Losing the Presidential Race in 1960
Before the 2000 election, the 1960 presidential election was the closest presidential election since the early days of the democracy. Nixon campaigned hard and would have won had it not been for four televised debates — the first-ever nationally televised presidential debates.
Nixon looked old and tired during the first debate. He had just come of out of the hospital after recovering from a life-threatening infection, and he looked ill. Despite his weary looks, he refused to wear makeup. Even his mother called him afterwards to ask if he was all right. John F. Kennedy, the Democratic nominee, looked young and energetic in comparison.
Kennedy went on to win the election by 112,803 votes out of almost 70 million cast. Despite charges of vote fraud in Illinois and Texas — states that Nixon lost by a few thousand votes — Nixon refused to go to court, saying, “to drag out the decision would do incalculable and lasting damage throughout the country” (from Rating the Presidents, William J. Ridings, Jr. and Stuart B. McIver, published by Citadel Press, 2000). Nixon congratulated Kennedy and returned to his law practice in California.
Contending from Coast to Coast
After returning to California, Nixon wrote his autobiography, entitled Six Crises, and was content to practice law. The California Republican Party approached him about running for governor in 1962. Only Nixon had a shot at winning against the popular Democratic incumbent Edmund G. Brown.
Nixon accepted the challenge and used his practiced tactic — he accused Brown of being soft on communism. But his strategy backfired this time, because the public wasn’t concerned with this issue in a state-level race.
When the votes were in, Nixon lost badly. Instead of giving a concession speech on election night, though, Nixon lashed out at the press, concluding with these famous words: “You won’t have Nixon to kick around anymore, because, gentlemen, this is my last press conference.” Boy, was he wrong!
After his defeat, Nixon moved to New York City to practice law. He campaigned for Republicans all over the country, including Barry Goldwater, the Republican presidential nominee, in 1964. His loyalty and effort paid off. By 1968, many in the Republican Party owed Nixon.
Nixon decided to give the presidency one more shot, announcing his candidacy in February 1968. He won the Republican nomination easily and launched his campaign on two issues: The unsuccessful war in Vietnam and the growing violent protest at home. He argued that only an experienced foreign policy leader could end the war and restore order on the home front.
Nixon faced Democratic vice president Hubert Humphrey and third-party candidate George Wallace, who ran on a platform supporting racial segregation. Wallace almost took the election away from Nixon by winning five southern states, but in the end, Nixon won with 43.4 percent of the popular vote to Humphrey’s 42.7 percent.
Nixon didn’t want to offend anyone, so he ran a very bland campaign in 1968. And, he refused to debate. He had learned the lesson of 1960 well.
President Richard Milhous Nixon (1969–1974)
As president, Nixon set out to make major changes in U.S. foreign policy. His priority was to end the war in Vietnam. In addition, Nixon believed that it was necessary to enter into arms control negotiations with the Soviet Union and achieve cordial relations with communist China.
In the domestic arena, Nixon attempted to control inflation and started some of the most important environmental legislation in U.S. history. Figure 21-1 depicts President Nixon.
Figure 21-1: Richard Nixon, 37th president of the United States.
Courtesy of the Library of Congress
Ending the war in Vietnam
Vietnam was Nixon’s first priority when he took office in 1968. He built on the policy changes that Johnson implemented shortly before he left office (see Chapter 20, especially the “Conflict in Vietnam” sidebar).
Nixon’s strategy was called Vietnamization. It called upon South Vietnam to do more of the fighting so that the United States could withdraw its troops. In addition, Nixon proclaimed what became known as the Nixon Doctrine, which stated that Asia could expect only military and economic aid in the fight against communism — the United States would not send more troops.
When Nixon entered the White House in January 1969, more than 500,000 U.S. soldiers were stationed in Vietnam. Nixon had pledged to reduce the number of U.S. soldiers fighting in Vietnam during his campaign, and this he did. By late 1969, Nixon had withdrawn 90,000 troops. When Nixon was up for reelection in 1972, only 30,000 soldiers remained in Vietnam.
When secret peace talks collapsed in 1972, Nixon decided to bomb North Vietnam and force them to the bargaining table. The increased air strikes proved to be the most severe in history to that point, but they worked. In January 1973, a cease-fire agreement was signed between the United States, South Vietnam, and North Vietnam, ending U.S. involvement in Vietnam.
The two Vietnams broke the agreement shortly thereafter, and the war dragged on for two more years. Without U.S. aid, the South Vietnamese army collapsed, and on April 30, 1975, the South Vietnamese capital of Saigon fell to North Vietnamese forces. The war was over, and the country reunified under communist control. Vietnam and the United States finally started to reopen diplomatic relations during the Clinton administration.
Having more successes in foreign policy
President Nixon was very successful in the realm of foreign policy. Some of Nixon’s important foreign policy accomplishments include the following:
He traveled to the Soviet Union to sign the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks Treaty (SALT I) in 1972. The treaty was the first arms control treaty with the Soviet Union since World War II. It set a ceiling of how many ICBM’s (Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles) each country could have. It also limited antiballistic missile systems (designed to shoot down incoming missiles) to two per country.
He became the first U.S. president to travel to Communist China. Secret negotiations to reestablish ties between the U.S. and China started in 1969. Nixon’s visit in 1972 led to a reestablishment of diplomatic relations between the United States and China.
He intervened in the 1973 war between Israel and Egypt and restored peace between the two countries. Egypt appealed to its ally, the Soviet Union, for help when things got tough. The Soviets didn’t want to see one of their allies destroyed, so they asked the United States to settle the conflict peacefully by forcing the Israelis to negotiate. When Nixon visited the Middle East in 1974, he received a hero’s welcome from both Israelis and Arabs.
Dealing with domestic issues
Nixon was also very successful in the area of domestic politics. From 1969 to 1973, he accomplished the following:
Landed the first U.S. astronauts on the moon in 1969, bringing the efforts of three administrations to fruition.
Established the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970.
Implemented the Water Pollution Act, which established funds for the creation of sewage treatment plants and prohibited dumping industrial waste into the nation’s waterways. The National Air Quality Standards Act of 1970 restricted auto emissions and established clean air standards.
Passed the 26th Amendment to the Constitution, which gave 18 to 21 year olds the right to vote.
Froze prices and wages to reduce inflation.
Curtailed government spending and raised interest rates to combat inflation.
Ended the draft in the United States.
Serving Part of a Second Term
With the 1972 election approaching, Nixon was a shoo-in to win. He had great successes in foreign policy, brought inflation under control, and was about to end the war in Vietnam. His opponent, Senator George McGovern of South Dakota, belonged to the liberal wing of the Democratic Party and had no support in the South.
The 1972 election produced one of the greatest landslides in U.S. history, as Nixon won 49 of the 50 states. Nixon won the election by almost 20 million votes. He was ready to make histo
ry. This he did, but not in the way he imagined.
Falling prey to the Watergate scandal
In 1972, five men were caught breaking into the Democratic Party National Headquarters at the Watergate hotel in Washington, D.C. At first, nobody thought much of it. The situation didn’t become a campaign issue in 1972, and it didn’t gain very much attention until police discovered an address book listing names, phone numbers, and even checks tying the burglars to the Committee to Reelect the President (CREEP) — the Nixon reelection committee.
Congress began investigating the issue in February 1973 and found that hush money from the Nixon campaign had been deposited in one of the burglar’s bank accounts. In addition, the burglars were tied to some of Nixon’s closest aides. Mass resignations of most of Nixon’s aides followed.
Then came the big question: What did the President know, and when did he know it? The Senate named a special prosecutor, Archibald Cox, in the spring of 1973 to investigate the ties between the burglars and the administration.
In July, one of Nixon’s aides revealed the existence of a secret taping system in the White House. Nixon used the taping device to record conversations for use when he wrote his memoirs. The special prosecutor wanted the tapes, but Nixon refused, citing executive privilege. Nixon became involved in a bitter court battle over the secret tapes. For the first time, members of Congress were demanding Nixon’s resignation.
Initiating the Saturday Night Massacre
When the special prosecutor of the investigation, Archibald Cox, continued to subpoena the tapes, Nixon told Attorney General Elliot Richardson to fire Cox on Saturday, October 20, 1973. Richardson refused and resigned instead. Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus also resigned rather than fire Cox, and it was left to Robert Bork, Nixon’s solicitor general, to actually accomplish the deed. This series of resignations and firings became known as the Saturday Night Massacre.
The House Judiciary Committee instituted impeachment procedures against Nixon. In response, Nixon handed over some of the tapes to Congress on October 23, 1973. When Congress discovered that the tapes had been edited, they were forced to appoint a new special prosecutor, Leon Jaworski.
As if Nixon didn’t have enough trouble in the early 1970s, his vice president, Spiro Agnew, was involved in his own scandal, which had nothing to do with Watergate. Agnew took bribes while serving as governor of Maryland and continued to do so after he became vice president in 1969. Federal prosecutors brought charges against Agnew in 1973. Instead of going to court, he plea- bargained, paid a $10,000 fine, and resigned as vice president. Nixon promptly replaced him with the Republican leader in the House, Gerald R. Ford of Michigan.
Returning to the tapes
In March 1974, Special Prosecutor Leon Jaworski asked for more of Nixon’s tapes. Nixon refused to hand them over. This time the case went before the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled on July 24, 1974, that Nixon had to hand the tapes over to Jaworski. That same day, the Judiciary Committee in the House of Representatives started impeachment procedures against Nixon. Nixon was charged with three articles of impeachment (see the “How to get impeached” sidebar in Chapter 11 for the basics on impeachment):
Article One included obstructing justice, making false or misleading statements, withholding evidence, counseling perjury, misusing the CIA, and misusing FBI information.
Article Two included abuse of power, misusing the Internal Revenue Service, the FBI, and the Secret Service, interfering with the Watergate investigation, and other crimes.
Article Three included failure to comply with Congressional subpoenas.
The House Judiciary Committee voted overwhelmingly to recommend that Nixon be impeached on all counts by the full House.
Resigning the presidency
The House and the Senate never got the chance to impeach Nixon. On August 5, 1974, the White House released tapes containing evidence that Nixon had instructed the CIA to stop the FBI investigation of the Watergate break-in. Even Nixon’s staunchest supporters turned away from him at this revelation.
Nixon addressed the nation on August 8, 1974, to announce his resignation. In his speech, he told the country that he no longer had the support he needed to continue the fight. He never admitted any guilt or error in the Watergate affair, and he continued to claim that he was innocent.
Nixon left office on August 9, 1974, and flew to California. The new president, Gerald Ford, gave Nixon an unconditional pardon on September 8, 1974, making Nixon safe from any prosecution.
Retiring and rehabilitating
As soon as Nixon left office, he set out to restore his reputation. Over the next 20 years, he wrote seven books, including his memoirs. He became a trusted foreign policy advisor to Presidents Reagan, George H. Bush, and Clinton.
Many considered Nixon one of the best foreign policy experts in the country. His visits to China and Russia became international events. He often received a hero’s welcome during his visits, especially in the Republic of China.
Nixon died suddenly of a stroke in 1994 and received a national burial. His funeral was attended not only by five U.S. presidents but by every major foreign leader in the world. Nixon rehabilitated himself to some extent, but he will always be associated with the Watergate scandal.
Part VI
Changing the Dynamics: Gerald Ford to George W. Bush
In this part . . .
I cover our most recent presidents. I begin with Gerald Ford, who served less than two years in office. Pardoning former President Nixon tarnished his presidency, and Ford never recovered form this. President Carter was a decent, honest, individual who nonetheless was brought down by economic problems and the hostage crisis in Iran.
The Great Communicator succeeded him. Ronald Reagan was able to connect to the U.S. public in a special way. The people loved his style and the way he restored national pride and worldwide power. By the time he left office, the Soviet Union was on the verge of collapse and the United States was number one, one more time.
Reagan’s vice president, George Herbert Walker Bush, finished the job of overseeing the collapse of communism in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. He also expelled Iraq from Kuwait, but that wasn’t enough to overcome a downturn in the economy.
Bill Clinton gave the country eight years of unexpected economic growth. The people loved him for this and even forgave Clinton for many of his personal shortcomings.
Our most recent president, George W. Bush closes out this part. I look at the disputed election of 2000 and the rough start Bush had as president. All this changed on September 11, 2001, when a terrorist attack brought out the best in a country and in a president.
Chapter 22
The Career Politician and the Peanut Farmer: Ford and Carter
In This Chapter
Becoming president after a resignation: Ford
Bringing humanitarianism to the presidency: Carter
P residents Ford and Carter were similar in style and character. Both were honest men who showed character and integrity in office. Both dealt with the aftermath of Vietnam and Watergate and restored credibility to the White House. The two were also similar politically: Ford was a moderate Republican, and Carter was a moderate Democrat.
Ford and Carter both had their problems in office. During Ford’s presidency, Vietnam was lost to communism, and Ford issued the controversial pardon of former President Nixon. Carter tried to pursue a moral, humanitarian foreign policy, which ended in failure when the Soviet Union took advantage of perceived weaknesses in U.S. foreign policy.
Today, President Carter is recognized as a great humanitarian. Carter goes on peace missions all over the world. President Ford, meanwhile, has become the grand old man in the Republican Party. He freely hands out advice to his successors. Both men are great human beings, but their presidencies were merely average.
Stepping in for Nixon: Gerald Ford
Gerald Ford, shown in Figure 22-1, became president by default. He never want
ed to be president. Ford actually turned down the vice presidency when Nixon asked him to be his running mate in 1968. Ford’s great desire was to become Speaker of the House. When he didn’t receive the position in 1972, he planned to retire in 1976. Fate intervened.
When Vice President Spiro Agnew resigned, Nixon needed a replacement fast. He chose Ford. Just a few months later, Ford suddenly found himself president of the United States, without ever running for the office.
Ford’s presidency is characterized by two major events: His controversial pardon of former president Nixon, which cost him reelection in 1976, and the loss of South Vietnam to communist North Vietnamese forces.
Ford did what he thought was right and did his best to restore honesty and prestige to the office of the presidency. For this he deserves credit.
It isn’t really fair to rank Ford’s presidency, because he served just a little over two years in office. Taking his whole political career into account, he can be rated as a great politician and an average president.
US Presidents For Dummies Page 36
