President Ford’s funeral plans have been finalized. There will be a private service at St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church in Palm Desert, Calif. This weekend, his body will be flown to Washington, D.C. where it will lie in state through New Year’s Day. On Tuesday, there will be a memorial service at the National Cathedral. Ford will be flown to his final resting place in Grand Rapids, Mich. and buried on the grounds of his presidential library.

It appears that incoming Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid will be unable to make the Ford funeral services, due to a previously scheduled trip to South America with a bipartisan group of senators. Understandable, though one detects a little snottiness in the comments by Reid’s spokesman, at least as reported. Our relations with some of these South American countries isn’t very good, Jim Manley reminds us. And Mrs. Ford hasn’t called Reid back yet.