Beschreibung:

REAGAN, Ronald. Autograph draft letter signed ("Ronald Reagan"), as Governor, TO DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER, El Dorado Country Club, Palm Springs, California, [2 February 1968]. 1 page, 8vo . REAGAN AND EISENHOWER ON THE GOLF COURSE A FUTURE PRESIDENT TO A FORMER CHIEF. "Dear General," Reagan writes: "Thanks for waiting until I wasn't your opponent. Congratulations--my hold on the other $4 is shaky." Obviously a reference to a friendly wager made on the golf links, where Eisenhower offered stiff competition to political friend and foe alike. Here Reagan also seems to be cultivating this great GOP leader in the opening months of the 1968 Presidential election season. Reagan made his first try for the White House that year, but never emerged out of the pack of candidates that included Nelson Rockefeller, Pennsylvania Governor William Scranton, and Eisenhower's own former Vice-President, Richard M. Nixon. Ironically, Eisenhower was always cool towards Nixon's presidential ambitions. On leaving office in 1960 he discreetly tried to push other Cabinet members like Robert Anderson to seek the GOP nomination. Then during Nixon's campaign against John F. Kennedy Ike committed a harmful gaffe: when a reporter asked him to cite an example where Nixon had made a significant contribution to the administrations' policies, Eisenhower paused and said he'd need a week to think of one. Now, eight years later, he was determined to avoid any embarrassment and said all the right things publicly in support of Nixon. But Reagan accurately sensed that there was a possibility of tilting Eisenhower's support towards his own candidacy rather than Nixon's.