Clinton 'rented out Lincoln bed'

ONCE treasured as a sacrosanct relic of the Civil War, the rosewood bed at the White House where Abraham Lincoln mapped the conflict, and where he was laid out after he was shot, emerged yesterday as a symbol of what critics call the crassness of the Clinton presidency.

It was turned into the most expensive bed-and-breakfast in America, with numerous liberal stars and producers in Hollywood offered a night there in a frantic grubbing for money, the mother's milk of politics, that the President instigated after the shock of the 1994 Republican seizure of Congress. The bed may be lumpy. One occupant, San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown, says it is difficult to clamber into. "You have to step up to get in, and it's not terribly comfortable."

But, as a friend of the president, Victor Fleming, a judge from Little Rock, Arkansas, remarked: "It beats the heck out of a Holiday Inn!" John Major used the bed, as did Queen Sonja of Norway, the evangelist Billy Graham, Britain's Liz Tilberis of Harper's Bazaar, and playwrights Neil Simon and John Guare. Nobody minded, as the room has always been regarded as a perk for pals of the President, or overseas visitors.

Richard Nixon, who once prayed with Henry Kissinger in the adjacent sitting room, offered it to Bob Hope and his wife, Dolores. But that was before the fat cats of Democratic politics were needed. Memos released by the Oval Office after five months of stalling, show that the room was virtually rented out by the President to anybody with $50,000 or $100,000 to spare to help his re-election.

The documents reveal that the lure was a top priority to counter the huge funds being amassed by the Republicans to win back the White House. After his congressional Democrats were hammered by the forces of Newt Gingrich, Mr Clinton approved a plan whereby high-rolling donors were rewarded. There were dinners, golf outings and morning jogs with him, along with a night in the suite where Sir Winston Churchill once took a bubble bath while smoking a cigar during a wartime visit.

The idea, according to Terence McAuliffe, then Democratic finance chairman, was to create "an excellent way to energise our key people" for the campaign. In a scrawled note, Mr Clinton said: "Ready to start overnight right away." He asked for the "top 10" list of donors, along with those paying $100,000 or $50,000.

His instructions had a powerful effect on the Democratic coffers. A list of 938 guests that have stayed in the bedroom showed that more than one in three donated money to the leader or the Democratic National Committee. They chipped in at least $6 million (£3.7 million).

Generous Americans sleeping in the bed, with its ornate headboard, included Hollywood moguls Steven Spielberg and Lew Wasserman, who gave $300,000 and $335,000 to the Democrats. The record producer David Geffen donated $200,000 and raised $1 million.

Other guests included singer Judy Collins, actors Tom Hanks, Candice Bergen, Richard Dreyfuss, Chevy Chase, Barbra Streisand, opera diva Kathleen Battle, and the CNN tycoon Ted Turner and his wife, Jane Fonda. In the days of Lincoln, there was a fuss about the cost of the bed. Lincoln said to his wife, Mary: "This will stink in the nostrils of the American people. Our soldiers need blankets."

Now, Americans, looking at the guest list, must be wondering what is going on, as the donors regarded as prime "sleepover" prospects included the head of a union suspected of Mafia ties.

It is also emerging that tax-payers paid the bill for the "extras" given to guests, from bathrobes embroidered "executive residence" to room-service ham and eggs.

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