Throughout the semester we have visited numerous sites in Washington, D.C., along with learned about various scandals throughout the history of D.C. However 2 scandals I believe show a lot about Washington, D.C. are President Kennedy’s sex scandal and The Octagon house scandal. D.C. has been the center for scandals since the beginning of time, whether that is President Kennedy and his mistresses or John Tayloe supposedly pushing his two daughters down the stairs when they wanted to marry men their father did not approve of. These scandals show how D.C. is full of secrets, corruption, sex, and how the culture of D.C has changed from scandal to scandal.
John F. Kennedy was the White House’s pretty boy. As part of class discussions he was “envied
The Octagon house was built for John Tayloe, who was a rich Virginia planter. George Washington encouraged Tayloe to have to house built to show support for the new capital city. John Tayloe was married to Ann Ogle who was a Maryland Woman, to be the perfect first family of the capital city, the combining of Virginia and Maryland. In the early 1800’s, John Tayloe supposedly pushed two of his daughters down the spiral staircase because they wanted to marry men their father did not approve of. There is no documentation or proof of these stories; however, if they’re true this once again falls into the patriarchal society of the early 1800’s. The Octagon house was also home to President Madison when the British burned part of the White House in the War of 1812. Dolly Madison’s is credited with saving the famous portrait of George Washington, showing how important the original pieces of our government were. After being seen as a hero Dolly Madison’s life was not always smooth sailing. After the Octagon House and the White House, Dolly Madison’s song had a gambling problem, and gambled all her money away. This forced her to rely on others generosity, along with the selling of the Madison papers. During this time from late 1700’s to the early 1800’s gambling was popular. However, during this time the national economy was falling as well, adding to Dolly Madison’s economic struggle. If you were to visit the Octagon house there are rumors that Dolly Madison haunts the house as well as the 2
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
Party Headquarters. This historical accuracy is evident in the portrayal of the two Washington Post journalists that covered the story, in the depiction of the events that took place to uncover the scandal, and in the rendering of the steps that led to Nixon's resignation from office.
Alexander’s family history along with his life story is almost as rich as the country’s who he helped to build. "[Alexander's] maternal grandfather, one John Faucette, ...emigrated from France to the West Indies sometime before 1700, ...moved to Nevis, became a planter and took a wife- Mary, [with whom he had children]. Confusion reigns as to whether there were one or two Mary Faucettes or two Faucette couples" (Emery 52). There was a "deed of gift"(Emery 54) between John Faucette and Mary Faucette in 1714 and another record of marriage between John Faucette and Mary Uppington of Nevis on August 21, 1718, leading to the possible conclusions either John had multiple lovers of the same first name at or around the same time, or it is uncertain beyond this point in history as to what is truly known about Alexander Hamilton’s past. Either way, Mary Faucette (Alexander’s grandmother) has been thought to have been plagued with poor luck, so much so that it is even referred to as an "extraordinarily stormy passage" (Emery 54) of a life. Though she appeared to have weathered well- "John Church Hamilton, Alexander's fourth son and first biographer, leaves this record of Rachel's impact on her son: 'He spoke of her as vividly impressed upon his memory' as a woman of intelligence, culture and elegance of form..." (Emery 55)...
Addams, whose father was an Illinois state senator and friend of Abraham Lincoln, graduated in 1881 from Rockford College (then called Rockford Women’s Seminary). She returned the following year to receive one of the school’s first bachelor’s degrees. With limited career opportunities for women, she began searching for ways to help others and solve the country’s growing social problems. In 1888, Addams and her college friend, Ellen Gates Starr, visited Toynbee Hall, the two women observed college-educated Englishmen “settling” in desperately poor East London slum where they helped the people. This gave her the idea for Hull House.
Other politicians were opposed to this, such as Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. Their opposition to the plan went away as assumptions became associated with other less controversial plans of Hamilton’s. Madison even turned in defense of the plan after being convinced of Hamilton’s financial vision (Bowers 61). Hamilton made a compromise, turning out in his favor when he allowed Madison and Jefferson to have a capital on the Potomac River. This allowed him to pass his plan more easily while giving up something of little importance to him or the country’s wellbeing (Bowers 65).
There are many conspiracies about the scandal. What they do know is that the burglars were wire-tapping phones and tried to steal secret documents. In this scandal it involved bribery, extortion, destruction of evidence, conspiracy, phone tapping, political burglary, illegal campaign contributions, and many more. They also know that they were connected to president Nixon’s re-election campaign. The burglary happened at the Democra...
Alexander Hamilton was a bastard son, orphan, immigrant, political scientist, soldier, and the first Secretary of the Treasury of the United States of America who transformed not only the country’s banking system but also left a rich legacy that changed America forever. A forgotten founding father, he wrote his way out of poverty at fourteen and later became George Washington’s aide-de-camp and a respected soldier before becoming apart of the first cabinet of the United States. Hamilton not only had a notorious political career, but also personal life, which captivated Americans and heavily influenced his career. Alexander Hamilton’s early life, revolutionary years, years in public service and the cabinet as well as his scandal and devastating
In January of 1990, Washington, DC, the seat of the federal government of the United States was turned upside down by scandal. While the headlines were filled with the efforts of the Bush Administration to crack down on drugs, the District's Mayor and symbol of black power against a nearly all white backdrop of authority was caught on videotape buying and than smoking crack cocaine with an exotic dancer two days before he was expected to announce an unprecedented fourth campaign for mayor. The sting was setup and carried out by a Federal Bureau of Investigation unit that had been pursing the frequent rumors of the Mayor's drug dependency.
The Eleanor Roosevelt Paper Project. Department of History, the George Washington University, n.d. Web.
White collar crime is a term created by Edwin Sutherland in 1939 that refers to crimes committed by people of higher social status, companies, and the government according to the book “White-Collar Crime in a Nutshell” by Ellen Podgor and Jerold Israel. White collar crimes are usually non-violent crimes committed in order to have a financial-gain (Podgor and Israel 3). A very well known white collar crime that has even been taught in many history classes is the Watergate scandal. This is a white collar crime that was committed by government authorities. Watergate was a crime that shocked the nation.
“The Watergate Files”. The Ford Library. 1995. The Gerald Ford Library and Museum. 5 May
Hamilton found a job as a merchant’s apprentice with the help of his aunts. By the time he was fifteen, his employers paid attention to his honesty and intelligence and they were impressed. Therefore, they collaborated with his aunts to send him for a formal schooling in New York. First, he attended Francis Barber's Preparatory School in Elizabethtown, New Jersey. Hamilton always displayed an unusual capacity for impressing older, influential men: so he gained his social footing in Elizabethtown with the surpassing spe...
THE WATERGATE SCANDAL Watergate is a hotel in Washington D.C. where the Democratic National Committee held their campaign headquarters. The current president at the time was Richard M. Nixon, who was involved in the scandal himself and which lead to the cause of his resignation. The Watergate scandal should not have happened, but it did and it caused the American people to judge less of their government system. The scandal began on June 17, 1972, with the arrest of five men who were caught in the offices of the Democrat’s campaign headquarters. Their arrest uncovered a White House sponsored plan of espionage against the political opponents and a trail of intrigue that led to some of the highest officials in the land. The officials involved in the Watergate scandal were former U.S. Attorney General John Mitchell, White House Counsel John Dean, White House Chief of Staff H.R. Haldman, White House Special Assistant on Domestic Affairs John Ehrlichman, and President Nixon. On April 30, 1973, nearly one year after a grand jury investigation of the burglary and arrest of the people involved, President Nixon accepted the resignation of Haldeman and Ehrlichman and announced the dismissal of John Dean. Furthermore, U.S. Attorney General Richard Kleindienst resigned as well shifting the position to the new attorney general, Elliot Richardson. However, Elliot Richardson decided to put Harvard Law School professor Archibald Cox in charge of conducting a full-scale investigation of the Watergate break-in. Hearings were opened in May of 1973 by the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Activities with Senator Sam Ervin of North Carolina as the chairman. Suddenly, a series of startling revelations began as Dean testified that Mitchell had ordered the break-in and that a major attempt was under way to hide White House involvement. Dean also claimed that President Nixon had authorized payments to the burglars to keep them quiet. The Nixon administration denied any involvement in the scandal, but the testimony of White House aide Alexander Butterfield exposed Nixon and unlocked the entire investigation. On July 16, 1973, Butterfield told the committee, on nationwide television, that President Nixon had ordered a taping system to be installed in the White House to automatically record all conversations. With this what Nixon had said and when he had said it was on the t...
Liddy, G. Gordon. Will: The Autobiography of G. Gordon Liddy. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1980.
of the suspects had an address book with the name and phone number of a