The Judson Welliver Society is a bipartisan social club composed exclusively of former presidential speechwriters

Speechwriters

Speechwriters may refer to:*Speechwriter, a speech composer*Speechwriters LLC, band from California...

 in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. The group is named after Judson C. Welliver

Judson Welliver

Judson Churchill Welliver was a "literary clerk" to President Warren G. Harding and is usually credited as being the first presidential speechwriter.-Biography:Judson Welliver was born on August 13, 1870 in Aledo, Illinois....

, the "literary clerk" to President Warren Harding, usually credited as being the first presidential speechwriter. Group meetings are usually held after major presidential speeches, such as the State of the Union

State Of The Union

"State Of The Union" is the debut single from British singer-songwriter David Ford. It had previously been featured as a demo on his official website, before appearing as a track on a CD entitled "Apology Demos EP," only on sale at live shows....

. Active members have included the late William Safire

William Safire

William Lewis Safire was an American author, columnist, journalist and presidential speechwriter....

 (a Nixon ghost who often hosted meetings), the late Jack Valenti

Jack Valenti

Jack Joseph Valenti was a long-time president of the Motion Picture Association of America. During his 38-year tenure in the MPAA, he created the MPAA film rating system, and he was generally regarded as one of the most influential pro-copyright lobbyists in the world...

 who was a veteran of the Johnson administration, Pat Buchanan

Pat Buchanan

Patrick Joseph "Pat" Buchanan is an American paleoconservative political commentator, author, syndicated columnist, politician and broadcaster. Buchanan was a senior adviser to American Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, and Ronald Reagan, and was an original host on CNN's Crossfire. He sought...

 (Nixon and Reagan), David Gergen

David Gergen

David Richmond Gergen is an American political consultant and former presidential advisor who served during the administrations of Nixon, Ford, Reagan, and Clinton. He is currently Director of the Center for Public Leadership and a professor of public service at Harvard Kennedy School. Gergen is...

 (Nixon, Ford, Reagan, and Clinton), the late Tony Snow

Tony Snow

Robert Anthony "Tony" Snow was an American journalist, political commentator, television news anchor, syndicated columnist, radio host, musician, and the third White House Press Secretary under President George W. Bush. Snow also worked for President George H. W. Bush as chief speechwriter and...

 (speechwriter for George H. W. Bush and press secretary for George W. Bush), Michael Waldman

Michael Waldman

Michael Waldman is executive director of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, a nonpartisan law and policy institute that focuses on fundamental issues of democracy and justice. The Center is one of the nation’s leading legal voices on election law, Constitutional law, government...

 (Clinton), George Stephanopoulos

George Stephanopoulos

George Robert Stephanopoulos is an American television journalist and a former political advisor.Stephanopoulos is most well known as the chief political correspondent for ABC News – the news division of the broadcast television network ABC – and a co-anchor of ABC News's morning news...

 (Clinton), James Fallows

James Fallows

James Fallows is an American print and radio journalist. He has been a national correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly for many years. His work has also appeared in Slate, The New York Times Magazine, The New York Review of Books, The New Yorker and The American Prospect, among others. He is a...

 (Carter), Chris Matthews

Chris Matthews

Christopher John "Chris" Matthews is an American news anchor and political commentator, known for his nightly hour-long talk show, Hardball with Chris Matthews, which is televised on the American cable television channel MSNBC...

 (Carter), Hendrik Hertzberg

Hendrik Hertzberg

Hendrik Hertzberg is an American journalist, best known as the principal political commentator for The New Yorker magazine. He has also been a speechwriter for President Jimmy Carter and editor of The New Republic, and is the author of ¡Obámanos! The Rise of a New Political Era and Politics:...

 (Carter), Anthony R. Dolan

Anthony R. Dolan

Anthony R. Dolan is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and was the principal speechwriter for President Ronald Reagan from March 1981 until the end of Reagan's second term in 1989...

 (Reagan), Michael Gerson

Michael Gerson

Michael John Gerson is an op-ed columnist for The Washington Post, a Policy Fellow with the ONE Campaign, and a former senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. He served as President George W...

 (George W. Bush), and the late Clark Clifford

Clark Clifford

Clark McAdams Clifford was an American lawyer who served United States Presidents Harry S. Truman, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson and Jimmy Carter, serving as United States Secretary of Defense for Johnson....

, who wrote speeches for Harry Truman.

At times the meetings had sixty persons in attendance. Other notables were writers Robert Hartmann, who worked for Gerald Ford, James Keogh who worked for Nixon, and Theodore Sorensen and Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. who worked for Kennedy.