Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities, June 6, 1973
Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities, June 6, 1973
[00.48.45] Senator GURNEY. He took you to Mr. Mitchell's office. Mr. SLOAN. Yes sir. Mr. Mardian was there, I believe. Of course, Mr. LaRue and possibly Jeb 'Magruder, Mr. Mardian suggested the first thing I ought to do is calm down a little bit. Senator GURNEY. This is when you first entered the office. Mr. SLOAN. Yes, sir. Senator GURNEY. Mr. Mardian was the first person who said anything. Mr. SLOAN. I believe that was the sequence, yes, sir. Senator GURNEY. Go on. Mr. SLOAN. Then it was a very brief meeting. I think I asked what is going on. The agents are here, they want to talk to me and my assumption at, that, point was that they were probably there to talk about financial matters. I was hoping for some enlightenment or somebody to say don't worry about it, we have an accounting of all of this, or something of that sort. Instead, I got the remark of Mr. Mitchell's. Senator GURNEY, That, was the only thing that, was said in this meeting. Mr. SLOAN. Senator, I am sure there was more, said but that essentially rocked me back so far on my heels, I have forgotten all the rest. I came away from the meeting with a feeling of absolutely no guidance as far as what, I should do -with the, FBI and particularly no guidance with regard to the whole general problem. Senator GURNEY. How long did the meeting last? Mr. SLOAN. I think it was only a couple minutes because, the Bureau was waiting, Senator GURNEY. Was the advice flippant, was it serious or wasn't it? Mr. SLOAN. I don't think anybody was being flip. I think he was being Serious but I did not understand what he meant to convey by that remark. Senator GURNEY. I would like to go over again the Chapin and Ehrlichman meetings. They were very important. By the way, in that meeting with Mitchell, LaRue, -Mardian, Magruder, and yourself, did the name of President Nixon come up at, all? Mr. SLOAN. NO, sir, Senator, as a blanket answer to that, question, I don't believe the President's name. had come up in any conversations, I have had with anybody in any meaningful way. Senator GURNEY. Well, now, let go to these Chapin-Ehrlichman meetings again, and there again could you construct in narrative detail about the meetings with Mr. Chapin at 12 o'clock? Mr. SLOAN. I really with the passage of time cannot really reconstruct the nature of the way I expressed a concern to them. The responses, as in the case of Mr. Mitchell's response, were very cryptic and they stick very strongly in my mind. Beyond that, I really cannot be very helpful. Senator GURNEY. Mr. Chapin, of course, had been your boss for 2 1/2 years, hadn't he? Mr. SLOAN, Yes, sir. Senator GURNEY. How long was that meeting? Mr. SLOAN. I am not sure,, probably 20 minutes. We, discussed some, other things. Senator GURNEY. Did you discuss with, him any Of the Liddy payments? Mr. SLOAN. I am not just sure,. I suspect, Senator, at that point in time I would probably have been very reluctant to make any specific accusations in terms of Mr. Liddy or anybody else. I think I was attempting to convey the general information there is a hell of a Problem over there and somebody has to really look into it. Senator GURNEY. As best YOU can say, well how long was the Ehrlichman meeting? Mr. SLOAN. I am just not sure, Senator. Aside. from the remark, they were all very friendly, talked about, other things, families. If was a Period of time of normal social interchange prior to getting these specifics we have discussed here. Senator GURNEY. And the only discussion was just, an indication on your part of a general alarm, as to what was going on down at the Committee To Re-Elect and somebody ought to do something about it. Mr. SLOAN. And also a personal fear I think with regard to the situation I found myself in. I just cannot reconstruct my own thinking or what I would have conveyed at that particular point in time. Senator GURNEY. And again was there any indication in these meetings that President Nixon knew anything about what was going on at the Committee To Re-Elect the President? Mr. SLOAN. No, sir, the President's name in any conversation I had with anybody with regard to the Watergate or related matters I don't believe has ever come up. Senator GURNEY. The summaries of cash disbursements that you gave to Mr. Stans, in your testimony you said you destroyed these after you gave them. Why was that? Why didn't you keep a* record of those? Mr. SLOAN, Senator, my understanding of Secretary Stans' instructions, and I think this has to be put somewhat in the context of what was happening there, we had had a number of different kinds of records. Decision had been made to remove all of the pre-April 7 records from the committee, as a part of the past. The question was constructing the kind of records for internal use that we want to have available to us as an aid in our fundraising post-April 7. Essentially, it would be we are after a man for you, target him as a man capable of giving $50,000. You would want to have available to you a record that indicates he has already given 25 in the pre-April 7 period, so when you went back to him you would have this fact in mind. So it was a 2 1/2 month period attempting to unscramble essentially what was a nightmare influx April 5 and 6, and put in a useable form. This finally consisted of the cash summary on the one side and on the other a total listing of all contributors by category. I might have been all contributors who had given above $50,000. Category 2 might be $100,000 or above, for instance. So, what was being requested was either a single copy or two copies to be tightly held of this kind of information and the request that had been made of me by Secretary Stans was a single copy of this final report. [00.55.24]