Letters
Letters I served as a legislative Assistant to Senator Eagleton for four years until I left his office last February to take a better position. I assume I was kept on the staff, in part,...
...I can only guess that in light of my critical statement about Senator Percy during the Lance hearing, Mr...
...This effort was in direct opposition to the desires of the majority leader of the Senate, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and many of the most powerful people in Congress...
...Chuck Percy would come to me on the floor and say to me [and here he exaggerated his voice to mimic Percy’s mellifluous tones] ‘My God, Tom, what has gotten into you?’ ” Eagleton indicated no animosity toward Percy, and seemed embarrassed when I told him that, when I had come to Washington in 1967 as a student and a Republican, Percy had given me my first job...
...I assume I was kept on the staff, in part, because we were successful in improving public policy irrespective of approval or disapproval of the other Senators My experience does not support the contention of your article, which implies that Senator Eagleton would compromise the public good in an effort not to offend his colleagues...
...Eagleton called me into his office in the first weeks of my employment and said a friend of his, a southern Illinois state legislator who wanted to run against Percy in 1978, had called to ask him for help in tracking down a rumor that Gulf Oil lobbyist Claude Wild had illegally contributed to Percy’s last campaign...
...ANDREW E. MANATOS Washington, D.C...
...He never brought up the matter again...
...Eagleton told me to do nothing illegal, to be discreet...
...Just as prisons are full of innocent men, I don’t suppose there was ever an employee fired for good cause-to hear the employee tell it...
...This is a small matter-small to me, and small in my story-but Senator Eagleton has made it important by lying about it...
...I tried very hard in my story to be fair to him-I repeatedly praised his talents, his accomplishments in the Senate, and his personal qualities...
...The fact is I fired Mr...
...Rushford’s allegation that I asked him to investigate Senator Percy is pure, unadultered fiction...
...That’s the same claim he repeatedly made in my office when asked how he was progressing with his assignment...
...Above all, he said, “don’t do anything that could be traced back to me...
...He opposed and defeated the chairman on this issue...
...Rushford also is wrong in suggesting onten- there is no future in government for honest hard-hitting investigators...
...It’s too bad my attempts at bal...
...Contrary to popular belief, the level of integrity in the Congress is quite high...
...Rushford claims to have been working on an expose of corruption in the Food for Peace program...
...It is just that there IS no place for sensation-seekers who allow suspicion to Serve in place offactTHOMAS F. EAGLETON Washington, D.C...
...Rushford such a juicy morsel would help him market his latest expose- It is simply not true...
...Gregory Rushford’s self-serving rationalization on “Why Senator Eagleton Fired Me” [December...
...Specifically, I’d like to refute what Senator Eagleton says about the matter of Senator Percy...
...Thomas Eagleton is the senior senator from Missouri The author replies: Generally, I stand by my story...
...Senator Eagleton is not a person who would forego an opportunity to correct an injustice in the hope of advancing himself within the Senate...
...But there is usually another side to these issues and had you inquired you might have paused before publishing Mr...
...Senator Eagleton even took the fight to the congressional committee that least chal lenges its chairmen-the Appropriations Committee...
...In numerous major floor and committee fights, spanning a two-year period, Senator Eagleton led the effort to cut off military aid to Turkey after Turkey’s invasion of Cyprus in 1974...
...Eagleton’s request that I investigate campaign contributions is usually referred to as “negative campaign research”-it’s the perfectly legitimate perusal of press clips and other public documents...
...Rushford because he failed to perform the duties he was assigned and because he was unable to get along with fellow workers...
...But, aside from dredging up the already-investigated charge of food rotting on docks, Mr...
...Rushford produced nothing to justify his unshakable belief that somewhere there was bound to be corruption in the program...
Vol. 9 • January 1978 • No. 11
