23. THE TROUBLED 1970s

WATERGATE

Opposing lines formed for battle when, during the summer of 1972 presidential election campaign, some of Nixon's re-election staff were caught by police undertaking "dirty tricks," by breaking into the Watergate offices of the Democratic National Committee in Washington, D.C., to plant bugs or listening devices.  What was a totally unneeded¹ event in the realm of dirty tricks – that sadly but also typically go on in high-stakes political campaigns – soon turned itself into a major scandal when two young Washington Post reporters (Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein) decided to pursue the story, a story leading hopefully all the way to into the White House if possible.  In this they had inside FBI help in unfolding the story as one after another individual on Nixon's campaign staff was implicated in the affair.

With the trial of the Watergate burglars finally beginning in January of 1973, immediately the cry went up for the strongly Democrat-controlled Congress itself to look into the whole affair.  The person seemingly now leading the Democratic Party, Senator Ted Kennedy, sponsored a resolution in February of 1973 to set up a select committee² of four Democrats and three Republicans to investigate the activities of the 1972 Nixon campaign committee.

At this point Nixon himself had done nothing that could have produced any reason to have him impeached.  For Nixon, the difficulty arose only when the Kennedy-inspired inquiry into the event to see if it would lead to the White House actually got underway.  At this point a huge political storm quickly developed between Nixon and those called to investigate his 1972 campaign operations.  To the understanding of Congress, any attempt to impede a wide-ranging search for irregularities in his conduct of his office would itself automatically place that activity in the category of "Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors" (Article II, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution).  And indeed, by very instinct, Nixon would do what he could to head off this search of him and his office for any evidence that an investigative team could find to have him removed from the presidency (and even sent off to jail afterwards as a private citizen).  Only at that point would Nixon find himself in a position where his Congressional (and press) enemies would have supposed grounds to bring down "the evil president."

In April of 1973, sensing that the axe would likely fall on him, Nixon's own Legal Counsel, John Dean, offered himself as witness against the president, claiming that Nixon himself had actually authorized a post-event coverup of the affair (though he himself had no actual evidence to present), and kept an enemies list of his opponents (not exactly uncommon in politics), supposedly indicative of Nixon's general abuse of power.  This was the kind of political feed that not only Congress but also the press was looking for.  Indeed, a political feeding frenzy was under full go at this point.

Sensing the world closing in on him, Nixon that same month began the firing of key White House and Cabinet officials, supposedly action on the president's own part to distance himself from those directly involved in the Watergate affair.  But whatever he hoped that might achieve instead proved pointless, actually making these firings appear to be more like some kind of admission of guilt in high places.

By May of 1973 the Senate was ready to go public in their investigation, with a series of hearings followed widely across the country.

When in July it was revealed that Nixon had tapes recording conversations he had had with various staff and government officials (as part of the material he wanted to have to help him later write his White House memoirs) Congressional pressure was on to get those tapes, which Nixon declared were personal (indeed presidential conversations were always considered to be sensitive and thus out of the reach of Washington politics).  But the Special Prosecutor Harvey Cox issued a subpoena for those tapes anyway, which Nixon resisted.  Finally in October an angry Nixon (this battle between the White House and Congress had now been going on for nine months) ordered his Attorney General Eliot Richardson to fire Cox (the Attorney General indeed did have such authority in this matter), but Richardson resigned instead.  The same happened when Nixon then turned to the Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus.  Finally, Solicitor General Robert Bork carried out the order, the action actually hurting rather than helping Nixon in this battle.  In any case, Bork then had to appoint a new Special Prosecutor, Leon Jaworski, and the battle continued.

By this time, Watergate had become high-drama politics.  Nixon now seemed like a man on the run.  Americans were glued to their televisions (the afternoon soap operas had even given way to the televised Congressional hearings) as both houses of Congress deliberated on the Watergate matter.  In short, a public trial was being held, even before formal charges could be presented and an indictment actually issued.  But all the drama was putting the names and faces of multiple Congressional officeholders in front of the voting public.  It was great political publicity, seeing these individuals defending American democracy against the imperialist presidency.

Meanwhile the Department of Justice announced that it was investigating Vice President Spiro Agnew for taking bribes for government contracts when he previously served as Maryland governor.  In early October Agnew resigned, and that same day Nixon announced that he was appointing the well-liked Michigan Congressman (and head of the Republican Party in the House) Gerald Ford as his vice president.  In November the appointment was approved by both houses of Congress by huge majorities.

But sadly, as events would soon demonstrate, this meant that the person standing closest to the President in line of succession had no power base of his own to operate from.  He could be only a very weak president if he were to inherit the office and then come under political attack, such as Congress was presently waging against the imperialist presidency.

The following March (1974) the case moved beyond the White House and Senate battlefield when a Washington, D.C. grand jury indicted seven of Nixon's closest staff-members of conspiring to hinder the Watergate investigation, after two others (including Dean) pleaded guilty to the same charges.

Finally in April Nixon agreed to release written transcripts of the much-sought-after White House conversations.  Deeply shocking to the public was Nixon's use of vulgarity, and comments he had made about this social group and that religious group.  At this point Nixon's embarrassed Republican supporters in both Congress and in the nation began to drift away from him.³

But even worse for Nixon, conversations Nixon had held with his legal advisor Dean and others revealed that Nixon had indeed been involved in the Watergate coverup, at least to the extent that Nixon back in March of 1973 had been part of a discussion concerning the demand for hush money coming from E. Howard Hunt – and potentially all of the Watergate burglars – blackmail funds that might possibly have to be paid out secretly to keep them quiet about any connections they might have had with the Nixon team.  This was the "smoking gun" the prosecutors (and the press) were looking for.  They finally had Nixon.

¹However, the break-in was likely motivated in part by the hope to find precise information about Democratic National Chairman Larry O'Brien's exact connections (if there actually were any) with the incredibly wealthy but highly secretive Howard Hughes.  It seems that the Democrats had been feeding information to Nixon through his rather improvident brother Donald that Nixon was going to lose the 1972 campaign because O'Brien had damaging information about Nixon given him by Hughes – including evidence that the gift of $205,000 from Hughes back in 1957 to rescue Donald's failing restaurant business was actually given as a political favor for then Vice President Nixon.  Such information – true or not true – would have damaged the 1972 Nixon campaign tremendously.  However, the whole thing was likely a hoax.  But this was the kind of misinformation that the Democrats were hoping would put Nixon in a self-destructive frenzy.  Unfortunately, it was not untypical of the kind of antics that go on in races for political office.  But in any case, it did succeed after all (quite ironically) if this is what got the Nixon team to attempt the disastrous Watergate stunt.

²For various reasons, however, it would be Sam Erwin, not Kennedy, who would chair the Senate Committee doing the investigation.  One explanation offered was that having Kennedy head up this committee, a man who had high hopes of being the Democratic Party's Presidential nominee in the 1976 national election, might make the investigation look partisan!  An unspoken explanation was that Kennedy's own moral credentials since the Chappaquiddick incident were hardly admirable.

³Political morality can be very selective.  Truman and Johnson were just as likely to use such salty language and offer unkind opinions on this group and that when president.  And this kind of behavior behind Washington politicians' closed doors was not uncommon – including among some of those Congressmen who sat in judgment of Nixon.  It is just that in general such privileged conversations were never allowed to leave through those closed doors.  This does not justify Nixon's language or his opinions.  But it raises questions about the level of political hypocrisy in Washington.