Saturday, March 1, 1997 | 11:59 a.m.
Honest Abe would have done more.
In the latest "much ado about nothing controversy" that the American people have allowed to consume the time and energy of official Washington, the focus is on the Lincoln Bedroom in the White House and who stayed there and for how much.
As if we haven't had enough of the Democrats and Republicans trying to out-investigate each other, this latest flap about the potential abuse of the White House bedrooms in search of campaign cash may take the cake.
First, a caveat. If the Chinese government had some grand or not-so-grand scheme to subvert our government through certain operatives who got close to the Clinton White House, then we need to find out what, if anything, happened.
But if the issue revolves around what friend of the president stayed at the White House and how much he or she may have contributed to the re-election effort, then I submit the hounds are barking up the wrong tree. If, indeed, the politicians are intent on wasting more of our money -- remember, they have spent more than $50 million on Whitewater already and, much to the chagrin of Rush Limbaugh and the conspiracy buffs, Vince Foster really committed suicide -- then trying to find harm done by inviting friends, relatives and supporters to sleep in the Lincoln Bedroom will be a giant disappointment.
Before I go too far, let me admit that I was one of the very fortunate few Americans who have been able to spend a night or two at the White House. When my wife and I were invited by the president early in his first term to stay at his house, we were thrilled beyond description. The opportunity to visit, let alone sleep over at the White House, was an honor and privilege few could ever hope to achieve. So, there you have it. I am biased.
I said that we were invited to stay at the president's house because that is exactly what the White House is for four years at a time. The people elect a president and give to him that beautiful home for him and his family for the length of his term. It is his right to choose who can visit and who can sleep there. No one else's.
I've tried to figure out what the big deal is that the president chose to invite those people who were his friends and supporters but, alas, I am at a loss. I suppose those who want us to believe President Clinton did something wrong would have us believe that he would have been better off to invite his enemies or those who supported his opponent's election to stay at his house. Like many other things that happen inside the Beltway, that would make no sense at all.
With so much talk about the Lincoln Bedroom, I started thinking about how other presidents might have acted. I must admit that the thought wasn't original. I have received more than a few calls from friends, Republicans and Democrats, expressing surprise and a healthy amount of cynicism at those who'd like us to believe that this stuff never happened before. "Who are they kidding?" was the most common reaction.
Since his name has been bandied about so much, I concentrated on President Abraham Lincoln and questioned whether he would have approved of future presidents using the room bearing his name to thank or reward their friends and benefactors. I came to the immediate and inescapable conclusion that Honest Abe not only would have approved of what Bill Clinton did but he would have encouraged it.
There was perhaps no darker time in our nation's history than the Civil War and no more lonely a period for an incumbent president than those fateful years when the president's decision to turn North against South and brother against brother cast a giant cloud over the states in our Union. If ever a president needed friends he could lean on and supporters he could count upon, it was Abraham Lincoln.
To deny the fellowship and good counsel of friends is to further remove the president from the people he has been elected to serve. To deny him the opportunity to be surrounded by people who might tell him a different kind of truth than that which would be conveyed by those who work for him is to further isolate the man we expect to stay in touch. President Lincoln would have been the first to understand the need for social contact with friends, especially those who were financial and moral supporters.
What those who want to make a big deal about the White House guest list hope to achieve is not yet clear other than to further cloud the political skies inside the Beltway. I believe, though, that the mere fact that friends and supporters were invited to sleep beneath the $10,000 headboard that Mary Lincoln purchased -- much to the outrage of those who paid attention in those days -- will amount to little more than another expensive waste of time.
There is real work to be done in Washington. Balancing the budget is one piece of business that has to be accomplished. Saving Medicare is another worthy goal, as is making sure that Social Security is solvent when those of us in the baby boom generation come a calling. There is not that much time left to continue the constant distractions that politically motivated hearings and calls for special counsel tend to promote.
It is enough to admit that the money needed to fuel national political campaigns is obscene and that the people charged with the responsibility to fix those things should spend the time needed to do just that rather than the political games-playing that gets back-slaps in the cloakroom but achieves little else.
President Lincoln never slept in the bedroom that carries his name. But a lot of good and patriotic Americans have. And they have done so at the invitation of every president who called the White House home. President Clinton's friends have been equally honored over the past four years.
If Honest Abe were around today, he would tell his fellow Republicans to pay attention to the business at hand and mind that they stay out of the president's affairs. He would tell them even more than that, but a family newspaper is not the place in which to print such advice.
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