Against the advice of his family and friends, Daniel Patrick Moynihan took a job with the Nixon administration as Richard Nixon’s domestic advisor. Although Moynihan didn’t necessarily agree with all of Nixon’s politics, he felt a duty to serve the American public. His impact as domestic advisor was wide-ranging, including creating the Council on Urban Affairs and the first Office of Early Child Development.
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- Ladies and gentlemen, I have another major announcement with regard to the White House staff.
- When he came back and he told me that Nixon had asked him to be his domestic advisor and that he accepted, I was enraged, I have to tell you.
I was just devastated, but furious.
- When he went into the Nixon Administration against the advice of his wife and friends, Nixon was the devil and going to work for Nixon was a disgrace.
- Presidents don't need advisors who agree with them about everything.
They agree with you, then you've got one man on the payroll you don't need.
- He had no stake in Nixon.
He had a stake, as he felt it, in the presidency.
- You can come home every weekend.
You can commute.
We're not gonna move.
- [Reporter] Urban Affairs advisor, Daniel Moynihan, told how the new administration hopes to attack urban problems.
- As Moynihan said to me in my interview for the job with him, he said, "John, I want you to work with me on everything I'm doing."
And he said, "That is domestic policy.
That is urban policy and that is, therefore, policy about the Black community."
- Now, having an urban policy is no more a guarantor of success with cities than having a foreign policy as a guarantor of success in say, world peace, but it's a condition of success.
I mean, you have to start- - [Narrator] Moynihan's portfolio was the newly-created Council on Urban Affairs, but its chairman was the President himself, making the council the powerful center for all domestic policy in the Nixon Administration.
- Pat was like a Roman candle going up.
The sparks were in the sky all over the place.
You go into a meeting with him and you really wouldn't know what was on his mind.
He could be all over the lot.
- Pat was a gingerman in some ways.
He was a yeasty, idea-creating person.
For example, he brought in Bruno Bettelheim, who had written of children in the kibbutz in Israel and about the importance of early child development and forthwith, Nixon created the first Office of Early Child Development in the Department of Health, Education and Welfare.
