AFTERMATH OF THE TOWER REPORT : Regan Accumulated Power but Alienated Congress, First Lady

WASHINGTON â€”  The end of Donald T. Regan’s two-year reign as White House chief of staff Friday came only months after he was hailed as the most powerful presidential aide since Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Sherman Adams.

The departure of the silver-haired ex-Marine had been forecast long before the Tower Commission’s devastating chronicle of the efforts to ransom American hostages with arms shipments to Iran was released Thursday, but the report sealed his doom.

The coup de grace followed weeks of criticism from Capitol Hill, where Regan had trampled on congressional sensitivities in his heyday, as well as increasingly pointed evidence that First Lady Nancy Reagan favored his departure.

Escalating Tension

While the Tower Commission faulted Regan for failing to take control of the Iran- contra affair, Mrs. Reagan was understood to have become furious at Regan’s efforts to hasten the President back to work and into the spotlight after his prostate surgery last month. Tension reportedly escalated to such a point that Regan twice hung up on the First Lady during telephone conversations.

In recent days, the grumbling from Congress had grown into a full-throated chorus of resignation demands from Republicans and Democrats alike.

With Regan’s departure, the embattled President loses one of the few Administration figures who had moved into his closest inner circle without benefit of longtime ties back in California.

As Treasury secretary during the first four years of the Administration, Regan was surpassed only by Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger and Secretary of State George P. Shultz as a Cabinet power.

Pushed Tax Cut

Some of the most staunchly conservative Republicans had disapproved of his nomination to the Treasury post because Regan, a millionaire Wall Street executive, was discovered to have contributed to campaigns of some liberal Democrats. The opposition was quieted, however, when he became a pivotal figure in pushing through Reagan’s tax cut and other Administration economic programs.

His troubles began shortly after he moved to the White House in February, 1985, exchanging jobs with then-White House Chief of Staff James A. Baker III.

A longtime congressional staff member said Friday, “The decline of the Reagan Administration began the day Jim Baker left the White House.

“Regan was impossible on the Hill,� he added, referring to Capitol Hill, “an utter disaster. He did not understand Washington, he did not understand politics, he had no political judgment. I don’t know of one single fan the man has on the Hill. He not only didn’t hobnob and make friends with members (of Congress), he wouldn’t even return their telephone calls. The general feeling is that he is more carried away with himself than with the President.�

Upbraided Congress

In one of his better known congressional relations gaffes, he went before the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and upbraided Congress on the budget deficit, saying lawmakers were “afraid to come to grips with the problem� and further declaring: “I am challenging them to do it.�

The remark displeased Reagan loyalists. “He didn’t say the President or the Administration was challenging them,� one presidential friend sniffed. “He said he was. I couldn’t believe it.�

Ironically, Administration sources said Friday, Regan had in the months immediately preceding the Iran-contra fiasco begun to improve his relations with Congress, and there was even scattered admiration for the way he stood his ground with powerful members of the House and Senate.

“He was just as good as they were,� said one Administration source, who asked not to be identified. “He’s just as good as they are, and, in a lot of cases, better.�

Shared Irish Heritage

Regan, because he shared the President’s Irish heritage, modest background, sense of humor and the perspective of a man past middle age, became the aide perhaps closest to the President personally.

Publicly, at the outset, he downplayed his own importance, comparing himself to a caddy whose role it was to tee up the ball for the boss.

But, in the White House, where every nuance is scrutinized, critics quickly found evidence of excessive ego.

One observed Friday that Regan subtly elevated his position in the hierarchy of the executive mansion’s office wing.

“He did not refer to himself as the White House chief of staff,� the source said. “He referred to himself as the chief of staff to the President of the United States.� Inside the White House and the Administration, that little change implied dominion over the Cabinet and the sub-Cabinet.

Staff members were nonplussed when protocol was altered to emphasize Regan’s importance.

“I was shocked,� one Reagan loyalist said, “when, at the signing ceremony for the new tax bill, there was included in the booming introductions before the President came out: ‘The chief of staff to the President of the United States.’ Old-timers couldn’t believe it. The guy has absolutely no political touch.�

The normal rivalry between top national security and domestic staff members was exaggerated with Regan’s arrival as staff chief, White House sources said, and culminated with Robert C. McFarlane’s departure as national security adviser less than a year after Regan arrived from the Treasury Department. McFarlane was uncomfortable with the new chief of staff’s managerial style and the two clashed repeatedly.

Summit Photo Cited

After the December, 1985, Geneva summit meeting, one source said, White House staff members were taken aback by a news photograph showing President Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev with Regan hovering over them. Because the picture was released by the White House staff, not taken by a press pool, the source said, it was immediately taken as another example of Regan’s inflating his own importance.

Regan’s blunt talk--often laced with expletives from the barracks--brought him additional troubles. After the Geneva summit meeting, he found himself scrambling to shake charges of sexism and finally had to apologize for an offhand remark that “women are not going to understand throw weights or what is happening in Afghanistan or what is happening in human rights.� Women, he suggested in the midst of discussions about nuclear arms control, were more interested in “human interest stuff.�

Image of Tough Marine

Still, despite the carping, Regan presented the image of a tough Marine in total control of the situation, allowing nothing to happen in the White House without his cognizance.

When government agencies fell into an intramural quarrel over space policy after the shuttle Challenger exploded last year, Regan repeatedly sent them back to develop more extensive detail in their proposals before going to the President for a decision.

When Vice Adm. John M. Poindexter was named to replace McFarlane as national security adviser, sources said, Regan’s first conversation took the form of a reminder that the chief of staff to the President did not like surprises.

It was his wish, he said, to be informed of everything going on in the White House.

Couldn’t Escape Culpability

In the end, his downfall occurred partly because he was so involved that he could not escape culpability in the arms-for-hostages imbroglio.

“More than almost any chief of staff in recent memory,� the Tower Commission said, “he asserted personal control over the White House staff and sought to extend this control to the national security adviser. He was personally active in national security affairs and attended almost all of the relevant meetings regarding the Iran initiative. He, as much as anyone, should have insisted that an orderly process be observed.�