On Jan. 1, 1943, Robert Gene Baker arrived in Washington at the height of World War II to
become a Senate page. Two decades later, this son of a mailman from Pickens, S.C., had become the reigning Washington wheeler-dealer and fixer of his day as secretary to the Senate’s Democratic majority. In the era of President John F. Kennedy’s New Frontier, Baker was indispensable on Capitol Hill: The Man Who Knew Too Much.
Exactly 50 years ago this fall, in the face of a widening official investigation into his private business dealings and vivid social life—an inquiry that threatened to engulf the Kennedy White House in a sex scandal and destroy Baker’s political patron, Vice President Lyndon Johnson—Baker drank four martinis at lunch and impulsively resigned his post. He had been as close as a son to Johnson, privy to the vice president’s deepest secrets. On Friday, Nov. 22, 1963, the tragedy of Kennedy’s assassination short-circuited the Baker investigation, and spared Johnson career-ending ignominy.
Still, prosecutors eventually caught up with Baker, if not his patron, and he ended up serving 18 months in prison on federal tax evasion charges. In 1978, he co-wrote Wheeling and Dealing, a rollicking memoir with Larry L. King, best known as the author of the musical The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas.
But Baker in recent years quietly recorded an even more unvarnished account of his anything-goes-era in Washington, which Politico Magazine now publishes for the first time. His recollections—of an age when senators drank all day, indulged in sexual dalliances with secretaries and constituents, accepted thousands of dollars in bribes and still managed to pass the most important legislation of the 20th century—were collected by Donald Ritchie of the Senate Historical Office in interviews with Baker in 2009 and 2010. The resulting 230-page manuscript was so ribald and riveting, so salacious and sensational, that the Historical Office refrained from its usual practice of posting such interviews online.
Today, Baker is alive and well and living in Florida, managing the successful real estate investments that he somehow retained through his darkest days. Earlier this month, he turned 85. In the reminiscences that follow, he offers indelible proof that the good old days were not always good: One senator died with $2 million in unexplained cash; another took a $200,000 payment to switch his vote; some showed up for work drunk. But he also explains the ways in which the old days might well have offered a better model than the present for how to do business on Capitol Hill: his was really a time when senators knew and respected each other, and bipartisan cooperation was the norm. It’s a close question whether the sanctioned immorality of 50 years ago was worse for the legislative process than the codified corruption of today. Readers, be the judge. But harken, meantime, to the words of perhaps the last living man who saw it all.
What follows, in quotes, are Baker’s recollections; the author’s notes are in italics.
***
“My first impression was when I saw all of the soldiers with their bayonets guarding the Capitol. It scared [the] hell out of me because I had never been 50 miles beyond Pickens when I came to Washington on a bus…I tell you, for a hillbilly from South Carolina, I could not believe the grandeur of the Capitol and Washington…
Baker on the patron who had brought him to Washington, Sen. Burnett Maybank (D-S.C.).
“He was very, very kind. …He had one weakness. He had to have about a half a tumbler of bourbon when he woke up in the morning. He died, I think, when he was about 51…”1
“He was very, very kind. …He had one weakness. He had to have about a half a tumbler of bourbon when he woke up in the morning. He died, I think, when he was about 51…”1
and Sen. Clyde Hoey (D-N.C.)…
“Senator Hoey used to wear a swallowtail coat. The secretaries used to call me in the cloakroom because back then we always got paid in cash, twice a month. They’d say, ‘Is that old son of a bitch out there by the water fountain?’ Because what he would do, when a pretty girl would come by, he’d call her over and then he would try to play with her breasts.”2
“Senator Hoey used to wear a swallowtail coat. The secretaries used to call me in the cloakroom because back then we always got paid in cash, twice a month. They’d say, ‘Is that old son of a bitch out there by the water fountain?’ Because what he would do, when a pretty girl would come by, he’d call her over and then he would try to play with her breasts.”2
Baker on meeting Lyndon Johnson, who would become his mentor—though the relationship began a bit the other way around, as Johnson sought advice from the 20-year-old after his election to the Senate in 1948.
“I was a skinny little boy, I weighed about 120 pounds. He weighed about 280. So when [Johnson’s aide] John Connally took me in to introduce me to Senator-elect Johnson, Johnson jumped up and he said, ‘Mr. Baker, they tell me you’re the smartest son of a bitch over there.’ I said, ‘Well, whoever told you that lied.’ I said, ‘I know all of the staff on our side. I know who the drunks are. And I know whose word is good.’ He said, ‘You’re the man I want to know.’ So we became great friends…”
“I was a skinny little boy, I weighed about 120 pounds. He weighed about 280. So when [Johnson’s aide] John Connally took me in to introduce me to Senator-elect Johnson, Johnson jumped up and he said, ‘Mr. Baker, they tell me you’re the smartest son of a bitch over there.’ I said, ‘Well, whoever told you that lied.’ I said, ‘I know all of the staff on our side. I know who the drunks are. And I know whose word is good.’ He said, ‘You’re the man I want to know.’ So we became great friends…”
By the time of Johnson’s arrival, Baker had already become the Democrats’ “chief telephone page,” responsible for tracking action on the Senate floor and being able to tell inquiring Senate aides whether their bosses were needed for a vote. He came to know all the Senate’s byways and personalities, including the secretary to the Democratic majority, Felton “Skeeter” Johnston, a laconic Mississippian. Like other pages, who boarded full-time on Capitol Hill, Baker would attend school each morning before the Senate day began.
“Skeeter had an alcohol problem, but back then the Senate didn’t go in session until 12 o’clock, so I’d get out of class [in the page school] around 12, be back to the Senate around 12:20. After then, I was basically in charge of what was happening, because he loved being in the Secretary of the Senate’s office, which was a fabulous bar for Democratic senators.”3
“Skeeter had an alcohol problem, but back then the Senate didn’t go in session until 12 o’clock, so I’d get out of class [in the page school] around 12, be back to the Senate around 12:20. After then, I was basically in charge of what was happening, because he loved being in the Secretary of the Senate’s office, which was a fabulous bar for Democratic senators.”3
In 1953, when Johnson became the Senate’s Democratic floor leader, he promoted Baker to the post of secretary to the majority. The two collaborated so intimately that Baker became known as “Little Lyndon” and operated as Johnson’s eyes and ears. After Johnson’s 1955 heart attack—which involved prolonged absences for recuperation—Baker’s counsel became all the more important. As the years went by, he became the Senate’s leading expert at counting votes. He explained the importance of getting to know members in relaxed, after-hours settings.
“They let their hair down when they’ve had a few drinks, tell you their likes and dislikes, and you file it away. You find out who likes to take trips around the world, and then you try to repay those who voted against their conscience to help you. Senator Johnson was very adept at taking care of senators and their wishes, and the bills that they wanted…”
“They let their hair down when they’ve had a few drinks, tell you their likes and dislikes, and you file it away. You find out who likes to take trips around the world, and then you try to repay those who voted against their conscience to help you. Senator Johnson was very adept at taking care of senators and their wishes, and the bills that they wanted…”
We had these sofas and chairs, and there’s the mirror where … Kennedy said, ‘God, why did you make me so beautiful?’”
Friendships—and employment relationships—stretched across the partisan divide, as Baker recalled of his first acquaintance with Richard Nixon. In 1949, Baker had married Dorothy Comstock, a secretary to Senator Scott Lucas (D-Ill.), but she left that job for a better-paying one with Nixon after his election to the Senate in 1950.
“I knew him when he was first elected to the Senate. He had a lovely wife and two pretty daughters. My wife went on his payroll, because he had a surplus of cash from his California campaign. The Senate Sergeant at Arms kept a list of people who knew the Hill, and he recommended my wife to Senator Nixon’s secretary, Rose Wood[s]. She worked there until I was in law school and needed more money, and Senator [Pat] McCarran’s [D-Nev.] administrative assistant, Eva Adams, gave my wife a fat raise, and she resigned from Senator Nixon’s staff.
“I knew him when he was first elected to the Senate. He had a lovely wife and two pretty daughters. My wife went on his payroll, because he had a surplus of cash from his California campaign. The Senate Sergeant at Arms kept a list of people who knew the Hill, and he recommended my wife to Senator Nixon’s secretary, Rose Wood[s]. She worked there until I was in law school and needed more money, and Senator [Pat] McCarran’s [D-Nev.] administrative assistant, Eva Adams, gave my wife a fat raise, and she resigned from Senator Nixon’s staff.
“Especially at the beginning of the Eisenhower administration, I would see Mr. [Roy] Wilkins and all of the lobbyists for the NAACP in and out of Vice President Nixon’s little old office right off the Senate floor. He was really courting them. And they were ready to make a deal, because he was much, much more liberal on the Negro question than the Democrats were. For the life of me, I do not understand how he wound up with so much hate, dislike—he didn’t like Jews, he didn’t like anybody…”4
Baker recalled the power of lobbyists to influence issues, recounting an exchange with the long-serving Senate Republican Leader Everett Dirksen (R-Ill.)…
“One time Senator Dirksen called me down to his office. … He had… the right-wing bomb-throwers [assembled there]. Senator Dirksen started off by saying, ‘Mr. Baker, you are the best vote-counter in the history of the Senate. Will you tell my colleagues how many votes you have on this issue?’ I said, ‘Mr. Leader, I have 40 votes on my side and 12 votes on your side.’ They said, ‘Goddamn you! How can you have 12 votes on our side?’ I said, ‘Well, my lobbyist friend from the Railway Union, Cy Anderson, showed me his sheet. He secured vote pledges from the following…’ I’d go down the list. They said, ‘Those bastards!’ They were really upset. Dirksen said, ‘Take another drink. Let’s go get a unanimous consent agreement and have a long weekend.’ That’s the way he worked. … Dirksen became a wonderful friend. I mean, had it not been for Senator Dirksen, the [1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965] Voting Rights Act would never have passed…. So I’ll tell you, I have great admiration for him…. He never saw a $100 bill he didn’t like.”5
“One time Senator Dirksen called me down to his office. … He had… the right-wing bomb-throwers [assembled there]. Senator Dirksen started off by saying, ‘Mr. Baker, you are the best vote-counter in the history of the Senate. Will you tell my colleagues how many votes you have on this issue?’ I said, ‘Mr. Leader, I have 40 votes on my side and 12 votes on your side.’ They said, ‘Goddamn you! How can you have 12 votes on our side?’ I said, ‘Well, my lobbyist friend from the Railway Union, Cy Anderson, showed me his sheet. He secured vote pledges from the following…’ I’d go down the list. They said, ‘Those bastards!’ They were really upset. Dirksen said, ‘Take another drink. Let’s go get a unanimous consent agreement and have a long weekend.’ That’s the way he worked. … Dirksen became a wonderful friend. I mean, had it not been for Senator Dirksen, the [1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965] Voting Rights Act would never have passed…. So I’ll tell you, I have great admiration for him…. He never saw a $100 bill he didn’t like.”5
Asked how he went about counting heads, Baker offered the following explanation….
“Well, basically I knew a senator’s position or leanings, whether a senator was a conservative or a liberal. Basically, they don’t deviate from that. If you have 30 liberals and 20 conservatives, you have it. One of the few times I did not know how the vote was going to turn out was when President Kennedy was seeking Medicare. I did not learn until later why Senator Jennings Randolph [D-W.Va.] voted against it. Senator [Robert] Kerr, [a Democrat from Oklahoma, and a wealthy oil magnate] had made a deal with the doctors in Oklahoma to kill Medicare. He was just adamant in his opposition to Medicare. Now, Senator Jennings Randolph was a wonderful senator. … Ninety-nine times out of 100, I knew how he was going to vote. … But he would never tell me how he was going to vote on President Kennedy’s Medicare bill. … But Senator Kerr gave him $200,000 for that vote. It shows you that money can talk.”6
“Well, basically I knew a senator’s position or leanings, whether a senator was a conservative or a liberal. Basically, they don’t deviate from that. If you have 30 liberals and 20 conservatives, you have it. One of the few times I did not know how the vote was going to turn out was when President Kennedy was seeking Medicare. I did not learn until later why Senator Jennings Randolph [D-W.Va.] voted against it. Senator [Robert] Kerr, [a Democrat from Oklahoma, and a wealthy oil magnate] had made a deal with the doctors in Oklahoma to kill Medicare. He was just adamant in his opposition to Medicare. Now, Senator Jennings Randolph was a wonderful senator. … Ninety-nine times out of 100, I knew how he was going to vote. … But he would never tell me how he was going to vote on President Kennedy’s Medicare bill. … But Senator Kerr gave him $200,000 for that vote. It shows you that money can talk.”6
Baker explained the method used by Walter Reuther, the longtime head of the United Autoworkers Union, to get cash to senators at a time when unions were barred from making political contributions.
“He had to be very careful with cash money that came to his union in the United States. But he had no such rule in Canada. So as a consequence, Walter Reuther, probably because of his cash contributions, had a minimum of 20 senators that would vote any way he wanted. … He bought more United States Senate seats than anybody in my life. I’m telling you, it was unreal for Senator Ted Moss [D-Utah] or Gale McGee [D- Neb.], coming from basically Republican territory, to get elected. Because Walter Reuther gave money. But boy, when I needed to get them to help on a vote, if Walter Reuther called them, I could never change them.”7
“He had to be very careful with cash money that came to his union in the United States. But he had no such rule in Canada. So as a consequence, Walter Reuther, probably because of his cash contributions, had a minimum of 20 senators that would vote any way he wanted. … He bought more United States Senate seats than anybody in my life. I’m telling you, it was unreal for Senator Ted Moss [D-Utah] or Gale McGee [D- Neb.], coming from basically Republican territory, to get elected. Because Walter Reuther gave money. But boy, when I needed to get them to help on a vote, if Walter Reuther called them, I could never change them.”7
Baker believed cash for votes was not limited to the Senate, recounting how Rein Vander Zee, an aide to Hubert Humphrey, had described Humphrey’s famous loss to JFK in the West Virginia Democratic presidential primary in 1960.
“Vander Zee, until his dying day, said that Humphrey would have defeated Kennedy … had it not been for that massive cash old man Joe [Kennedy] bought the election with. Ryan, being an ex-FBI man, had every sheriff in each of those counties committed to voting for Humphrey. And, boy, when Election Day came, it was total news to him. They changed on Thursday before the Tuesday. Vander Zee said, ‘They wouldn’t even return my call.’’’8
“Vander Zee, until his dying day, said that Humphrey would have defeated Kennedy … had it not been for that massive cash old man Joe [Kennedy] bought the election with. Ryan, being an ex-FBI man, had every sheriff in each of those counties committed to voting for Humphrey. And, boy, when Election Day came, it was total news to him. They changed on Thursday before the Tuesday. Vander Zee said, ‘They wouldn’t even return my call.’’’8
…and he described the challenge of getting Robert F. Kennedy confirmed as attorney general in his brother’s administration…
“The President had said, ‘Lyndon, I need your help,’ because Senator [Richard] Russell [D-Ga.] and the Republicans were solid against Bobby being attorney general. He had really no legal experience. Johnson said [to me], ‘If the president is defeated by my supporters, it’s a terrible, terrible, can’t do situation for me.’ He said. ‘See what you can do with our mutual friend Senator Russell, because if you get enough bourbon in him, he gets more reasonable.’ So I took him out to the secretary of the Senate’s office and I said, ‘Your best friend loves you and he called me and he needs your help and will you please let me have a voice vote?’ And he said, most reluctantly, ‘You can have a voice vote.’ And Senator Dirksen, being a decent man, let it go through that way. But had it had a roll-call vote, Bobby Kennedy would have never been attorney general. He would have been lucky to get 40 votes. That’s how the Senate that I knew thought of him.”9
“The President had said, ‘Lyndon, I need your help,’ because Senator [Richard] Russell [D-Ga.] and the Republicans were solid against Bobby being attorney general. He had really no legal experience. Johnson said [to me], ‘If the president is defeated by my supporters, it’s a terrible, terrible, can’t do situation for me.’ He said. ‘See what you can do with our mutual friend Senator Russell, because if you get enough bourbon in him, he gets more reasonable.’ So I took him out to the secretary of the Senate’s office and I said, ‘Your best friend loves you and he called me and he needs your help and will you please let me have a voice vote?’ And he said, most reluctantly, ‘You can have a voice vote.’ And Senator Dirksen, being a decent man, let it go through that way. But had it had a roll-call vote, Bobby Kennedy would have never been attorney general. He would have been lucky to get 40 votes. That’s how the Senate that I knew thought of him.”9
Russell was the most revered—and feared—senator of his day. But his staunch segregationist views and implacable opposition to civil rights legislation made him anathema to the national Democratic Party…
“Being from Georgia and being much more conservative than the Democratic Party, there was no chance that he would take any position. Had he conceded that the South lost the Civil War, and after the Brown v. Board of Education had he stated that our customs in the South are totally different, but if you’ll go with me, we’ll start in kindergarten and we’ll integrate, he would have been president. He actually could have been president and he wanted to be president. But civil rights killed him, and that’s all he knew, Rule 22 [the filibuster rule.]”
“Being from Georgia and being much more conservative than the Democratic Party, there was no chance that he would take any position. Had he conceded that the South lost the Civil War, and after the Brown v. Board of Education had he stated that our customs in the South are totally different, but if you’ll go with me, we’ll start in kindergarten and we’ll integrate, he would have been president. He actually could have been president and he wanted to be president. But civil rights killed him, and that’s all he knew, Rule 22 [the filibuster rule.]”
Baker also recounted stories of the legendary characters of the Senate from his time there in the 1950s and 60s, offering vivid descriptions of their sexual peccadillos, proclivities and various other vices.
“Senator [Clinton] Anderson [D-N.M.] was a big disappointment. He was full of hate. I had a little Mexican-American kid as a page boy and he told me, he said, ‘Senator Anderson is the meanest son of a bitch I have ever met.’ He said, ‘He just treats you like you’re a dog.’ And he was also sort of a sex maniac…”
“Senator [Clinton] Anderson [D-N.M.] was a big disappointment. He was full of hate. I had a little Mexican-American kid as a page boy and he told me, he said, ‘Senator Anderson is the meanest son of a bitch I have ever met.’ He said, ‘He just treats you like you’re a dog.’ And he was also sort of a sex maniac…”
“Senator [Estes] Kefauver [D-Tenn.] had a drinking problem. He smelled like booze all the time, but he was not a mean man. His staff loved him … a tragic figure, but he was way ahead of all his Southern colleagues because when he first was elected to the Senate, he proposed a [Fair Employment Practices Commission] bill [to outlaw employment discrimination], which, oh, the Southerners, they hated. He was despised among all the Southern Democrats. Not a one of them liked him. But he had a bad alcohol problem and he also had a very bad record of wanting to go to bed with every woman he ever met. He got some of these young kids testifying, you know, before his Juvenile Committee or something and then he couldn’t wait to go to bed with them.”10
“Senator [Jacob] Javits [R-N.Y.] was a publicity hound. He was a very, very bright man, but he was another one—like Senator Jack Kennedy—he was a sex maniac. One of the postmen went in and caught him on his couch having a sexual affair with a Negro lady. He couldn’t wait to come and tell me.”
“I was always very fond of Senator Tommy Kuchel [D-Calif.]. He was a fun guy. … The difference between he and Senator Richard Nixon was that Senator Nixon could get 20 votes and Senator Tommy Kuchel could get 51. … Kuchel was having a relationship with his secretary, so he’d come over to me and ask me if I could send a page boy to buy him some rubbers—true story!”
She said, ‘Lyndon, I need some advice.’ She said, ‘Styles has got $2 million in cash here and I don’t know how to handle it.’”
“Senator [Herman] Talmadge was an extremely conservative Democrat from Georgia who had a monumental alcohol problem. He liked Senator Lyndon Johnson. He would hold his nose and vote for some things that Senator Johnson was proposing, but it turned out he was basically for hire. He was a crook, a bad crook. … He had a bitter divorce. I think she leaked the story that he had $100 bills in his top coat [in presumably ill-gotten gains] or something like that. He died with a broken heart… When I was in charge of Senator Lyndon Johnson’s vice presidential trip through the South, he was too drunk to show up.” 11
On frequent occasion, Baker was asked to dispense delicate advice…
“When Johnson was vice president, he invited me to go with him to Senator Styles Bridges’s [R-N.H.] funeral. … Dolores Bridges was very fond of Vice President Johnson. She said, ‘Lyndon, I need some advice.’ She said, ‘Styles has got $2 million in cash here and I don’t know how to handle it.’ Vice President Johnson, being the true coward, he said, ‘Talk to Bobby.’ So I told her, ‘The banks are the government. If you put it in the bank, you are dead meat. Whatever you do, do not put that money in the bank.’ I don’t know what the hell she did with it.”12
“When Johnson was vice president, he invited me to go with him to Senator Styles Bridges’s [R-N.H.] funeral. … Dolores Bridges was very fond of Vice President Johnson. She said, ‘Lyndon, I need some advice.’ She said, ‘Styles has got $2 million in cash here and I don’t know how to handle it.’ Vice President Johnson, being the true coward, he said, ‘Talk to Bobby.’ So I told her, ‘The banks are the government. If you put it in the bank, you are dead meat. Whatever you do, do not put that money in the bank.’ I don’t know what the hell she did with it.”12
As treasurer of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee when Johnson was majority leader, Baker himself had the job of dispensing campaign funds to selected members…
“My rule was if you’re five percentage points ahead, I cut the money off. But if you are tied, or something, I tried to get all the money I could for that particular senator. That was one of the reasons that Senator Johnson was so successful is that those people who you had a chance to elect, you would get money to, and as a consequence they were very grateful. But once again, you are selling your office. … It made my job much easier because a man that you have helped when he is running for his life, and he’s run out of money, and you send him $50,000, boy he is grateful…. We had no rules.”
“My rule was if you’re five percentage points ahead, I cut the money off. But if you are tied, or something, I tried to get all the money I could for that particular senator. That was one of the reasons that Senator Johnson was so successful is that those people who you had a chance to elect, you would get money to, and as a consequence they were very grateful. But once again, you are selling your office. … It made my job much easier because a man that you have helped when he is running for his life, and he’s run out of money, and you send him $50,000, boy he is grateful…. We had no rules.”
While working in the Senate, Baker earned a law degree and found a way to put it to use in some sharp extracurricular dealings—after all, in his day there were no rules against senators or staffers running private businesses on the side.
“No, no. None whatsoever. Just as long as you paid your taxes, you could do what you wanted to. Senator George Smathers, [D-Fla.], who was my dear friend, he made a lot of people wealthy peddling Winn-Dixie stock. Anytime Winn-Dixie wanted to build a new supermarket, they would tell him and he would go buy the land and build a shopping center, and he did not die broke. … He was … by far … the brightest and ablest guy between Nixon, John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson.”
“No, no. None whatsoever. Just as long as you paid your taxes, you could do what you wanted to. Senator George Smathers, [D-Fla.], who was my dear friend, he made a lot of people wealthy peddling Winn-Dixie stock. Anytime Winn-Dixie wanted to build a new supermarket, they would tell him and he would go buy the land and build a shopping center, and he did not die broke. … He was … by far … the brightest and ablest guy between Nixon, John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson.”
He would never tell me how he was going to vote on President Kennedy’s Medicare bill. … But Senator Kerr gave him $200,000 for that vote. It shows you that money can talk.”
Smathers’s best friend in the Senate was John F. Kennedy, and on a tour of the Senate Democratic cloakroom in 2009, Baker spied familiar furnishings and was moved to recollect…
“We had these sofas and chairs, and there’s the mirror where … Kennedy said, ‘God, why did you make me so beautiful?’”13
“We had these sofas and chairs, and there’s the mirror where … Kennedy said, ‘God, why did you make me so beautiful?’”13
Eventually, Baker’s investments would spell his downfall, starting with his partnership in building the Carousel Motel in Ocean City, Md. Lyndon and Lady Bird Johnson and a raft of senators and reporters attended the resort’s gala opening in 1962, but by then construction delays and other troubles had left Baker deeply in debt to his friend Sen. Robert Kerr (D-Okla.).
“I was probably the biggest wheeler-dealer around—and I enjoyed it, I’ll tell you. Ocean City was nothing until we built the Carousel…. I was working around people—Senator Lyndon Johnson and Senator Bob Kerr—who were multimillionaires. And so I wanted to be like them. I never neglected my Senate duties, but I had all this time when the Senate wasn’t in session. The way I went into the hotel business was my wife had hay fever and she breathed much better when we’d go to Ocean City.”14
“I was probably the biggest wheeler-dealer around—and I enjoyed it, I’ll tell you. Ocean City was nothing until we built the Carousel…. I was working around people—Senator Lyndon Johnson and Senator Bob Kerr—who were multimillionaires. And so I wanted to be like them. I never neglected my Senate duties, but I had all this time when the Senate wasn’t in session. The way I went into the hotel business was my wife had hay fever and she breathed much better when we’d go to Ocean City.”14
Desperate for cash, Baker went into another business, with backing and loans arranged by Senator Kerr. The venture, called the Serv-U Corporation, would furnish vending machines for large corporations and government offices. But Baker promptly ran afoul of a major industry rival, Canteen, which was owned by supporters of Sen. Everett Dirksen from Chicago, and had held the contract for the Senate’s own vending machines.
“It was going to be big, big business. Senator Dirksen’s friends, who owned Canteen, had the contract and they went bonkers. … And Dirksen put a lot of heat on to get Canteen back. … They got the contract to run the Senate restaurants and Senator Dirksen did not die broke, I can tell you that.”
“It was going to be big, big business. Senator Dirksen’s friends, who owned Canteen, had the contract and they went bonkers. … And Dirksen put a lot of heat on to get Canteen back. … They got the contract to run the Senate restaurants and Senator Dirksen did not die broke, I can tell you that.”
But the business that got Baker into the hottest political water was the Quorum Club, a private after-hours joint upstairs in the Carroll Arms Hotel on Capitol Hill, where lobbyists and legislators could repair for a drink (or three) with attractive women out of the sight of prying journalists’ eyes. Baker had begun an office affair with a pretty blonde named Carole Tyler, who lived with her roommates in a townhouse he owned. The most notorious habitué of the club was Ellen Rometsch, the wife of a West German army officer stationed at the German embassy in Washington, though she was suspected by the F.B.I. of being an East German spy…
“Oh, sure, all of the administrative assistants, every one of them had a girlfriend just like I did. Carole Tyler and I were both mutually stupid. … Ellen Rometsch was … as pretty as Elizabeth Taylor. … She was sort of like me. She’d come from Germany broke. She really loved oral sex. So any time – 90 percent of the people who give you money want to know if you can get them a date. I don’t give a damn who they are. They’re away from mama and their wives and they have a tremendous desire to party. … Bill Thompson [a lobbyist] … said [of Rometsch], ‘Baker, where did you get that good-looking woman? ... You think if I invited her to my apartment she’ll go to the White House and see President Kennedy?’ I said, ‘She would jump at the chance.’ So she went to the White House several times. And President Kennedy called me and said it’s the best head-job he’d ever had, and he thanked me….
“Oh, sure, all of the administrative assistants, every one of them had a girlfriend just like I did. Carole Tyler and I were both mutually stupid. … Ellen Rometsch was … as pretty as Elizabeth Taylor. … She was sort of like me. She’d come from Germany broke. She really loved oral sex. So any time – 90 percent of the people who give you money want to know if you can get them a date. I don’t give a damn who they are. They’re away from mama and their wives and they have a tremendous desire to party. … Bill Thompson [a lobbyist] … said [of Rometsch], ‘Baker, where did you get that good-looking woman? ... You think if I invited her to my apartment she’ll go to the White House and see President Kennedy?’ I said, ‘She would jump at the chance.’ So she went to the White House several times. And President Kennedy called me and said it’s the best head-job he’d ever had, and he thanked me….
“Any time I had a rich guy in town, my secretary called her to see if she could go out. She told me that of all the people she had met … the nicest one was Congressman Jerry Ford [R-Mich.]. [FBI Director] J. Edgar Hoover could not find out the happenings when the Warren Commission was investigating the killer of President Kennedy. … J. Edgar Hoover could not find out what they were doing. So, he had this tape where Jerry Ford was having oral sex with Ellen Rometsch. You know, his wife had a serious drug problem back then. … Hoover blackmailed … Ford to tell him what they were doing. That’s the reason I don’t like him. It’s just a misuse of authority.”15
By 1963, Baker’s public and private worlds were beginning to collide. That summer, Attorney General Robert Kennedy became so concerned about the rumors involving President Kennedy and Ellen Rometsch that he had her secretly deported back to Germany. That fall, a rival vending machine operator sued Baker, alleging that he was peddling influence to win contracts for Serv-U. The suit drew the attention of journalists, and the Senate Rules Committee, which began an investigation into Baker’s dealings. Baker’s high-flying life came crashing down around him—and everyone he knew, especially Lyndon Johnson. Johnson had not been involved in Baker’s investments, but Baker had helped arrange a life insurance policy for Johnson after his 1955 heart attack—and later, for the gift of a stereo set as a kind of kickback from the broker who wrote the policy. Johnson was terrified that he would be tarred by association with Baker, while the Kennedy administration—and senior senators of both parties—worried about being drawn into the Rometsch affair. On Oct. 7, 1963, Baker was set to meet with Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield and Minority Leader Dirksen to review the allegations against him. Instead, hoping to stop the investigation, Baker downed four Tanqueray martinis at the Quorum Club at lunch, and then resigned. He hoped his resignation would end the investigation, but it did not.
On the afternoon of Nov. 22, 1963, Don Reynolds, the Maryland broker who had written the life insurance policy for Johnson, was telling investigators for the Senate Rules Committee that he had been pressured to buy advertising time on an Austin television station owned by Johnson—even though the insurance salesman was unknown in Texas and could hardly expect to generate business there.
“And on November 22 … after lunch, in the Senate Rules Committee investigation [of] Bobby Baker, Don Reynolds was going to really spill his guts. But when President Kennedy was killed, it basically killed the Baker investigation. You know, President Johnson acted like he did not know me. … I think the Reynolds testimony plus the absolute hatred of Bobby Kennedy of Johnson [would have forced LBJ off the 1964 Democratic ticket if Kennedy had lived]. Poor old Walter [Jenkins, one of Johnson’s most trusted aides, who had worked with Reynolds to buy the advertising time on the Johnson station], had President Kennedy not been killed, he either would have had to take the Fifth Amendment and quit, or tell the truth and Vice President Johnson would have definitely been off the ticket in 1964, had it [been] shown that he had really been the party in the back of this.”
“And on November 22 … after lunch, in the Senate Rules Committee investigation [of] Bobby Baker, Don Reynolds was going to really spill his guts. But when President Kennedy was killed, it basically killed the Baker investigation. You know, President Johnson acted like he did not know me. … I think the Reynolds testimony plus the absolute hatred of Bobby Kennedy of Johnson [would have forced LBJ off the 1964 Democratic ticket if Kennedy had lived]. Poor old Walter [Jenkins, one of Johnson’s most trusted aides, who had worked with Reynolds to buy the advertising time on the Johnson station], had President Kennedy not been killed, he either would have had to take the Fifth Amendment and quit, or tell the truth and Vice President Johnson would have definitely been off the ticket in 1964, had it [been] shown that he had really been the party in the back of this.”
But he had a bad alcohol problem and he also had a very bad record of wanting to go to bed with every woman he ever met.”
The press furor and Senate investigation of Baker continued in the aftermath of the assassination, and on Feb. 19, 1964, Baker was called to testify. On the advice of his lawyer, the legendary Edward Bennett Williams, he took the Fifth Amendment. In 1966, Baker was indicted on charges of income tax evasion, stemming from financial transactions he had handled for Sen. Robert Kerr, who by then had died. Baker was tried and convicted the following year, and his appeal was ultimately rejected. He served 18 months in the federal prison at Allenwood, Pa. before his release in 1972. He and his wife, the former Dorothy Comstock, were married for 27 years, and divorced for 15, but later reconciled and live together today in northern Florida. In 2008, he voted (for Barack Obama) for the first time in more than 40 years, because Florida passed a law restoring the franchise to convicted felons who have served their time.
“When I see my Negro friends, I tell them, ‘You go say a little prayer for LBJ.’ Because I said, ‘The Voting Rights Act made us all equal.’ The only way in hell that Senator Obama ever got elected president was because of the Voting Rights Act. I said, ‘It’s the greatest thing that’s happened to our country.’
“When I see my Negro friends, I tell them, ‘You go say a little prayer for LBJ.’ Because I said, ‘The Voting Rights Act made us all equal.’ The only way in hell that Senator Obama ever got elected president was because of the Voting Rights Act. I said, ‘It’s the greatest thing that’s happened to our country.’
I’ll tell you, the people who disliked me are dead and I’m still alive. Had I not had trouble … you cannot work seven days a week, 18 hours a day, and drink as much and eat the wrong foods. It saved my life. Now I wait till 5 o’clock to take a drink, take two drinks and I’m through. I attribute it to my troubles. Had I not had it, I’d been dead a long time ago…. You cannot believe the amount of ill press I received for about 10 years. But time is a great healer. So when you walk down the street and meet 100 people and you say, ‘Do you know who Bobby Baker is?’ they don’t have a clue.”
Todd S. Purdum is senior writer at Politico and contributing editor at Vanity Fair.
