SECRETARY CLARK TO RESIGN

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000201010069-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 20, 2012
• Sequence Number: 69
• Publication Date: January 2, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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t Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA
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WASHINGTON POST
2 January 1985
Secretary Clark to design
`It's Time to Go Home to California,' Interior Chief Says
By Lou Cannon
Washington Post Staff Writer
PALM SPRINGS, Calif., Jan. 1-
Interior Secretary William P. Clark
has told President Reagan he is re-
signing his post to return to his Cal-
iiornia ranch.
",My task at interior is substan-
tially complete so it's time to go
home to California," Clark said.
Clark, a trouble-shooter for Rea-
gan and important member of his
inner circle for 18 years, kept his
plans from all but a handful of
friends. He told Reagan of his in-
tentions over the weekend here in
Palm Springs, where the president
is vacationing during the new-year
holiday.
The unexpected departure of
Clark is likely to come as a blow to
administration conservatives, who
had hoped he would stay on at the
Interior Department and eventually
become White House chief of staff if
that position is vacated by James A.
Baker III being named to a Cabinet
post.
But, in conversations with inti-
mates during the past several
months, Clark has expressed a de-
sire to return to his 888-acre barley
and cattle ranch northeast of Paso
Robles in central California.
In confirming that he would leave
the administration, Clark said today
that he has set no firm date for his
departure but expects to be gone by
early 'spring, probably late in
March.
Although Clark is said to have
told Reagan that he would be avail-
able .for specific assignments from
time to time, he also has made it
clear that he has no desire to return
to a post in Washington or to serve
on the federal bench.
Clark, 53, a lawyer, has served as
a key operative for Reagan since
the early days of his California gov-
ernorship.
In 1967, at a time the governor's
'office had been rocked by a scandal
:and the Reagan administration in
California was in disarray, Clark
moved in as executive secretary,
he chief of staff's job, and restored
~)rder and interoffice harmony.
In 1973, when Reagan was con-
Terned by what he perceived as the
liberal drift of the California Su-
preme Court, he named Clark as a
Clark became; a conservative -1-
of ::controversial struggles with
,'thief Justice Rose Bird.
3n 1980, during Reagan's cam-
paign for president Clark -joined
with other Californians in helping to
replace John P. Sears with William
J. Casey as campaign manager. Sub-
sequently_after Case was a
pointed director of the ntr I In-
telhgence Agency, he and Clark
became firm allies in the Reagan
admmistratign.
Reagan brought Clark to Wash-
ington, using White House counsel-
or Edwin Meese III as his emissary,
in 1981 to become deputy secretary
of state.
In that role Clark became Rea-
gan's personal watchdog at the
State Department, where then-Sec-
retary Alexander M. Haig Jr. was
embroiled in disputes with the
White House staff. Clark often took
Haig's side in these clashes with
Baker and other White House aides.
But after Clark became national
security affairs adviser three years
ago today in Palm Springs, he be-
came a catalyst in the process that
eventually led to Haig's resignation
and replacement by George P.
Shultz as secretary of state.
Clark's tenure as national secu-
rity adviser was a stormy one, with
Baker and Shultz privately com-
plaining that he was trying to direct
Central American policy from the
White House.
Often, he was allied with Casey
and with Defence Secretary awr
W. Weinberger, another veteran of
the Reagan administration in Cal-
ifornia. Clark supported Weinber-
ger's repeated and largely success-
ful attempts to win defense budget
increases. , - `
But Clark and Weinberger, again
ir. conflict with,Shultz, were unsuc-
cessful in their efforts to prevent a
deployment in force of U.S. Ma-
rines to Beirut where 243 service-
men were killed in a bombing attack
in October 1983.
By the time of the bombing,
Clark had left the National Security
Council job, which he found wearing
and where he was under increasing
pressure from Baker and deputy
chief of staff Michael K. Deaver.
In September 1983, Clark re-
placed the controversial James G.
Watt as interior secretary 'after
'Watt resigned under pressure over.
a remark that slurred minorities
and the handicapped.
Even Clark's critics in the admin-
istration have praised his perform-
ance at the Interior Department,
where he defused many of the crit-,
icisms created by Watt's confron-
tational style while still moving to
follow the Reagan policy of opening
more lands to resource develop-
ment.
Since Reagan's reelection 'last
November, Clark has removed sev-.
era! key assistant secretaries at the
department.
While he has told the president
that he will stay until the current
reorganization is completed, Clark
said he would leave the task of find-
ing replacements for these posts to
his successor.
c4nunupA
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201010069-6
 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201010069-6
Clark's departure marks a period
of turnover in which Californians
long associated with Reagan are
changing jobs or leaving the admin-
istration.
Deaver, the aide considered clos-
est to the president and Nancy Rea-
gan, is expected to take a Washing-
ton public relations post in April.
Attorney General William French
Smith, who was Reagan's personal
attorney in California, has said he
will leave for his Los Angeles law
firm as soon as attorney general
nominee Meese is confirmed by the
Senate.
These changes would leave Rea-
gan without any of his California
aides in the top ranks of the White
House staff; Weinberger and Meese
would remain as the only holdovers
in the Cabinet from the. president's
California days.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201010069-6