The Gortons and Slades - Washington Secretary of State

232 sLAde goRton: A hALf centuRy in poLitics
tunity to move the left-leaning court to the right, or at least toward the
center. But Gorton was not on his short list.
What Slade sensed at the time was fully documented in 2007 when
Reagan’s diaries were published. The dyspeptic entry for May 27, 1987,
says: “Last subject was a group of our Sens are demanding we appoint
former Sen. Slade Gorton (Wash. defeated in 1986) to court of appeals.
We might settle for a district judgeship if there’s an opening—but he has
been an opponent of everything I’ve tried to do.” 2
Attorney General Ed Meese—Reagan’s dark side alter ego—also mistrusted
Gorton, and the feeling was mutual. Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah
and many other conservatives who wanted Gorton to get the seat were
unhappy when a “Meese man,” San Diego law professor Bernard Siegan,
was nominated. An ad hoc coalition of liberals and conservatives soon
derailed his nomination. By then Meese was on his way out on the heels
of multiple scandals and Gorton was weighing other options. 3
Reporters were pressing Evans on his own future. Would he seek reelection
in 1988? He was mulling, and he wasn’t in a hurry. One thing
was clear: He still hated passing the hat, describing as “an abomination”
the “incessant” fundraisers that were already nightly events almost two
years before the next election. 4
As sLAde And sALLy crossed the Potomac and headed home to Seattle
through the middle of America in their Renault Alliance, they listened to
the Iran-Contra scandal unfold on the car radio.
Slade accepted an offer to join Davis Wright & Jones, one of Seattle’s
leading law firms, after a therapeutic overseas business trip financed
by his brother Mike, who knew getting away would do him good. Never
much of a traveler and a critic of junkets, he enjoyed making calls on
customers and suppliers of Slade Gorton & Co. in New Zealand, Australia,
Singapore and Hong Kong.
That March, while Jennifer Dunn and 13 other members of the Republican
National Committee were lunching at the White House, Dunn told
the president and his new chief of staff, Howard Baker, that Gorton
“would make a great FBI director.” William Webster was leaving the post
to become director of the CIA. Baker said “there’d be nobody better” than
his former Senate colleague. Dunn’s suggestion caught Slade by surprise.
“With friends like that, I don’t need any enemies,” he laughed. “No one
has talked to me about taking that job, and I have no background in that
kind of law enforcement . . . so I will not be offered that job.” In fact, he’d