Russell A. Rourke counselor John O. Marsh. In 1976, he became a special assistant to President Gerald R. Ford. His responsibilities included legislative liaison between the White House and Congress. After President Ford lost his bid for re-election in 1977, Rourke serve on the White House Transition Team. At the close of the Ford Administration, Rourke accepted a position as administrative assistant to Republican Congressman Harold S. Sawyer of Michigan. In May 1981, President Reagan nominated Rourke as assistant secretary for legislative affairs in the Department of Defense. In that capacity, Rourke was the principal adviser to Secretary of Defense Caspar W. Weinberger
Assassination of James A. Garfield bill collecting, and time in the utopian Oneida Community. He wrote a speech in support of Ulysses S. Grant called "Grant vs. Hancock". Grant was the early front runner for the Republican nomination for president in the election of 1880, but he lost to Garfield. Guiteau then revised his speech to "Garfield vs. Hancock", and he tried to sign on as a campaigner for the Republican ticket. However, he never delivered the speech in a public setting, but printed it and distributed several hundred copies. The speech was ineffective, even in written form; he had made a hurried but incomplete