One of the alarming times in American history came directly after August 9, 1974 when President Richard Nixon was forced to resign by the United States Congress. Nixon had been convicted for secretly recording every conversation he ever had in the White House, whether in person or on the telephone, and for the discovery of his involvement behind the Watergate complex break-in. Although considered a victory for the Constitutional government of the United States, Richard Nixon’s resignation for the crimes of the Watergate Scandal of 1972 brought an inadvertent consequence for the American people of a growing lack of faith and cynicism for the government and the office of the president. After the break-in of the Watergate Hotel, an investigation …show more content…
Erika Wittekind (2013), who has degrees in journalism and political science, reported that because of the magnitude of the case, both sides were given three times the normal allotted time during the trial (p. 106). The Senate had to decide whether they were going to impeach Nixon, and the Supreme Court had to decide what it really meant to impeach a president. Wittekind (2013) showed that President Nixon tried to claim “executive privilege” as a means to clear his name in the Watergate scandal (p. 132). Even though Nixon was the president he put himself in a situation that not even he could get out of. Jeff Madrick (2012), who has written political articles for eight different news sources, stated in his article “Can We Trust the Government Again?” for The Nation that the entire situation with the Watergate scandal never would have happened if Nixon had not been so obsessed with getting reelected for his second term (p. 12). The other question they had to answer was how to get Nixon to turn over the copies of the recordings he had made of conversations he had while serving as the president. Nikolaieff (1974) expressed that Congress does not technically have the right to make the president give up some of his personal belongings (p. 126). The Supreme Court ruled unanimously that Nixon had to give the tapes up to the Senate. Nixon gave them up and Congress told Nixon to resign or they would vote him out of office. Feldstein (2004), in his summary of Watergate, wrote that journalism played a big role in bringing all the facts to the public, which in turn had an effect on Congress’s decision to impeach Nixon (p. 62). Samuel Day (1975), who has published political articles for various newspapers and magazines, in his article “The Lessons from Watergate” in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
Morgan Ruth P. “Nixon, Watergate, and the study of the Presidency”. Presidential Studies Quarterly, Vol. 26, No. 1, The Nixon Presidency. 1996, pp. 217-238
The documentary entitled, Watergate Plus 30: Shadow of History, documents the political decisions and environment within the Nixon Administration from 1969-1974. The documentary specifically details and describes the environment and culture in which the Watergate scandal could occur and the events and abuses of power that lead to its occurrence. Setting the tone and the political climate of the Nixon Administration was the Vietnam War; making him a wartime President, a war that he inherited from his predecessor. The Vietnam War faced a lot of opposition from the general public, with massive protests and political demonstrations by the younger generations and overall general public. Nixon’s presidency was surrounded by this climate amidst the
Historians on the opposing side believe that Nixon had a choice, but he choose the wrong one. He wanted to cover up the Watergate Scandal, and that was the turning point of his presidency. Maurice H. Stans explains, “Nixon was not a party to the Watergate break-in. That has been established, especially by the White House tapes beginning in June 1972, which showed his initial consternation at learning about it.” (Nixon 178) He could have turned the guilty party to the police, but he thought that it would end up hurting him.
It is clear that while political scandal, primarily the 1974 Watergate scandal, played a large role in the rapidly declining confidence in government between 1968 and 1980, it is not the sole or even the dominant factor. The Watergate scandal only impacted on the Nixon era, and subsequently lead to measures that should have prevented further distrust in the government. Instead, the role played by the four presidents who held office in those years was the main reason behind the decline in confidence. The role of the presidents and their White House administrations encompassed political scandals, and also clearly influenced other factors such as the role
President Richard M. Nixon and his involvement in the Watergate scandal were broadcast nightly on the 6 o’clock news in the early 1970’s. Americans were engrossed with the scandal and each person held his or her own view of situation. Each broadcast or newspaper article created a mistrust of political and governmental leaders. In response to this mistrust, the Freedom to Information Act was strengthened by the United States Congress in 1973 (Chamberlain). Although this act was first placed into law in the late 1960’s, the Watergate scandal provided the incentive make this law stronger.
During the 1970’s, the United States experienced "Watergate," the most famous political scandal in American History. It was a scandal that began with a break in and ended in resignation. On June 17, 1972 five intruders were caught and arrested for illegally entering the rooms of the Democratic National Committee headquarters in Washington’s Watergate Complex. "The investigation of the break-in lead directly to the reelection campaign of President Richard M. Nixon and unraveled a web of political spying and sabotage, bribery and the illegal use of campaign funds" (Washingtonpost.com). Two-and-a-half-years later along with a number of court hearings led to the 1974 resignation of Richard M. Nixon. Nixon became the first President in U.S. History to resign. During all the political drama the United States brought an end to an unpopular war and made great strides in space exploration.
Out of all of the current presidents in our time the most interesting president to explore was President Richard Nixon and out of all of them he was the only one in term to resign. That Richard M. Nixon, President of the United States, is impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors, and that the following articles of impeachment to be executed to the fullest extent of their nature. His poor choices and decisions led to his resignation. Although he did have some good qualities in helping the U.S. the bad however override the good. In the CRS (Congressional Research Service) It states: “ Obstruction of justice is the impediment of governmental activities. There are a host of federal criminal laws that prohibit obstructions of justice. The six most general outlaw obstruction of judicial proceedings (18 U.S.C. 1503), witness tampering (18 U.S.C. 1512), witness retaliation (18 U.S.C. 1513), obstruction of Congressional or administrative proceedings (18 U.S.C. 1505), conspiracy to defraud The United States (18 U.S.C. 371), and contempt (a creature of statute, rule and common law). Simple perjury in a federal investigation or judicial proceedings carries an extensive fine and up to 5 years in prison.” This was the first article president Richard M. Nixon was charged with by the House of Judiciary Committee. The vote was 27 to 1 for Nixon to be charged with the first article of impeachment, which was Obstruction of Justice. In denial of his liability in part taking in the Watergate scandal by saying he wasn't involved in the scandal He pointed finger at others that were involved in the break-in. However, tapes were found of conversations that proved his involvement and he was going to be impeached. Before he was charged, he made a resignat...
Despite the national attention the Watergate scandal had gained President Nixon, he won the second term presidency. The major problem for Nixon would come later. The investigations of the Watergate scandal lead to the discovery of other criminal acts by officials including Nixon. During the investigation many things begin to surface. It was discovered that documents had been destroyed that may have made a link between Nixon and the Watergate scandal. These documents may have shown that he had some acknowledgement in what had happened. There was evidence that people involved in the Nixon campaign had been wire tapping phones illegally for a long time according to “dummies.com”. The greatest issue would come to light during the 1973 Watergate hearings. During testimonies it came to light that every conversation was recorded in the Oval office according to “study.com”. It was demanded that these tapes be reviewed to learn how much involvement President Nixon had in the Watergate burglary. The President felt that he had the right to withhold these tapes through what he referred to as executive privilege. This means that if it is the best interest of the public the president has the right to keep information from the
I have decided to use the Nixon Watergate Scandal as my topic for this museum post. I chose the Watergate scandal because it brought about the first and only resignation of a president. That president’s name was Richard Nixon and he resigned August 9, 1974, after being “faced with what seemed almost certain impeachment” (Frank and Sidey). The Watergate scandal came to be after a break-in occurred on June 17, 1972, at the office of the Democratic National Committee. This office was located in the Watergate building in Washington, D.C., hence the name Watergate Scandal. The intruders were caught and arrested after trying to setup secret recording devices and steal documents. After an investigation into the five burglars it was found that these
Despite his loss to JFK in the 1960 presidential election, in 1968, Richard M. Nixon was elected as the thirty-seventh president of the United States. He was praised by many for his comeback after previously losing an election and seemed to be an admirable man. While in office, Nixon made many achievements and followed through with all of his promises made during his campaign. For the first time in what seemed like forever, the American people had finally elected a leader who seemed unquestionably trustworthy – or so they thought. Unfortunately, shortly after Nixon was elected to his second term of presidency in 1972, the Watergate Scandal changed America forever by creating a sense of mistrust toward the government for the American people because of The Nixon Administration’s actions.
The mistrust most Americans feel toward the government officials and political parities of today can be traced back to the Watergate scandal of 1972, which led to the resignation of an American president. The crimes of the Watergate scandal included political burglary, bribery, extortion, wiretapping (phone tapping), conspiracy, obstruction of justice, destruction of evidence, tax fraud, illegal use of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), illegal campaign contributions, and use of taxpayers' money for private purposes.
As television exposed the truth of government, so did Journalists. Daniel leaking of the Pentagon Papers that explained in detail the Vietnam War, and the leaking of the information to the New York Times in 1971. Scandals like this played an active role throughout the late 1960’s and into the early 1970’s. This eventually led to the resignation of President Richard Nixon in 1974. The critical stand point of the journalists led to the marked contradictory of American politics that grew into turbulent during the 1960s.
Nixon’s hamartia, a fatal flaw that leads to the character’s downfall, was his hunger for power and insecurity. Many people have reported that he would lash out at his enemies. The cause of the Watergate Scandal, the incident when burglars broke into the Democratic National Committee’s office and tried to wiretap phones and steal documents, was Nixon’s insecurity. He didn’t think he was going to be reelected and resorted to unethical actions. This event forced Nixon to resign from office, thus displaying that his insecurity led to his downfall.
Nixon’s run as an international crook finally caught up to him in 1972, when burglars were caught and arrested inside the Democratic national headquarters at the Watergate hotel complex in Washington. Nixon attempted to cover it up, but eventually he was found caught in his own web of lies, and was forced to resign in 1974 (Lecture 30, December 12). Nixon’s promises of a return to normalcy were shattered with these revelations. The confidence in the Presidency that he had hoped to restore was even lower than it was when he entered office. If the 1960’s were defined by political and social instability, then Richard Nixon did nothing but further the sixties into the 1970’s.
Nixon was long associated with American politics before his fall from grace. He was along time senator before finally being elected president in 1968. During his first term, his United States went through the Vietnam War and a period of economic inflation. In 1972 he was easily re-elected over Democrat nominee George McGovern. Almost unnoticed during his campaign was the arrest of five men connected with Nixon’s re-election committee. They had broken into the Democrats national head quarters in the Watergate apartment complex, in Washington D.C. They attempted to steal documents and place wire taps on the telephones. By March of 1973, through a federal inquiry, it had been brought to light that the burglars had connections with high government officials and Nixon’s closest aids. Despite Nixon and his lawyers best efforts, it was shown that the president had participated in the Watergate cover-up. On August 8, 1974 Nixon announced, without admitting guilt, that he would resign. He left the Oval Office the next day: an obvious fall from grace.