Why Nixon Resigned

[SoDesuKa]

Nixon loved a fight, especially when cornered. His whole career can be summed up in the Checkers speech, which he gave over and over again in one form or another throughout his career.

Nixon won a landslide re-election victory in 1972 but resigned in disgrace in 1974. Why the suddent departure from Nixon's whole career of battling back?

They were going to put him in prison, that's why.



I am not a crook

[madokie]

1. I wish the would have put his sorry ass in prison

then maybe we wouldn't have had the reagan nor the bush 1 and 2

[Scuba]

2. Not likely. He would have been impeached, certainly. Fords pardon makes it a moot point. n/t

[Ken Burch]

25. From what I've read and heard, Ford had to agree to the pardon

in order to get Nixon to resign. Nixon would have been impeached, but it's extremely unlikely that the votes would have been there in the Senate to actually remove him from office. Too many GOP and old time Southern Dems would have filibustered.

Ford knew he'd have to swallow the pardon...consequently, Ford went into office knowing he would almost certainly lose in the next election.

The tragedy was that we didn't nominate a strong progressive Dem. Jimmy Carter is a good man in many ways, but because he was hostile to the liberal wing of the party and saw it as his enemy, he wasn't interested in preserving the huge Democratic gains of 1974(gains that were retained intact in 1976). Like all other conservative Democrats, Jimmy Carter saw it as his mission in life to stop most of the Democratic Party from getting what it wanted(and what the country needed). He made this clear when he put the Republican priority of low inflation before the working people's priority of full employment.

[Hamlette]

39. Nixon would have been convicted and he knew it

Goldwater told him fewer than 10 Senators would vote against impeachment.

It is only rumor that he made a deal with Ford but there is no evidence he did. I actually liked Ford, for a republican he was not so awful, so my opinion is there was no deal but there is no evidence one way or the other.

I also think Ford made the right decision. The aim was to get Nixon out of power, a trial on criminal charges would have served no useful purpose at that point. And it may have caused more damage.

[monmouth]

3. That was back in the day when Dems had ba**s and knew how to

use them...

[styersc]

4. Prison was not likely, but impeachment was assured.

The backlash gave us the outsider Jimmy Carter who was scarred by the economy and Iranian hostage crisis giving us Reagan and then Bush.

Question is how the Obama thing comes out.

[gratuitous]

5. Nixon: The template for so much of what followed

And the worst of it is that instead of his hand-picked crony letting him off the hook, or lame duck issuance of presidential pardons in the dead of night on Christmas Eve, crooked Republican politicians can now count on the Democrats to let them make a clean getaway. Personal responsibility? That's only for the little people.

[twogunsid]

6. Nixon knew he would be removed from office....

after the Supreme's ruled against him on the matter of the tapes he knew his ass was out. If he would have fought to the bitter end and lost, which was highly probable, he would have been removed from office. He would not have been covered by the "Former Presidents Act" and would not have received the approx. $400k a year pension we taxpayers paid him until the day he died. He would have lost his $100k/yr that Reader's Digest paid him and maybe the $2million advance he received from his book deal.

Nixon bargained wisely.

His fighter image was hype. He fought only when he could win. He was, as Hunter Thompson said, "...a cheap-jack punk."

[madokie]

11. as only Gonzo could put it

What a fun writer to read. I so miss his style.
The Thompsons who live one town over claim that he used to visit them when they were kids as he was a cousin. Never did know it that is true or not but they swore by it. Some of them actually resembled him in more ways than looks too.

[twogunsid]

13. I miss him too....

I carried a dogeared copy of "The Great Shark Hunt" with me through 6 years of active duty in the '80's. Best instincts of any political writer, ever.

I'd like to party with your local Thompsons.

[elfin]

7. Yes, he HAD to go

For so many reasons. Yet another politico fatally tripped up by personal obsessions, which so negated the very "democracy" he was supposed to affirm.

I cheered at his resignation and still have the newspaper with the headline.

And yet, I still respect his China initiative, the formation of EPA and his foray into more positive urban renewal policies.

We will never "get over" Nixon and his complexities.

[RB TexLa]

8. And he was a wuss for resigning, he owed it to the people that voted for him to fight

till he was forcibly removed from the White House.

[SoDesuKa]

10. Substantive Crimes

Much of our understanding of what is called "Watergate" is the product of the official version, which said that Nixon was involved in the cover-up after the fact but not the planning or execution of the crime itself. The fact of Nixon's resignation suggests he was guiltier than we commonly believe.

The senators and the pundits went on and on about what a disgrace it was that the President participated in a cover-up. If in fact he'd done much more - and they knew about it - then Nixon's decision to resign seems more plausible in light of what we know of his character.

Frankly, I think Nixon was involved in Watergate up to his eyeballs, and that he would indeed have been indicted for substantive crimes. He resigned because prison was a very real possibility.

[RB TexLa]

12. And regardless of whatever you are indicted for you fight to the very end

[SoDesuKa]

17. If The Best Deal You Can Get is a Deal, Take It

If the prosecutor had evidence that Nixon was part of the conspiracy from the beginning, Nixon wouldn't have been acquitted at any post-impeachment trial. He would have gone to jail.

The fact that feisty old Nixon took the deal instead of fighting the charges suggests to me that he was a lot guiltier than we've been assuming.

[RB TexLa]

22. It shows a lack of guts, even indicted you have the power of the presidency

At your disposal. You use it and everything else you have and fight to the end. Guilty or not

[WinkyDink]

33. Completely at odds with the reality of the time. And a bizarre attitude about "the power of the

presidency," WHICH IS EXACTLY WHAT NIXON MISUSED, FGS.

[coalition_unwilling]

28. What 'deal' are you talking about? Barry Goldwater went to

the White House after the Supreme Court ruled unanimously against Nixon's claims of executive privilege to tell Nixon in person that the votes were no longer there to support him in the Senate. There was no 'deal' to secure Nixon's resignation in return for no criminal indictment. Ford's decision to pardon Nixon after the fact (while not fully pardoning all draft resisters) probably cost Ford re-election in 1976.

[WinkyDink]

34. Nitpick: Cost Ford ELECTION.

[coalition_unwilling]

36. Touche! Good catch and thanks for noting it! - n/t :)

[WinkyDink]

32. Were you alive then? Did you see the ENTIRE SUMMER given over to this, with Nixon men

resigning, being fired, going to prison, etc.? With demonstrators being illegally arrested by AG Mitchell?
With more dirt being revealed (ITT; E. Howard Hunt and dead wife Dorothy; etc.)?
With Dean's finally telling all?

NIXON DID FIGHT AS LONG AS HE COULD.

[coalition_unwilling]

37. As a young teenager, I was just coming into political awareness in those years and

your posts have brought back many pleasant memories of watching Nixon's self-destruction play itself out and the magisterial processes of the Ervin and House Judiciary Commitees. It was like watching a Shakespearean tragedy play itself out before our very eyes. I especially remember how the Repuke members of the House Judiciary mostly turned on Nixon after the Supreme Court ruled against him on the question of Executive Privilege.

I think I got the most pleasure, though, out of watching those a-holes Colson, Erlichman and Haldeman bite the dust. Couldn't have happened to a nicer group of sociopaths. I saw Colson on one of the Sunday morning news programs when I was only 13 and, even then, I knew that son-of-a-bitch was lying through his teeth just from the way he came across on TV.

[WinkyDink]

40. It WAS Shakespearean, complete with high-ranking man falling via fatal flaw. Our catharsis, of

course, was the wave before he entered the plane.

I was visiting San Francisco at the time; I have fond memories of that city. :-)

[coalition_unwilling]

26. Your thesis is not supported by the historical record. Nixon resigned

because he no longer had the votes in the Senate to survive a trial. He DID NOT resign because prison was a very real possibility. Indeed, even after his resignation, he still faced the theoretical possibility of criminal charges. Ford's pardon rendered such fears moot.

There is nothing in the historical record that I'm aware of that suggests that Nixon knew of the Watergate break-in before it happened. What he did do was to obstruct justice after the break in happened (aka the "cover up"). That's bad enough.

[WinkyDink]

31. Seriously?! He was caught back-dating his income tax; THAT was the straw. There was no "fight" to do

But you think the SPECTACLE of a President's being "forcibly removed from the White House" would have been better for the nation?!

This is ridiculous.

[Dumpster Macaine]

9. Why Nixon Resigned?

Obviously over Watergate. But I think that was an inside job primarily intended to contain the damage caused by the Pentagon Papers, released prior to Watergate. Printed and discussed daily in U.S. papers and T.V., as long as the Vietnam War went on American's were going to learn, through "The Papers", the true face of our government, a major national security risk. The problem was Nixon had no intention of ending the war. As long as the war went on so would the Pentagon Papers. Watergate then, I believe, was an inside job ("Deepthroat") to discredit Nixon, and end the ruckus over The Papers. Once Nixon resigned, we never heard of the Pentagon Papers again.

[coalition_unwilling]

27. Hunh? That's pure rubbish and there is nothing in the historical

record to support your assertions.

The Pentagon Papers that Ellsburg leaked to the various print media outlets had been commissioned by Robert McNamara and covered the time period up through LBJ's administration. Nixon may have been paranoid that Ellsburg and his allies had the goods on Nixon (hence the "Plumbers"), but the "Pentagon Papers" as published DID NOT cover Nixon's tenure.

[WinkyDink]

35. I have shelves of books on the subject that would completely refute your "inside job" theory.

There were many, many elements subsumed under the short-hand rubric of "Watergate."

[Octafish]

14. A public trial would have done democracy a world of good.

Instead of a long line of Democratic presidents we get four years of Jimmy Carter, cut short by Nixon's man Poppy Bush and his October Surprise.

[SoDesuKa]

16. Nixon On Trial

Nixon avoided a public trial because the Republican bigs who came to see him convinced him that the prosecutor had the goods on him and that he would go to jail if he fought the charges. We don't know enough about what really went on at Watergate. I suspect the truth is that Nixon directed the break-in of Ellsberg's psychiatrist's office.

Nixon didn't just cover it up; he was part of it.

[coalition_unwilling]

38. You are wrong. Goldwater went to tell Nixon it was 'over' because

there were no longer enough Repuke votes in the Senate to prevent Nixon's removal following his impending impeachment by the House. Goldwater DID NOT tell Nixon he would go to jail if he 'fought' the charges. There was no discussion of criminal charges whatsoever.

As to whether Nixon directed the break-in at Fielding's office, Nixon and Kissinger had laid out the general policy directive to stop the leaks (hence the formation of the "Plumbers"), but there is no evidence that Nixon personally ordered Liddy and the Plumbers to break into Fielding's office.

[Stuart G]

15. Yes, I gotta newspaper sitting in my basement that says,"

dated. Aug l974..yes ..

[former9thward]

18. He was never going to be put in prison.

That was never an option discussed by anyone at the time.

[Zanzoobar]

19. Pure conjecture

Dragging up Tricky Dick cannot possibly shed light on Weiner's situation.

[roamer65]

20. I still wanna know what he meant by the "Whole Bay of Pigs thing".

I think Haldeman was right that it was a reference to the Kennedy assassination and it was the topic on the 18.5 minute gap.

[AntiFascist]

23. Whatever happend to Paul Kangas?

http://educationforum.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=964&st=30

...The same people involved in the Bay of Pigs were the people involved in the Watergate burglary. Why was the Watergate burgalarized ? The CIA was trying to plug up a possible news leak. They were trying to stop the Democrats from publishing the photos of Hunt & Sturgis under arrest for the murder of JFK (May 7, 1977, SF Chronicle.)

Presently, there is a law suit attempting to force the government to release the records about the Bay of Pigs invasion. Why are those documents still secret? Why are they locked in the National Archives along with all the photos from Dallas assassination of JFK? Why are the 4000 hours of Watergate tapes in which Nixon is babbling about the mysterious connections between the Bay of Pigs, Dallas and Watergate also being sealed in the National Archives? Is it because all three incidents are connected?

...

[Canuckistanian]

21. He knew impeachment was inevitable

He was told of the political landscape. He did the math.

Back then, Republican politicians resigned because they KNEW they couldn't fight public opinion.

Now, they have Fox News.

[coalition_unwilling]

24. Nixon resigned because he did not have the votes to survive

a trial in the Senate. Barry Goldwater delivered the news to Tricky Dick in person.

At the time he resigned, Nixon still had to consider the possibility of criminal indictment. Resignation did not remove that threat; only Ford's pardon did.

[SoDesuKa]

41. Nixon's Fear of Prison

We may never find out if there was any substance to Nixon's fear of prison. By mid-1974 Nixon was certainly aware of how intensely his enemies hated him. It's possible that he believed that they would try to put him in prison, but at issue now is the extent to which Nixon's enemies had the actual power to do so. There were a lot of co-conspirators available to finger Nixon as having directed the break-in - whether or not it was true - and prosecutors might well have offered them a deal to say so.

Some time during the past year I came across a discussion of the Watergate case which argued that Nixon was indeed involved in more than just the cover-up. I should have flagged it, but I didn't. Now I can't find it. Nixon's character suggests the possibility of this greater involvement. He was deeply insecure, but vain to the point of saying, "If the president does it, it's not illegal." It seems possible to me that he was a hands-on crook, not just a craven sneak after the fact.

[coalition_unwilling]

42. Oh, Nixon was a 'hands-on crook' all right. It's just that his crimes

(like, say, obstruction of justice) tended toward the high crimes in 'high crimes and misdemeanors'. I suppose it is theoretically possible that Nixon knew of the break-in ahead of time although, to my knowledge, none of the principal conspirators or perpetrators has alleged such. There is speculation that the missing 18.5 minutes of tape may have included some such damning evidence, although the tapes even with the gap are damning any way.

[NNN0LHI]

29. Nixon won a landslide re-election victory in 1972 but resigned and ...

... after he resigned you couldn't find one person who admitted voting for him.

My Republican parents stopped voting in the primaries so they didn't have to declare they were Republicans.

True story.

Don

[WinkyDink]

30. No, no, they were not.