Herschensohn Gets Boost From Nixon Appearance

In a rare political appearance, former President Richard M. Nixon spoke Tuesday evening at a $1,000-per-person reception in Newport Beach for his former speech writer Bruce Herschensohn, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate.

In brief comments as he left, Nixon, 73, stressed that he was not endorsing Herschensohn, a former television commentator and one of 13 Republicans seeking the party’s nomination to run against Democratic Sen. Alan Cranston.

“I don’t follow that practice,” Nixon said outside a cocktail reception attended by about 200 Herschensohn supporters at Newport Beach’s luxurious Big Canyon development.

But if Nixon’s appearance did not constitute an official endorsement for Herschensohn, it came close.

Asked what he thought of Herschensohn as a Senate candidate, the former president smiled. “I feel that he is particularly well qualified in an area I am, which is in foreign policy,” he said.

“I don’t mean to suggest that he agrees with everything that I stand for in foreign policy, although his views are very close to mine in many respects.

“But he is an expert in that area. And I think--I don’t mean to suggest the others are not experts--but I know he is. And I think that when you are electing a senator, as distinguished from a congressman, the most important issue by far is foreign policy. In that area, he is very well qualified.”

Herschensohn, Nixon’s speech writer from 1972 to 1974, said he was “just delighted” that the former president had left his Saddle River, N.J., home to help with the fund-raiser.

“Let’s face it,” Herschensohn said. “People aren’t going to pay $1,000 just to see me.”

Herschensohn denied that the appearance by Nixon, who resigned the presidency in August, 1974, after the Watergate scandal, might be a liability for his campaign.

Fund-Raiser Nets $200,000

Nixon’s appearance was “awfully good for us,” he said. Now that Nixon is out of power, even the media, who were at first “terribly biased against President Nixon,” seem to recognize him as an elder statesman, he said.

Herschensohn added that his goal in handling foreign policy would be to combine the more conservative “instincts of a Ronald Reagan with the experience of a Richard Nixon.”

Herschensohn’s fund-raiser, held at developer Donald Bendetti’s Tudor-style home overlooking a golf course, was one of the campaign’s largest to date and raised about $200,000, campaign manager Angela Bay Buchanan Jackson said.

At Nixon’s request, reporters and photographers were barred from the reception, where the former president reportedly shook hands, made a half-hour speech and then fielded questions on politics and foreign policy for another half-hour.

Later, about 20 reporters and photographers were permitted to stand at the edge of the Bendetti lawn and watch as Nixon, in a dark suit and smiling broadly, emerged from the house, walked stiffly up a brick path and shook hands with several neighborhood children.

Before he left, Nixon also spoke with reporters for about two minutes, commenting on his support for Herschensohn. Then, with a curt “Thank you very much,” he cut off the questions. He left with one last word for Herschensohn, however. “Get to work,” Nixon said as he shook Herschensohn’s hand and, to cries of “ ‘Bye, Mr. President,” stepped into his limousine.