On August 9, 1974, President Richard Nixon was the first, and so far the only president of the United States to resign from office. Out of what looked like to be an inevitable impeachment, Nixon became a part of one of the biggest scandals ever known. President Nixon believed he was taking the necessary measures to reunite a divided country that was undergoing the Vietnam War. About 2 years prior, a group of burglars were arrested at the Watergate complex after breaking into the office of the Democratic National Committee. A security guard noticed there was taping over some of the locks of the building and responded by immediately calling the police. The thefts were involved in the reelection campaign for Richard Nixon’s second term by stealing …show more content…
That was a demonstration of his abuse of wealth, but in a much worse crime, it was known he was abusing his power as president. With the FBI undergoing investigations, he and his aides tried to use the CIA to stop their progress. Seven people that were convicted in January of 1973 for having some part in the scandal, where five of them pleaded guilty. Nixon was marked as an "unindicted co-conspirator."
Even though the president was using his wealth to pay off those that were involved, several of his aides still stepped forward during this time where many thought there were far worse crimes that were yet to be uncovered. They testified that every meeting and word was recorded secretly in the Oval Office by the president. They filed for a subpoena to obtain the tapes as they were believed to be related to the ongoing investigation. It was now the goal of the prosecutors to get access to these tapes to bring down the crimes of the
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683 was held on the 24th of July in 1974. Among the other judges that served this court were Douglas, Brennan, Stewart, White, Marshall, Blackmun, Powell, and Rehnquist. Rehnquist was the only one who ended up not taking part in the decision of the case. The question raised was whether or not the President of the United States has power to an “executive privilege” that allows him or her “immunity from judicial process” (“Summary of the Decision”). The United States was in favor by the Court under unanimous decision. The role of executive privilege was decided that it is not an absolute. The President trying to keep everything a secret was offset by the judges and their ability to provide a fair trial. His attorneys argued that this whole trial went against the idea of the separation of powers because the judicial branch should not be getting involved with the actions of the executive branch. However, because a constitutional question was raised, it fit the textbook reason for the requirement of getting the judicial branch involved. They granted that his argued privilege was limited, especially where there are “military of diplomatic affairs” (“Modern Era”). The controversial issue of the subpoena that called for aid to the public interest was marked as a pro, requiring that the President release the tapes. Chief Justice Burger was the one who wrote the majority opinion for the Court
At first light of June 17, 1972, a considerable amount of burglars were aprehended inside the office of the Democratic National Committee, located in the Watergate building in Washington, D.C. This was no everyday robbery, the crooks were linked to President Richard Nixon’s reelection campaign. Upon getting caught in the Watergate building, the robbers were in there attempting to wiretap phones and abduct secret records. Nixon poorly persued to cover up any relation to his administration and to avoid indictment he relinquished himself from office on August 8, 1974. Although Nixon was never araigned for his potential role in this scandal, it forever altered American politics, driving many Americans to have inquiry about the leadership of their
With rumors of impeachment beginning to circulate, Nixon finally agreed to turn over the subpoenaed White House tapes. The committee listened to the recordings and discovered an 18-minute gap on one of the tapes. It was surmised that someone had erased part of the tape, but investigators were unable to determine exactly what had happened. In March 1974, seven former presidential aides were indicted on charges of conspiracy to hinder the Watergate investigation, and Nixon was named as an unindicted co-conspirator. On July 24, the Supreme Court voted unanimously to order Nixon to release the rest of the White House recordings, considering them evidence in the case that came to be known as the United States v. Nixon.
On an ordinary morning of June 17, 1972, five burglars were caught in the Watergate complex after signs of breaking in were found on the doors. No one at that time knew this subtle crime would lead to the greatest scandal in the US history and the resignation of the current President, Richard Nixon. Evidences later showed that the Watergate Incident was only a mere part of the ugly crimes the Nixon Administration had committed to achieve their ultimate goal of reelection, and Nixon had intentionally attempted a cover up to save his reputation. The Watergate incident had inflicted a deep suspicion inside the US citizens toward the government, especially the President, because during his terms, Nixon had obstructed justice and refused to
There were many events that occurred in this scandal. On June 17, 1972 there were five men arrested. They were caught trying to spy on the Democratic National Committee. The men who were arrested were directly associated with Richard Nixon. accused of this were men directly associated with Nixon. One of the men is a man by the name of James McCord who was in charge of the security for the Committee for the Re-Election of the President. This committee was also know as CREEP.
June 17, 1972 a group of criminals started tapping into the white house at the nearby watergate apartment complex where the scandal got it’s name. The secret service quickly caught on and soon the criminals were caught and convicted. There was no problem with this until a few weeks later Nixon ordered the FBI to stop investigation on this because they were already caught and convicted President Nixon ended up with the tapes that the criminals had recorded and he ended up giving over a few tapes but not all the tapes he had. President Nixon resigned soon after because the media was making it too much for him to handle and everyone hated him making him the first president to resign from office. His successor Eisenhower soon pardoned him of all his crimes and was never convicted for the watergate
On November 5, 1968 Richard M. Nixon was elected the 37th president of the United States. In 1972 Nixon was reelected in a landslide victory. However, His undoing was already in the works. A few months prior to Nixon’s reelection a group of men linked to the Nixon administration were arrested in the Democratic party headquarters in Washington’s Watergate complex and what followed was one of the biggest scandals in presidential history. The Watergate scandal was revealed as a cover-up by the Nixon administration to hide involvement in illegal activities against their opponents and ultimately lead to Nixon’s resignation from his presidency on August 9, 1974. Nixon was granted a full pardon from the Ford administration a month later. A few years later Nixon was paid $600,000 by British TV personality David Frost for a string of in depth television interviews. The last decades of Nixon’s life were spent rebuilding his reputation. He will always be remembered as the face of the embarrassing Watergate scandal. Due to these events no president will ever be trusted.
Nixon refused to release the tapes, claiming that they were vital to the national security. Therefore, U.S. District Court Judge John Sirica ruled that President Nixon must give the tapes to Cox, and an appeals court upheld the decision. Nixon still refused to turn over the tapes and on Saturday, October 20, 1973, ordered Richardson to dismiss Cox. Richardson refused and resigned instead, as did Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus. Finally, the solicitor general discharged Cox. Suddenly, a storm of public protest occurred, thus leading to the “Saturday Night Massacre.” Nixon, in his defense, appointed another special prosecutor, Leon Jaworski, a Texas lawyer, and gave the tapes to Sirica. Unfortunately, some of the conversations were missing from the tapes and one tape had a mysterious gap of eighteen and a half minutes. Experts determined that the gap was the result of five separate erasures. Nevertheless, on March 1974, a grand jury indicated Mitchell, Haldeman, Ehrlichman, and four other White House officials for their part in the Watergate cover-up and named President Nixon as an “unindicated co-conspirator.” In the following month Jaworski requested and Nixon released written transcripts of forty-two more tapes. The conversations revealed an overwhelming concern with punishing political opponents and denied the Watergate investigation. On May 1974, Jaworski requested sixty-four more tapes as evidence in the criminal cases
Watergate scandal remains one of the historical revelation of excessive use of power during the reign of President Richard Nixon. After the break-in at the Democratic National Committee at the Westgate offices, there was a remarkable series of rotten underbelly in the Nixon’s administration. Specifically, this scandal led to the discovery of the multiple abuses of the power under the articles of impeachment. Because of the unlawful approach used by this administration to thwart those who were critical of Nixon’s administration, human rights groups and political activities embarked on demanding for explanation and resignation of the president. Rightful, there was reasonable grounds to demand the president’s resignation because it became overt that he had used FBI, CIA and Internal Revenue Service to silence critics. Subsequently, this
United States President Richard Nixon was involved in a major political scandal during the 1970s that resulted from a break in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters. The scandal was known as the Watergate scandal. The scandal was called Watergate because it occurred at the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C. Nixon and his administration attempted to cover up the scandal, but the scandal was discovered and investigated by Congress. The scandal comprised of illegal activities such as bugging of offices, ordering investigations of activist groups and political figures with the use of the FBI, CIA, and IRS. There were several abuses of power during the scandal and the results of the scandal and investigation were indictment of sixty nine individuals and Richard Nixon resigning his office as President of the United States.
In July 24, 1974, Supreme Court rules that it does have jurisdiction and executive power is limited to certain area like military, foreign policy. Therefore, Supreme Court decides in favor of U.S and against President Nixon asking him to release the tape. After that President Nixon resigns from the office and his Vice President took over after.
At the hearings, all the illegal activities done on the behalf of the president became known: wiretapping, harassment, bribery, and obstruction of justice. This prompted Nixon to defend himself with a 4000 word report that didn’t just deny the accusations, but claimed the security operations, “stemmed from national security needs.”10 But there was still no hard evidence until Alexander Butterfield, Nixon’s aide, revealed that there was a secret recording system in the oval office, leading the Senate and special prosecutor Archibald Cox requested the tapes from the president. Nixon refused to hand them over citing “executive privilege.” The struggle for the tapes proved to be the beginning of the end of his presidency. By August, the public would overwhelmingly turn against his duplicity with 73 percent believing he was involved in Watergate.11 Despite this pressure to relent, Nixon continued his tactics of blanketly dismissing the charges and blaming the media. In September, the Supreme Court called on Nixon to release the tapes which he would again refuse. This began the chain of events that would come to be known as the Saturday Night Massacre. That night, Nixon ordered his attorney deputy attorney general to fire special prosecutor Cox, which both would refuse to do and resigned instead. Solicitor General Robert Bork, however, did comply and abolished the special prosecutor’s investigation. Several days later the House of Representatives called for impeachment hearing. In United States v. Nixon, the Supreme Court ruled that the president could not use executive privilege to withhold the tapes. From the tapes, it was apparent that Richard Nixon took part in the Watergate cover up and the subsequent obstruction of justice. With the impeachment proceedings in place, Richard Nixon was forced to announce his resignation as the president of United
Archibald Cox was appointed special prosecutor for Watergate in May of 1973 (Feinstein 39). Nixon had previously taped White House conversations and had Cox fired when asked to turn in these tapes (Feinstein 39). Clearly, Nixon had something to hide. According to “Watergate,” from July 10 through July 12 of 1973, former Attorney General Mitchell testified in court. He confessed that he helped cover up the scandal to save Nixon 's reelection. Mitchell also revealed the "plumbers,” which were a secret White House group created to stop information leakage involving President Nixon (Watergate (1973)). The information that surfaced during the trial always led back to Nixon.
The infamous Watergate Scandal was the first of its kind; occurring in June of the year 1972, several robbers were taken into police custody inside the office of the Democratic National Committee (DNC), established in the Watergate building in Washington, D.C. This break in was out of the ordinary, however, because the burglars were tied to former U.S. President, Richard Nixon's reelection campaign, and they had been caught during their attempt to wiretap phone lines and steal classified documents (History.com Staff). Even though it is unknown whether or not Nixon was aware of the Watergate infiltration before it occurred, many people believe he was involved due to steps he took to cover it up afterward. Nixon raised "hush money" for the robbers, in an effort to end the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) from investigating the crime that had occurred (History.com Staff.). Nixon is also accused of destroying evidence and firing staff members that he thought to be uncooperative. In August 1974, after his role in Watergate Scandal had been brought to the public's attention, President Nixon resigned from office. His successor, former U.S. President Gerald Ford, immediately pardoned Nixon for the crimes he "committed or may have committed" while he was still in office (History.com Staff.). "Although Nixon was never
The topic of Nixon’s tapes resurfaced in a hearing on April 11, 1974. The House of Representatives subpoenaed the tapes and Nixon publically said that he would give them up, but he never did. They also opened an impeachment hearing and later found Nixon guilty of obstructing justice along with other charges.
The President directed Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox to halt any further efforts to hand over the recordings. Archibald attempted to refuse Nixon's orders. Nixon turned to his Attorney General, Elliot L. Richardson, and instructed him to fire Cox for his desire to turn over the recordings. However, this was unconstitutional, so both the Attorney General, and Deputy Attorney General resigned. Regardless, Cox, as well as several other Justice Department members protested Nixon's refusal to turn over the tapes, and left the White House. This development was described as "the most traumatic government upheaval of the Watergate crisis".