Watergate scandal
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"Watergate" redirects here. For other uses, see Watergate (disambiguation).
The term Watergate scandal refers to a series of events, spanning from 1972 to 1974, that gained its name from burglaries of the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate Hotel in Washington, D.C.. Though then-President Richard Nixon had endured two years of mounting political embarrassments, the court-ordered release of the "smoking gun tape" about the burglaries in August 1974 brought with it the prospect of certain impeachment for Nixon, and he resigned only four days later on August 9. He is the only U.S. president so far to have resigned from office.
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[edit] The break-in
On June 17, 1972, Frank Wills, a security guard working at the office building of the Watergate complex of office space, residential buildings and a hotel, noticed a piece of tape on the door between the basement stairwell and the parking garage. It was holding the door unlocked, so Wills removed it, assuming the cleaning crew had put it there. Later, he returned and discovered that the tape had been replaced. Suspicious, Wills then contacted the D.C. police.
After the police came, five men — Bernard Barker, Virgilio González, Eugenio Martínez, James W. McCord, Jr. and Frank Sturgis — were discovered and arrested for breaking into the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee. The men supposedly had broken into the same office three weeks earlier as well, and had returned intending to fix wiretaps that were not working.
[edit] The Senate investigation
The connection between the Watergate burglary and the President's re-election campaign fundraising committee dramatically increased the profile of the crime and consequent political stakes. Instead of ending with the trial and conviction of the burglars, the investigations grew broader; a Senate committee chaired by Senator Sam Ervin was set up to examine Watergate and started to subpoena White House staff.
On April 30, 1973, Nixon was forced to ask for the resignation of two of his most influential aides, H.R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman, both of whom would soon be indicted and ultimately go to prison. He also fired White House Counsel John Dean, who had just testified before the Senate and would go on to become the key witness against Nixon himself.
On the same day, Nixon named a new Attorney General, Elliot Richardson, and gave him authority to designate for the growing Watergate inquiry a special counsel who would be independent of the regular Justice Department hierarchy, to preserve his independence. On May 19, Richardson named Archibald Cox to the position. Televised hearings had begun the day before.
[edit] The tapes
The hearings held by the Senate Committee, in which Counsel Dean was the star witness and in which many other former key administration officials gave dramatic testimony, were broadcast from May 17 to August 7, causing devastating political damage to Nixon. Each network carried coverage of the hearings every third day, starting with ABC on May 17 and ending with NBC on August 7. It was estimated that 85% of Americans with television sets tuned in to at least one portion of the hearings. [1]
Most famously, Republican Senator Howard Baker of Tennessee asked the memorable question "What did the president know, and when did he know it?" which focused attention for the first time on Nixon's personal role in the scandal.
On July 13, Donald Sanders, the Assistant Minority Counsel, asked Alexander Butterfield if there were any type of recording systems in the White House. Butterfield answered that though he was reluctant to say so, there was a system in the White House that automatically recorded everything in the Oval Office. The shocking revelation radically transformed the Watergate investigation. The tapes were soon subpoenaed by both first special prosecutor Archibald Cox and the Senate, as they might prove whether Nixon or Dean was telling the truth about key meetings. Nixon refused, citing the principle of executive privilege, and ordered Cox, via Attorney General Richardson, to drop his subpoena.
[edit] Saturday Night Massacre
Cox's refusal to drop his subpoena led to the "Saturday Night Massacre" on October 20, 1973, when Nixon compelled the resignations of Richardson and then his deputy William Ruckelshaus in a search for someone in the Justice Department willing to fire Cox. This search ended with Solicitor General Robert Bork, and the new acting department head dismissed the special prosecutor. Public reaction was immediate and intense, with protestors standing along the sidewalks outside the White House holding signs saying "HONK TO IMPEACH," and hundreds of cars driving by honking their horns. Allegations of wrongdoing famously caused Nixon to state "I am not a crook" in front of 400 Associated Press managing editors at Walt Disney World in Florida on November 17.
Nixon was forced, however, to allow the appointment of a new special prosecutor, Leon Jaworski, who continued the investigation. While Nixon continued to refuse to turn over actual tapes, he did agree to release edited transcripts of a large number of them; Nixon cited the fact that any sensitive national security information could be edited out of the tapes; it was also speculated that the tapes may have contained both foul language and racial slurs which would have made Nixon look bad. The tapes largely confirmed Dean's account, and caused further embarrassment when a crucial, 18½ minute portion of one tape, which had never been out of White House custody, was found to have been erased. The White House blamed this on Nixon's secretary, Rose Mary Woods, who said she had accidentally erased the tape by pushing the wrong foot pedal on her tape player while answering the phone. However, as photos splashed all over the press showed, for Woods to answer the phone and keep her foot on the pedal would have required a stretch that challenged many a gymnast. She was then said to have held this position for the full 18½ minutes. Later forensic analysis determined that the gap had been erased several — perhaps as many as eight — times over, refuting the "accidental erasure" explanation.
[edit] Supreme Court
This issue of access to the tapes went all the way to the Supreme Court. On July 24, 1974, in United States v. Nixon, the Court (which did not include the recused Justice Rehnquist) ruled unanimously that claims of executive privilege over the tapes were void, and they further ordered him to surrender them to Jaworski. On July 30, he complied with the order and released the subpoenaed tapes.
[edit] Articles of impeachment, resignation and convictions
On January 28, 1974, Nixon campaign aide Herbert Porter pleaded guilty to the charge of lying to the FBI during the early stages of the Watergate investigation. On February 25, Nixon's personal lawyer Herbert Kalmbach pleaded guilty to two charges of illegal election-campaign activities. Other charges were dropped in return for Kalmbach's cooperation in the forthcoming Watergate trials.
On March 1, 1974, former aides of the president, known as the Watergate Seven — Haldeman, Ehrlichman, Mitchell, Charles Colson, Gordon C. Strachan, Robert Mardian and Kenneth Parkinson — were indicted for conspiring to hinder the Watergate investigation. The grand jury also secretly named Nixon as an unindicted co-conspirator. Dean, Magruder and other figures in the scandal had already pleaded guilty. Charles Colson stated in his book Born Again that he was given a report by a White House aide that clearly implicated the CIA in the whole Watergate scandal and showed an attempt to implicate him as the one responsible.
On April 7, the Watergate grand jury indicted Ed Reinecke, Republican lieutenant governor of California, on three charges of perjury before the Senate committee. On April 5, former Nixon appointments secretary Dwight Chapin was convicted of lying to the grand jury.
Nixon's position was becoming increasingly precarious, and the House of Representatives began formal investigations into the possible impeachment of the President. The committee's opening speeches included one by Texas Representative Barbara Jordan that catapulted her to instant nationwide fame. The House Judiciary Committee voted 27 to 11 on July 27, 1974 to recommend the first article of impeachment against the President: obstruction of justice. The second (abuse of power) and third (contempt of Congress) articles were passed on July 29 and July 30, respectively.
In August, the previously unknown tape from June 23, 1972 was released. Recorded only a few days after the break-in, it documented Nixon and Haldeman formulating a plan to block investigations by having the CIA claim to the FBI (falsely) that national security was involved. The tape was referred to as a "smoking gun". With this last piece of evidence, Nixon's few remaining supporters deserted him. The ten congressmen who had voted against all three Articles of Impeachment in committee announced that they would all support impeachment when the vote was taken in the full House. Throughout this time, Nixon still denied any involvement in the ordeal.
Nixon's support in the Senate was weak as well. After being told by key Republican Senators that enough votes existed to convict him, Nixon decided to resign. In a nationally televised address on the evening of August 8, 1974, he announced he would resign effective noon on August 9. Though Nixon's resignation obviated the pending impeachment, criminal prosecution was still a possibility. He was immediately succeeded by Gerald Ford, who on September 8, 1974, issued a pardon for Nixon, immunizing him from prosecution for any crimes he may have committed as President. Nixon proclaimed his innocence until his death, although his acceptance of the pardon was construed by many as an admission of guilt. He did state in his official response to the pardon that he "was wrong in not acting more decisively and more forthrightly in dealing with Watergate, particularly when it reached the stage of judicial proceedings and grew from a political scandal into a national tragedy."
Charles Colson pleaded guilty to charges concerning the Ellsberg case; in exchange, the indictment against him for covering up the activities of CRP was dropped, as it was against Strachan. The remaining five members of the Watergate Seven indicted in March went on trial in October 1974, and on January 1, 1975, all but Parkinson were found guilty. In 1976, the U.S. Court of Appeals ordered a new trial for Mardian; subsequently, all charges against him were dropped. Haldeman, Ehrlichman and Mitchell exhausted their appeals in 1977. Ehrlichman entered prison in 1976, followed by the other two in 1977.
[edit] Aftermath
The effects of the Watergate scandal did not by any means end with the resignation of President Nixon and the imprisonment of some of his aides. The effect on the upcoming Senate election and House race only 3 months later, was enormous; voters, disgusted by Nixon's actions, became thoroughly disillusioned with the Republican Party. In that Election, the Democrats gained 5 seats in the Senate and a remarkable 49 in the House. (See: Watergate babies)
Indirectly, Watergate was the cause of new laws leading to extensive changes in campaign financing. It was a major factor in the passage of amendments to the Freedom of Information Act in 1986, as well as laws requiring new financial disclosures by key government officials.
While not legally required, other types of personal disclosure, such as releasing recent income tax forms, became expected. Presidents since Franklin Roosevelt had recorded many of their conversations, but after Watergate this practice purportedly ended.
Watergate led to a new era in which the mass media became far more aggressive in reporting on the activities of politicians. For instance, Wilbur Mills, a powerful congressman, was in a drunken driving accident. The incident, similar to others which the press had previously never mentioned, was reported, and Mills soon had to resign from his position as the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee. In addition to reporters becoming more aggressive in revealing the personal conduct of key politicians, they also became far more cynical in reporting on political issues. A new generation of reporters, hoping to become the next Woodward and Bernstein, embraced investigative reporting and sought to uncover new scandals in the increasing amounts of financial information being released about politicians and their campaigns.
Since Nixon and many senior officials involved in Watergate were lawyers, the scandal severely tarnished the public image of the legal profession. [1] In order to defuse public demand for direct federal regulation of lawyers (as opposed to leaving it in the hands of state bar associations or supreme courts), the American Bar Association (ABA) launched two major reforms. First, the ABA decided that its existing Model Code of Professional Responsibility (promulgated 1969) was a failure, and replaced it with the Model Rules of Professional Conduct in 1983. The MRPC has been adopted in part or in whole by 44 states. Its preamble contains an emphatic reminder to young lawyers that the legal profession can remain self-governing only if lawyers behave properly. Second, the ABA promulgated a requirement that law students at ABA-approved law schools take a course in professional responsibility (which means they must study the MRPC). The requirement remains in effect.
The Watergate scandal left such an impression on the national and international consciousness that many scandals since then have been labeled with the suffix "-gate" — such as Koreagate, Contragate, Whitewatergate, Travelgate, Rathergate, "Zippergate", Filegate in the U.S., Tunagate in Canada, Dianagate/Squidgygate and Thatchergate in the UK, and even Pemexgate and Toallagate in Mexico and Narcogate in Argentina. The judging scandal in the pairs event at the 2002 Winter Olympics in which a controversial double-gold medal was awarded to Russians Yelena Berezhnaya & Anton Sikharulidze and Canadians Jamie Salé & David Pelletier was termed "Skategate." In 2003 a scandal involving a group of Poland's key political figures and a Polish media magnate Lew Rywin was frequently referred to in Polish media as "Rywingate." Other impressions included Colegate, Sheikgate and Edgate. In 2005, a scandal concerning the legitimacy of Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's reelection as president of the Philippines, due to an alleged conversation Arroyo held with an official from the Commission on Elections, was named the "Gloriagate" scandal.
[edit] The Watergate scandal in the media
- Woodward and Bernstein wrote a best-selling book based on their experiences titled All the President's Men, published in 1974.
- Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford starred (as Bernstein and Woodward, respectively) in the 1976 movie All the President's Men.
[edit] The Watergate scandal in fiction
- In the first season of The New Adventures of Superman Perry White takes his top two reporters, Lois Lane and Clark Kent, to meet his number one source Sour Throat in a basement, and when Lois is shocked at what little he gives them, the source says "what did you expect: follow the money".
- The Watergate scandal was a primary influence upon the television series The X-Files. The first season featured a character (played by Jerry Hardin) modeled after Deep Background/Deep Throat and referred to by both names. The second season also featured a similar character simply named X.
- In Forrest Gump, Tom Hanks's character, staying the night at the Watergate (on Nixon's suggestion), innocently complains that he cannot sleep because of the lights from an office across the way from his room. This inadvertently causes guard Frank Wills to investigate and catch the intruders.
- While driving through the rain in the Rocky Horror Picture Show, Brad and Janet listen to Richard Nixon's resignation speech ("I am not a quitter!").
- The movie Dick starring Kirsten Dunst and Michelle Williams is based around the story of Watergate.
- The Simpsons episode Sideshow Bob Roberts parodies the Watergate scandal and All the President's Men when Bart and Lisa start investigating Sideshow Bob's election fraud.
- Many Futurama episodes feature Nixon's head in a jar and as being elected as President of Earth. One in particular parodies the Watergate scandal by having Fry, Leela and Bender sneak into Nixon's Watergate Hotel room (he is staying there because you get a discount if you've been there before). Later, Bender tapes Nixon's evil plan to "go into people's houses at night and wreck up the place," and Nixon, knowing that the tape would ruin his chances, makes a trade for it.
- In the movie Point Break, a gang of bank robbers wear masks of former United States Presidents. While leaving a bank at the end of the first robbery, the one wearing a Nixon mask proclaims "I am not a crook."
- Missing White House Tapes was an album created by National Lampoon.
- In both the PlayStation videogame Metal Gear Solid and the GameCube remake Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes, one of the characters who remains anonymous throughout most of the game uses the pseudonym "Deepthroat." He informs and warns the player at several intervals in the game. In the sequel, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, another character imitates the character from the first and uses the same handle, but later changes to "Mr. X", which may be a reference to the afforementioned X-Files tie-in.
- In an episode of Family Guy, "Stewie" and "Brian" meet an informant (Kermit the frog) in an underground car park for details on a scandal involving the town's Mayor (Adam West). The informant, Kermit, uses the pseudonym "Deep Throat."
- In the Quantum Leap episode "Star-Crossed," Sam is a college professor in 1972 trying to reunite his future fiancée with her father, a general in the Pentagon. They visit the hotel where he is staying, but when the security guard refuses to let them in, they sneak around to the side and break in. When the guard is shown discovering the break-in, it is revealed that they are in the Watergate Hotel.
- In Season-Two episode "Negotiation" of the TV Sitcom "NewsRadio," Matthew Brock jokingly inquires of Jimmy James as to whether or not he was really Deep Throat. (Mr. James, incidentally, was portrayed as possessing top-secret government conspiracy information a number of times throughout the show's five-season run.) A season later, in the Season-Three episode "President," Mr. James confirmed that he was, in fact, the informant previously known only as "Deep Throat."
- In Nickelodeon's "Fairly OddParents" movie entitled "Channel Chasers," Timmy's parents, Mom and Dad, encounter Vicky's sister Tootie, who hides her identity behind the pseudonym "Deep Toot," a play on the name "Deep Throat."
- In the movie Trading Places, "Eddie Murphy" poses as undercover operator Clarence Beeks to provide false financial information to the Duke brothers in a scene reminiscent of Bob Woodward's clandestine meetings with Deep Throat.
- Celebrity impersonator Rich Little starred in 1978 in a one-man rendition of A Christmas Carol, where he personified the ghost of Jacob Marley as Richard Nixon who drags audio tape reels instead of chains and tells Ebenezer Scrooge that he would be visited by a ghost every 18½ minutes (i.e. the length of time erased off a key recording of Nixon subpoenaed by the House committee investigating Watergate).
[edit] Alternative theories
- Further information: Kennedy assassination theories
Numerous theories have persisted in claiming deeper significance to the Watergate scandal than that commonly acknowledged by media and historians. In the book The Ends of Power, President Richard Nixon's chief of staff Haldeman claimed that the term 'Bay of Pigs' was used by Nixon as a coded reference to the Kennedy Assassination in White House conversation recorded on the Watergate tapes. [2]
An alternate theory to the mainstream media account of the Watergate scandal can be found in Silent Coup, a 1991 book by Len Colodny and Robert Gettlin. The authors believe that it was Nixon's silent war with the Pentagon that ultimately led to his removal from office. The book was widely criticized for leaps of logic and weak evidence, and its theories enjoy little support from either professional historians or the general public.
[edit] References
- ^ Jerold Auerbach, Unequal Justice: Lawyers and Social Change in Modern America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1976): 301.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- CBS first report on the Watergate scandal, June 19th, 1972: video
- Watergate trial sketches by artist John D. Hart
- White House tape transcripts
- The White House tapes themselves
- Washington Post Watergate Archive
- Washington Post Watergate Tape Listening Guide
- BBC News reports on Watergate
- The Scandal That Destroyed Pres. Richard Nixon
- Watergate Timeline
- Watergate Key Players
- Schemers In the Web
- Extensive set of online Watergate
- The Watergate Decade
- Michael Schudson, Watergate in American Memory: How We Remember, Forget, and Reconstruct the Past (New York, 1992)
- Silent Coup
- Biography of Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein
