Summer, 1967 - 1975
s 1967 advanced, and guidance from his pads became stable, A JFK knew he must start early on what would become the most ambitious of his ideas. He was determined to see it completed in his lifetime, so he tapped the shoulder of a young astrophysicist 222
named Carl Sagan, and whispered sweet nothings into his ear.
Carl had been dreaming on an astronomical scale since the age of five, when he opened a book in a public library and for the first time realized how vast the universe is. He hadn’t voiced most of the ideas he’d dreamed up since then, because most of them were so fanciful and impossible-sounding that people would have laughed at him. He learned to keep a lid on his more revolutionary thoughts, so as not to be sidelined by those ideas.
JFK learned Carl would attend a National Space Club luncheon in D.C. that summer. He arranged a late-night meeting at the White House on the pretense he wanted Carl’s opinion on something. The suitably impressed Sagan walked smack dab into JFK’s trap.
When Carl arrived, Kennedy wasted little time on small talk.
He said he wanted Carl to accept a challenging mission. He could have all the money in the world to accomplish it, and if he used that up, Kennedy would get more. All Carl had to do was to develop, and give to the world, a free energy source, perpetually available, with no pollution or harmful side effects.
“Oh, hell,” Carl said, laughing, “piece-a cake. Want me to control the weather while I’m at it?”
Kennedy smiled. “Funny you should ask…”
Their meeting was in Kennedy’s office. Kennedy relaxed, reclining in his chair behind his desk, and Carl was sitting to Kennedy’s left, beside the desk.
The Resolute Desk. Carl couldn’t stop looking at it. To tell the truth, since he had entered the Oval Office, he had spent more time looking at the desk than he had looking at Kennedy. He was still staring at it when he noticed Kennedy had said nothing more, beyond his last remark, which Carl had taken as a joke. Indeed, Carl had presumed everything the president had said so far was light bantering, not a joke so much as outrageous statements that weren’t meant to be taken seriously.
Carl dragged his eyes away from the desk and looked at Kennedy, and the way he sat there, staring back at Carl, gave Carl an eerie feeling, a feeling something momentous had just occurred. A 223
chill came over him as it occurred to him that Kennedy might not be joking. He opened his mouth to speak, but didn’t know what to say. JFK filled the silence for him.
“You thought I was joking, didn’t you?”
“Well, I—”
“I thought you scientific types examined all the evidence before you draw any conclusions.”
A direct challenge to his professional integrity! Carl was just a bit miffed! “What, specifically, Mr. President, of the available evidence, should have caused me to conclude you were serious?”
“Well, consider precedent. Have you ever heard me joke about energy before?”
There were holes in the president’s argument, but still, it wasn’t an altogether bad one. “I haven’t heard you joke about anything before. Your point is taken,” Carl said. “I’ll be more careful around you from now on. That said, and despite evidence to the contrary, I still can’t believe you’re serious.”
“So then, if the evidence points one way, and you believe the opposite, you must base your belief on… what… faith? Hm?”
“Touché. You came prepared.”
Kennedy sat up straighter in his chair and squared his shoulders to Carl. “It’s a lifelong project, a lifetime commitment, I’m asking for.”
“I’ve already planned my life, Mr. President.”
Kennedy stood up as he spoke. “You won’t have to give it all up. In fact, if you accept this mission, the very fact of your association with it will allow you to be even more involved in most of the other things you love doing.” He began pacing as he continued to speak. “You’ll continue to advise NASA, and you’ll brief astro-nauts. You’ll teach, write books, even appear on television. You’ll still fuel the imagination of ordinary people by showing them the wonders of science.
“I wouldn’t just blurt this out, Carl, what I’m about to tell you now, if I weren’t sure you’ve already seen the signs. You won’t be 224
given tenure at Harvard next year. Some of your colleagues are jealous of your showmanship, and your willingness to entertain ideas they’ve rejected.”
In his pacing, Kennedy had wandered to a point behind Carl, and off to the side. Carl thought he had heard enough of this ranting.
He thought he had things to do, he should take his leave as diplo-matically as possible and get on with his life. Yet, he hesitated. He couldn’t say why, but when he imagined himself sidestepping toward the door, he saw it in a negative light, as an act of… what?
Cowardliness? NO! Did he fear that if he took this mad assignment and failed, he would never regain his stature as a serious physicist?
He jumped up and turned to face Kennedy, standing near the door, hands in his pockets, looking down at the presidential seal sculpted into the carpet there.
“And you know all these things how, exactly, Mr. President?”
“Oh,” Kennedy said, looking up. “I have a crystal ball.”
One minute he’s serious, then… “A crystal ball. Heard of them.
Never saw one,” Carl said. He stared at Kennedy for a moment longer, then asked, “Who’ll win the World Series this year?”
“It would be cheating if I told you.”
Carl was incredulous, that he was standing here, in the White House, having this conversation, with this man.
“A crystal ball,” Carl said, in a good-natured attempt to play along with whatever game Kennedy played. “You’ve asked me to take on a herculean task, and you have a crystal ball. It follows that you can see the future, so… So, you must already know whether or not I’ll succeed.”
“You will,” Kennedy said quickly. Carl recoiled.
“Would it be cheating to reveal how I will accomplish this task?”
“No, it wouldn’t. I would tell you, if I knew.”
“Ah.” Carl said, picking up on Kennedy’s thought process.
“And if you knew that, it logically follows, you wouldn’t need me, would you?”
Kennedy glanced at Carl, then resumed his slow pacing, until 225
he was behind his chair, facing the windows, staring out. Without turning around, he said, “The process of discovery, invention, is often more rewarding than the invention itself, as I’m sure you’re aware. If I could use my crystal ball to sort through the chaff, give you the final blueprint, the formula, the design for the machine that frees us from our labors, we’d miss all the little discoveries along the way, wouldn’t we.” Turning to face Carl, he said, “The cosmos awaits, Carl. It’s been waiting for billions of years. You’ve said so yourself.”
“You’re starting to sound as if this crystal ball actually exists, Mr. President.” Kennedy only smiled.
Having had a few minutes to think, Carl decided to call JFK’s bluff, accept the job. Kennedy would admit it was a joke. If he didn’t, well… he’d just have to. There couldn’t be another outcome.
“When do I start, Mr. President?”
Kennedy hurried to his desk and picked up a thin folder. “I put you on the payroll this morning,” he said, as he handed Carl the folder. “This is a list of buildings I believe would suffice to put your initial R&D team to work, say fifty to one hundred of the best minds you can find? Pick one building, or more if you wish. They’re all on the east coast, so you’ll be closer to home to start with. I’d like your initial team to begin brainstorming within one week.”
This bluff-calling wasn’t working out quite like Carl had planned. He stared with open disbelief as Kennedy rolled on.
“You’ll need more space in a few months, once you zero in on a few of your best ideas. We’ll have to build, of course, mission specific, eighteen months out? I hope that’s not too optimistic?”
Carl cut in, “I can’t thank you enough for this incredible offer, Mr. President, but…”
Kennedy interrupted, saying, “Think nothing of it. I expect your work to generate building on several fronts, Carl. R&D labs, test labs, factories, housing for workers. I have a skeletal management team already waiting for you to start. Names and résumés are in that folder. Delegate any and every thing you can. Your time is best spent thinking, experimenting, choosing direction.” Kennedy 226
pushed a button on his desk and said, “Send in Leslie.”
The door opened immediately and a slim, middle-aged woman with short blond hair entered. She wore glasses with heavy black rims; she had one pencil tucked behind her right ear and she carried another, along with a clipboard, in her left hand. Kennedy waved Carl toward the door as he said, “This is Leslie. She’ll be your contact for now with the foundation. She’ll act as your GM until you have your own in place. Get her involved. Leslie has a sharp mind, an engineering background. She’s here to help you get started.”
As the still speechless Carl shook Leslie’s hand, Kennedy’s secretary came to the door and said, “The General is here, Sir.”
Kennedy shouted, “Come in, Max,” and he and Leslie guided Carl through the door, headed out, as General Maxwell Taylor brushed past them, headed in.
“Remember Carl,” Kennedy said, as he pushed the door closed,
“the sky is NOT the limit. Think big. Whatever you need, you’ll have. Keep me posted.”
With the door to his office closed, Kennedy turned to the general and said, “Thanks for stopping by, Max.”
“Glad to, Mr. President. What can I do for you?”
“You’ve already done it, Max,” Kennedy said.
Taylor looked back toward the door. “Seems all I’ve done is help you give that man the bum’s rush out of your office, if you don’t mind my saying so, Mr. President.”
“I don’t mind at all, Max,” Kennedy said, as he walked to a sideboard. “Carl was about to turn me down. He just needs time to think. Nightcap?”
Staring at the closed door, Carl asked, “What just happened?”
to no one in particular.
Leslie, already heading for the hall, turned around and, ignoring his question, said, “I’m so glad you’re on board, Mr. Sagan. I don’t know what would have happened if you didn’t accept. There was no list, no second choice. It was you and only you the president 227
wanted. Now,” she said, as she took his elbow and guided him toward the hall, “I know you won’t be able to devote a lot of time to this now, but I can get things started for you. If you can spare a couple more hours tonight to go over the R&D candidate properties, I’ll get started on that right away.
Before Carl could utter a word, Leslie continued, “I don’t think we’ll have to work too hard on initial R&D personnel scouting. The president will announce the project tomorrow, and your involvement, of course. Once it’s known you’re at the helm, I think they’ll come to us. Don’t worry, I have a phone bank team standing by so we won’t miss a single call. Also, the president’s announcement tomorrow should make it much easier for you to break with Harvard.
Do you think you’ll be more or less full time by next week? Then of course we need to…”
Leslie went on talking nonstop. An A-type personality if he’d ever seen one, Carl thought. He had to admire the skills, and una-bashed audacity, Kennedy had employed in coercing Carl to accept the position. Kennedy must know he would likely call tomorrow to turn it down. It was, however, an intriguing idea Kennedy had asked him to pursue. He was at least considering it now, whereas when Kennedy had first pitched it to him, he’d thought only of turning it down flat. Well, he would sleep on it and decide tomorrow morning.
He got back to his hotel a little after 1 AM, easily fell asleep, and didn’t wake until 8:30. He was in the shower when he realized that in his heart, he had already accepted the president’s offer. Like a thread that lead from his present to his future, he felt as if he’d been waiting for the offer his entire life.
The contract Carl signed with the CASE Foundation was short, simple, and allowed Carl wide latitude in pursuit of his goal. There were two important stipulations. First, Sagan would publicize the project: all developments, discoveries, methods or inventions that came from his work must be made available to the public domain.
Second, Sagan would take extreme precautions against exposure to radiation, at any level, starting at the top with Carl, down to the 228
lowliest factory floor-sweeper.
Carl believed in the first stipulation, and although the second would be a bit confining at times, especially considering the ultra-low levels Kennedy insisted upon, Carl went along with it. An employer concerned about his health wasn’t the worst thing an employee could have.
In the beginning, the CASE Foundation funded the entire project. Most experts considered it risky, even foolhardy, and the CASE Foundation itself was still an untested entity, even though it was run by one of the most popular presidents ever.
The frugal side of Carl prevented him from spending all the money in the world, but he launched himself headlong into the project. During the last eighteen months of JFK’s presidency, hundreds of scientists, from a dozen disciplines, went to work in a flurry of hiring that became headline news on a weekly basis. In addition to several R&D facilities in the U.S., Sagan also opened facilities in Japan, Germany, Australia, the USSR and China. Carl supervised the pursuit of many different approaches at once, with many teams of scientists and researchers. He was up to his eyeballs in conceptual theory, and loving every minute of it.
From its low point just before the 1964 election, Kennedy’s popularity steadily grew. It wasn’t due to any one thing, but rather a dawning awareness by the nation that JFK just might be a real leader: solid, steady, dependable.
In October 1967, it had been over a year since the last U.S.
soldier had returned from Vietnam. Many Americans, however, still wondered if they wouldn’t rather have waged that war against those Godless Communists, believing, as they did, that the U.S. would have won.
It was as if they didn’t want to give him too much credit, too soon. They needed more evidence before they committed themselves to believe him to be anything more than the self-serving politician with whom they were familiar.
Still, Kennedy’s approval ratings, which had declined to under 229
30% just before the last election, were now, late in 1967, back up above 50%. He wasn’t making mistakes. Not since the Bay of Pigs.
That, in itself, set him apart. Kennedy also tried to draw Republicans and Democrats together. It was evident in his words and deeds.
It was in this atmosphere of budding bipartisan cooperation that Kennedy presented Congress with a piece of legislation. He said he would like to see it passed into law quickly.
Kennedy named his bill the Keep Congress Working Act. It was in response, he said, to the growing momentum of an organization claiming that the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives could conduct their work more efficiently by telephone. Political activist Ralph Nader headed the group. The idea was a catchy one.
Nader’s group pointed out that a large portion of legislative communication already took place over the phone, even when legislators spoke to someone across the hall or down the street. Why not expand on that concept and save taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars each year?
Kennedy said his bill preempted any effort to force legislators to work from home, by pointing out the many reasons they needed to meet face to face, in Washington D.C, and by writing that into law. He said they needed to pass it quickly, before Nader’s group gained any more adherents.
There was no shortage of legislators, from both sides of the isle, willing to sponsor Kennedy’s bill, predisposed as they were to agree that they needed to nip this silly phone idea in the bud.
The bill was massive, and the wording peculiar in places, but the same could be said of most bills. A few Senators and Congressmen browsed through the draft, and they asked staffers to read it.
Most reported the bill looked harmless. A few said they’d like more time to study it. No one raised a red flag.
The vote was nearly unanimous, and Kennedy signed his bill into law on October 21, 1967. Nader disbanded his group, the KCW
Act went on a shelf, and everyone forgot it.
That same month, on the 27th, VP Lyndon Johnson called upon 230
“Mr. President,” he said, “you know that were it up to me, we would have made a massive injection of troops into Vietnam. I still believe that would have been the right decision, given the facts at the time. It’s clear to me now I was wrong, that there was a better way, and that you were the only one who saw that better way. You saw it three years ago, to boot. I’ll never know how you did that, only that you did. I think you know things the rest of us do not.”
Johnson said he wanted to run in ‘68. He wanted JFK’s endorsement, but he wanted more. He wanted JFK a phone call away, or in an office down the hall. He would either create a white house staff position or ask Congress for a new Cabinet level position. In short, he wouldn’t run unless JFK agreed to stay on in an adviser capacity.
Kennedy agreed to the endorsement, and to advising whenever possible, but he preferred to keep his consulting activities low on the radar. “With an appointment I’d waste too much time on politics,” he said.
A year later, on November 5, 1968, Johnson won his first term as President of the United States.
Kennedy gave the State of the Union speech on January 17, 1969. During that speech, Kennedy twice congratulated the Congress for passing the Keep Congress Working Act, telling Americans that the KCW Act would enhance the entire process of making laws, making them fair, and making them efficient. Most legislators viewed Kennedy’s mention of the KCW Act as an attempt to bolster his list of accomplishments, and they would think nothing more of it until about fifteen months later.
January 20, 1969, LBJ took the oath of office, and JFK moved his family from the White House to the Kennedy compound in Hyannis Port. They also maintained a home in D.C. near the CASE
Foundation headquarters. Kennedy and his family divided their time between these locations, always on an irregular schedule, always with heavy security of unpredictable numbers.
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