(6 of 11)
Then came the Cabinet's collective offer to resign. White House aides insisted that the resignations had not been solicited. Still, the offers seemed to fit the President's Camp David script too closely to have been entirely spontaneous. According to one official, Carter did indeed start the process. His version: "Carter said, 'I would like all of you to submit pro forma resignations.' And then he indicated that we should get pro forma resignations from all of our appointees. At this point [Secretary of State Cyrus] Vance said, 'You don't want these in writing.' And everybody chorused that that would be Nixonesque. Vance said, 'You can take our resignations orally.'"
Attorney General Bell raised a lawyer's demurral. The resignations should all be in writing, he said, but he was overruled by the group. Treasury Secretary Blumenthal observed that the whole exercise was pointless because Cabinet members serve at the President's pleasure, and so Carter in effect already had their resignations.
In the middle of the discussion, another high official, Robert Strauss, suddenly strode into the room. Apparently not aware of precisely what was going on, he breezily offered a parody of Nixon's famous 1962 political retirement statement: "Well, Mr. President, I've already resigned. You won't have me to kick around any more." The assembled Cabinet members greeted Strauss's joke with frigid silence.
The meeting ended soon after Jordan passed out the evaluation forms. He first asked that they be filled out for every official earning $25,000 a year or more. When he was told that this would cover thousands of people in the Pentagon alone, he limited the evaluations to the deputy assistant secretary level, which still meant that several hundred people would be involved. Many of the Cabinet members left the room in dismay, asking themselves whether the evaluation forms were to be taken seriously.
At noon, Carter lunched privately with Rosalynn and briefed her on how the Cabinet session had gone. As usual, he sought her advice on the changes that he had in mind. Just what she recommended was not disclosed, but she was probably not reticent. Camp David summit guests have told of how surprised they were at the extent of Rosalynn's participation. Said her aide, Mary Finch Hoyt: "She has been very heavily involved in all aspects of the whole Camp David evaluation, and will be involved in all aspects of this evaluation."
That afternoon, Jordan again assembled the senior White House staff in the Roosevelt Room. This time, he sat at the head of the dark mahogany conference table, in the place where Carter had been seated that morning. Jordan announced the Cabinet's offer to resign, and said that some staff members had recommended that the senior aides do likewise ''to allow the President all the flexibility he needs." It was a suggestion that no one could refuse. Frank Moore, Carter's congressional liaison chief, spoke up: "We can do no less."