In 1966 George Hamilton, the
movie star and future proprietor of the George Hamilton Sun Care
System taning salons, started dating President Lyndon Johnson’s
daughter, Lynda Bird Johnson. At that point, the Philadelphia
Inquirer reports,
Johnson enlisted Supreme Court Justice Abe Fortas and
J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI to investigate every rumor they could find
about Hamilton, including claims that he was gay and a
draft-dodger, in a bid to dig up dirt on the actor….Rumors cited
in it ranged from scurrilous to outright false, including the
allegation that Lynda Bird Johnson was “running around with a bunch
of homosexuals,” that Hamilton was a draft-dodger, and that the
actor was gay and had been seen with someone described as “little
more than a prostitute.”
Much of this story has been told before. Catha DeLoach, the FBI
man who ran the operation with Fortas, wrote about it in his
1995
memoir. And while George Hamilton’s autobiography
does not mention the FBI probe, it does describe the “incredible
scrutiny” he faced at the time, noting that the actor’s brother was
gay and that “‘gay’ was the dirtiest word anyone could have used in
and around the Johnson White House.” (*)
But the bureau’s full file on the investigation has yet to be
released. Two years ago, Tuan Samahon, a law professor at
Villanova, sued to pry the file from the government, hoping it
would shed light on Abe Fortas’ career on the court. Last
week U.S. District Judge Eduardo Robreno issued an opinion in
the case.
Robreno notes that the full file “is overflowing with
gossip, rumor, and third-level hearsay concerning potentially
embarrassing allegations and personal details about private
citizens,” and that some of this material may thus be exempt from
the Freedom of Information Act. He has ordered the FBI to review
its documents and release any material that does not pose these
potential privacy problems. In the meantime, the judge says the
bureau must produce the unredacted version of DeLoach’s memorandum
on the investigation—that is, a version where Hamilton’s name is
not blotted out.
We may never get to see every page of this story, but what we do
know shows, as Robreno writes, “the ways and means of the
government’s investigation of private citizens in the 1960s.” More
specifically, it shows the particular styles of sleaze that
coagulated in the Johnson White House, the Hoover FBI, and Abe
Fortas’ office at the Supreme Court.
(* I have not read either of those books, but both are cited
in Judge Robreno’s decision.)
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