Jump to Content

Collection Guide
Collection Title:
Collection Number:
Get Items:
Frederic V. Malek Papers, Committee for the Re-Election of the President, ca. 1971-1972
3432800  
View entire collection guide What's This?
Search this collection
Collection Details
 
Table of contents What's This?
  • Descriptive Summary
  • Access
  • Publication Rights
  • Preferred Citation
  • Acquisition Information
  • Biography/Administrative History
  • Scope and Content of Collection
  • Indexing Terms
  • Additional collection guides

  • Descriptive Summary

    Title: Frederic V. Malek Papers, Committee for the Re-Election of the President, ca. 1971-1972
    Dates: ca. 1971-1972
    Collection Number: 3432800
    Creator/Collector: Malek, Frederic V. (Frederic Vincent), 1936- Committee for the Re-election of the President (1971 - 1972)
    Extent: 21 linear feet, 10 linear inches; 50 boxes
    Online items available
    Repository: Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum
    Abstract: The Frederic Malek papers from the Committee for the Re-Election of the President Collection consists of materials relating to individual states, voting blocs, political strategies and day to day operations of the committee, as well as assorted materials from Frederic Malek's White House office.
    Language of Material: English

    Access

    Open for use by researchers with exceptions for personal privacy.

    Publication Rights

    The donor gave to the U.S. government the copyrights in this material and in any other material received by the U.S. government and maintained in a depository administered by the National Archives and Records Administration. The copyright law of the United States (Title 17, United States Code) governs the making of photocopies or other reproductions of copyrighted material. Under certain conditions specified in the law, libraries and archives are authorized to furnish a photocopy or other reproduction. One of these specified conditions is that the photocopy or reproduction is not to be “used for any purpose other than private study, scholarship, or research.” If a user makes a request for, or later uses, a photocopy or reproduction for purposes in excess of “fair use,” that user may be liable for copyright infringement. This institution reserves the right to refuse to accept a copying order if, in its judgment, fulfillment of the order would involve violation of copyright law. The copyright law extends its protection to unpublished works from the moment of creation in a tangible form. Direct your questions concerning copyright to the reference staff.

    Preferred Citation

    Frederic V. Malek Papers, Committee for the Re-Election of the President, ca. 1971-1972. Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum

    Acquisition Information

    In February, April, and May 1973, the materials of the Committee for the Re-Election of the President were placed into courtesy storage with the National Archives and Records Service for eventual deposit into Richard Nixon's presidential library (the materials of the separate Finance Committee to Re-Elect the President were not placed into NARS' custody). Throughout the spring of 1973, subpoenas for civil and criminal investigations concerning the Committee were served on the General Services Administration (at the time the overseeing agency of the National Archives). NARS personnel reboxed the textual committee records and created draft descriptions of the materials in preparation for compliance of the subpoenas. Despite NARS' requests, the agency never received a deed of gift for the materials. The collection remained in NARS' physical custody through 1986 until the decision of the 1972 Campaign Liquidation Trust to deed all of the remaining money and records from the Committee and Finance Committee to the Republican National Committee, which in turn gave the records of the Committee to Richard Nixon. In 1989, the Committee records were moved to California, where they were temporarily stored at the Reagan Presidential Materials Project in Culver City, California, and were subsequently placed by the Nixon Foundation in an offsite storage facility in Orange County, California. On July 10, 2007, Don Bendetti, the chairman of the Richard Nixon Library & Birthplace Foundation, signed a deed of gift deeding the Committee materials to the newly formed Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, part of the National Archives and Records Administration. In February 2008, due to space constraints in Yorba Linda, the materials were moved from the Foundation's offsite storage facility to the NARA facility in Laguna Niguel, California. In November 2008, the Jeb Magruder papers were moved to the Nixon Library and in November 2009, the Frederic Malek papers were moved to the Nixon Library.

    Biography/Administrative History

    In late 1970, members of the Nixon administration's White House staff began planning for President Nixon's re-election campaign. Accordingly, in the spring of 1971, Attorney General John Mitchell, who had managed the 1968 Nixon campaign, was tapped to serve as campaign director and the nucleus of the campaign staff opened offices at 1701 Pennsylvania Avenue NW. Originally called the Citizens Committee to Re-Elect the President, the organization, then headed by acting director Jeb Magruder (who became deputy campaign director when Mitchell resigned from the Justice Department to take up his political duties full-time in 1972), began planning to run a national campaign independently of the Republican National Committee. The White House and the Citizens Committee decided to keep the fundraising and financial operations of the re-election effort separate from the rest of the campaign apparatus. Francis Dale was named campaign chairman with a committee of eight co-chairmen, Maurice Stans became the finance chairman, and John Mitchell formally inhabited the campaign director position in April 1972. Under Mitchell, the committee (renamed the Committee for the Re-Election of the President) was split into three divisions: Administration, Citizens and Political. The Administration division of the committee consisted of the advance/tour office, the attack division, the counsel for the committee, polling and scheduling. It also incorporated an in-house advertising agency called the November Group (as opposed to hiring an outside company as had been the practice of campaigns) and the convention planning office. The citizens groups focused on voter blocs such as Labor, Ethnic, Business, Veterans, and Spanish. Each group had a division leader. The political division was split into regions with each region assigned to one political leader. On June 17, 1972, five men, including James McCord, the committee's head of security, were arrested while breaking into the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate Office Complex in Washington, D.C. Upon hearing of the break-in, members of the committee staff proceeded to destroy records relating to the burglars' activities from the committee offices. As a result of the break-in and subsequent publicity, Mitchell resigned as campaign director on June 31, 1972. Former Congressman Clark MacGregor replaced Mitchell. Jeb Magruder retained the rank of deputy campaign director but White House personnel chief Fred Malek officially joined as a second deputy campaign director. Malek's ascension prompted a reorganization of the committee, with Magruder remaining in charge of Administration and Malek assuming command of the Citizens and Political divisions.

    Scope and Content of Collection

    The Frederic Malek papers from the Committee for the Re-Election of the President Collection (CRP) consists of memoranda, letters, reports, federal files and campaign related materials from Malek’s Deputy Campaign Director office and White House Personnel Operations (WHPO) office. These materials relate to the operation of the Committee, the formation and implementation of the Citizens and Political Divisions, and also include materials relating to personnel and communication in the government at large. The papers are arranged into four series: Correspondence, Campaign Administrative, Citizens Division and Political Division. The Correspondence series is arranged alphabetically and thereafter chronologically when applicable. There is one sub-series of WHPO materials relating to administration communication, management of non-career personnel and Malek’s article for the Harvard Business Review. Within this sub-series, the memorandums are arranged chronologically, the remaining subject files are arranged alphabetically. The second series of materials are Campaign Administrative Files. These files consist of documents relating to the creation and day to day operations of the CRP at large. This series is arranged alphabetically. The third series consist of materials relating to the Citizens Division. The citizen groups or voters blocs were groups of people organized to assist in the re-election of the President Nixon. The groups are Agriculture (Farm), Blacks, Business & Industry, Catholic, Educators & Teachers, General Citizens, Heritage, Intellectuals, Jewish, Labor, Lawyers, Older Americans, Physicians & Dentists, Spanish-Speaking, Special Ballots (Transient), Urban Citizens (Ethnic), Veterans, Women and Youth. These files are arranged alphabetically by group/bloc, and then alphabetically within each group. The fourth series relates to materials regarding the Political Division. Regional directors were hired to serve as point people for the campaign in designated regions of the county. These materials include documents relating to the canvassing of voters and information relating to state committee activities and chairmen. The files are arranged alphabetically. There is one sub-series of state files, which are arranged alphabetically.

    Additional collection guides