Clay gave me a look that showed there wasn’t much doubt in his mind. Then he pulled a pen out of his pocket, picked up his napkin, and sketched the organizational chart of the White House. It was a tangled mess, with lines of authority crossing and blurred. His point was clear: This was a major source of the unrest. Then he said, “I am not the only one who feels this way.” He told me that several people had spontaneously used the same unflattering term to describe the White House structure: It started with “cluster” and ended with four more letters.
Clay was right. The organization was drifting. People had settled into comfort zones, and the sharpness that had once characterized our operation had dulled. The most effective way to fix the problem was to make a change at the top. I decided it was time to take Andy up on his offer to move on.
The realization was painful. Andy Card was a loyal, honorable man who led the White House effectively through trying days. On a trip to Camp David that spring, I went to see Andy and his wife Kathi at the bowling alley. They are one of those great couples whose love for each other is so obvious. They knew I wasn’t there for bowling. My face must have betrayed my anguish. I started by thanking Andy for his service. He cut me off and said, “Mr. President, you want to make a change.” I tried to explain. He wouldn’t let me. We hugged and he said he accepted my decision.
I was uncomfortable creating any large vacancy without having a replacement lined up. So before I had my talk with Andy, I had asked Josh Bolten to come see me. I respected Josh a lot, and so did his colleagues. Since his days as policy director of my campaign, he had served as deputy chief of staff for policy and director of the Office of Management and Budget. He knew my priorities as well as anyone. My trust in him was complete.
When I asked Josh if he would be my next chief of staff, he did not jump at the offer. Like most at the White House, he admired Andy Card and knew how hard the job could be. After thinking about it, he agreed that the White House needed restructuring and refreshing. He told me that if he took the job, he expected a green light to make personnel changes and clarify lines of authority and responsibility. I told him that was precisely why I wanted him. He accepted the job and stayed to the end, which made him one of the first staffers I hired for my campaign and the last I saw in the Oval Office—with ten full years in between.
Shortly after taking over, Josh moved forward with a number of changes, including replacing the White House press secretary with Tony Snow, a witty former TV and radio host who became a dear friend until he lost his valiant battle with cancer in 2008. The trickiest move was redefining Karl’s role. After the 2004 election, Andy had asked Karl to become deputy chief of staff for policy, the top policy position in the White House. I understood his rationale. Karl is more than a political adviser. He is a policy wonk with a passion for knowledge and for turning ideas into action. I approved his promotion because I wanted to benefit from Karl’s expertise and abilities. To avoid any misperceptions, Andy made clear that Karl would not be included in national security meetings.
With my communications team, (from left) Dan Bartlett, Dana Perino, and Tony Snow. White House/Eric Draper
By the middle of 2006, Republicans were in trouble in the upcoming midterm elections, and the left had unfairly used Karl’s new role to accuse us of politicizing policy decisions. Josh asked Karl to focus on the midterms and continue to provide strategic input. To take over the day-to-day policy operations, Josh brought in his deputy from OMB—Joel Kaplan, a brilliant and personable Harvard Law graduate who had worked for me since 2000.
I worried about how Karl would interpret the move. He had developed a thick skin in Washington, but he was a proud, sensitive man who had absorbed savage attacks on my behalf. It was a tribute to Karl’s loyalty and Josh’s managerial skill that they made the new arrangement work until Karl left the White House in August 2007.
While White House staff and Cabinet appointments are crucial to decision making, they are temporary. Judicial appointments are for life. I knew how proud Dad was to have appointed Clarence Thomas, a wise, principled, humane man. I also knew he was disappointed that his other nominee, David Souter, had evolved into a different kind of judge than he expected.
History is full of similar tales. John Adams famously called Chief Justice John Marshall—who served on the bench for thirty years after Adams left office—his greatest gift to the American people. On the other hand, when Dwight Eisenhower was asked to name his biggest mistakes as president, he answered, “I made two and they’re both sitting on the Supreme Court.”
Shortly after the 2000 election was decided, I asked my White House counsel, Alberto Gonzales, and his team of lawyers to develop a list of candidates for the Supreme Court. Al was an impressive second-generation American who had worked his way through Rice University and Harvard Law School and earned my trust when I was governor. I told him the Supreme Court list should include women, minorities, and people with no previous experience on the bench. I made clear there should be no political litmus test. The only tests in my mind were personal integrity, intellectual ability, and judicial restraint. I was concerned about activist judges who substituted their personal preferences for the text of the law. I subscribed to the strict constructionist schooclass="underline" I wanted judges who believed the Constitution meant what it said.
With Al Gonzales. White House/Chris Greenburg
For more than eleven years, the same nine justices had sat together on the Court, the longest such streak in modern history. On June 30, 2005, Harriet Miers—who had replaced Al Gonzales as White House counsel when he became attorney general—was informed that the Supreme Court would be forwarding a letter for me from one of the justices. We all assumed it was from Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who was eighty years old and sick. But the next morning Harriet called me with a surprise. “It’s O’Connor,” she said.
I had met Justice Sandra Day O’Connor many times over the years. The first female justice in the history of the Court, she had an engaging, straightforward personality. I was fond of Sandra and called her immediately after I received her letter. She told me it was time for her to go take care of her beloved husband, John, who was suffering from Alzheimer’s.
While the vacancy was not the one I expected, we were prepared to fill it. Harriet’s team prepared a thick binder that contained the biographies of eleven candidates, as well as detailed analyses of their writings, speeches, and judicial philosophies. I had a trip to Europe scheduled in early July, and the long hours on Air Force One made for good reading time. After studying the binder, I narrowed the list down to five impressive judges: Samuel Alito, Edith Brown Clement, Michael Luttig, John Roberts, and J. Harvie Wilkinson.
Each came to meet me in the White House residence. I tried to put them at ease by giving them a tour of the living area. Then I took them to the family sitting room that overlooks the West Wing. I had read the summaries of their legal opinions; now I wanted to read the people. I was looking for someone who shared my judicial philosophy, and whose values wouldn’t change over time. I went into the interviews hoping one person would stand apart.
One did. John Roberts flew in from London, where he was teaching for the summer. I knew Roberts’s record: top of his class at Harvard and Harvard Law School, law clerk to Justice Rehnquist, dozens of cases argued before the Supreme Court. Roberts had been nominated to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals in 1992, but he wasn’t confirmed before the election. I had nominated him to a seat on the same court in 2001. He was confirmed in 2003 and had established a solid record. Behind the sparkling résumé was a genuine man with a gentle soul. He had a quick smile and spoke with passion about the two young children he and his wife, Jane, had adopted. His command of the law was obvious, as was his character.