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The events that led to the Watergate scandal occurred during Richard Nixon’s reelection campaign in 1972.
As the incumbent, Richard Nixon easily won the Republican nomination. His Democratic challenger was George McGovern, who emerged from another contentious primary process that revealed changes in the liberal Democratic coalition.
Many Democrats, particularly White working-class voters, did not support McGovern. They saw his opposition to the Vietnam War as unpatriotic. Some voters also disapproved of his alleged support for a woman’s right to an abortion and claims of wanting to decriminalize drug use.
As the incumbent, President Nixon enjoyed an advantage. He built on this advantage during the campaign by describing McGovern as a radical leftist. In November 1972, Nixon was reelected in a landslide: He won every state except Massachusetts.
Richard Nixon’s victory came as the result of the biggest landslide since Franklin D. Roosevelt’s reelection in 1936. However, Americans soon discovered that he and members of his administration had engaged in unethical and illegal behavior. Their misdeeds were, in part, the result of Nixon’s obsession with secrecy and his belief that liberals and radicals wanted to undermine his administration.
In 1971, following the publication of the Pentagon Papers, Nixon and his advisors set up an investigations unit known informally as the “plumbers.” The purpose of this unit was to spy on Nixon’s political opponents and to stop leaks from reaching the press.
EXAMPLE
While collecting information that could be used to damage the reputation of Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the Pentagon Papers, the “plumbers” stole his patient file from the office of his psychiatrist.During the 1972 presidential campaign, several of Nixon’s “plumbers” worked for the Committee to Re-Elect the President (CREEP), which was headed by Nixon’s former attorney general, John Mitchell. Their job was to play “dirty tricks” on Democratic political opponents.
EXAMPLE
During the Democratic primary in New Hampshire, CREEP operatives leaked a letter written by presidential hopeful Edmund Muskie to the press. In it, he insulted French Canadians, one of the state’s largest ethnic groups. The letter was later discovered to be a forgery.CREEP’s most notorious operation was the break-in at the offices of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) in the Watergate office complex in Washington, DC. On the evening of June 17, 1972, the police arrested five men inside the DNC headquarters. According to a plan originally proposed by “plumber” G. Gordon Liddy, the men were there to wiretap DNC telephones.
The FBI discovered that E. Howard Hunt’s name was in the address books of two of the men the police arrested. Hunt was a former CIA officer—and a “plumber.” In the weeks that followed, the FBI uncovered more connections between the burglars and CREEP, including the thousands of dollars that the committee had paid to cover the burglars’ expenses.
President Nixon was notified of the Watergate break-in by H. R. Haldeman, his chief of staff, on the morning of June 23, 1972. We know this because Nixon made tape recordings of conversations in his office.
The following is an excerpt from that conversation:
The Watergate Tapes
Haldeman: “Now, on the investigation, you know, the Democratic break-in thing, we’re back to the, in the, the problem area because the FBI is not under control, because [L. Patrick] Gray [acting head of the FBI] doesn’t exactly know how to control them, and they have, their investigation is now leading into some productive areas, because they’ve been able to trace the money, not through the money itself, but through the bank, you know, sources—the banker himself . . . .
. . . the way to handle this now is for us to have [Vernon] Walters [of the CIA] call Pat Gray and just say, ‘Stay the hell out of this . . . this is ah, business here we don’t want you to go any further on it . . . .’”
President Nixon: “‘Um huh.”
During the conversation with Haldeman, it appears that Nixon had little knowledge of the actual break-in. It is also clear that Haldeman did not want to implicate Nixon in the actual break-in. What would ultimately get Nixon in trouble, however, was authorizing the cover-up by ordering the CIA to prevent the FBI from looking into the matter further.
President Nixon: “. . . I’m not going to get involved . . .”
Haldeman: “No, sir. We don’t want you to.”
President Nixon: “You call them in.”
President Nixon: “Good. Good deal! Play it tough. That’s the way they play it and that’s the way we are going to play it.”
Haldeman: “OK. We’ll do it.”
Additional Resource
Visit the Nixon Library to examine the “Nixon White House Tapes” audio and written transcripts.
Having the CIA tell the FBI to stop its investigation of the break-in was both an illegal use of the CIA and an obstruction of justice. Furthermore, on August 30, 1972, President Nixon announced to the American people that John Dean, his White House counsel, had completed his own investigation into the Watergate break-in and found no evidence that the White House was involved. Despite attempts by George McGovern’s campaign to publicize the break-in, Nixon won the November election in a landslide.
Nixon’s attempt to cover up his administration’s role in the Watergate break-in unraveled shortly after it began for three key reasons:
Following the Watergate break-in, The Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein received information from several anonymous sources, including one known to them only as “Deep Throat.” This information revealed that the White House was implicated in the break-in.
As the White House misled investigators and the American public, Woodward and Bernstein continued to dig and publish their findings. The rest of the press corps focused on the election, the Vietnam War, and other events.
As Nixon won the 1972 election, most Americans were not concerned by reports of what had happened at the Watergate. However, the federal court system—specifically, District Judge John Sirica—investigated the break-in and the other activities of the “plumbers” and CREEP.
Based on evidence collected by the FBI, Sirica convicted five of the Watergate burglars along with G. Gordon Liddy and E. Howard Hunt in January 1973. In his ruling, Sirica indicated that he was not convinced that everyone involved in the break-in had been discovered. He promised harsh sentences unless someone came forward to identify the additional participants.
In March, one of the burglars, James W. McCord Jr., who feared a harsh sentence, admitted that he had committed perjury during the trial. He also identified people in the Nixon administration who had been involved in the break-in. Jeb Magruder, a deputy director of CREEP, admitted to lying under oath and indicated that White House counsel John Dean and former Attorney General John Mitchell (the director of CREEP) were involved in the break-in and the cover-up.
Dean confessed and, on April 30, Nixon fired him and requested the resignation of his aides, John Ehrlichman and H. R. Haldeman, who had been implicated by McCord’s and Magruder’s statements to the court. To defuse criticism and avoid suspicion of participating in a cover-up, Nixon also announced the resignation of the current attorney general, Richard Kleindienst. He appointed Elliott Richardson to replace him.
In May 1973, Richardson appointed Archibald Cox as a special prosecutor to investigate the Watergate affair.
Cox became a special prosecutor as Congress’s role in the Watergate investigation grew. Throughout the late spring and summer of 1973, many Americans watched as the major TV networks took turns broadcasting the hearings of the Senate Watergate Committee. One by one, former members of the administration admitted, or denied, their role in the Watergate scandal before a national audience.
The congressional investigation might have ended if not for the testimony of Alexander Butterfield, a low-ranking member of the administration. During his statement, Butterfield mentioned that a voice-activated recording system had been installed in the Oval Office. This meant that the president’s private conversations, including the discussion between Nixon and H. R. Haldeman on June 23, 1972, had been taped.
The Senate committee and Special Prosecutor Cox subpoenaed the tapes of the president’s Oval Office conversations. Nixon refused to turn them over, citing executive privilege.
When Nixon offered to provide summaries of taped conversations instead, Cox refused. What followed was a chain of events known as the “Saturday Night Massacre” (October 20, 1973):
In April 1974, Nixon responded to the subpoena by telling the American people that he was releasing 1,300 pages of edited transcripts of his taped conversations. “As far as what the President personally knew and did with regard to Watergate and the cover-up is concerned, these materials . . . will tell it all,” he said.
The transcripts showed Nixon to be dishonest, cruel, and coarse (the phrase “expletive deleted” occurred frequently). They also revealed nothing about Nixon’s knowledge of the break-in, but since the transcripts had been edited, this did little to allay suspicions.
Early in July 1974, the House Judiciary Committee moved to impeach President Nixon. Before the full House voted on the committee’s recommendation, however, the Supreme Court ordered the president to release the tapes of his conversations, not just transcripts or summaries. Among the tapes released was Nixon’s June 23, 1972 conversation with Haldeman in which he was told about the Watergate break-in and stated his intention to obstruct the investigation. That tape came to be known as the “smoking gun” tape: It proved the case against the president.
Warned by other Republicans that he would be impeached and removed from office, Nixon announced his resignation on August 8, 1974. It took effect the next day.
“I regret deeply any injuries that may have been done in the course of the events that led to this decision,” Nixon said as he announced his resignation. “I would only say that if some of my judgments were wrong—and some were wrong—they were made in what I believed at the time to be the best interest of the Nation.”
Source: This tutorial curated and/or authored by Matthew Pearce, Ph.D with content adapted from Openstax “U.S. History.” Access for free at openstax.org/details/books/us-history LICENSE: CREATIVE COMMONS ATTRIBUTION 4.0 INTERNATIONAL
REFERENCES
Transcript of Recorded Meeting Between Nixon and Haldeman in Oval Office Jun 23, 1972, Richard M. Nixon Library, Ret from bit.ly/2pQnV6Y
Nixon- Address to the Nation on Presidential Tape Recordings, Apr 29, 1974, Ret from Miller Center, bit.ly/2rmLWTY
Nixon- Address to Nation Announcing Decision to Resign the Office of President, Aug 8, 1974, Ret from the Miller Center, bit.ly/2qnP4AU
