The Watergate Scandal : A Series Of Events That Shook The Political Structure Beyond Repair

Watergate Scandal has been considered as one of the darkest chapters in American history. The event not only refers to unethical use of power by the public representatives but also levied great deal of attention on the mechanism of surveillance over the activities of public servants. Watergate scandal provides ethical directions not only to public servants but also provides ethical guidelines to the lawyers and media representatives as well. This incident reveals how ethical lines were crossed time and again by the politicians, legal attorneys and media for their own purposes. Ignoring the righteousness of the outcomes, events like these cause severe damage to the public's trust vested in these authorities which takes a long time to restore.

The transgressions uncovered during the Watergate break-in investigation discouraged Americans by shattering their belief in Presidential infallibility. As Richard Nixon’s chief-of-staff, H.R. Haldeman, said, “…comes a very clear thing: you can’t trust the government; you can’t believe what they say; and you can’t rely on their judgment; and the – the implicit infallibility of presidents, which has been an accepted thing in America, is badly hurt by this, because it shows that people do things the President wants to do even though it’s wrong, and the President can be wrong.” These words expressed the sentiment of most Americans following Watergate and the publicity surrounding the investigation and President Nixon’s subsequent resignation.

The Watergate Scandal was the downfall of Richard Nixon. It made Americans put less trust in the government and built trust in the media. It all takes place at the Watergate Hotel. He led an extremely corrupt administration to get him re elected. He also was the first President to resign. The unethical organization that was formed was called the CRP (later creep). They helped Nixon get re elected in 1972. They used illegal tactics to get him re elected. They paid lawyers for the burglars who broke into the Watergate Hotel. These people were known as the Plumbers. That was directed by John Ehrlichman. They were the White House investigation unit. They prevented information leak and burglarize any of Nixon reveals. Watergate seven was Richard Nixon closest comrades. They were in charge of the Creep and the plumbers that carried out many illegal activities. Christ the Transformer of Business culture is a good trait to obtain. “These people are intimately involved with those in the business, but their distinctive Christian standards are not lost” (Ruddell, 2004, p. 40). The people that were involved in the Watergate scandal should have had this trait.

The Watergate Scandal and crisis that rocked the United States began on the early morning of June 17, 1972 with a small-scale burglary and it ended August 9, 1974 with the resignation of Republican President Richard Milhous Nixon. At approximately 2:30 in the morning of June 17, 1972, five burglars were discovered inside the Democratic National Headquarters in the Watergate office building in Washington DC. The burglars, who had been attempting to tap the headquarters’ phone were linked to Nixon’s Committee to Re-Elect the President (CREEP). Over the next few months, what had began as a minor break-in quickly escalated into a full-blown political scandal. It was

The year was 1972. From events such as the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement, the United States was faced with extreme political and social turmoil. Despite Nixon’s promise to end war and unite the country, no one could have predicted that his election would accompany one of the largest political scandals to date. It all began with tape on door latches, finally ending with the resignation of a president and a scandal that echoes in American culture four decades later. Like most scandals, Watergate started simply enough with the intention of keeping Nixon’s political enemies at bay. However, before long it went from tape on door latches to bugging offices to breaking into the Democratic National Committee headquarters. By the year 1974, 43 people were facing legal consequences for their role in Watergate, and President Nixon was nearing the frightening reality of trial and possible impeachment. As small as it may have seemed at its beginning, the Watergate Scandal ending up affecting all aspects of American culture, specifically American politics.

Watergate is the popular name for the political scandal and constitutional crisis that began with the arrest of five burglars who broke into the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office in Washington D.C. on the night of June 17, 1972. It ended with the resignation of president Richard M. Nixon. The burglars and two co-potters-G. Gordon Liddy and E. Howard Hunt were indicated on charges of burglary, conspiracy, and wiretapping. Four monthes later, they were convicted and sentenced to prison terms by District Court Judge John J. Sirica, who was convicted that pertinent details had not been unveiled during the trial and proffered leniency in exchange for further information. As it

The Watergate Scandal was truly the biggest political scandal in United States History. Over forty people where charged with crimes relating to the scandal. Bernstein and Woodward were given a fantastic oppourtunity to uncover something truly significant in history. The twenty-one months of investigative reporting done by these two men would ruin Nixon’s name and make these two common everyday reporters lives change forever. Woodward first got his life changing call on June 17th 1972 with his editor telling him about a small invasion of the Democratic Party Headquarters. With being related to the scandal, two members of President Nixon’s cabinet, H.R. Hadlemen and John Ehrlichman, quickly resigned. When first thought of the president even having something to do with the Watergate Scandal, he made every effort to possibly hide this career ruining event. The break in was first found by a security guard by the name of, Frank Wills. Wills saw a piece of tape covering a broken lock. Wills was

Nixon’s presidency—a period wrought with scandal. The most well-known of these, Watergate, a complex web of deceit, has become a political term synonymous with corruption and crime. Afraid of possible defeat in the 1972 election, Nixon and his republican associates sanctioned underhanded, illegal, acts, namely a break-in at the Democratic Party national headquarters at the Watergate complex. The break-in failed and the story was revealed to the public, despite the Nixon administration’s attempts to cover up the scandal. As a result of their insistence on covering up the infamous event, the leadership of the United States was sent spiraling into a mess of treachery and dishonesty, threatening both the nation’s stability and future.

The Watergate Hotel was the home of the Democratic headquarters during the election of 1972. The guard called the police, and they arrested the burglars, Bernard Barker, Virgilio Gonzalez, Eugenio Martinez, James W. McCord Jr., and Frank Sturgis, who were trying to wiretap the phones of two high-ranking officials in the building. A money trail led back to the Committee to Re-elect President Nixon, putting Nixon himself in the crosshairs of the public’s accusatory finger. President Nixon denied his involvement in the

Republican President Richard M. Nixon was up for reelection, in a time that the country was extremely divided when the United States was involved in the Vietnam War. The Watergate scandal uncovered an intricate trail of wrongdoing on June 17, 1972, when members of Nixon’s Committee to Re-Elect the President were arrested for burglary. The burglars had broken into the Democratic National Committee’s Watergate headquarters and stole copies of top-secret documents and wiretapped the telephones. The burglars at first were not clear that they were associated with the president, but it became disbelieving when detectives found copies of the reelection committee’s White House phone number in the burglars’ possessions. Richard M. Nixon later gave a

In 1968 Richard M. Nixon a 55 year old former vice president who lost the presidency for the Republicans in 1960 reclaimed himself by defeating Hubert Humphrey in one of the closest elections in United States history. On July 23, 1970 Nixon approves for a plan for greatly expanding domestic intelligence gathering by the FBI, CIA, and other agencies. He later has second thoughts though. A few days later he resends his approval. On September 9th 1971 the Whitehouse plumber unit named for the orders to plug leeks in the administration steals files on Daniel Ellsberg, the former defense analyst who leaked the pentagon papers from a local physiology office. On the evening of August 8th 1974 President Richard Nixon gave his last speech ever as the face of the United States. His resignation changed the ideas of political trust in the country. The Watergate scandal destroyed the reputations and revised the rule of law and politics.

The President of the United States is one of the most coveted, but difficult positions to obtain in the world. Every four years a new leader is elected to uphold the supreme laws of the land that make up our constitution. The president is sworn into office on their inaugural day in January where they are sworn to faithfully execute and support all laws in the constitution, delegate international matters, and be an advocate for the people. As the new leader of the United States of America and, the free world as a whole, the President of the United States has many roles and functions, including: Commander-in-Chief, Chief Diplomat, Chief Legislator, Chief Magistrate, Chief Executive, Party Leader, Chief of State, Foreign Policy Director, and Popular Leader.

The Presidential election of 1972 gave birth to an event known as watergate. Watergate is a hotel the Democrats established as their headquarters for the election. Five guys were busted breaking into the democratic headquarters. An investigation was brought forth and it comes out that one burglar was a former FBI agent. Another burglar had a black book and it was ceased. They found the initials WH with a number to the White House. It was speculated that the president sent these mean to steal information to help with his campaign. Congress got involved and opened their own investigation. In the investigation it became known that Nixon had a separate recording device that records people unknowingly. President Nixon declared executive privilege

On June 17, 1972, there was an attempted burglary at the Watergate office complex. A security guard named Frank Wills noticed tape covering a few latches here and there and removed them unconcernedly, only to find them back again a while later. There were five men in the DNC at this point and they were promptly arrested. Unbeknownst to most at the time, there had been another burglary before June 17th, on May 28th, and two phones were wiretapped in the process. The reason there was a second break-in was due to repairs. These were both performed by the White House Plumbers, a group formed in 1971 under Nixon to stop security leaks. They eventually branched out into illegal affairs, like the Watergate burglary.

The final straw that caused the full downfall of the Nixon administration, and with it the hope in the U.S. government, was the “Watergate scandal”. This showed deceit of illegal activity. Where a president went to the maximum extent to cover up and hide his wrongdoings. Many in his administration were tried and arrested. This showed a face of American government never seen before. Nixon resigned after that. In his speech of farewell he attempts to restore some of America's hope; he states when speaking about the white house, “this is the best house”, “this house has a great heart”(President Nixon’s farewell, Reader pg. 240). The discontent, fear, anger and disillusion that the American people had experienced for their government culminated