The Watergate Scandal was the most famous political scandal in American history and led to the resignation of President Nixon so that he could avoid impeachment. The crime began in 1972 with 5 members of the Committee to Re-Elect the President (CREEP), which was a fundraising campaign designed to help Nixon be elected for another term . The 5 members of the committee broke into the Democratic Party’s headquarters at Watergate, an office complex in Washington D.C, and were discovered looking through files and attempting to plant listening devices. Their objective was to find evidence that could be used to destroy or embarrass any political opposition facing Nixon, but it clearly backfired as he was forced to resign under threat of impeachment in 1974.
The trials for the burglars were held in 1973 and evidence that put President Nixon in the middle of the affair began to emerge. They claimed that Nixon was trying to cover up his part of the scandal by paying the defendants to lie or neglect to tell the truth. It was later discovered that the president had a tape system in his office that was used to record conversations with his aides and other members of his administration. When asked by the court to supply these tapes as evidence, Nixon refused, making him look even more suspicious and guilty. After the the firing and resignation of many officials who were part of the scandal or refused to obey Nixon’s commands that would make them part of the scandal, the tapes were handed over and revealed that the president knew about the cover up since 1972. Although he did not directly partake in the Watergate Scandal itself, his efforts to cover it up were what led to his downfall and made the American people wary of government corruption.
One thing that I thought was interesting about Nixon facing impeachment was that he was the only president to leave office as a result of the accusations. Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton were the other two presidents to have faced impeachment for violation of the Tenure of Office Act and for accusations of having an affair with a White House aid, respectively. Both of these men were acquitted by extremely narrow margins, and went on to finish their terms in office, unlike Nixon.
ReplyDeleteRemember Nixon actually was not impeached. He would have be impeached easily but the question of removal (2/3 vote of the Senate) would have made incredible political theater but Nixon made the choice to resign before the vote on the articles of impeachment.
ReplyDeleteBoth Johnson and Clinton were impeached. Johnson came within a single vote of removal in the Senate while Clinton was not in any danger as the removal vote came well short along mostly partisan lines. In his particular case Clinton was under fire due to accusations of perjury in a civil case involving Paula Jones. Jones was accusing Clinton of sexual harassment related to a real estate scandal called Whitewater. In the course of this case the Monica Lewinsky scandal came to the forefront due to a deposition Clinton testified in. We will have an opportunity to learn about that a little later.
Fun fact: you do not have to impeached as a federal political official for something specifically illegal. The impeachment process is difficult and was designed as such to prevent it from being used freely as a political weapon.
We shall discuss further this week. Good post and comments.
This is a good solid post about the watergate scandal. Now I question if Nixon brought upon his own downfall. Do you think if Nixon had just been open about what happened at Watergate, and had not tried to divert the FBI, he would've not have ended up resigning ?
ReplyDeleteIn answer to your question Lawrence, i do believe that openness would have saved Richard Nixon from his downfall in the eyes of the public. Like Mr. Stewart said in class it was because of his meeting with his staff member, in which he specifically suggested a diversion of the FBI (which counts as obstruction of justice), that made it impossible for him to disassociate himself from the watergate scandal. Had he not suggested these diversions as a way of keeping the truth about the scandal hidden, there would have been no traceable way for him to have been connected to the issue. Now of course there still could have been some severe repercussions to his popularity, because it still looked bad for a president to have appointed a staff which all ended up criminals. However it may not have incited the debates in congress on impeachment that caused Nixon to turn in his resignation. Of course there is still a chance that Nixon could have been impeached, for as Mr. Stewart pointed out above, illegal actions are not a requirement for impeachment, and a president may be impeached for many other reasons. But compared to the results of his diversionary tactics and attempts to cover up his involvement in the issue the chance of him being impeached without that evidence that he had participated in something illegal is very slim.
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