"Dear Mr. President": The institutionalization and politicization of public opinion mail in the white house

Political Science Quarterly

Volumn 121, Issue 3, 2006, Pages 451-476

  Rottinghaus, Brandon ^a,b  

^a Department of Political Science ^*

^b UNIVERSITY OF IDAHO   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 33749344957     PISSN: 00323195     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1002/j.1538-165X.2006.tb00578.x     Document Type: Article

References (145)

1. Public Papers of the President, George H.W. Bush. "Remarks at a Republican Fundraising Breakfast in Des Moines, Iowa," 16 October 1990 (Washington DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1992), 1286.
2. Sidney Verba, Kay Lehman Schlozman, and Henry E. Brady, Voice and Equality: Civic Volunteerism in American Politics (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995), 56.
3. Steven J. Rosenstone and John Mark Hansen, Mobilization, Participation and Democracy in America (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1993), 72.
4. See Melvin Small, "Influencing the Decision Makers: The Vietnam Experience," Journal of Peace Studies 24 (Issue 2 1987): 185-198;
5. Bruce J. Evensen, Truman, Palestine and the Press: Shaping Conventional Wisdom at the Beginning of the Cold War (New York: Greenwood Press, 1992);
6. Anthony Lewis Dexter, "What Do Congressmen Hear: The Mail," Public Opinion Quarterly 20 (Spring 1956): 16-27;
7. and David P. Thelen, Becoming Citizens in the Age of Television: How Americans Challenged the Media and Seized Political Initiative during the Iran-Contra Debate (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1996).
8. Leila Sussmann, "Mass Political Letter Writing in America: The Growth of an Institution," Public Opinion Quarterly 23 (Summer 1959): 5-16.
9. Leila Sussmann, "FOR and the White House Mail," Public Opinion Quarterly 20 (Spring 1956): 203-212.
10. Ira Smith, Dear Mr. President (New York: Julian Messner, 1949);
11. Donald W. Whisenhunt, Poetry of the People: Poems to the President 1929-1945 (Bowling Green, OH: Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1996);
12. Lawrence W. Levine and Cornelia R. Levine, The People and the President: America's Extraordinary Conversation with FDR (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 2002);
13. D.M. Giangreco and Kathryn Moore, Dear Harry ...: Truman's Mailroom, 1945-1953 (Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 1999).
14. Taeku Lee, "The Sovereign Status of Survey Data" in Jeff Manza, Fay Lomax Cook, and Benjamin I. Page, eds., Navigating Public Opinion: Polls Policy and the Future of American Democracy (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2002);
15. and Taeku Lee, Mobilizing Public Opinion: Black Insurgency and Racial Attitudes in the Civil Rights Era (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2002).
16. Lee, Mobilizing Public Opinion, 240 (footnote 3) also claims that Presidents Truman, Elsenhower, and Kennedy did not appear to keep summaries. As this article demonstrates, this is probably true of Truman but not true of Elsenhower and Kennedy.
17. See Elmer E. Cornwell, Jr., Presidential Leadership of Public Opinion (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1965), 245-246;
18. John C. Geer, From Tea Leaves to Opinion Polls: A Theory of Democratic Leadership (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), 51;
19. Michael J. Towle, Out of Touch: The Presidency and Public Opinion (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2004), 116.
20. Lawrence R. Jacobs and Robert Y. Shapiro, "The Rise of Presidential Polling: The Nixon White House in Historical Perspective," Public Opinion Quarterly 59 (Summer 1995): 163-195.
21. Eisinger notes that President Hoover's internal gauging of opinion was interpreted as a desire to gauge opinion independent of the Republican Party, with which the Hoover administration did not have the best relationship. Robert M. Eisinger, "Gauging Public Opinion in the Hoover White House: Understanding the Roots of Presidential Polling," Presidential Studies Quarterly 30 (December 2000): 643-661.
22. Lawrence R. Jacobs and Robert Y. Shapiro, "Presidential Manipulation of the Polls and Public Opinion: The Nixon Administration and the Pollsters," Political Science Quarterly 110 (Winter 1995): 519-538;
23. Jacobs and Shapiro, "The Rise of Presidential Polling," 163-195;
24. Robert Eisinger and Jeremy Brown, "Polling as a Means Towards Presidential Autonomy: Emil Hurja, Hadley Cantril and the Roosevelt Administration," International Journal of Public Opinion Research 10 (Issue 3 1998): 237-256;
25. Melvin G. Holli, The Wizard of Washington: Emil Hurja and Presidential Leadership (New York: Palgrave Press, 2002);
26. Robert Eisinger, The Evolution of Presidential Polling (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2002);
27. Brandon Rottinghaus, "Reassessing Public Opinion Polling in the Truman White House," Presidential Studies Quarterly 33 (June 2003): 325-332.
28. Sussmann, "Mass Political Letter Writing," 203.
29. Records of this were ironically found in the Truman Archive. See Harry S. Truman Library, official file, "The White House as a Business Office," copy for President Harry S. Truman, delivered 16 May 1945.
30. Merlin Gustafson,"The President's Mail (Is It Worthwhile to Write to the President?)" Presidential Studies Quarterly (Summer 1987): 36-44;
31. Sussmann, "Mass Political Letter Writing," 6;
32. Levine and Levine, The People and the President, 10-11.
33. Henry Scarupa and William Klender, "What Happens to Your Letters to the White House?" The Sun Magazine, 24 July 1977, 5, 8-9.
34. Bradley H. Patterson Jr., The White House Staff: Inside the West Wing and Beyond (Washington DC: Brookings, 2000), 383-384.
35. Data compiled by the author from weekly opinion mail summaries taken from each presidential archive. Specific archival locations are listed in the analysis of each president below. The mail counted in these averages is listed across administrations as "Presidential Mail," which excludes mail sent to the first family, gifts, and requests for presidential paraphernalia. This is the most direct measure of mail addressing popularity and policy available. The unit of measure is the average per president, not time period.
36. Sussmann, "Mass Political Letter Writing," 6-7.
37. Patterson, The White House Staff, 383-384.
38. Eisinger and Brown, "Polling as a Means," 237;
39. Eisinger, The Evolution of Presidential Polling.
40. See Levine and Levine, The People and the President, 10-11;
41. Leila Sussmann, Dear FOR, A Study of Political Letter Writing (Totowa, NJ: Bedminster Press, 1963).
42. Sussmann, "FDR and the White House Mail," 9. The Guide to Historical Materials (both in hard copy and online) from the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Archives shows that some fragmented attempts were made to summarize the incoming White House mail. Only a few actual summaries of incoming mail were discovered after searching the Library's holdings, and a search of the internal database at the Roosevelt Library produces no consistent viable results. Visits to the Library produced only selected summaries of incoming White House mail, usually on a salient political issue. Selected letters, apart from summaries, were chosen from the White House mail and shown to the President, particularly when he was away from Washington at his home in Hyde Park. For example, the papers of William Hassett, the mail chief in the White House, include several forms outlining the mail sent to President Roosevelt while he was at Hyde Park. These letters are subdivided into categories: "for President's signature," "for President reading," "Letters from ..." and "secret," box 13.
43. Quoted from New York Times, 17 December 1933, in Sussmann "FDR and the White House Mail," 10.
44. Smith, Dear Mr. President, 156.
45. Thomas McGreer, What Roosevelt Thought: The Social and Political Ideas of Franklin Roosevelt (Lansing: Michigan State University Press), 101;
46. Sussmann, "FDR and the White House Mail," 8;
47. and Cornwell, Presidential Leadership of Public Opinion, 135-136.
48. Holli, The Wizard of Washington, 69-73.
49. Louis Howe, "The President's Mailbag!" The American Magazine, June 1934, 23.
50. These daily abstracts are continuous for every date in 1933, but no similar documents were located to offer a contiguous stream of data. See Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library, Louis Howe papers, editorial and mail abstracts, "Abstract of the President and Mr. Howe's Mail," miscellaneous dates in 1933, box 43.
51. Louis Howe Papers, Ibid., 2 May 1933 summary, box 43.
52. Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library, DNC files, DNC mail, "Governor Roosevelt's Mail," 27 May 1932, box 507-509.
53. Governor Roosevelt's Mail, Ibid., 20 June 1932.
54. Governor Roosevelt's Mail, Ibid. 1932
55. See in particular, Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library, DNC files, boxes 1, 40, 847-849, 862, and 880.
56. Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library, DNC files, "1944 VP Candidate," box 1174.
57. Holli, The Wizard of Washington, 69-73.
58. Rottinghaus, "Reassessing Polling, 325-332";
59. Jacobs and Shapiro, "The Rise of Presidential Polling," 164.
60. David McCullough, Truman (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992).
61. Harry S. Truman Library, oral history interview with Mildred Lee Dryden, 26 September 1963, 55.
62. Harry S. Truman Library, post-presidential files, "Memoirs," tape 12, transcript page 29.
63. Giangreco and Moore, Dear Harry, 8.
64. The Guide to Historical Materials (both in hard copy and online) Harry S. Truman Presidential Archives shows that some fragmented attempts were made to summarize the incoming White House mail on sporadic issues. Two visits to the Library produced only selected summaries of incoming White House mail, usually on a salient political issue. Consultations with Truman Library archivists suggest that there was very little information available regarding mail summaries but that samples of public opinion mail were saved on selected issues. Cornwell, Presidential Leadership, 246 notes that the Truman administration recorded mail issues weekly, but two visits to the Library and consultation with the archival staff at the Library uncovered one such memorandum totaling three pages in length in the "Paul Hume" vertical file. The format and font seem to precisely match the format and font of the mail summaries collected at the Eisenhower Library, indicating that the Truman White House possibly initiated a continuous systematic analysis of the mail, although this claim is not provable, given that the archivists assume the original documents to be lost, misplaced, or destroyed.
65. Harry S. Truman Library, oral history interview with Joseph G. Feeney, 22 April 1967,104.
66. See Harry S. Truman Library, papers of Harry S. Truman, White House central files, "Public Opinion Mail," boxes 1-10;
67. see also Harry S. Truman Library, official file-500 misc.-505 (1948), box 1372.
68. Harry S. Truman Library, oral history interview with Perry Hardin, 8 May 1991, 10-11.
69. Rottinghaus, "Reassessing Polling in the Truman White House," 104.
70. Dennis Merrill, ed. Documentary History of the Truman Presidency, vol 20 (Bethesda, MD: University Publications of America, 1995), 227.
71. David McCullough, Truman (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992), 845-846.
72. See Harry S. Truman Library, papers of Harry S. Truman, White House central files, "Public Opinion Mail," boxes 1-10. In particular, boxes 1-9 include several hundred original postcards on the Palestine issue as well as several tabulations based on type of communication (including form letters, personal letters, petitions, resolutions, and clippings).
73. Harry S. Truman Library, Philleo Nash files, Palestine analysis, "Knutson to Nash," 24 July 1951 and 6 August 1951, box 13.
74. Knutson to Nash, Ibid., 24 July 1951, box 13, page 3 of report.
75. See Eisinger, The Evolution of Presidential Polling, 85-87.
76. Louis Harris, Kennedy's pollster, polled for Senator Kennedy very early before the 1960 campaign, and in October of 1957, conducted a poll entitled, "An Analysis of a Trial Pairing of Vice President Richard M. Nixon vs. Senator John F. Kennedy For the President of the United States." The rapid increase in the number of polls began in 1960, when Harris conducted statewide polls in almost every state (in many states, including New York, Pennsylvania, and California, up to five times) and produced seventy reports for the campaign between 3 September and 3 November.
77. See John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, Robert F. Kennedy pre-administration files, political correspondence 1959-60, Harris, "Schedule of Delivery of Harris Polls," 12 August 1960, box 13.
78. Eisinger, The Evolution of Presidential Polling, 84-85.
79. The Evolution of Presidential Polling, Ibid., 88;
80. Lawrence R. Jacobs and Robert Y. Shapiro, "Issues, Candidate Image and Priming: The Use of Private Polls in Kennedy's 1960 Presidential Campaign," American Political Science Review 88 (September 1994): 527-540.
81. Dwight D. Elsenhower Library, White House central files, official file, White House files, "Steffan to Officials of White House Office," 22 June 1953, OF 72.
82. Steffan to Officials of White House Office, Ibid., boxes 308 and 309, and Gerald Morgan staff files, boxes 30 and 31. Several handwritten comments, the initials "DE," or officially stamped "The President Has Seen" notations appear on the mail summaries at various and multiple dates.
83. Morgan was the only staff member to have copies of these weekly reports, and his filings of these reports became the official reports for the record. See Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, White House central files, official file, White House files, "File Memo," 6 January 1960, OF 72.
84. Scholars have found that Kennedy had significantly fewer polls querying the public on policy and popularity than did subsequent presidents. Lawrence R. Jacobs and Melanie Burns, "Presidential Polling in Perspective" (paper presented at "Researching the Public Presidency Conference," Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, 23 January 2003).
85. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, Robert F. Kennedy pre-administration political files, weekly report on issues mail (and misc.) 10 November 1959-16 September 1960, "Weekly Report on Issues Mail by David L. Hacker," 2 September 1960, box 52. Emphasis in original.
86. The files of Robert Kennedy, who served as the manager of his brother's campaign, contain the bulk of the material relating to the 1960 presidential campaign. Although the folder title indicates that the mail reports span from November of 1959 to November of 1960, a thorough search of Robert F. Kennedy's papers yielded a low number of such reports.
87. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, Robert F. Kennedy pre-administration political files, "Weekly Report on Issues Mail by David L. Hacker," 2 September 1960. Emphasis in original.
88. Weekly Report on Issues Mail by David L. Hacker, Ibid. Emphasis in original.
89. Weekly Report on Issues Mail by David L. Hacker, Ibid.
90. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, Robert F. Kennedy pre-administration political files, political miscellany 7 October-5 November 1960, "Weekly Report on issues mail by David L. Hacker," 21 October 1960. Emphasis in original.
91. Theodore C. Sorensen, Kennedy (Old Saybrook, CT: Konecky & Konecky, 1965), 191.
92. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, Robert F. Kennedy pre-administration political files, "Weekly Report on Issues Mail by David L. Hacker," 21 October 1960.
93. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, White House central subject file, WH 5-1 (mail) 20 January-30 September 1961, "Holborn to Hatcher," 27 February 1961, box 1006A.
94. Holborn to Hatcher, Ibid. 1961
95. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, White House central subject file, WH 5-1 (mail) 1 January 1963, "Memorandum from Hopkins," 6 February 1963, box 1006A.
96. Memorandum from Hopkins, Ibid. 1963
97. John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, White House central subject file, WH 5-1 (mail) 1 January 1963, "Memorandum 'Filed by Press Office,'" author unknown, 5 March 1963, box 1006A.
98. Jacobs and Shapiro, "The Rise of Presidential Polling," 167. The total number of private polls increased from 93 under Kennedy to 130 under Johnson and 233 under Nixon.
99. Bruce E. Altschuler, LBJ and the Polls (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1990);
100. Eisinger, The Evolution of Presidential Polling, 92.
101. Jacobs and Shapiro, "The Rise of Presidential Polling," 187.
102. Robert A. Caro, Means of Ascent (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1990);
103. and Robert A. Caro, Master of the Senate (New York: Random House, 2002).
104. Lyndon Johnson Presidential Library, aides' files (Middleton), the President's mail, "Remarks by the President" written by Whitney Shoemaker, 2 December 1968, box 90.
105. Remarks by the President, Ibid. 1968
106. Remarks by the President, Ibid. 1968
107. President Johnson specifically asked Paul Popple, assistant to the President for correspondence, to see weekly summaries of the mail. See Lyndon Johnson Presidential Library, PR 16, 9 April-7 September 1965, "LBJ to Popple," no date, box 8.
108. See the 2 April 1965 summary for a full list of the individuals to whom the mail summary memos were circulated.
109. Lawrence O'Brien, oral history interview XIX with Michael L. Gillette, 22 April 1987,4; internet copy, accessed at the LBJ Library online, at http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu/johnson/archives.hom/ oralhistory.hom/obrienl/obrienl.asp, 25 May 2006.
110. Michael Beschloss, Reaching for Glory: Lyndon Johnson's Secret White House Tapes, 1964-1965 (New York: Touchstone, 2001), 272.
111. Ironically, the documentation for this procedure was found in the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library, White House administration files, Gianinni files, mail section 3, processing presidential mail (1965), box 40. Issue subjects referenced by letter writers that did not match polling results were also tallied and forwarded to the mail chief for a decision on whether to include the results in the summary.
112. Robert Dallek, Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson and His Times, 1961-1973 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 425-428.
113. Robert Dallek, Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson and His Times, 1961-1973, bid., 427.
114. Robert Dallek, Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson and His Times, 1961-1973, Ibid., 429.
115. Michael B. Grossman and Martha Joynt Kumar, Portraying the President: The White House and the News Media (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins Press, 1981);
116. and John Anthony Maltese, Spin Control: The White House Office of Communications and Management of Presidential News (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1994).
117. Eisinger, The Evolution of Presidential Polling, 98-103.
118. "Nixon's Methods of Feeling the Pulse," New York Times, 12 December 1969.
119. Jacobs and Shapiro, "The Rise of Presidential Polling," 163-195.
120. See Richard Nixon materials project, National Archives II, White House central files, (CF) WH 4-1 (mail) 1971-1974, "Campbell to Gergen," 2 November 1971, box 69.
121. Diane Heith, "Staffing the White House Public Opinion Apparatus," Public Opinion Quarterly 62 (Summer 1998): 165-189.
122. Only pro mail received an acknowledgement from the White House.
123. Richard Nixon materials project, National Archives II, White House central file, subject file, EX WH 4-1 (mail) 29 January-28 Febuary 1969, "Haldeman to Brown," 3 February 1969.
124. Richard Nixon materials project, National Archives II, President's personal file, memos, February 1971, "President to Haldeman," no date, box 3.
125. Richard Nixon materials project, National Archives II, President's personal file, memos, June 1971, "President to Haldeman," 1 June 1971, box 3.
126. Richard Nixon materials project, National Archives II, H.R. Haldeman papers, mail operation, "Haldeman to President," 11 June 1971, box 129.
127. See Richard Nixon materials project, National Archives II, White House central files, (CF) WH 4-1 (mail) 1971-1974, "Gergen to Melencamp and Higgins," 18 March 1971, box 69.
128. Richard Nixon materials project, National Archives II, White House central files, subject file (WH), EX WH 4-1 (mail) 1-11 March 1971, "Price to President," 5 March 1971, box 11.
129. Richard Nixon materials project, National Archives II, White House central files, subject file (WH), EX WH 4-1 (mail) 1-31 March 1971, "Price to President," 12 March 1971, box 11.
130. Richard Nixon materials project, National Archives II, White House central files, subject file (WH), EX WH 4-1 (mail) 1-15 July 1971, "Price to President," 9 July 1971, box 11.
131. Richard Nixon materials project, National Archives II, White House central files, (CF) WH 4-1 (office management mail) 1969-1970, "Haig to Cole," 10 October 1969, box 69.
132. Haig to Cole, Ibid. 1969.
133. Richard Nixon materials project, National Archives II, papers of H.R. Haldeman, polling memoranda, "Melencamp to Haldeman," 5 February 1971, box 263.
134. Melencamp to Haldeman, Ibid. 1971.
135. Melencamp to Haldeman, Ibid. 1971.
136. George Lardner, Jr., "Butterfield: Response to Nixon's Silent Majority Speech was Contrived," Washington Post, 23 January 1999.
137. Public Papers of the President, Richard M. Nixon. "Remarks in the Chamber of the United States House of Representatives," 13 November 1969 (Washington DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1971), 932-933.
138. Brandon Rottinghaus, "Limited to Follow: The Early Public Opinion Apparatus of the Hoover White House," American Politics Research 31 (September 2003): 540-556;
139. Eisinger, "Gauging Public Opinion," 643-661.
140. Steven J. Rosenstone and John Mark Hansen, Mobilization, Participation and Democracy in America (New York, Macmillan Publishing Company, 1993), 109.
141. Philip J. Powlick "The Sources of Public Opinion for American Foreign Policy Officials," International Studies Quarterly 39 (December 1995): 427-451.
142. Diane J. Heith, Polling to Govern: Public Opinion and Presidential Leadership (Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press, 2003), 165-189.;
143. Diane J. Heith, "Staffing the White House Public Opinion Apparatus, 1969-1988, Public Opinion Quarterly 62 (Summer 1998): 162-189."
144. Eisinger, The Evolution of Presidential Polling, 100.
145. The Evolution of Presidential Polling, Ibid. 100