A week after the Maddox inauguration, Callaway replaced former President Eisenhower as director of Freedoms Foundation, a nonpartisan group dedicated to patriotic causes located in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. A few months later, he became the Georgia Republican national committeeman and Richard M. Nixon's 1968 "southern coordinator," which secured Nixon's nomination through the Southern Strategy with the help of other Deep South figures, such as Senator Strom Thurmond of South Carolina and the state chairmen Charlton Lyons of Louisiana and Clarke Reed of Mississippi. In 1973, Callaway began a stint as Secretary of the Army under Presidents Nixon and Ford and was an important figure in managing the post-Vietnam transition from the draft to the all-volunteer army. After managing the first phase of the Ford election campaign, Callaway resigned on July 3rd of 1975, when NBC News alleged his involvement in a conflict-of-interest case relating to the United States Forest Service in Colorado. A congressional investigation found "no positive evidence of impropriety." In 1977, "Harper's Magazine" concluded that Callaway had been a scapegoat in the matter.