First Ladies (65 page)

When rumors began circulating in late 1998 that Hillary Rodham Clinton might seek a political office of her own, opinions were mixed. Skeptics maintained that she had never really enjoyed the flesh-pressing of a campaign or the hectic schedule of a politician. Unlike Bill, she was a “policy person” rather than a “people person.” Others insisted that her reluctance to campaign had dissipated with practice and she relished the idea of showing what she could do on her own. Election to a potent, nationally visible platform—such as the U.S. Senate—would liberate her from the shadow of a husband who had humiliated her.
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By November 1998, a coveted spot opened up when Patrick Moynihan, the professorial and respected New York Senator, announced that he would not be seeking a fifth term in 2000. Within weeks, the First Lady announced she would embark on “listening tours” throughout New York state to learn more about constituents' needs and worries. Since she had never resided in the state, she knew she would face the same kind of carpetbagger charges that plagued Robert Kennedy in 1964; unlike Kennedy, she had more than a year to overcome those charges. By July 1999, she was ready to announce the formation of the Hillary Rodham Clinton for U.S. Senate Exploratory Committee, generally acknowledged as a first step in running for office. She doggedly persisted in learning the intricacies of economic conditions in upstate counties and ethnic conflicts in New York City. She memorized the state's official flora and fauna choices, and read up on its authors and sports teams.
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When the Clintons announced that they would spend part of their summer vacation in the Adirondacks, a considerably less fashionable location than Martha's Vineyard where they had previously vacationed, it was taken as evidence that she had decided to run, although the formal announcement would not come until the following February.

Hillary Clinton thus initiated a new chapter in First Lady history—leading to new criticism. None of her predecessors had used the special vantage point of presidential spouse to launch her own election campaign.
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Charges quickly arose that she was taking advantage of White House perks to advance her own senate race. The content and budget of each trip was scrutinized. In March 2000, House Republicans released documents showing that the twenty-six trips taken by the First Lady between June and December the previous year cost $182,471 and she had reimbursed taxpayers for only about one-sixth of the total.
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How to decide whether it was First Lady work or a candidate's operation? Was she still devoting adequate time to White House duties?

In order to establish residency in New York state so Hillary could run for office, the Clintons purchased a home in Chappaqua, just north of Manhattan, in late 1999. She began spending more time away from Washington. But she still had to figure out ways to meet First Lady responsibilities three hundred miles south in the capital—host state dinners and make other official appearances. Daughter Chelsea sometimes filled in, taking time off from Stanford studies, but mostly Hillary learned to divide her time, covering two fronts on the same day.
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The presumed Republican opponent, New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, dropped out of the race six months before the election, when he was diagnosed with prostate cancer. Rick Lazio, a relatively unknown Long Island congressman stepped in to replace him. But Lazio quickly gained national attention as the underdog in an important race, and contributions poured in from across the country to help him mount a full campaign against a much better known candidate. Eventually this became one of the most costly senatorial races in history, with Hillary Clinton spending $29 million, including about $9.6 million in “soft” money,
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and Rick Lazio disbursing nearly $40 million, a record for a losing candidate.
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On November 7, 2001, Hillary entertained jubilant supporters at her victory celebration at the Grand Hyatt hotel in Manhattan by summing up the race: “Sixty-two counties, sixteen months, three debates, two opponents and six pantsuits.”
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In fact, she had won handily, and some observers expressed surprise that she had done so well with women voters who favored her over her Republican opponent by roughly three to two. Throughout the campaign, the media focused on the “why I hate Hillary” syndrome among female voters, who disapproved of her ambition, distrusted her explanations on the lost billing records and other matters, and denigrated her decision to defend and stay with a husband who had treated her so shabbily. But the candidate's stands on important issues, including an unequivocal support for
Roe v. Wade
and her hard work in the long campaign, paid off. She had defeated Lazio by 12 percentage points.
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For the next few weeks, Hillary made history by juggling two demanding roles, lame duck First Lady and senator-elect from one of the nation's largest states. She continued to preside over a busy presidential mansion, taking advantage of her last few weeks at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue to entertain hundreds of people at receptions and dinners. Her new book,
An Invitation to the White House,
dealt with typical First Lady fare, including favorite family recipes, anecdotes about invited guests, and many photos of the mansion's interior.
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But she
also attended briefing sessions for newly elected legislators and gave her own share of interviews about what she considered the most pressing among national issues, such as health care and education. A U.S. senator needs a residence in the capital, and in December, the Clintons purchased a six-bedroom house in northwest Washington, a house big enough, she explained, to accommodate researchers examining her First Lady records. When the time came to sign a contract for her autobiography, she set another record for presidential spouses by drawing an $8 million advance.
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Her first eight months in the U.S. Senate brought few surprises and little notice. Assigned to committees dealing with some of her favorite interests, she was able to champion bills that helped her constituents with expanded school budgets and improved transportation.
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Then, with the attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, everything changed for the freshman senator from New York, and she moved into a far more prominent role, trying to help New York City and those most harmed.

Before she had completed two years in the Senate, Hillary Rodham Clinton was already being mentioned as a possible candidate for president in 2008. She disavowed any interest in running, but shrewd observers pointed out that her chances had improved considerably in the last few years: many voters in 2008 would have come of age recently, with little memory of her troubles in the early White House years; time and hard work would obliterate some of the negatives once associated with her; and people would see her, not as a humiliated First Lady who eventually ran for office, but as powerful New York senator who had once lived in the White House. Much would depend on how she used the Senate years.

In the 2000 presidential campaign, the candidates' wives made a point of showing how much they differed from Hillary. In fact, they shared much with her. The four women whose husbands headed the major party tickets (Laura Bush and Lynne Cheney on the Republican and Tipper Gore and Hadassah Lieberman on the Democratic) were all well educated, with at least one graduate degree each, and Cheney boasted a Ph.D. in English literature. Two had published books and all four had run enough charities and voluntary organizations to feel confident about undertaking an executive role. All four had been coached about the most flattering makeup and clothing choices, and they had spent enough time in the nation's power hub to feel comfortable in front of TV cameras. None suffered from the “microphone fright” that paralyzed Mamie Eisenhower or the insecurities that dogged capital newcomer Rosalynn Carter.

A comparison with their counterparts in the presidential election a century earlier shows how very much women's lives had changed. Before their marriages, the spouses of the candidates in 1900 had all shown considerable spunk, but by the time their husbands vied with each other to lead the nation they had learned they could best advance their husbands' political careers by keeping their mouths shut. Ida McKinley, who as a young woman had flaunted tradition by taking a job in her father's bank, matured into a sickly, possessive, doll-like mannequin who rarely spoke but simply sat by her husband's side wearing lavish lace and costly jewels. Edith Roosevelt, whom her brainy husband praised as better read than he, shunned interviews of any kind and avoided making comments that could be construed as even mildly controversial. Mary Bryan, who held the same law degree as her husband and often helped research and write his speeches, had already paid a price for showing she had a brain. In the previous election, when her husband had first been chosen to head the Democratic ticket, she was castigated as a “woman who aims to do too much.”
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Letitia Stevenson, wife of the Democratic vice presidential nominee (and grandmother of Adlai Stevenson who later ran twice for the presidency), had met her husband when they were both college students, but in their thirty-four years of marriage, she had learned to defer to him.

The lives of this earlier quartet of women varied in other ways from their counterparts in 2000. Although well-read and smart, none except for Mary Bryan had much formal education or any work experience outside the home. They produced far more children than their counterparts in 2000, who averaged only 2.5 children each. While divorce was a dirty word for Ida McKinley's generation, it was a fact of life a century later when the previously divorced Hadassah Lieberman maintained a household—as did millions of other Americans—that included children that were “his,” “hers,” and “theirs.”

Because of a dispute over contested ballots, final results in the 2000 presidential election became clear much more slowly than in 1900 (when McKinley won a clear victory with 65 percent of the popular vote). Not until mid-December did Laura Welch Bush know for sure that she would be the first to claim the title of White House spouse in the twenty-first century. Her biography resembled her immediate predecessor more than that of her mother-in-law who had moved out of the White House eight years earlier. Almost a year older than Hillary Rodham Clinton, Laura Bush also boasted a work record of her own. But unlike Hillary she had waited until age thirty-one to marry and had then quit work to devote herself full time to running a household
and assisting George W. Bush in his political and business career. Although she sometimes described how her agreement to marry him had included the promise that she would never have to give a political speech, no one quite believed her. When she first met George W. Bush, he was already preparing to run for Congress, and his father stood as a serious contender for the presidency. Anyone marrying into the Bush family in 1977 could expect to see a lot of politics.

The subject had rarely crossed Laura's mind for the first thirty years of her life. Raised in Midland, Texas, as the only child of house-builder Harold Welch and his homemaker wife, Jenna Hawkins Welch, Laura had little direct exposure to political talk or campaigning. Like George W.'s parents, the Welches had settled in Midland after World War II, when a series of big oil strikes just south of town drew thousands of new settlers to the area. As the population jumped from fewer than 10,000 in 1940 to more than 62,000 in 1960,
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Harold Welch saw a chance to prosper by filling the housing shortage; with his business partner, he built hundreds of new homes.
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But George W.'s father increased his personal fortune far more dramatically by going into the oil business. With their elite Eastern connections (George W.'s grandfather had been Connecticut's U.S. Senator) and millionaire status, the Bushes did not meet the Welches, even though the two families lived only a few blocks apart in the 1950s. They attended different churches and, except very briefly, their children enrolled in different schools.
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Both Laura and George W. later remembered Midland as an ideal place to grow up in the 1950s—when residents felt no need to lock their doors and the school's athletic teams made the biggest news. Less than one hundred miles from the New Mexico border, Midland got its name from its location at the halfway point between Fort Worth and El Paso, the two extremes of the Texas and Pacific Railway. Whatever the hardships of the climate in western Texas, where summers could be hot, dusty, and dry, Laura developed a firm attachment to the area. In her preface to a book of poetry,
Whatever the Wind Delivers
, she wrote proudly that people from her part of the world “don't simply live on or off the land; they live with it—and thrive.”
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Although neither Harold nor Jenna Welch ever graduated from college, they both held higher expectations for their daughter and began setting aside tuition money when she was in first grade. Jenna, an avid reader herself, fostered Laura's interest in the subject by reading to her when she was young and encouraging her to break the monotony of long rides by taking a book along. Not surprisingly, Laura decided to become a teacher while she was still very young, and
later recalled that one of her earliest childhood memories was lining up her dolls and “teaching them.” Too outgoing to be dubbed a bookworm, Laura also studied ballet and enrolled in Girl Scouts, but she had already settled on a career before graduating from Robert E. Lee High School in 1964.
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At age seventeen, she appeared the healthy, happy, all-American girl—except for one ugly reminder that lives are rarely uncomplicated or neatly summed up. In November of her senior year, while driving near Midland, she went through a stop sign, struck a car driven by a classmate, Michael Douglas, and fatally injured him. For years Laura refused to discuss the incident, and when she finally confronted the subject during the 2000 presidential election, she admitted it was an extremely painful memory. “It was a horrible, horrible tragedy,” she told one interviewer. “But at some point I had to accept that death is a part of life, and as tragic as losing Mike was, there was nothing anyone could do to change that….”
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Close friends insisted the accident had an enormous impact on her and permanently changed her views about personal responsibility. But at the time, neighbors in Midland refused to hold her responsible, and although they grieved, they attributed the death to some horrible “mishap” rather than to any fault of one of their most popular teenagers. Laura suffered no legal consequences and her driving privileges were not affected.
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