First Ladies Read Free

door to the millionaire contributors to his war chest. Pat Nixon was being herself in those poignant words—reflecting her hardworking middle-class background. For a moment she had forgotten that she was also a politician’s wife.
    Again and again, First Ladies, while being themselves or trying to be public symbols, have collided with harsh political realities—and with the public’s often unrealistic expectations of their roles. Betty Ford found this out when she voiced some frank personal opinions about abortion and premarital sex on the TV show
60 Minutes
. The firestorm of criticism looked for a while like it might trigger a political meltdown in the Ford White House. Barbara Bush confessed in her memoirs that her opinion on abortion differed from her husband’s conservative stance—but remembering Betty’s experience, she artfully concealed it during her White House years.
    In both their private and public lives, which have become virtually indistinguishable, First Ladies have had to feel their way along an invisible boundary between aristocratic luxury and democratic simplicity. Criticism of a First Lady’s style did not begin with Nancy Reagan. It goes back to Martha Washington and has recurred with varying degrees of rancor throughout the following two hundred plus years.
    Not long ago, journalist Barbara Matusow moderated a panel on First Ladies and the media at the Smithsonian Institution. She opened the discussion by stressing the importance of historical perspective in understanding First Ladies. Without naming her, Ms. Matusow described a First Lady who was incredibly superstitious and fearful for her husband’s safety and who loved elaborate gowns and spent so much money on them and on decorating the White House that the bills deeply embarrassed her husband. She also had a reputation for pushing her husband around politically so often some people called her the Associate President. A ripple of recognition ranthrough the audience—until Ms. Matusow said: “It’s not Nancy Reagan. It’s Mary Lincoln.”
    The disapproval both these First Ladies incurred for their supposed extravagance and political weight throwing underscores a fundamental point. The American people have always wanted a First Lady to be a traditional wife and mother first Any interests or activities beyond these spheres have frequently been greeted with criticism or distrust.
    Not just from the public, I might add. Jack Kennedy was violently opposed, at first, to Jackie’s plans to redecorate the White House in 1961. It took a great deal of firmness on Jackie’s part to resist this presidential negativism and push ahead to the famous—and fabulously successful—redecoration. Other First Ladies, from Mary Lincoln to Pat Nixon to Nancy Reagan, have had to contend with powerful presidential aides, who saw them as competitors and were not averse to blackening their reputations.
    There is another trip wire in the First Lady’s path if she enters the explosive world of real politics. Bess Truman’s instinct to remain behind the scenes as her husband’s political partner was in part the result of her personal reluctance to face reporters and congressional committees. It was also rooted in conclusions she drew from Eleanor Roosevelt’s overtly political activities. She felt that sometimes Mrs. Roosevelt’s good intentions, her desire to achieve instant justice and equality between the
sexes
and races in America, led her into situations which embarrassed her husband—and even forced him to disavow her opinions.
    FDR, one of the most popular Presidents in American history, landslide winner of a second term in 1936, could tolerate these political differences, often with a smile. As a vice president catapulted into the White House by fate, Harry Truman had very little political capital to expend, so this too justified my mother’s covert style.
    No one can top me (or my mother) in admiration for Eleanor Roosevelt. She was one of the