. The Clintons were young and informal. Twelve-year-old Chelsea was the first young child living in the White House in twelve years, and only the second preteenager since the Kennedy clan had run roughshod on the lawn. But what really distinguished the Clintons was the chaotic atmosphere they and their rather ragged retinue of aides (in comparison with the departing Republicans) introduced.
The many twenty-somethings and thirty-year-olds in Clinton’s administration raced around what they called “the campus,” the young men often tieless, the women sometimes in slacks. This youthful cadre, now installed in offices in the West Wing and the Executive Office Building, shared their president’s round-the-clock work habits and energy. George Stephanopoulos, the communications director, was thirty-two; Dee Dee Myers, the press secretary, was thirty-one; and Mark Gearan, the deputy chief of staff, was thirty-six.
The White House of January 1993 was surprisingly lacking in high-tech toys like laptops and cell phones. It operated at the mercy of a manual telephone switchboard system that could be maddeningly slow and through which half a dozen presidents had placed and received their routine calls. Bill Clinton, zealous of his privacy and suspicious of a switchboard’s capacity for abuse, insisted within weeks of his arrival that he be able to dial out directly, and that operators be incapable of listening to his calls once routed to him. His aides slammed down phones and complained loudly that they needed more lines, fax capability, and portable communications. Some members of the holdover office staff were horrified at what they considered the shockingly unprofessional manner of the twenty-somethings who sometimes chewed gum as they talked, answered telephones like they were in their dorm rooms, and let unanswered messages pile up for days. Soon, the offended holdovers were on the phones to departed colleagues relating anecdotes both fabulous and fact-based about the lack of decorum in the White House. The stories were repeated in newsrooms, at dinner parties, everywhere.
Photo Insert
An early picture of Hugh, Hillary, Hughie, and Dorothy Rodham
Hillary with three high school classmates (AP Wide World Images)
At Wellesley (Brooks Kraft/Corbis)
With Bill on the Yale campus (William J. Clinton Presidential Center)
Hillary and Bill on their wedding day, October 11, 1975 (William J. Clinton Presidential Center)
In the governor’s mansion with newborn Chelsea, February 1980 (William J. Clinton Presidential Center)
The Clintons with Vince and Lisa Foster, 1988 (Arkansas Democrat/ Mike Stewart/ Corbis Sygma)
The president-elect with Hillary and Chelsea (William J. Clinton Presidential Center)
Chelsea rings a replica of the Liberty Bell to begin pre-inauguration festivities on the Mall, January 1993. (Smithsonian)
Greeting well-wishers on the Mall during inaugural week, 1993 (William J. Clinton Presidential Center)
On Pennsylvania Avenue during the inaugural parade (William J. Clinton Presidential Center)
Chief Justice Rehnquist administers the presidential oath. (AP Wide World Images)
At one of the inaugural balls (Getty Images)
The new first lady with schoolchildren in Washington, D.C. (William J. Clinton Presidential Center)
Dancing in the White House (William J. Clinton Presidential Center)
At Chelsea’s high school graduation in Washington, June 6, 1997 (William J. Clinton Presidential Center)
With Chelsea and Jordan’s Queen Noor after a visit to the grave site of her husband, King Hussein (AP Wide World Images/Enric Marti)
With American peacekeeping troops in Kosovo (William J. Clinton Presidential Center)
With Mother Teresa at her orphanage in India (William J. Clinton Presidential Center)
With Chelsea at the Western Wall in Jerusalem (AP Wide World Images)
Hillary’s chief of staff Maggie Williams being sworn in to testify at congressional Whitewater hearings (AP Wide World Images)
Hillary on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno during her first Senate term (© Reuters/Corbis)
Permanent staff members generally preferred Hillary to the president, whom some of the help judged inconsiderate, rude, and un-presidential. He stayed up until 2 or 3 A.M. (often discussing policy, playing cards, chewing a cigar, and working crosswo
rd puzzles all at once). He allowed junior aides to wander unannounced into the Oval Office. Upstairs, in the family quarters, the ushers and Secret Service agents could not finish their shifts until he was in bed. Only after he retired could they turn off the lights and reduce the number of agents at work. The Bushes and the Reagans, or someone acting on their behalf, had always sent word what time they expected to turn in, so the agents and ushers could plan appropriately. But with the Clintons, particularly given Bill’s habits, there was often no word of when this might be. Morning plans were similarly indefinite. He kept in shape by jogging, but whether he felt like a pre-breakfast run depended on the previous night’s sleep; hence two teams of Secret Service agents stood ready in the morning, one dressed for running and the other attired in business suits.
Bill found the copious procedures, particularly the requirements of the Secret Service, suffocating. He half-joked about the White House being a high-class “penitentiary.” Though his mother had coddled him, he was uncomfortable with all the personal attention. When he was ready to get dressed in the morning, one of two Navy stewards arrived to put out his clothes, brush them, and make sure everything was in order. When he decided it was time to go to the Oval Office, downstairs, the Secret Service detail that hovered overnight in the bedroom hallway accompanied him to the small elevator. A valet accompanied him with his papers, and four agents covered him front and rear as he made his way—less than 150 feet—under the colonnaded walk by the Rose Garden to the Oval. (It was never the Oval Office with the handlers—just the Oval, and his codename was “Eagle.”) One night, he and a group of aides working in the Oval Office decided to order pizzas. As the president opened his mouth to take a bite, he was tapped on his shoulder by an agent who told him to put the pizza down. The slice had not gone through screening procedures. A steward brought Clinton cookies—screened—to munch on instead. “Why can’t I do what I want?” he had once shouted, after being told that his sudden decision to drop in on a friend’s book party downtown could not be accommodated by the Secret Service.
The tensions between the Clintons and some members of the household staff and security details were obvious. One usher had never removed the “Re-elect Bush” bumper sticker from his car. Hillary and Bill, not unreasonably, questioned the loyalty of at least a few aides. Hillary complained to Vince Foster that some of the agents seemed abrupt and unfriendly. Their constant presence was intrusive. She became especially concerned about the number of functionaries who hung by doorways, and the agents who were always stationed in the long living area that stretched east–west on the second floor, within listening distance of conversations. Four Secret Service agents were assigned to be inside the Oval Office or just outside when the president was there. The potential mischief from conversations overheard was too obvious to ignore. This seemed particularly true after Harry Thomason, who with his wife, Linda, was living part-time in the White House during early 1993, came back one night from a dinner attended by some reporters. He told the Clintons that particulars about the first family’s personal life in the White House were being leaked to the press by some of the agents. He urged replacement of the whole White House Secret Service detail. The problem was deemed serious enough for Hillary to tell Foster to solve it, and that she wanted new agents assigned who were more inclined to be sympathetic, perhaps who had worked with them in the campaign.
Among the things Hillary valued most about Foster’s judgment were his caution and calm, his ability to look beyond the immediate, to see the big picture. He worried that precipitous replacement of the White House Secret Service contingent, or even a few agents, would inevitably leak to the press—especially if Thomason’s information had been correct—and would produce a professional and public backlash. He met with David Watkins, another Hope native who was assistant to the president for management and administration (Watkins, Foster, and Mack McLarty had all been student-body presidents at Hope Senior High School), and Mark Gearan. It was agreed that they should watch the situation carefully, but do nothing for the moment.
On February 19, vivid evidence of the problem showed up in a Chicago Sun-Times column by Bill Zwecker: “Seems First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton has a temper to match her hubby’s.” Zwecker reported, without attribution, that Hillary had smashed a lamp during a fierce argument with Bill in the family quarters. “Just in case you care,” he added, “Bill and Hillary sleep in separate bedrooms”—which, in fact, was not the case. Other mainstream media outlets picked up the story, some embellishing it: Hillary, it was said, had thrown a vase or a Bible at her husband. In one version, a Secret Service agent supposedly had to break up the dispute, telling Hillary, “We’ve got to protect him, including from you.”
That Hillary had a temper and that she had directed it toward Bill (and vice versa) was hardly news to people who had been close to the Clintons in Arkansas. They had scrapped and screamed at each other since their courtship. None of their friends or aides is known to have given credence to the Sun-Times story. Still, it raced through the capital as no other bit of Clintonian gossip had since their arrival.
Hillary was livid about the story and about the Secret Service. When the Service failed to issue a formal denial, she became even angrier. (Later, Zwecker said that one of two sources for his column had been someone involved in “White House security.”) When Newsweek picked up the item, she declared the magazine escrit non grata and said she would never allow its correspondents to interview her.
She was also harsh in her response to Foster. If she had ever previously had a really cross word with him, no one had ever heard about it, including Webb Hubbell. The relationship between Hillary and Vince had always reflected a solicitous mutual caring, and a deep understanding of the vulnerabilities beneath the surface of each. In this instance, she seemed to draw no distinction between Watkins and Foster, reprimanding them at the same time. Both were subordinates who had failed to take action when she had expressed her urgent concerns. The two of them were “too naive and too nice, being from Arkansas,” Hillary said, making a strange connection.
Watkins seemed to take her rebuke in stride, but Vince was clearly devastated. Thereafter, he referred to Hillary as “the client.”
Vince had come to Washington a week before the inauguration, excited at the prospect, filled with high hopes. He was not a political animal, and never had been. His allegiance was personal—to the president, but even more so to Hillary. His wife, Lisa, had told him, when he was asked to join the administration, “I’m afraid if you don’t do it you’ll always be sorry.” But now he was beginning to have doubts, according to many of his fellow Arkansans who also made the trip.
While Bernie Nussbaum had temporarily moved into the $300-a-night Jefferson Hotel, Vince felt he couldn’t afford such extravagance. He had a family back home to support. The price of living in Washington was generally shocking to him. Real estate, food, going to the movies—he could see that he would not be able to live nearly as well as he had in Little Rock, no matter how exalted his position. He moved into the Northwest Washington house of his sister, Sheila, who was married to a former congressman from Arkansas, Beryl Anthony.
Lisa had been expecting to enjoy living in the capital—her husband was deputy counsel to the president; there would be state dinners at the White House, congressmen and senators to rub shoulders with, the Kennedy Center honors. But Vince had insisted that she and their children stay behind until their youngest son had finished the high school year in Little Rock. She was not pleased with his decision. She and their children came to Washington for the inauguration, but Vince had no time for them. As soon as the ceremony at the Capitol was over, he had hurried to the White House because of the trouble with the Zoë Baird nomination. Lisa and the children were left behind on the Capitol grounds, in a strange city with little idea of how they would get back to Sheila’s house. She was so angry that she refused to go to the inaugural ball that evening. In fact, she said later, “I was angry at Vince about 90
percent of the time. I wasn’t angry at him for going [to Washington]. I was just angry at him for ignoring us and leaving us behind, and making me have to deal with everything, all the decisions, and he was getting all the so-called glory.”
Immediately Vince was thrown into the maelstrom of the administration’s difficult first days, almost everything in which Hillary was involved. Though he was deputy counsel to the president in title, he was, in fact, her counselor, all the more so as she became preoccupied with her health care mandate, and left more and more details of other matters to him. “This is gold,” he told Webb Hubbell, referring to his White House pass. “I could never go back.” In the White House, Vince and Hillary “were the team he had always imagined they would be,” Hubbell said. The glow did not last long.
Foster appeared to internalize the blame for the item in the Sun-Times, as if he had failed to protect her and the president. She was right, he told Nussbaum. He had not been forceful enough. Nussbaum thought Foster’s initial instincts—that dismissing members of the presidential Secret Service detail would leak to the press and cause a backlash—were probably correct, but by now, Vince and Watkins had no doubt that action was in order, if for no other reason than to calm the first lady.
Foster and Watkins met with the Secret Service official in charge of the presidential detail, John McGaw, and expressed the displeasure of Hillary and the president over both the Sun-Times story and the attitude of agents in the residence.