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[overlapping songs]

[crowd shouting]

[birds twittering]

[rooster crows]

[muted cheering]

[Johnny Cash] I thank God for all the freedoms we've got in this country.

-I cherish them. -[cheering continues]

Even the rights to burn the flag, you know, I'm proud of those rights.

-[crowd shouting, booing] -But I'll tell you what,

we've also got-- Let me tell you something. Shh.

We've also got a right to bear arms, and if you burn my flag, I'll shoot you.

-[crowd cheering] -[Cash playing guitar]

But I'll shoot you with a lot of love, like a good American.

[wild cheering]

[chanting indistinctly]

[Mark Stielper] In the '60s and '70s, America was torn apart

around issues of race, war, peace,

and a battle for the heart and soul of what it meant to be an American patriot.

[Nixon] We will determine what kind of nation America will be.

[Cash] It's the prettiest country in the world that we've got.

-There ain't nothing like it anywhere. -[applause]

Mr. Nixon said Johnny Cash speaks to all America.

[Aram Bakshian] He understood Johnny Cash's symbolic importance.

[Nixon speaking on tape] Country music is the Johnny Cash crowd.

-[aide] It gets you elected. -[Nixon] Yeah. You know, it's Southern.

[Pat Buchanan] Nixon wanted to identify with Middle America,

and Johnny Cash was as Middle America as you can get.

[Joanne Cash] We got a phone call from the White House. It was President Nixon.

He had invited Johnny to sing and do a concert there.

[Stielper] President Nixon requested that John sing

redneck country music songs,

affiliating country music with the president's cause,

and the result was just catastrophic.

How could the president be so mean-spirited?

Johnny was very, very conflicted.

It was a defining moment for him.

[announcer] Ladies and gentlemen, Johnny Cash!

[cheers and applause]

Thank you very much.

[Stielper] Who was going to show up to the White House?

Johnny Cash of "Folsom Prison Blues,"

"The Rebel"...

So, what do you want to hear?

[Stielper] ...the guy who was photographed flippin' off the man,

or the God-fearing family man with a baby on the way,

gospel-singing Johnny Cash.

How do you be both?

What did Johnny Cash stand for?

Carl Perkins wrote a song that tells about the reason for it all.

It takes us back home and again,

tells it like it was when I was a little-bitty kid

and we gathered around the piano,

and me and little brother would join in and Mama'd sing tenor and Daddy sang bass.

[band playing]

♪ I remember when I was a lad Times were hard and things were bad... ♪

Johnny was born in Kingsland,

in south Arkansas.

♪ Just poor people That's all we were ♪

♪ Trying to make a living Out of black land dirt ♪

♪ We'd get together In a family circle singing loud... ♪

When my family came to Dyess, Johnny was three years old.

♪ Singin' seems to help a troubled soul ♪

♪ One of these days and it won't be long ♪

♪ I'll rejoin them in a song ♪

♪ I'm gonna join the family circle At the Throne ♪

[Cash] Now each one of these houses had a barn,

a chicken house, and a smoke-house where the farmers raised their own hogs

and cured their meat.

And they had a mule and 20 acres of land here.

It was a beautiful little place.

The Dyess, Arkansas experience was part of FDR's New Deal.

They moved people from terrible situations where they had no hope, no future,

and gave them an opportunity.

♪ My clothes may be ragged And my shoes may be worn ♪

♪ But I've been a wealthy boy Since I've been born... ♪

We were a happy family. We didn't know we were poor.

We always had plenty to eat and plenty of clothes.

We were happy to be part of the American dream.

[Joanne] Our family would start the day in the cotton fields,

singing old church hymns and songs that we all knew, we'd sing together.

Gospel songs or country songs

because it's about our life with the Lord.

Johnny's grandfather was a hellfire preacher.

He had preacher grandparents on multiple lines of his family tree.

They spoke of hell and damnation,

and what it was like if you did not live the right kind of a life.

John was a dyed-in-the-wool conservative person

because his parents were. He was from that part of Arkansas.

I don't remember anybody in our family criticizing the government.

We were patriotic no matter who the president was.

We loved to see the American flag flown.

My daddy flew it every day until the day he died.

Johnny loved America.

He believed that you should support your government

and support the president.

[Joanne] He was one of the most patriotic men I've ever known.

In 1968, the idea of patriotism itself

became controversial.

[sirens blaring]

[Nixon] As we look at America, we see cities enveloped in smoke and flames.

We hear sirens in the night.

We see Americans dying on distant battlefields abroad.

[machine gun fire]

We see Americans hating each other, fighting each other,

killing each other at home.

It was a period where

lots of stuff came to a boil at the same time.

We not only have a right to be free, we have a duty to be free.

[Bakshian] There were civil rights protests.

There was this unpopular war.

We will prevail in Vietnam over the Communist aggressor!

The country split into what has come to be called hawks and doves.

Doves wanted to end the war.

Hawks wanted to pursue the war.

-[man] What do you want? -[all] Peace!

-[man] When do we get it? -[all] Now!

And these two sides, both Americans,

both claiming to be patriots, went to war with each other.

[Bakshian] It was the perfect storm,

and Nixon understood that.

And I pledge to you tonight that the first priority

foreign policy objective of our next administration

will be to bring an honorable end to the war in Vietnam.

[crowd cheering]

Nixon lost the 1960 presidential election to Kennedy,

and he was traumatized by that defeat.

In 1968, he was running for president

in a desperate attempt to resurrect his career.

The time has come for honest government in the United States of America!

[crowd cheering]

-Thank you! -Thank you, girls.

My father was never afraid to stand up for someone in need.

And he would always put himself in a position to help those if he could.

It was that simplicity that was within the heart of the man.

It wasn't the complications of politics.

[fans murmuring]

[Cash] Thank you.

[John Carter] I think that empathy goes back to the loss of his brother.

[Cash playing slow guitar]

♪ Beside a singin' mountain stream... ♪

Growing up, my father and his brother, Jack,

were dearest of friends.

Jack was a man of God at 14 years old.

He studied the Bible all the time.

He knew in his heart that he was going to be a pastor.

They were so inseparable.

♪ But flesh and blood Needs flesh and blood ♪

♪ And you are what I need ♪

On Saturdays, Johnny, Jack, and my other brothers,

all of us, would do odd jobs to help Mama with the groceries.

In May of 1944, Jack was sawing some fence post.

As he was pushing the fence post into the saw,

it jerked... and jerked him into the saw.

It was beyond horrible.

I remember Johnny crying and holding his hand,

saying, "Somebody do something!"

It was as bad as you can imagine.

The next day after the funeral,

we were all back in the cotton fields, working.

I can't even describe the emptiness and the hurt.

[Stielper] Ray and Carrie,

Johnny's mother and father, and 12-year-old Johnny

are the ones that had to shoulder that burden.

It was back-breaking.

They were working every day and not getting anywhere.

Ray Cash, who had thought Dyess was his promised land,

found that it wasn't.

Jack was going to be a preacher.

He was going to be the son of Dyess that made it.

Johnny was a very sensitive young man.

There was not room for sensitivity.

There was not room for dreamers in Dyess, Arkansas in the 1940s.

Ray became so bitter, he resented his son.

He would look at Johnny and he would say, "You weren't the right son.

You should've died."

Johnny Cash grew up feeling unworthy of being himself.

He felt that he would never measure up

to what his father wanted him to be.

Something happened within my dad,

and there was this deep wound that was placed there,

this hollow well.

There was also a drive that was installed,

and all these different faces that were Johnny Cash were developed

through that great loss at an early age.

[indistinct chatter]

A prison's a prison.

And that's all it is.

[June] I'm sure you'll enjoy him this afternoon.

He seems to have a lot of things in common with you, Mr. Johnny Cash!

[crowd cheering]

[John Carter] My father knew what it was like to suffer.

He knew what it was like to feel lost.

And so, he could connect with other people's suffering.

He sang for those who needed something to believe in and needed to be lifted up.

[Stielper] In January of 1968,

Johnny Cash went to Folsom Prison and performed for the inmates.

♪ I hear the train a comin' It's rollin' 'round the bend ♪

♪ And I ain't seen the sunshine Since I don't know when ♪

♪ I'm stuck in Folsom Prison And time keeps draggin' on ♪

-[crowd cheers] -Yeah!

[Stielper] He looked on some of those guys in there,

looked on the desperation in their eyes,

and he thought, "There but for the grace of God goes me.

I made some stumbles in my life.

That could've been me."

♪ But I shot a man in Reno Just to watch him die... ♪

He brought recording equipment because he wanted people to hear

the rawness of what it was like to perform for these men.

John always related to prisoners,

amongst others that had drug troubles.

My father was full of love.

He was full of faith. He worked hard.

He was self-made.

But he was also a man who hit hard rock bottom quite a few times.

Whether it's alcohol, drugs, whatever it is that changes your personality,

your demeanor, your physical look, and he went through all of this.

[John Carter] He could be a liar.

He struggled. He made mistakes.

He was a different man when he was in that mode.

My father had never been an inmate,

but they accepted him as one of their own.

He was a champion of the underdog and the downtrodden.

[interviewer] Do you have political leanings?

No, not all that much.

If somebody says,

"I'm not my brother's keeper," he's wrong 'cause he is.

He is his brother's keeper.

[Stielper] In May 1968, Johnny Cash At Folsom Prison is released.

"Folsom Prison Blues" gets to number one.

He is viewed as Johnny Cash, this rebel.

And that appealed to a broad audience.

[John Carter] People responded to that rebel identity,

but what was amazing is they'd think they knew him,

and then he'd change.

The Album of the Year, Johnny Cash, At Folsom Prison!

He had a lot of songs that he would cut as a country song,

and it would spill over into the pop charts.

I think that was why he was so successful.

There was no limit to who wanted to listen to Johnny Cash.

[Stielper] By the late '60s, Johnny's star rises,

as does Mr. Nixon's.

He wins the presidency in 1968.

Having lost a close one eight years ago and having won a close one this year,

I can say this... winning's a lot more fun!

[laughing]

But we won narrowly, we won with 43% of the vote.

I, Richard Milhous Nixon, do solemnly swear...

That you will faithfully execute the office...

That I will faithfully...

The Southern strategy that Nixon used to win the 1968 presidential election

has been used by every Republican presidential candidate since.

[excited chatter]

The Southern strategy sends out dog whistles to racists

and dog whistles to conservatives,

using key phrases like "the silent majority."

The Southern strategy basically was to hold the South,

bringing those people into the Nixon Coalition.

The essence was traditional conservatives and law and order,

supporting Americans in Vietnam,

standing up against the demonstrators who were against the war,

and basically representing the values and beliefs of Middle America

against the rising social and cultural revolution in the country.

The peace of the world will depend not just on America's military might,

which is the greatest in the world,

but it's going to depend on our character,

our love of our country,

our willingness to not only wear the flag but stand up for the flag,

and country music does that.

[Buchanan] Throughout Nixon's entire presidency,

well, even into his second term,

he attempted to cultivate the support of the South.

[all] ♪ God bless America ♪

♪ My home sweet home ♪

[crowd cheering]

[intro music plays]

Hello, I'm Johnny Cash.

[cheering]

[Stielper] In 1969, The Johnny Cash Show first aired on national TV.

Oh, hi, there!

It was a variety entertainment show,

and it was unlike anything anyone had ever seen.

Certainly unlike anything that anybody had ever seen in country music.

♪ He healed the leper and the lame... ♪

Mm-hmm.

[Stielper] He sings gospel songs.

Make welcome my brother, Tommy Cash.

Hey, Tommy! Welcome!

♪ He'd say do what you do, do well, boy! Do what you do, do well! ♪

[Stielper] It was a family affair all around.

♪ You say you're lookin' for someone Who's never weak ♪

♪ But always strong... ♪

He puts on a special segment on every show called "Ride This Train."

Ride this train with me to San Antonio, Texas;

Springfield, Missouri; Boise, Idaho.

It's a quintessentially American experience.

And he puts people on TV that nobody's ever seen before,

but it's not just country people.

Please make welcome Ms. Joni Mitchell.

♪ Rows and flows of angel hair... ♪

[Stielper] Bob Dylan...

♪ Love is all there is It makes the world go 'round... ♪

He puts on Pete Seeger.

-That's nice. [chuckles] -[applause]

That's nice.

[Stielper] These were all leaders of the anti-war movement.

The people that I'm contracted with said that,

"How dare you, supposedly such a good American,

have a Communist like Pete Seeger on your TV show?"

The Pete Seeger I know

and the Pete Seeger that June and I have come to love is,

I'd say, one of the best Americans and patriots I've ever known.

But Pete Seeger is not coming on there

and singing "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?"

This is a non-political venue.

[John Carter] My father did not adhere to any certain party.

A Republican would claim him and also a Democrat would,

and my father wouldn't argue either point.

♪ I keep my eyes wide open all the time ♪

John walked a political line.

♪ I walk the line ♪

Yes, he tried. He tried to walk the line.

People will say, "Oh, he tried to have it both ways."

♪ Because you're mine I walk the line... ♪

This was in the midst of tremendous social turmoil.

Johnny Cash doesn't get involved in that. He is not political.

He does not take a stand.

[applause]

I thank you very much.

While you could be neutral in the middle of those polarities,

culturally and politically, it was difficult.

And the more time went by, the harder it was to be neutral.

[chanting] Peace over war! Peace over war!

Peace over war! Peace over war!

[Buchanan] In the Fall of '69,

a huge demonstration was planned

to bring out hundreds of thousands of people

to break the Nixon presidency on Vietnam.

We have been too often disappointed by the optimism of the American leaders,

both in Vietnam and Washington,

to have faith any longer...

When parts of the news media projected the failures of US policy,

it began to create a gap

between what the government was telling us and what the news media started to report.

In the midst of this war, we began to understand

that we were being lied to,

and that further polarized society.

[Nixon] The radical fuel that you see on your television screens night after night,

they're not a majority of American youth today

and they will not be the leaders of America tomorrow.

[cheering]

Nixon was paranoid about these antiwar protesters,

most of whom were young.

[crowd] One, two, three, four, Tricky Dick passed a law!

He used to say to me sometimes, "What is it with these young people?

What don't they understand?"

We felt that we were being patriotic.

He wanted them to look shameful.

We're in the middle of a revolution.

So, I told the president, "If we don't stand up here,

your presidency is going to be broken."

Tonight I want to talk to you on a subject of deep concern to all Americans,

the war in Vietnam.

The American people are entitled to know the truth...

but as President of the United States,

I would be untrue to my oath of office

if I allowed the policy of this nation

to be dictated by the minority mounting demonstrations in the street.

North Vietnam cannot defeat or humiliate the United States.

Only Americans can do that.

And so tonight, to you,

the great Silent Majority

of my fellow Americans,

I ask for your support.

I have initiated a plan which will end this war

in a way that will bring us closer to that great goal:

the goal of a just and lasting peace.

Johnny Cash was, like most Southerners,

supportive of the president's position and strategy in ending the war.

From his TV show, he gets up there and he says...

My family here and I stand behind the President of the United States

in his quest for a just and lasting peace.

He's surrounded by a crew and by producers

who are from California, who are from New York,

who do not believe what they are hearing.

"What did you just do?

You have just alienated half of your audience.

This is outrageous!"

Johnny Cash said, "You put that in or I do not come back to work."

They put it in.

Johnny's message that goes out across the airwaves

gets to the White House,

and the president writes a letter.

"Dear Mr. Cash,

Pat and I were so appreciative of what you said about us.

We want to find an honorable end to the war.

Thank you for your support. Richard Nixon."

Johnny Cash had been

one of my favorites since the mid-1950s.

And so I started pushing, and others did,

"Let's being Johnny Cash to the White House!"

[Joanne] One day, I was at work at the House of Cash

and we got a phone call from the White House.

And it was President Nixon.

We were sayin', "What? What?"

He had invited John and June and the Cash family

to come visit the White House, and for Johnny to sing

and do a concert there.

Having Johnny Cash at the White House

symbolizes the kind of base that Richard Nixon was trying to appeal to,

which wasn't a traditional Republican base:

blue collar Americans that did go for Nixon in millions,

and who liked Johnny Cash's music.

[Buchanan] Nixon liked classical music, but we persuaded him

that this would be a great evening.

Also, culturally and socially,

Johnny Cash represented Nashville, he represented country and western.

This is culturally us.

We had someone mainstream who had not been at Woodstock.

He and June are over-the-top.

June goes out and gets herself a custom-made dress,

gorgeous, still in a museum.

Everybody wants to be on the guest list.

There's only 250 people that can get into the East Room,

and the White House had never seen anything like it.

They got requests from literally everywhere

to get a ticket to this moment.

Anybody who wasn't Johnny Cash's friend suddenly became his friend,

and his friends became his best friends.

President Nixon requested that my father perform "Okie from Muskogee"...

♪ And I'm proud to be An Okie from Muskogee ♪

...which Merle Haggard had recorded that was a big country hit.

♪ We don't smoke marijuana In Muskogee ♪

♪ We don't burn our draft cards Down on Main Street... ♪

[Buchanan] It was about the values of somebody in Muskogee, Oklahoma,

and how their way of life differed utterly

from the counter-culture hippies from San Francisco.

[Stielper] The other was "Welfare Cadillac."

It was a very mean-spirited song that made fun of people who were on welfare.

♪ Well, I've never worked much ♪

♪ In fact, I've been poor all my life ♪

♪ I guess about all I really own Is ten kids and a wife ♪

♪ Of course This house that I live in is mine ♪

♪ But it's really a shack ♪

♪ But I always managed To drive me a brand new Cadillac! ♪

[Stielper] When a press release went out from the White House staff

that announced that President Nixon had requested that John sing those songs,

immediately there was this brouhaha in the media.

Country singer Johnny Cash is booked for a White House appearance April 17th.

The performance already is stirring some protest though.

Not about the singer, but about a song.

[Dan Rather] The name of the song is on jukeboxes all over the country,

"Welfare Cadillac,"

a man who drives to pick up his welfare checks in a big automobile.

[Stielper] It was on the CBS News.

It was in Time magazine, in newspapers.

"Nixon wants Cash to sing these songs."

Well, now there are some protests from welfare and civil rights leaders.

One says, "A song like that distorts the facts about welfare

and further irritates those who pay their taxes."

How could the president ask for this song that put down citizens of this country?

A White House spokesman said the president didn't know whether

Johnny Cash would sing it or not.

[Stielper] The response from the Cash side was

"Johnny's learning them now."

Johnny Cash says he will sing it at the White House

if that's what the president wants. The White House says,

the president wants it.

[Stielper] The president has asked John to come and sing

for this great cultural moment.

This is as great a stage as you could possibly imagine.

The politicians in the White House had another agenda, though.

They wanted to use Johnny Cash as part of their Southern strategy,

especially as it related to the upcoming Senate election in Tennessee.

[Bakshian] Almost since the Civil War,

Tennessee was a Democratic state,

but with the Southern strategy,

the new Republican party is being born in the South.

The old Democratic party is dying.

I am target number one of the Southern strategy.

And President Nixon anointed in the White House

his chosen instrument of the Southern strategy,

Congressman Brock of Chattanooga.

Well, I appreciate your help my friend, very much.

Good to see you.

[Bakshian] And Bill Brock is one of the key people in the vanguard

on the Southern strategy.

And William Brock III, whose conservative record has been unsullied

in eight years in the House of Representatives.

[Bakshian] Bill Brock was being opposed by Tex Ritter

for the Republican Senate nominee in Tennessee.

-Hello there! -Hello.

-Tex Ritter. -Good evening.

[Bakshian] Tex Ritter was an old Country Western singer.

[Buchanan] Cash was a great friend of Tex Ritter's.

There was a memo written by a guy named Murray Chotiner

roughly a month prior to Johnny Cash appearing at the White House.

It said, "To Bob Haldeman, From Murray Chotiner:

Johnny Cash is great with a certain block of voters in Tennessee.

Obviously, he will not say or do anything against Tex Ritter,

who is running for the US Senate against Congressman Bill Brock

for the GOP nomination.

At the Johnny Cash evening at the White House, it'll be most helpful

if privately the president can neutralize Johnny Cash

so he does not campaign for Tex Ritter."

Nixon was thematically appealing to the Silent Majority,

but more than wanting to take advantage of Johnny Cash,

Richard Nixon really identified with him.

And he thought they were kindred souls

because they both had had really tough upbringings

and everything they got and everything they achieved

they had earned for themselves against tight odds.

Well, Nixon was raised by a sometimes abusive father.

You know, out there on a struggling lemon farm in California.

Two of his brothers died of tuberculosis.

And he grew up poor, poor as hell.

And because of these parallels,

you know, Nixon, he thought he understood Johnny Cash.

He felt that he knew what kind of person Cash was.

But when someone's invited to perform at the White House,

there always is some political danger involved.

During the Lyndon Johnson administration,

Lady Bird Johnson had a big event

where Eartha Kitt was invited to the White House,

where she proceeded to denounce Lyndon Johnson to his face

for his Vietnam policies.

There was another time when that kind of thing happened.

President Nixon, stop bombing human beings, animals, and vegetation.

You go to church on Sundays and pray to Jesus Christ.

If Jesus Christ were here tonight, you would not dare drop another bomb.

-[man] Throw her outta here! -[crowd] Yeah!

All right. [chuckles nervously]

I think you ought to...

[Carole] Certainly.

[scattered applause]

[Butterfield] In Nixon's estimation,

Johnny Cash wouldn't pose a risk to the White House.

But the Nixon administration may not have been aware

that my father was paying attention to what was happening in the world.

In example,

he was the champion for such rights as Native American rights.

This down here is where they were?

Yeah. They was all hunted down up this canyon...

across the creek over there.

The American government, with Gatling guns, machine guns,

killed innocent women and children

on December 29th, 1890 at Wounded Knee.

They shoved 'em into one mass grave.

The United States lied

about the atrocities they've done against American Indians.

Johnny Cash came and heard the real stories.

Is that the names of the people that are there?

[Miller] Over a period of years,

he met with several of the tribes that were still dealing with

the Bureau of Indian Affairs. There were still tribal land issues going on.

People were seeing us as outsiders,

and I think Johnny Cash always felt somewhat as an outcast

trying to prove himself, not only to his father, but to a society that

didn't accept people who've been downtrodden.

The beauty of Johnny Cash was he'd bring it into the songs.

Bitter Tears was a serious record about United States indigenous people,

and there was nothing like it in the world.

He had songs like "The Ballad of Ira Hayes."

Ira Hayes was a Pima Indian man who'd joined the Marines at a young age.

He was one of the men who actually hoisted the flag

upon victory in Iwo Jima.

♪ And when that fight was over And when Old Glory raised ♪

♪ Among the men to hold it high Was the Indian, Ira Hayes ♪

[John Carter] Ira Hayes died a sad, lonely death

at the hands of alcoholism and depression.

[Stielper] Johnny Cash, this atypical son of the South,

is singing about social causes

that aren't necessarily norms

for people to be hearing from Tennessee or Arkansas or Louisiana.

The Bitter Tears album was boycotted by the music industry

and John became enraged by that.

This offense brought out the rebel inside him.

He wrote a letter to the music industry,

which he had published as a full-page ad

in Billboard magazine.

[John Carter] "Why don't you play 'Ira Hayes'?"

It's like, hey, this song has purpose.

This song is important.

"Okay, country world, play this. I dare you."

[Miller] Johnny Cash was giving a voice to us who weren't being heard.

[Stielper] And what the brain trust at the White House also didn't know

is that Johnny Cash had experienced the personal side of war.

His views were changing.

♪ His dying barely made The morning paper... ♪

Jan Howard is a very well-known Grand Ole Opry star.

She sang with the Carter Family, with Johnny for many years.

Jimmy, my oldest son, was drafted.

He said, "Well, I'm no better than anybody else."

He said, "I'll be fine."

[Cash] He grew up on a little farm just a couple of miles out of town.

Her son was in Vietnam

and was killed.

[Stielper] Johnny Cash was deeply upset.

He wrote a song called "Route #1, Box 144."

It was a very...

quietly eloquent statement

about war.

[Cash] His body was sent back on a plane, and then by train.

[Stielper] Like so many in this country

who were called out of the fields, called out of their homes,

off the assembly line, and sent to Vietnam.

♪ ...thought that he was President or something ♪

♪ At Route #1, Box 144 ♪

My father always supported people within the Armed Forces.

Of course, my father himself served in the Air Force

during the Korean conflict.

He would set aside any political notion

or any consideration of whether one certain battle was right or wrong,

and support the men and young women that were fighting

and giving their lives for us.

And so, he went to Vietnam and performed for the troops.

♪ Well, one morning at breakfast I said to my wife ♪

♪ We've been everywhere once And some places twice ♪

♪ As I had another helping Of country ham ♪

♪ She said we've never been to Vietnam ♪

♪ There's a quarter of a million Of our boys over there... ♪

[Stielper] He went to Vietnam in December of 1969,

just months before the White House concert.

And he and June laid there in the tent

listening to the shells exploding,

listening to the sounds of war,

of people dying,

of watching the carnage.

It made a very serious impression on him.

♪ Then we did our last song For the night ♪

♪ And we crawled into bed For some peace and quiet ♪

♪ But things weren't peaceful ♪

♪ Things weren't quiet ♪

I'd gone over with my father to Vietnam.

I was at the airport, the Tan Son Nhat airport,

getting ready to fly back,

and I said, "That looks like John and June Cash!"

And so I made my way over,

and I said, "John, what're you doing in Vietnam?"

He said, "I'm in a search mode right now."

He said, "I'm troubled about what's happening here."

He said, "You know, Jimmie, I was raised in a Baptist church in Arkansas.

I know what's right."

He said, "What troubled me was it had taken our soldiers down."

It had pulled their... their morale, their spirit down

because of what they heard back home.

Because of the way our country was so divided.

Some of them had reached a point where...

"What're we doing this for? Why are we over here?"

Because politics had entered so strongly

into Vietnam.

[voice trembling] They were... looking for

a little bit of hope.

We prayed about that.

Servicemen and prisoners have a lot in common.

There is a kind of a brotherhood about the whole situation.

I think they feel a lot of the same things.

The loneliness, and a lot of times, boredom,

and isolation.

[Snow] "And he said there are some things that I want to do

that I feel like I need to do now with my voice."

We oughta live every day just as though the Lord's coming!

Doing all we can...

to help our neighbor!

And above all, loving!

One of the people who was watching Johnny Cash

is this superstar preacher, the evangelist, Billy Graham.

President Nixon and Dr. Graham had been friends for decades.

Billy Graham called John and said, "May I meet Mr. Cash?

My son is a rebellious teenager.

I want to ask John advice."

One Sunday in December 1969,

Billy and Ruth Graham came to supper at the Cash's.

Billy Graham says to him,

"Johnny, you are somebody who speaks to youth

because you are so authentic and that's what they are looking for today.

And I hope that you will use this gift

to further good purpose

in speaking to young people today."

This is the Arkansas sharecropper's son,

sitting there listening to this.

June is five months pregnant at the time. This is their first child together.

He hasn't necessarily been the best father

to his four girls that he left with Vivian in California.

He is thinking about his responsibility to the future now.

And when Billy Graham left, John said to his father, "Well, Daddy,

Billy Graham just had supper in my house.

That was pretty good, wasn't it?"

And Ray said, "You ain't shit, boy. That's nothing."

It was devastating.

Throughout his life, my father saw a lot of struggle, a lot of troubles.

When I was born and I was healthy,

he was lifted up inside.

[Tommy] He was just ecstatic.

He thought that that was a great blessing.

[Stielper] Here's the chance to be the father that he never had

to his own son.

-He's doing all right, ain't he, Mama? -[June] He's doing fine.

[Stielper] John was so moved and inspired after meeting Billy Graham

and becoming a father, that he wrote a new song

about young people and the future.

[Jim Lovell over radio] Uh, Houston, we've had a problem.

[Stielper] As it happened, the same week as the White House concert,

the Apollo 13 astronauts were stranded in space.

[reporter] The Apollo 13 space craft has had a serious power supply malfunction.

But they came down to Earth safely.

[reporter 2] Just a beautiful sight to see!

[man] And welcome home!

Theirs is the spirit that built America.

Johnny Cash would be at the White House that night.

We arrived at the White House that very afternoon that Apollo 13 splashed down.

We were excited to go.

Although, you know, there was a lot of turmoil with the war going on,

and marching in the streets and violence

and a lot of hatred on both sides.

But we said, "No, this is the White House. This is history."

We were looking forward to this.

[Stielper] The president had so many Southern Congressmen,

White House staff.

HR Haldeman, the White House Chief of Staff,

who was a great, great Johnny Cash fan,

was there, as were other people in the Nixon administration.

They were all clamoring to get in. It was very, very tight.

These were all prominent conservative supporters of the president.

John invited his family.

All of his siblings were there.

His father, Ray, was there.

It's the first time he's ever worn a tux in his life.

[Joanne] And I remember we had these beautiful long dresses.

We're actually in the White House with the president.

It was awesome and scary and wonderful, all at the same time.

[John Carter] I would've been barely over one month old

when they put me down for a nap in the Lincoln bed.

[Nixon] We're very happy to welcome all of you tonight

at this evening at the White House.

It's rather hard to describe Johnny Cash in terms that are perhaps adequate.

The music that he represents tonight

is called country music and western music,

but I think it's really American music,

because it speaks in stories about America,

in a way that touches the hearts of all Americans, north, east,

west, and south.

Ladies and gentlemen, Johnny Cash.

[applause]

[Reid] I was a little bit uptight

because you never know exactly what's going to work.

This is a different audience.

And when you put a tuxedo and gowns on people,

they become different people.

They're not as loose and as jovial as they usually are.

Thank you very much.

You got the president and the first lady sitting in the first row staring at you,

and you think, "Wow, let's hope this comes off."

[Cash] We hope to show you a little bit of the soul of the South tonight.

[band playing]

♪ Well, they gave him his orders At Monroe, Virginia... ♪

I never had any idea what we were gonna play.

It didn't do any good to rehearse with Johnny Cash

because he didn't know what he was going do.

♪ ...poor boy ♪

[applause]

My father made a decision and refused to sing the two songs

that the president had asked him to sing.

[Cash] Daddy. Daddy, you remember this.

♪ How high is the water, Papa? ♪

♪ He said It's two feet high and rising... ♪

However, the president and the audience did not know

or have any idea what he would sing.

♪ High and rising... ♪

[applause]

I get asked a lot of questions about war and...

drugs and youth and...

this and that. Well...

We took our show to Long Bihn Air Force Base near Saigon, Vietnam.

We did shows for the men over there,

as many as we could for the time that we had.

Somebody said, "That makes you a hawk. You went to Vietnam."

No, but after you watch the wounded come in in the helicopters,

if you were a dove, you might come away a dove with claws.

[Reid] All of a sudden, John got very quiet.

We were in trouble...

We're waiting with these solemn looks on our faces. "What's going on?"

[Cash] Of course, um,

in order to say something to somebody that might be meaningful, you...

gotta kind of get them on your side.

So I had these words, a poem that I wrote to the youth of America.

♪ And the lonely voice of youth cries ♪

♪ "What is truth?" ♪

♪ Little boy of three Sitting on the floor ♪

♪ Looks up and says "Daddy, what is war?" ♪

♪ "Son, that's when people Fight and die" ♪

♪ Little boy of three says "Daddy, why?" ♪

♪ A young man of 17 in Sunday school ♪

♪ Being taught the Golden Rule ♪

♪ And by the time Another year has gone around ♪

♪ It may be his turn To lay his life down ♪

♪ Can you blame the voice of youth For asking ♪

♪ "What is truth?" ♪

I saw the squirming in Nixon's chair when Johnny was singing "What is Truth."

Nixon was smart enough and attentive enough to be uncomfortable.

♪ Young man sitting On the witness stand ♪

♪ Man with a book says ♪

♪ "Raise your hand, repeat after me I solemnly swear" ♪

♪ Judge looked down at his long hair ♪

♪ And although the young man Solemnly swore ♪

♪ Nobody seemed to hear anymore ♪

♪ And it didn't really matter If the truth was there ♪

♪ It was the cut of his clothes And the length of his hair ♪

♪ And the lonely voice of youth cries ♪

♪ "What is truth?" ♪

♪ Young girl dancing to the latest beat ♪

♪ Found new ways to move her feet ♪

♪ Young man speaking in the city square ♪

♪ Trying to tell somebody that he cares ♪

♪ Yeah, the ones That you're callin' wild ♪

♪ Gonna be the leaders In a little while ♪

♪ This old world's waking To a newborn day ♪

♪ And I solemnly swear That it'll be their way ♪

♪ We better help that Voice of youth find ♪

♪ "What is truth?" ♪

♪ And the lonely voice of youth cries "What is truth?" ♪

[applause]

Johnny had a way to say something in a song

to get a point across,

and he did it well.

The most powerful man in the United States at that time,

I think it got to him.

He understood the message.

[John Carter] My father wasn't afraid to say what he thought,

which was, "I hope to bring peace. But I'm not afraid to get dirty.

And I'm not afraid to fight for what I believe in.

And I'm not afraid to go where I'm uncomfortable

to stand up for love.

I'm a dove with claws."

[Stielper] Johnny Cash was putting himself front-and-center.

He had gone out on a limb there.

This song was delivering a message

that the current leaders who were looking on young people

and marginalizing them need to understand that

this is the future,

and we need to honor and respect that.

Mr. Nixon, whose personal taste in music runs more to tunes from South Pacific,

threw himself into the foot-tapping spirit of Cash's twanging guitar,

and when it was over, heaped praise on the entire troupe.

The closest Cash came to a song with obvious political overtones

has a theme not from the '30s,

but from now,

and the thrust of it seemed to surprise the president a bit.

Johnny Cash, you've played country fairs,

Grand Ole Oprys and before prison audiences.

Was it any different tonight,

playing before the President of the United States and at the White House?

Well, in several ways, it was, Dan.

It was quite different, uh...

We were playing for some very important people tonight, of course.

I tried to keep the performance honest.

Good or bad,

it was honest, I think.

My dad would never, in his life, disrespect the office of the presidency.

It was part of his patriotism.

He had a history of being bold.

But his performance at the White House was a turning point.

[Snow] Evidently, John knew something or picked up on something

and I think he was trying to say,

powerfully, to President Nixon,

"You need to think about what you're doing.

And you need to be truthful."

Who would have ever thought that that song would have been so prophetic?

I have concluded that the time has come for action.

Attacks are being launched this week to clean out major enemy sanctuaries

on the Cambodian/Vietnam border.

Shortly after the Johnny Cash event,

Nixon announced the Cambodian Incursion.

The speech basically said that Americans are going to be fighting in Cambodia.

Cambodia was a neutral country.

Nixon had been bombing it secretly, without Congressional approval,

and without the knowledge of the American people.

[Stielper] It galvanized those who said, "Well, wait a minute.

We're supposed to be getting out of Vietnam.

Now, we're expanding the war."

[Snow] We all thought he was doing one thing,

and they were actually doing another.

Nixon lied not only to America

but to our soldiers.

The country went into flames.

[Buchanan] At Kent State University, there had been riots.

National Guard troops were on the campuses.

Instantly, there were four dead and nine wounded.

[Stielper] Kent State happened two weeks after the White House performance.

For all of his support for the president and for the government,

Johnny Cash was blindsided.

John didn't like the idea of being used.

[Cash] Those young people out there seem to be

trying to hold on to that part of our American heritage

that they believe was good and beautiful.

All they desire is to be listened to.

They're only exercising their freedom of speech

and God help you if that's ever taken away from them, America.

John starts thinking much harder about the totality of what's going on.

He sang "Blowin' in the Wind" on his television show.

♪ How many times Must the cannonballs fly ♪

♪ Before they're forever banned? ♪

"Blowin' in the Wind" was a whistle.

The quintessential anti-war anthem.

♪ The answer is blowin' in the wind ♪

The people in the audience,

half of them sat on their hands.

The other half burst into a standing ovation.

That was America.

Johnny Cash was America.

[reporter] Five men arrested early Saturday,

who were charged with breaking into the party's national headquarters

at the Watergate in Washington.

[Fred Thompson] Mr. Butterfield, are you aware

of the installation of any listening devices

in the Oval Office of the President?

I was aware of listening devices. Yes, sir.

[Butterfield] I'm from a military family.

Lying was just considered-- We just didn't do it.

[Stielper] In August 1974, the president resigned

in the face of almost certain impeachment.

John attended the trial of HR Haldeman

amid the trials associated with the Watergate break-ins.

You guys have to get up awfully early, don't you?

Watergate was personal to him because of what it represented,

of what Johnny Cash was always seeing as the nobility

of the American people.

And when our leaders let us down,

he felt it very personally.

So, here is Johnny Cash watching HR Haldeman on trial,

who had been at the White House four years before

for Johnny's White House performance.

Haldeman turned to John and said,

"I'm sorry. I let you down."

If Johnny were here today,

and he is in spirit,

he'd play that song.

I'm going to go request it to be played

on the airwaves,

because that message in that song, "What is Truth,"

needs to be heard today.

[John Carter] It was not long after his performance at the White House

that Dad released the song "Man in Black."

And if you want to understand what my dad stood for,

the words to the song "Man in Black" exemplify that.

♪ I wear the black for the poor And the beaten-down ♪

♪ Livin' in the hopeless Hungry side of town ♪

♪ And I wear it for the prisoner ♪

♪ Who has long paid for his crime ♪

♪ But still is there because He's the victim of the times ♪

♪ I'm the man in black ♪

[crowd whistling, applauding]