Watergate, one of the most famous and plush hotels, is famous not for all of the celebrities that have been there, but for the large political scandal that occurred. Watergate hotel was never thought to be the same after this very important incident occurred, where a seemingly random robbery at a Washington, D.C. hotel led to the first presidential resignation in American history. Watergate was a huge political scandal that happened in the United States in the 1970’s, following a break in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C. and then Nixon's administration attempted a cover-up of its involvement. The scandal, led by political officials including Richard M. Nixon, brought the downfall …show more content…
In early 1974, the cover-up began to fall apart. On March 1, a very special and important jury appointed by a new special prosecutor indicted seven of Nixon’s former aides on various charges related to the Watergate affair. The jury, not sure if they could accuse a president, called Nixon an “unindicted co-conspirator.” In July, the Supreme Court ordered Nixon to turn over the tapes. As Nixon took a long time to “try and recover all the tapes,” the House of Representatives voted to impeach him for obstruction of justice, abuse of power, criminal cover-up and violations of the Constitution. After all that, on August 5, Nixon released the tapes, which gave sure evidence of his involvement in Watergate. In the face of impeachment by the Senate, Richard Nixon became the only president to resign on August 8th. Six weeks after the new president, Gerald R. Ford, was sworn in, he immediately pardoned Nixon of any and all crimes he committed while in the office. Most of Nixon’s helpers weren’t as lucky as him. Most were convicted of very serious crimes and sent to federal prisons. Surprisingly, Nixon himself never said that he did anything wrong, besides using poor judgement. This sequence of events led to political turmoil, creating an atmosphere of uncertainty about the
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
When Nixon was inaugurated, he took a sworn oath to protect the people and the country. He lied to his people. He states, “The major problem on the Watergate is simply to clean the thing up by having whoever was responsible admit what happened. Certainly I am satisfied that nobody in the White House had any knowledge or approved any such activity.” (Memoirs 646).
“From Watergate we learned what generations before us have known; our Constitution works. And during Watergate years it was interpreted again so as to reaffirm that no one - absolutely no one - is above the law.” -Leon Jaworski, special prosecutor during the Watergate scandal.
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.
The Biography Editors state that the Watergate burglary occurred June 17, 1972 where five men were apprehended for breaking into the Democratic National Committee Headquarters. The five men were Bernard Barker, Virgilio Gonzalez, Eugenio Martinez, Frank Sturgis, and James W. McCord Jr. The Watergate scandal revolved around multiple crimes that were committed. The crimes that have been stated in articles such as, the Washington Post, dealt with political espionage, obstructing the investigation, breaking and entering which led to wiretapping phones. Also, there was campaign fraud during President Nixon’s reelection. The five men who were arrested were all associated and working on behalf of the president’s reelection campaign. As stated by The
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...
...criminal case. On June 23, 1972 the “smoking gun” was recorded in the Oval Office. Many say that this tape almost single handedly caused the end of the Nixon era as President of the US. This tape is referred to as the “smoking gun” because it is direct evidence of criminal guilt. On this tape President Nixon told Bob Haldeman to obstruct justice by having the CIA impede the FBI’s investigation of the Watergate break in (Nixon 848-851). In July 1974, the House Judiciary Committee recommended that Richard Nixon be impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors. The committee claimed that Nixon had obstructed justice, abused presidential powers, and withheld evidence in a criminal case. Nixon was forced to release the “smoking gun” on August 5, 1974. On August 8, Richard Nixon issued a statement that he would be resigning as the President of the United States effective at noon on August 9, 1974. Therefore on August 9, Gerald Rudolph Ford became the thirty-eighth President of the United States. Ford immediately pardoned Richard Nixon of any and all federal crimes he may have committed while in office. Richard Milhous Nixon died on April 22, 1994 leaving behind his wife and two daughters.
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
Everyday citizens often live unaware of their government’s inner workings. The knowing of political espionage is often too heavy of a subject to be inducted in conversation. True, prima facie, modest twists and turns of information may not be considered substantial, but this inconsideration leaves much to be uncontrolled. It is easy for political leaders to become power crazed, to not realize the massive implications that come of their actions. Only after all is said and done do the people actually realize their government is an opaque mask of deception. The Watergate Scandal substantially impacted Americans’ trust in their government.
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.
The lying and cover-ups did not end there, it went on and on for months, and as the scandal kept unraveling, President Nixon and White House, and CREEP officials were deliberately misleading the public about the significance of the Watergate affair. As Watergate was becoming a front-page article in the newspapers, new evidence was being uncovered. One piece of evidence that changed the peoples’ ideas of our president was the tapping of every conversation in the oval office since about the 18th month of President Nixon's term. Those tapes would soon prove that the president was deeply involved in the scandal. The Nixon tapes brought out much controversy. The tapes alone could prove the president innocent or guilty, but whichever one it was, Nixon refused to hand over the tapes. After much struggle Nixon agreed to give a transcript of the tapes. The transcripts brought to light a significant amount of evidence against Nixon. The transcripts revealed payoffs, affiliation with the burglaries and the OK's to the cover-up, but most important the transcripts showed that Nixon had lied repeatedly after he had denied knowing anything about the conspiracy.
“On June 17, 1972, five men, including CIA agent James McCord were arrested in the burglary of the Democratic party headquarters in the Watergate apartment complex in Washington, D.C.” “The Post Investigates.” Later that year, the Federal Grand Jury indicted these five men for their involvement in the Watergate burglary. Less than two months later, Richard Nixon was reelected President in an unprecedented landslide over George McGovern, the Democratic candidate. At the end of January the following year, James McCord and Gordon Liddy were convicted of illegally wiretapping the Democrats Watergate apartments, (“The Watergate Decade”).
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.
A year before the election of 1972, President Nixon was becoming nervous about what the Deomocrats were planning on for the election. Nixon wanted to be re-elected but he did not think he could become re-elected without some sort of help. Nixon decided to send a group of spies to investigate what was going on at the Democrat Headquarters to see if they had any plans on how they were going to bring down Nixon. Supposedly hired by Nixon, a group of five men went to the Watergate hotel and stole some documents. Unsatisfied with what they found, they returned three weeks later intending to fix wiretaps that were not working and photograph documents. However while they were inside the building these fiv...