 Telephone conversation between President Johnson and Senator Richard Russell on November 29, 1963 at 4.05 p.m. Thank you Senator Russell. Is our connection good? Can you hear me? Yes ma'am, I hear you very well. Thank you very much. I'm trying to avoid having all the House committee Hillbob and a bunch of things started over there. Jim Easton and Erdertson and a bunch of others started in the Senate. Bobby Kennedy's got his ideas. Hoover's got his report. They want to have you in for a while. So I've about concluded the phones that I can get people pretty well together and I've talked to the leadership on trying to have the three branches have two congressmen and two senators and maybe two or three outsiders and maybe somebody in the court, or at least some person of a judicial background, that are absolutely top-like that folks are on about a seven-man board to evaluate Hoover's report. It'll be largely done by staff but they can work on it. Bill, give me that list of people and I want to get your reaction to it. I think that'd be better than judiciary running one investigation, House running another investigation and having 4.05 going in opposite directions. I agree with that but I don't think that Hoover ought to make his report too soon. He's ready with it now and he wants to get it off just as quick as he can. Uh-oh. And he'd probably have it out today if most on Monday. He ain't gonna publish the damn thing. He's gonna turn it over to this group and there's some things about it I can't talk about. Yeah, I understand that. But I think it's being not aware that that thing is skeptical. I think it would be turned over as they're taking this Court of Inquiry in Texas and I think the results of that Court of Inquiry and Hoover's report and all of them would go to this group and they would evaluate it and then maybe evaluate it for the general public. Uh-huh. Now here's who I'm going to try to get on it. I don't know, I don't think I can get any member of the court that wouldn't try to. Wouldn't try to get Alan Dulles. I'm gonna try to get Senator Russell and Senator Cooper from the Senate. Oh, don't know, get somebody else. I haven't got time. Get Jerry Ford. It's not gonna take much time, but we got to have States Rights Man and somebody that the country has confidence in. And I'm gonna have Boggs as the end of the resolution over there and I haven't talked to anybody about the membership but you. But I would think that Ford and Boggs would be pretty good. They're both pretty young men and I think that Cooper's Republican and you're a good States Rights Man. And I think it might get John McClaw and Alan Dulles and maybe somebody in the court. If you don't get somebody in the Supreme Court, I don't know him. But Jack Medina, I think you don't say you're too repealed up in New York now. Who would be the best if I didn't get to Chief? I understand none of the court. No, you wouldn't want Clark, are you? I understand none of the court. No, we can't have a Texas. No, that's what I said, that's the court. Whoever tells me all three of these shots were aimed for the President. And that this telescopic sight would bring this thing up where you could shoot a man that was as easy as you could get a man to sit and talk to you. I thought it was just a simple doll on the head thing. That was a $21 gun but he said he looked through the telescopic sight himself and said, Mr. President, I could hit a man on that street going 20 miles an hour as easy as I could hit you, sit and talk to you. That's his language. It's okay now. I know you don't want to do anything, but I want you to. And I think that this is important enough and you'll see why. Now, the next thing, I know how you feel about this CIA, but they are worried about having to go into a lot of this stuff with foreign relations committee. How much of a problem would it give you to just quietly let Fulbright and Hick and Looper come into your CIA committee? As long as it's confined to those two, it wouldn't bring an insult to them. That's all we'd make it now. But there'd be changes made up there. I don't want some of those stuff in the committee. Why don't you do it by invitation? We've got a perfect one, and they know that, but they're worried about it. I didn't do it with you. I mean, I kept my position in the Fulbright committee though I've got a lot of faith in her, but I kept her off. Couldn't you do it quietly by invitation? On a personal basis, and then that invitation at the end anytime you wanted it to, and I'd say that to them? Yes, I'd be glad to do that. Invite them over there. Okay, when you coming back? Well, I just got out. I had a nice visit with your governor and told him what he told me. You didn't invite him up here. I didn't invite him up here. You told me that he was coming up here. Well, I came back in my office. I told you to tell him that I wanted to see him. I know it. That's why I couldn't understand it. Well, when I came back in my office I told him that you said he was going to have lunch with you and to get a hold of him and tell him that I wanted to see him before I went back. Well, I invited him up here and never heard of it, but that's the existence. I saw what you did in the box there with Ladybug. Oh, they heard that he was coming. You see, when you told me that afternoon that he was coming, they wanted something southern there, some outstanding southern. That was a good thing. I don't think you could have done better. But I just, I just... No, no, I didn't know at the time I'd seen you if he was invited. I don't know. See, Bird got up a list of folks and I guess he got a better... You could have done better and got him. He's also a nice young fella. Well, and you just lived in the best old lot of him. Well, I just, I just told him how much I love George and he told the press that he'd come back and came for me. Yeah, well, he's a good boy. Well, George is a good state. That's what I like about him. George is a good state. And, uh... But, Bird, if you get someone else... Well, if I can, I will, but I'm not gonna... But this country's got a lot of conference in here. And if I had my way, you'd be in my place and I'd trade with you. Oh, no, that would never be the case. Well, it would, too. Country being a hell of a lot better shape. And you're gonna run it next nine years. I'll be dead in another two or three years. You get you rest. I don't want to bother you anymore, I'm gonna have to be calling you every once in a while. Well, you know I'm always available. All right, goodbye. You think about anybody else now besides Medina. Well, I don't know... What about that old man died on that circuit court down there? Well, he would have been an ideal, but he's dead. That other fellow... He's a magnificent man. He'd have been perfect. That fellow you got on there now, though, is not too good, is he? That'll know. He's an eye pointy. Yeah, he's a pretty good man, but... That tell me he gives him some problems about that circuit. No problem. These kind of fellows think he's the last word. Mm-hmm. Thinks he's the last word. You know Prettyman? Yeah. What do you think about him? Pretty good man. He's getting a little old, isn't he? Yeah. Pretty much a good man. I don't think he's known. Well, he's not, but he don't have to be, aren't you? No, uh-uh. Are you going to have a move on that? No. It's his report. He's agreeable to folks like Douglas. Well, that is a good man. That's happy to know it. McCloy? Thank you. What do you think about his justice? Why shouldn't you? How many times are you doing that? President Sassonade, but every 50 years. Where are they put? President Sassonade, probably. 50 years? They put him on the bar, huh? You know what? He's up there. He's against him now. They're afraid it might get in there. I guess so. I don't know. That's probably his dear court. I guess so. Don't think about things. Well, give me the arguments, uh... Why they ought to. Well, give me the arguments. Well, I thought judges are... But daddy is the argument. The Supreme Court judge. I don't know if we should make... Yes, we should make...