December 21, 1970: President Richard Nixon Meets Elvis Presley

December 21, 1970: The President of the United States meets the King of Rock and Roll. It doesn't go quite the way the fans of either would have imagined.

Richard Nixon, who had been Vice President when rock and roll debuted in the mid-1950s, had been elected in 1968 by, essentially, running as "the adult in the room," against youth culture and its running wild in the streets, promoting rock music and civil rights and opposing the Vietnam War.

In contrast, Elvis Presley, who became a star in the South in 1954 and nationally in 1956, was seen as a disruptive figure, pitting teenagers against their parents and other authority figures. And he had made a big comeback with a TV special in 1968 and a Las Vegas residency in 1969.

What people tended to overlook was that Elvis had accepted being drafted into the U.S. Army in 1958 (between the Korean and Vietnam Wars), had served without controversy, and was discharged with the rank of Sergeant, and remained proud of his service, entirely in peacetime though it was.

Furthermore, while he had recorded and had hits with "If I Can Dream" and "In the Ghetto" in 1969, and appeared to be without either racial or religious prejudice, he was not a flaming liberal. He was a man of his time when it came to relating to women. More to the point of this post, he was disturbed by the rise in illegal drug use, including by major rock performers, despite his own rising use of prescription drugs.

*

Let's take a step back, to April 24, 1970. Nixon's daughter, Tricia -- who, the following year, would marry lawyer Edward Cox at the White House -- hosted a White House tea party for her fellow alumnae of Finch College, a since-closed all-women's school in New York City. One of the invitees was Grace Wing. (She was of Scandinavian descent, not Chinese.)

That was her maiden name. Legally, she was using the married name Grace Slick. Professionally, she was using the name Grace Slick, as lead singer of The Jefferson Airplane, which was led by guitarist Paul Kantner, who whom she was in a relationship. (Their daughter, actress China Wing Kantner, was born almost exactly 9 months later.)

Grace knew she would never have been invited under her married/show biz name. She decided to take advantage of this by bringing Abbie Hoffman, leader of the Yippies and the recently-acquitted "Chicago Seven" defendant. Together, they intended to spike President Nixon's tea with LSD.

But White House security knew it was an "all ladies" event, and, even before they realized who he was, they told Abbie they wouldn't let him in. So Grace didn't go in, either. What could have been an epic event was thwarted.

*

Elvis had landed in Washington on the morning of December 21, 1970, fresh off a red-eye flight from Los Angeles, on which he had penned a letter to the President on 6 pages of American Airlines stationery. This is what he wrote, without my having changed any spelling or grammar:

Dear Mr. President.

First, I would like to introduce myself. I am Elvis Presley and admire you and have great respect for your office. I talked to Vice President Agnew in Palm Springs three weeks ago and expressed my concern for our country. The drug culture, the hippie elements, the SDS, Black Panthers, etc. do not consider me as their enemy or as they call it the establishment. I call it America and I love it. Sir, I can and will be of any service that I can to help the country out. I have no concern or motives other than helping the country out.

So I wish not to be given a title or an appointed position. I can and will do more good if I were made a Federal Agent at Large and I will help out by doing it my way through my communications with people of all ages. First and foremost, I am an entertainer, but all I need is the Federal credentials. I am on this plane with Senator George Murphy and we have been discussing the problems that our country is faced with.

Sir, I am staying at the Washington Hotel, Room 505-506-507. I have two men who work with me by the name of Jerry Schilling and Sonny West. I am registered under the name of Jon Burrows. I will be here for as long as long as it takes to get the credentials of a Federal Agent. I have done an in-depth study of drug abuse and Communist brainwashing techniques and I am right in the middle of the whole thing where I can and will do the most good.

I am Glad to help just so long as it is kept very private. You can have your staff or whomever call me anytime today, tonight, or tomorrow. I was nominated this coming year one of America's Ten Most Outstanding Young Men. That will be in January 18 in my home town of Memphis, Tennessee. I am sending you the short autobiography about myself so you can better understand this approach. I would love to meet you just to say hello if you're not too busy.

Respectfully,
Elvis Presley

P. S. I believe that you, Sir, were one of the Top Ten Outstanding Men of America also.
I have a personal gift for you which I would like to present to you and you can accept it or I will keep it for you until you can take it.

On the 6th and last page, he included his private telephone numbers, and those of his manager, "Colonel" Tom Parker, at his homes in Memphis, Beverly Hills and Palm Springs, and at his hotel in Washington.

Once they landed, the King directed his limo to Pennsylvania Avenue. He jumped out to hand the note to Secret Service guards, who didn’t immediately recognize him, despite his high-collared topcoat and cane.

What Elvis really wanted was a special badge from the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs -- not so much as to be a real federal agent, but to add to his personal collection of police badges.

Jerry Schilling, a close friend of Elvis' who joined the visit to Washington, later described the King's penchant for flashy signals of authority in a conversation with the Nixon Presidential Library: "It was kind of a James Bond thing to him as well, but with a lot of respect for it."

Dwight Chapin, then a Deputy Assistant to the President, ended up arranging the meeting. He said, “This was a very humorous situation among us. Everybody thought we were joking."

Another Deputy Assistant, Egil "Bud" Krogh, went to the hotel to meet Elvis. "There was an interrogation," Schilling said. "That's a tough word, but, you know, 'Why do you want to meet the President? What do you want to talk about?' And it was a real nice, serious conversation between Bud and Elvis."

And so, Elvis, in purple velvet pants and a matching cape blazer, was led into the Oval Office, and shook hands with the President. It's the most requested photograph from the U.S. National Archives, an item more coveted than copies of the Constitution.

Krogh, the sole staffer who witnessed the Elvis-Nixon exchange in the Oval Office, with Schilling and Sonny West also in the room, later wrote meeting notes that sketched out the conversation: After the legendary photo-op, Elvis told the President that he was on his side, and he wanted to help reach young people to discourage drug use.

He also added a dig at The Beatles, who had broken up 8 months earlier, but whom Elvis told Nixon had promoted "anti-American spirit," much to Nixon's surprise. While Nixon would later try to get John Lennon deported, he had not, as yet, made any negative public statement against the group, or any member thereof, or, indeed, against any musical performer.

At first, Nixon was annoyed by what he saw as a public-relations stunt. But over the course of the meeting, he found that they had much in common: They were both "self-made men," who came from humble beginnings, and worked hard for their success, and both felt under-appreciated by an American culture they no longer understood, and had appeared to have passed them by. (It wasn't brought up, but another thing they had in common was being major "mama's boys.")

As for the gift, it was a gun. Yes, Elvis brought a gun into the White House. It was a Colt .45 pistol made for the U.S. Army during World War II, in what Nixon called a "handsome wooden chest" in the thank-you note he sent, dated on December 31. Elvis and Dick parted on good terms.

And the badge that Elvis so badly wanted? It came in the mail a few days later. This was one occasion on which Richard Nixon kept his word.

Despite the fame of both men, the meeting was not reported in the media at the time, and went unnoticed for more than a year until Jack Anderson's nationally syndicated newspaper column of January 27, 1972.

The revelation of the meeting shocked pretty much everybody. Nixon's supporters couldn't believe that Elvis the Pelvis was allowed in. Elvis' supporters figured he was too liberal to meet with the much-despised Tricky Dick. For Nixon-haters, it got worse: At the 1972 Republican Convention, Nixon was seen on TV getting hugged by Sammy Davis Jr., and applauded by Frank Sinatra, who had publicly supported Democratic Presidential nominees from Franklin Roosevelt in 1940 to Hubert Humphrey in 1968, especially John F. Kennedy against Nixon in 1960.

Dwight Chapin was convicted of perjury for lying to a grand jury over the Watergate case, and served 8 months in federal prison.

The meeting has been the subject of 2 movies. In 1997, Elvis Meets Nixon starred Rick Peters, Bob Gunton, Alyson Court as Priscilla Presley, Denny Doherty of The Mamas & The Papas as Elvis' father Vernon, and Richard Beymer (Tony in the film version of West Side Story) as White House Chief of Staff Bob Haldeman. In 2016, Elvis & Nixon starred Michael Shannon, Kevin Spacey, Tate Donovan as Haldeman, and Johnny Knoxville as West. No one in Elvis' family appears as a character.

Elvis died in 1977, his heart weakened by his prescription drug use. Senator George Murphy died in 1992, Nixon in 1994, Bud Krogh in 2020, and Sonny West in 2022. As of December 21, 2022, Dwight Chapin and Jerry Schilling are still alive.

*

December 21, 1970 was a Wednesday. Baseball was out of season. Football was in midweek. There were no games scheduled in the NHL.

There was 1 game in the NBA: The Milwaukee Bucks beat the Los Angeles Lakers, 113-88 at the Milwaukee Arena. In 1974, it was renamed the Milwaukee Exposition, Convention Center and Arena, or "The MECCA." Since 2014, it has been named the UW-Panther Arena. Lew Alcindor scored 37 points and grabbed 16 rebounds. He went on to lead the Bucks to the NBA Championship that season. After another year, he changed his name to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. In 1975, he was traded to the Lakers, and would lead them to 6 titles.

There were 2 games played in the American Basketball Association, and they were a doubleheader at the Indiana State Fairgrounds Coliseum (now the Corteva Coliseum) in Indianapolis. The Miami Floridians beat the Kentucky Colonels, 125-119. Dan Issel scored 37 in defeat for the Colonels. And the Indiana Pacers beat the Pittsburgh Condors, 144-115. Bill Netolicky scored 36 for the Pacers.