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Like so much else of my own history, the story of how Ifirst came to know Nancy Reagan begins with her husband. InNovember 1966, Ronald Reagan delivered a body blow to thenational political establishment when he was elected governor of California. His opponent, two-term Democratic incumbent Pat Brown, dismissed Reagan as a fading matinee idol turned political novice. East Coast liberals ridiculed him as a knee-jerk Goldwaterite and corporate pitchman. To a greater or lesser degree, Reagan was all those things, but his detractors missed the critical element: Ronald Reagan talked to voters in an idiom they could understand about issues that resonated deeply across the political spectrum. When the dust settled, the ex-actor had trounced the consummate politician, showing Pat Brown the door by a million votes.
The 1966 elections were good to me, too. I had been over-seeing three state assembly races in coastal California for Republican candidates and had managed to bring home two winners, thanks in part to Reagan's surprising coattails. But I hadn't climbed on the new governor's bandwagon early on when it counted, and even after the campaign was over, I still didn't know much about Ronald Reagan and even less about California's new first lady, Nancy.
Unlike most GOP field men who had been working thestate that year, I also had little interest in joining thegovernor-elect's team in the capital city. I was living in Santa Barbara, with its Mediterranean climate, inviting beaches, and tile-roofed homes. I couldn't imagine giving that up for Sacramento, a sweltering valley town like Bakersfield, California, where I was born. For my money, Santa Barbara was heaven on earth. Sacramento was close to its opposite.
I also liked my work. I had become fixated with the power of advertising and creative direct mail in political races, and I had been able to field-test both -- to great success -- in the campaigns I had just managed. My immediate strategy was to join a small advertising firm in Santa Barbara, where I could continue to refine my techniques. From there, I liked to imagine a career path that ascended to the top of the ad industry.
A few weeks later, I took a call from Reagan's new hand-picked chairman of the state Republican Party, Denny Carpenter, and put my plans for becoming Mr. Madison Avenueon temporary hold. Denny told me I was needed up north.Specifically, I was to report ASAP to William P. Clark, one of the chiefs of Reagan's transition team. I don't know why I got the call -- presumably my old friend and political guru Stu Spencer had put them on to me. But there I was, Bill Clark's number two man overnight.
The transition team gave me a fascinating look insidestate government. I was meeting great people and addingmuscle to an otherwise fairly puny résumé. But I was also a short-timer. Chances were, I would retreat back to Santa Barbara without ever meeting California's new first couple, much less saying an intelligible word to either one of them. And that's almost the way things worked out.
On January 3, 1967, I watched as Ronald Reagan raisedhis right hand and took the oath of office. Nancy, of course, was at his side. The hour was late. Irked by the unseemly blitz of judicial and commission appointments that Pat Brown was doling out to his friends, Reagan asked to be sworn in at the "earliest possible moment." That earliest possible moment came at 12:14 A.M. Despite the hour, many of the Reagan campaign people were jubilant, to the point of welling up. They were finally seeing the fruits of a most difficult, unexpected journey.
I would see that same jubilation again in 1980, in Washington, not Sacramento, and from a much better seat. This time, though, I was in the peanut gallery -- a transition staffer with neither the history nor the political juice to command a choice vantage point. Still, even watching from a distance, I found myself wondering if I would ever be involved in a cause so great that it would make me as emotional as those young staffers.
The next morning, still thinking about commitment, theReagans, and Santa Barbara, I walked into my office ready to say good-bye. The transition was done; it was time to start governing. An hour or so later, Bill Clark asked if I would stick around and be his assistant in the cabinet affairs office. With little thought, I found myself saying yes. Sunny Santa Barbara suddenly seemed very far away.
I accepted the offer so quickly in part because I was warming up to Sacramento. As a conservative, I was bothenthusiastic about Ronald Reagan's programs -- although Istill had trouble believing he was actually the governor -- and curious about his capacity to lead. Reagan's promise to be a "citizen-governor" held real appeal to me, as it obviously did to millions of other Californians, but I wondered to myself just how effective a man with no elective experience could be in handling one of the nation's toughest political jobs. In truth, too, I had enjoyed my small introduction to political power during the transition. Managing campaigns was exhausting but exhilarating. Who knows, governing might be fun, too.
Reagan had been in office about six months when hischief of staff and deputy chief quit abruptly, and the governor appointed my boss, Bill Clark, to the top post, and Bill made me his deputy. Until then, I had flown almost entirely under the radar, one of many relatively inconsequential staffers. Now, amazingly, thanks to the staff shake-up, I was a "senior administration official": the figurative, if not the actual, number two man in the statehouse, complete with a well-appointed office directly across from the governor of California ...
Nancy LP
Excerpted from Nancy: A Portrait of My Years with Nancy Reagan by Michael K. Deaver
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