Watergate
Watergate was a United States political scandal which involved the illegal activities of the incumbent Republican administration of President Richard Nixon, during and after the 1972 presidential campaign. It came to national attention following the arrest of five men on June 17, 1972, who had broken into the Watergate office and hotel complex, which was the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee. The five men arrested were charged with burglary and wiretapping, before two others, former White House aide E. Howard Hunt and general counsel for the committee for the re-election of the President, G. Gordon Liddy faced the same charges.
In the run-up to their trial, President Nixon and his aides denied any knowledge or involvement in the Watergate affair. Despite Nixon’s denial, media reports to the contrary continued to suggest otherwise. Two journalists working for the Washington Post, namely Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein began to receive leaked reports from a source known as “Deep Throat.” The mysterious “Deep Throat” character’s identity was finally revealed in 2005 as W. Mark Felt, who at the time was the deputy director of the FBI.
At the men’s sentencing in March 1973, Judge John J. Sirica read a letter written by one of the defendants, James W. McCord Jr. which accused the President of conducting a cover-up, and claimed that the defendants had been pressured to plead guilty and remain silent. McCord also alleged that witnesses had perjured themselves before the court. On April 17, 1973, Nixon announced that he had begun a new investigation into the events surrounding Watergate. On April 30th Nixon stated publicly that he took responsibility for the actions of members of his staff implicated in the case.
In February 1973, the Senate established the Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities under the chairmanship of Senator Sam J. Ervin to investigate any White House involvement. Before the committee, at one of the televised hearings, Dean accused Nixon of direct involvement in the cover-up, while a former staffer stated that conversations in the president’s offices had been secretly recorded. Subpoenas were issued for the tapes by the committee and by Special Watergate prosecutor, Archibald Cox. Nixon refused to hand over the tapes, claiming executive privilege and national security reasons for withholding them. Judge Sirica then ordered Nixon to hand over the tapes, and that order was upheld by the U.S. Court of Appeals in October.
Nixon offered written transcripts of the tapes instead. When Cox rejected this, Nixon sought to have him fired. The Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General subsequently resigned, and Cox was later dismissed by the new Attorney General, Robert Bork. Seven of the nine subpoenaed tapes were eventually handed over in December 1973. The White House claimed that the other two never existed. One of the seven tapes handed over contained a gap that a panel of experts later concluded could not have happened accidentally.
By July 30, 1974, the House Judiciary Committee had passed three articles of impeachment. On August 5, Nixon supplied transcripts of the tapes which implicated him in the cover-up. Facing impeachment, Nixon resigned on August 9.