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[[yt:xrNKguJLUYE|Ronald Reagan's Interview on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, 1/3/1975]]
[[yt:xrNKguJLUYE|Ronald Reagan's Interview on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, 1/3/1975]]
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my first guest tonight is uh rather a
phenomenon on a political scene as a
citizen politician making his first try
for public office he was elected
california's 33rd governor
in 1966 by a majority of something
around over a million votes
and he held that office you know for
eight years and he used to joke that
in his earlier profession he used to
write off in a sunset with the words
the end on his back but there are those
who would say that ronald reagan the
1975 may only be the beginning would you
all complete the former governor of
california
ronald reagan
nice to see you nice to be here john a
nice view to have me here after
a little more than two months
unemployment that's right uh how does it
feel to be uh well you're not really
unemployed now because i know you're
doing a syndicated column and um
for many who's been around 120 papers i
think in the radio show
and on the lecture tour but how does it
feel to be
i don't know they use the word
temporarily out of politics or not but
we'll get into that later
uh how's it feel to be away from
sacramento well it's
doing what i'm doing i wanted to for a
long time it's very exciting
and um there's mixed emotions when you
step down there's always things that you
had left undone that you'd like to have
done but then uh
all of a sudden the curtain's pulled and
that chapter's over and uh
somebody else takes over yeah did you
have any major disappointments what
would you
like to have done or your biggest
disappointment maybe your biggest
highlight in office as you look back on
it
well uh i'll start with the biggest
highlight the
first of all was proving that some
things i'd long believed as a citizen
would work that you could introduce
common sense in government and after the
first traumatic shock
you kind of made some of it work we
we came into quite a a mess and at the
end of eight years
you know government in the united states
federal state and local has been growing
for 20 years
in size about two and a half times as
fast as the
increase in population except for the
last eight years in california
we turned over a government that was the
same size as the one we inherited eight
years ago
there'd been no growth and in some
departments this meant an increase of as
much as 66 percent
in the workload but um part of that was
the welfare reforms
right welfare was increasing here in
california 40 000 cases a month
and we left with about 400 000 fewer
people on welfare than there were four
years ago
this saved the taxpayers about a billion
dollars but what was
equally important we were spread so thin
we couldn't do what we should have done
for uh the really needy they really
deserve and we were able to increase
their grants by way of those reforms percent
now you asked for what was the greatest
disappointment
the people handed it to us when i think
they were deceived
but when they voted down the tax
limitation plan i still say that the
answer to our problems in this country
even at the national level
is to have a law that says there is a
percentage limit
of the people's earnings that government
cannot go beyond without the consent of
the people
you're talking about whether you're
talking about the gross income of the
country and how much
they can appropriate for us that's right
for federal policy
when um when you and i were boys back in
the midwest
right governments federal state and
local were only taking about 15 cents
out of every dollar earned today they're
taking almost half of every dollar
earned in the united states
and most people don't realize it because
the taxes are hidden in the
so-called business taxes you know the
politician that stands up and yells oh
let's save the little man let's tax
business and everybody else hurray
they haven't figured out that every tax
on business
is just a part of the cost of production
and the customer winds up
paying it when he buys the product it's
a hidden sales tax
there's 116 of them in a the suit of
clothes that each one of us has
right so a lot of economists have
suggested and
i don't know they'll ever come to be in
this country that they're if they closed
all of the
loopholes and corporations and maybe tax
loopholes and even on the rich certain
loopholes and
and made a percentage income and made a
flat fee without all of the deductions
that the government might raise as much
money as they do now oh
sure and really the loopholes this has
been overdone by the politicians too
the bulk of the money that is taken by
what are called loopholes are the
legitimate deductions with which if the
people didn't have them they couldn't
pay their income tax
interest on their mortgage interest on
the installments on their
on their car their property taxes on
their home if they have one and so forth
these are in politicians eyes loopholes
but we ought to have tax reform and we
ought to start by making it so simple
that you don't have to hire a lawyer to
find out how much you owe every year
that's for sure it used to be uh it used
to be a little simplified but not
anymore
we johnny we live in the only country in
a world where it takes more brains to
figure out your income tax than it does
to earn the income
you might be right why do you think
people are so they seem to be so
disheartened now i i know
let's not get into the watergate thing
but that certainly had something to do
with the
uh the antipathy i think of a lot of
people toward government no we we
see these revelations of whether their
revelations or at least accusations that
possibly the cia has been involved in
some operations that they shouldn't have
been involved in certainly domestically
and people regularly get turned off how
do you how do you turn people around and
say all right now
we're not going to do this anymore and
every day you see more of these things
and i think people withdraw further and
further and that's too bad
i know and i think part of it is because
we're being bludgeoned every day it's
news
bad things are news we just every day we
pick up and they read and record another
tenth of a percent unemployment and so
forth
we keep hearing the the bad things we
hear the accusations and we're kind of
used to accepting the accusation as
proof of guilt
now i'm on the cia commission so i'm
rather limited i cannot talk
at this stage true but i think
one of the sad things is that the
american people
cannot know instead frankly we have to
have
a counter intelligence organization for
our own safety if the american people
knew
the extent to which were being spied on
by the russians
they'd throw data out the window and
regenerate a few fellows with it
well obviously i agree that that has to
go on internationally to protect your
national security but
when they start looking at you know
their own their own congressmen and own
private citizens who's only a
threat to national security seem to be
to voice some difference of opinions
that's going a little over the line
isn't it no because
well again as i say we oh you're with me
we can't
we can't give any progress for you you
want to speak into this right here and
tell me privately
all i'd say to the people is wait until
the report comes in
and i think when a report comes in uh um
maybe they might be greatly reassured i
didn't mean to put you behind the eight
ball there i realize of course you're on
that commission and you
couldn't expand on that let's take a
brief break and we'll come right back
and get on another subject
we're talking with uh former governor
reagan and uh during the break we were
discussing what i mentioned uh
that i thought most people uh were not
apathetic i think they're confused
basically because you hear intelligent
people from
both political parties or in the middle
conservatives and liberals and they all
seem to have
different answers as to what is going
wrong in the country some people say
well let's let the government spend
billions of dollars and then other
people say no no more federal spending
uh let's give the tax rebates and the
other intelligent people say no tax
rebates we've got to do this and do that
so everybody is confused how do you see
the thing what how are we going to get
out of this
well johnny i think that one of the
things is that people keep looking to
government for the answer and
government's the problem
you a moment ago you asked you know
about
people and feeling not only confused but
right low and and down in america
first of all the american people if they
would just take a little inventory and
look around
you triple our troubles and we're better
off than any other people on earth
and we've asked so much of government
and we've gotten in the habit over the
last 40 years of thinking the government
has the answers
there's very little that government can
do as efficiently and as economically as
the people can do themselves and if
government would shut the doors and
sneak away for about three weeks we'd
never miss them
now the
if the people anybody had in mind
particularly
no i said this while i was in government
okay our biggest problem is
that we have built a permanent structure
of government federal state and local
the permanent employees and they've come
to the place that they actually
determine policy in this country
more than does the congress of the
united states there are 14 and a half
million
public employees in the united states
that's quite a voting bloc
and the bureaus and agencies not in
washington
i heard you talking earlier about some
of the research programs
well there was a senator the other day
and he took up some pages of the
congressional record he was doing the
same thing you were listing all these
crazy research programs
and how much they were costing and wound
up his speech by introducing his own he
wants a study in a research of
transcendental meditation
[Music]
so you know there's a state senator in
michigan
and he just found out the other day they
got a 93 000 study
on whether chitlins are bad for you and
and he said that as a fourth generation
chitlin eater he figured that he could
tell you how for 93 cents
you can find out the answer to that no
we laugh at those things but they do
happen i guess
oh listen there you had you had some
beauties and there's some others
what would you say if i told you about
one a study in which
this was called the the demography of
happiness
and in this study the government found
out that young people are happier than
old people found out that people that
earn more are happier than people that
earn less
and they found out that well people are
happier than six people that's good
249 000 to find out it's better to be
rich young and healthy than old porns
so when you say now that it's the
government may be the problem
so so what do people do
they have to look to somebody and you
say if they look for themselves
that's uh it may be good advice but how
about somebody who's on a you know a
social security pension or a pension
they're trying to live on a month you know they have to look to
somebody i guess yeah they're saying hey
we can't make it we can't afford to go
to a doctor
well 62 of the people can't stay home in
an election and cure things
as we did in the last election i just
read this the week on i heard this week
on the radio they dropped 300 000 voters
from the los angeles rule because they
didn't take the
time to go to the polls in the last
election three hundred thousand people
the lowest percentage in history only percent of the people voted in the
national election
and this means that people aren't paying
any attention to what
well here a poll was taken recently
that found out that only 46 percent of
the people in the poll could name their
united states congressman
but what was worse 86 of those who could
name him
couldn't tell you a single thing that he
represented or stood for
they just knew that he represented the
state he was a congressman but what's he
doing
while he's up there and the same is true
at the at the local levels of government
and
and all the rest but uh so you're saying
people really have to take an active
interest and you have to have con uh
citizen action groups locally and uh
and let them know it's concerning
special interest groups
now the special interest groups aren't
as everyone thought big powerful
business interests are something that
are going to persuade government to do
things as a matter of fact i don't know
anyone with less influence today in
government
than business they're just a convenient
whipping boy but it's the groups that
have got a particular axe to grind
you can't have a power plant because it
might interfere with
the seagulls now i think i'm an
environmentalist
and i do not agree with those people way
over the edge who paved the whole
country over in the name of progress
but also i don't like those on the other
extreme that won't let you build a house
unless it looks like a bird's nest
someplace in the middle we got to allow
people are ecology too
right well this kind of group and they
want their particular program
hundreds of dollars have been added to
the cost of an automobile putting
gadgets on it to
to clear up the air we're the only
country in the world that set out to do
it that way
the automobile industry over and over
again told government
if they give them more time the answer
lay in making the motor more efficient
and making it burn the fuel better
and then when they were given the
limited time there was only one within
they could turn to that was the add-ons
that you had to go and uh
the verdict is really kind of still out
on on those whether they're going to add
more sulfuric acid to the
to the air or not yeah what do you think
is going to happen now you've been asked
this question i'm sure you knew that i
was
would might possibly bring it up tonight
uh
there's an election coming up you're uh
you're out of politics now but
you're speaking and as i say you're
going around the country
you envision a possibility say in 76 if
the
convention say was deadlocked i'm giving
you all the theories and so forth and
the conservatives took over possibly and
got control of the uh
of the electoral process and they
couldn't quite make a decision
and they came to you and said governor
reagan
uh we can't decide between mr uh ford mr
rockefeller we're divided
um would you like to uh would you like
to go to the white house
uh you remember that answer i gave you
about the cia yeah
come on i know i hope i'm not gonna buy
them
now i can understand the cia now but uh
no i thought that was delicately phrased
yes
verbose but delicate yeah verbose but
that one i um
no i think it's an unanswerable question
i don't think anyone in view of the
things that are going on the last few
years knows what's going to happen in
the
in the next two years down the road i
think that everyone should hope and pray
that
people are there will do the job so well
there won't be any question about it
because if they do then everything's all
right with the rest of us uh
do you think they're doing their job
well well i agree with some things and
disagree with others
when they when they give me a when they
give me a choice between a 53 billion
dollar deficit in the budget and an billion dollar deficit
when budget deficits are what's causing
inflation i don't see that there's any
room
to be on either side of that argument i
think the answer to
curing inflation is a balanced budget
now
how do you do that i mean how do you
balance the budget
well balancing the budget is like
protecting you don't spend more than you
take in right
it's like protecting your virtue you
have to learn to say no
there's got to be another way
what's the second option well
no there's some ways that this could be
brought about first of all that
limitation here's another one
why shouldn't we have in addition to a
simplified income tax why shouldn't we
also have a law
that says that anytime a legislator a
congressman introduces a spending
program he has to introduce with it a
tax program to pay for it
then let the people find out there was a
woman that
from a financial firm that was back at
the president's economic council and her
words weren't quoted everybody else's
words got in the paper all the
hellers and the gall breaths and all the
so-called economists
and i had i have a degree in economics
so i can say this
i think an economist is someone who has
a phi beta kappa key on one end of his
watch chain and no watch on the other
uh this woman said that you go to the
polls and you ask the people do they
want some social service some program
that government can give and
the people in the polls are apt to read
and say that sounds good yeah
but she says that isn't exactly accurate
she says put a
100 bill in each person's hand
and then show them the program and say
now isn't that a nice program do you
want it
give me the hundred dollars and she says
see what the poll says then and
how many people hang on with a hundred
dollars instead of the program
in other words it was rather hidden and
someone doesn't know exactly where it's
going to come they all start all the
government programs start a dollar down
and we'll catch you later
and and they they multiply all of those
things that you were
the office of management and budget in
washington that's responsible for the
budget putting up putting the budget
together
cannot even tell you how many boards
commissions agencies bureaus and
departments there are in the federal
government
but all of them can pass regulations and
those regulations have the force of law
and the difference is when you break the
law you're innocent until proven guilty
when you break a regulation the fellow
that charges you with a break in the
regulation
you're guilty right if you want to take
him to court and prove you're innocent
that's up to you
and all of these are things that that um
yes we can trim the budget there's
enough fat in the federal government
that if you rendered it you could wash
the world
you uh now you took
they took a poll of the american people
the past week and i think or something around 75 percent were
opposed to more military
aid to vietnam and cambodia and
southeast asia in general
and yet the administration uh was
trying to tell the american people that
a couple hundred million or 222 million
dollars
would make some kind of difference or
that the government might make it and uh
how do you feel you think that that is a
lost cause in a way i think people can
see humanitarian
you know for children hospitals etc and
medical supplies and food
but it seems that the public has just
almost had it up with military
involvement where
we feel we are not directly threatened
well
we we are uh fed up we're war-weary
after
a long and badly fought war
on the other hand and this is one where
i'll probably lose a lot of people
because it isn't popular or political to
say this
today when we withdrew our troops
we made a ceasefire a peace agreement
and
it was based on uh supporting
the non-communist forces in indochina
on a basis of one-for-one replacement
every bullet they expended a bullet to
replace it if the communists violated
the ceasefire
the communists have violated the
ceasefire 72 thousand times
since it was instituted and we brought
our men home
and i think for the united states to
break its word
we're in that agreement we pledge
something and the congress is now
saying that the united states reserves
the right to just break its word and not
what other allies ever going to trust us
and i
um there's no question that backed by
red china and the soviet union
the communist forces in vietnam and
cambodia
are on their way to take those over they
do of course laos just automatically
falls
then they're on the edge of indonesia
140 million people which comes within miles at its nearest point of the
philippines
the domino theory is is still a viable
theory
and yes it is and i i could see the
united states
one day being very very lonely
now it's a very funny thing that the
same forces that want to cut
our defense spending are the same ones
that want to
increase all these social services and
this social tinkering and experimenting
that hasn't worked
and every time it doesn't work they just
impose a more expensive program on top
of it i think the american people if
they
really look at all the facts uh yes we
want fiscal responsibility
but i think we also want a country that
is strong enough at all times that we
can say to any adventurous guys over
there on the other side of the water
you better look twice brother before you
start getting rough
that we can take care of ourselves
as you said you even before you made the
statement that would probably get mixed
with your
uh uh reaction i can understand that
people aren't
and it's hard to understand how maybe
your interest is involved
10 000 miles away
but russia seems concerned that their
interests extend all the way to cuba
and to south america to chile and to
other countries of that kind and
they're the ones that have said they're
going to impose their way of life and
the rest of the world we haven't said we
want to do it to the rest of the world
our way let me ask you one more question
before you go let us assume that there's
a third party
that neither party seems to go yeah uh
you like this approach already huh
uh and they're thrown into disarray as
they say
and a third party is formed would you
think that'll ever happen in this
country why a third party will be a
major
type of uh alternate to what we have
well i'd still prefer to see a
revitalization of the two
major parties we have because the
two-party system has served us very well
third parties have a notorious way of
not being successful now the republican
party some people say well that was a
third party 100 years ago when it
started
it actually wasn't it was a second party
the whig party had
shrunk and shrunk and then the remainder
of the wig party said the two other
groups that had foreign parties hey
want to get together with us they
changed their name and called themselves
the other party and so it was in fact
the wigs just disappeared it was a new
second party
uh maybe this is time maybe it's time
for
uh realignment between people who might
be find themselves in the wrong parties
maybe there are some people still voting
i was a democrat most of my life i
became a republican only
not too many years ago and
i had the pleasure of telling some of
those people that are saying the
republican
party ought to broaden its base the
other day that uh
when i switched parties i didn't do it
because the two parties were alike
i did it because they were different and
i think that the two parties ought to
stand up as to what they represent
what they stand for a third party i
they have a way of electing the wrong
people they because they simply divide
themselves from the other forces that
feel the same way and then the other
fellow
sneaks in and then i'd it it could
happen that the
that neither party would would represent
what the people want and finally the
people would take some action do
something about it but
i'd i'd rather devote our effort to see
and if we can't
find out what the present two parties
stand for and which one we want but you
don't see yourself or do you see
yourself as maybe as a part of that
actively
active politically again uh i certainly
don't give up do i
uh yeah you you you sure sure don't i
wish i could think of a good get offline
i have lauren spivak's old questions you
know for that nancy
nancy you know said to say hello tonight
she thought it was great that we're both
in town at the same time
you too i get that thanks for being with
us tonight really
it's a pleasure to see you again
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Ronald Reagan's Interview on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, 1/3/1975


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