Abe Holtzman, who was a very partisan Democrat – he had visited with Harry Truman when I believe he was a UCLA undergraduate –
Abe was here on campus, I loved taking his courses, and we would have back and forth and discuss and debate.
But he was at a conference where Anderson was speaking and he said, “Look, there’s a guy on the NC State campus you ought to get in touch with.
He’s a fairly prominent Republican.” Well the beauty of Anderson’s campaign, you know, Howard Baker was from next door in Tennessee, Reagan had Tom Ellis and all the Helms guys,
I’m just a student at NC State but suddenly I kind of go to the front: “Well, we’ve got an elected leader; we’ve got the student body president at NC State,”
and it gave me entrée into the workings of a presidential campaign; really interesting.
And of course by May of 1980 – I believe it was May – when Anderson decided to leave the Republican party and run as an independent,
I wasn’t really happy with that but I said, well, I gave him my personal commitment and I’ll stick with him through this.
He came to town, and this was kind of interesting, because we’re doing this rally up on the capitol grounds
So, I’m just a kid, right, but I’m like the only guy that Anderson has, so they decide at the rally I’m going to introduce Anderson.
So, we’re right there at the State Capitol. I guess Governor Hunt could look out the window and see this thing going on.
I go out to meet the car, and John B. and I turn, and it was the first sensation – this would happen a few other times in public life –
but all the cameras, and you’re in this almost like cocoon of media people, not so much a crush, more of a cocoon, because they’ve got to have space to take the pictures.
You’ve got all the television, and all the photographers, and all the reporters and I’m going, “Wow; this is really something.” So I step, and obviously wanted to hear John speak. I did not make a Clinton mistake.
In stark contrast to the verbosity of this interview, I knew my job is to get on and get off, so I think I spent maybe forty-five seconds to a minute introducing Anderson.