Introduction
Watergate was a controversial scandal that rocked the USA in the 1970s, following a burglary attempt at the Democratic National Committee (DNC) headquarters located in Watergate Office Complex in Washington D.C. and the alleged involvement of the then US president Richard Nixon in the cover-up. The Watergate scandal marked a historic significance in the US politics as it showed how politicians abused their power to get what they desired. The Watergate scandal brought to the surface an array of secret and illegal activities conducted by the members of the Nixon administration. These activities involved the adoption of unethical means such as bugging the offices of political adversaries and people who were suspected by Nixon and his officials. The reason for President Nixon to take part in such clandestine affairs was that he wanted to win the election of 1972 desperately. In the election of 1960, he lost to John F. Kennedy by 0.2% in the popular vote and he beat Hubert Humphrey in the popular election of 1968 by only 0.6% (Olson, 2003). So in order to make sure that he got re-elected, he kept a tab on the political opponents by eavesdropping their conversations to hinder any plan that went against his interests. The Watergate scandal that initiated with a burglary opened the Pandora’s box of Nixon’s illegal activities, leading to ultimately his resignation.
Burglary and Watergate Scandal
On 17th June, 1972, five burglars were apprehended at the Democratic National Committee (DNC) office located in the Watergate office complex. The police traced sophisticated eavesdropping and photography equipment and a cash amount worth $2300 in the arrestees' possession. Four out of these five burglars took active part in clandestine activities conducted by Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) against Fidel Castro in Cuba. Though the arrestees were addressed by the press as 'Cubans', only three of them were Cubans by heritage. One of the arrestees was James W. McCord, Jr., who was the security chief of the Committee to Re-elect the President (CREEP) overseen by the President Nixon's former attorney general, John Mitchell (Fremon, 1998).
Washington Post reported the arrest in the morning daily. The article reporting the arrest was written by three reporters, Alfred E. Lewis, Carl Bernstein, and Bob Woodward. Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward were two unknown young reporters who played a pivotal role in uncovering the mysteries surrounding the incident. They published a report on 10th October, 1972 in Washington Post alleging the involvement of aides of the President Nixon in the burglary. They together with Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) investigators discovered the identities of the two confederates who were involved in the burglary. These confederates were G. Gordon Liddy, a former FBI agent, who worked as an attorney for CREEP and E. Howard Hunt, Jr., who had been a former high-rank official at CIA, was recently hired as a staff of the White House (Olson, 2003). At the time when the break-in took place, Gordon Liddy was supervising a similar type of break-in attempt of the headquarters of George S. McGovern, who was soon to be a Democratic nominee in the presidential election of 1972. Woodward and Bernstein were supplied with the information related to the involvement of the aides of the President in the burglary by an anonymous source called “Deep Throat". They did not reveal the identity of 'Deep Throat' until 2006. The 'Deep Throat' was a FBI deputy director called W. Mark Felt, Sr (Welch, 2007).
In the wake of the controversy pointing towards the involvement of Nixon’s administration in the break-in, Ron Ziegler, the White House press secretary, made a comment that President Nixon had nothing to say on a “third-rate burglary attempt” (Elish, 2004). An elaborate media campaign initiated by the White House public relations ensued with the agenda to prove that President Nixon or his administration or the reelection committee had nothing to do with the break-in attempt. Meanwhile, the conspirators involved in the burglary took to destroying evidence, including the equipment used in the break-in and a cache of $100 bills (Fremon, 1998). The deputy director of CREEP, Jeb Magruder, destroyed the transcripts of wiretaps of an earlier burglary attempt at the DNC office building. Alibis of the president, his special counsel, Charles Colson, his chief of staff, H.R. Haldeman and his close political aides were spread throughout Washington. Claiming that FBI’s investigation was putting national security at stake, the President ordered FBI to call off its investigation. FBI’s investigation subsequently revealed how Nixon made a secret audio recording of his own phones calls and conversations and also of various administration officials and the White House staff. This added fuel to the controversy proving the president's involvement in a criminal cover-up from the very beginning.
The White House called the reporting of Woodward and Bernstein as a vendetta carried on by a single newspaper against the US president. Shortly before the election of 1972, CBS News aired a television report in two parts showing the connection of the Watergate scandal to the White House. Immediately after the first part was aired on 27th October, Charles Colson, who was a self-proclaimed hatchet man for president Nixon threatened William Paley, the CBS’s president. The second part was aired in a truncated version. Newspapers that took side with Nixon did not cover the Watergate incident at all. In a Gallup Poll conducted on the day of the election, respondents claimed that they had more trust in Nixon than the Democratic presidential candidate McGovern (Elish, 2004). Nixon won the election with a landslide victory and stepped into a dynamic second term of presidency.
Watergate Aftermath and Trial
The trial of the five apprehended burglars and two aides started in the federal court a fortnight before Nixon embarked on his second term of presidency. G. Gordon Liddy and James W. McCord, Jr. were found guilty of conspiring the burglary and wiretapping the DNC headquarters to eavesdrop the conversation of Democratic officials. E. Howard Hunt and the other four accused pleaded guilty. Four aides of President Nixon, including chief of staff, H. R. Haldeman, White House counsel, John Dean, assistant for domestic affairs, John D. Ehrlichman, and Richard G. Kleindienst, Attorney General resigned as the Watergate scandal grew acute. A special investigating committee under the supervision of Democrat Samuel J. Ervin, Jr. was established to scrutinize on the abuses of power in the 1972 presidential campaign. Ervin was a strict constitutionalist who from the very beginning was vocal about the power abuse by president Nixon who continued bombing Cambodia even though a ceasefire was agreed upon in the Vietnam war. The Ervin hearings were aired live on three national television networks (Elish, 2004). The daily televised hearings were so dramatic and sensational that it caught the attention of the entire nation. College students instead of going to classes watched the live hearing on TV set in corridors. TVs were set up in high school cafeteria throughout the civic lesson period for the students to witness the political drama unfolding before their eyes (Olson, 2003).
In May, 1973, Archibald Cox was appointed as a special prosecutor for the investigation of the Watergate scandal. John Dean, who was a former White House counsel, testified before Senate Select Committee about the Nixon's administration and President Nixon's involvement in the Watergate burglary and cover-up. During the hearings, Alexander Butterfield, a former aide of Nixon disclosed that beginning 1971, President Nixon had been wiretapping all of his communications within White House. Archibald Cox ordered Nixon to hand over the tapes, but Nixon claiming 'executive privilege' refused to turn over the tapes stating that the turning over of the tapes will jeopardize the national security (Olson, 2003).
Two subpoenas were issued to President Nixon by the Ervin Committee to turn over the tapes, but President Nixon refused to comply with the request of submitting the copies of White House recordings. John Sirica, Federal Judge ordered Nixon to turn over the tapes, but Nixon declined to comply with the order of Sirica too and made appeals for the subpoenas and orders issued to him. However, on 19th October, 1973, his appeal got denied and he was issued an order to submit the tapes to Cox. Nixon offered to submit a summary of the recorded White House communications that he would personally edit. However, the offer was rejected and Mr. Cox was told to drop the case, but Cox declined to withdraw from the case. Resultantly, the 'Saturday Night Massacre' in which Nixon ordered the firing of Cox from the post of special prosecutor ensued, followed by the resignation of William Ruckelshaus, Deputy Attorney General and Elliot Richardson, Attorney General both of whom were ordered by Nixon to fire Cox but they refused. Robert Bork, the Solicitor General, eventually fired Cox (Tracy, 2007). After Cox was fired, Nixon hired Leon Jaworski as a special prosecutor.
Eventually President Nixon agreed to submit some of the tapes and one such tape that had the recorded conversation of June 20, 1972 had an 18-minute-long gap. Nixon claimed that it was the result of an oversight committed by Rose Mary Woods, his secretary. However, experts opined that the tape had been erased at least five different times. On 30th April, 1974, the Supreme Court in the United States vs. Nixon case ruled that President Nixon should hand over the original recordings of more than 64 conversations immediately to Leon Jaworski, the special prosecutor. One of the tapes, popularly known as the smoking gun tape, revealing the conversation that transpired on 23rd June, 1972 proved that the President was aware of the cover-up from the very beginning. In that tape, which was recorded six days after the Watergate break-in, Nixon agreed that the White House administration officials should approach the Director of the CIA, Richard Helms, and Deputy Director, Vernon A. Walters with the request to pressurize the Acting Director of the FBI, L. Patrick Gray, to call off the FBI investigation into the Watergate burglary on the ground that it was a matter of national security (Tracy, 2007). In late July, 1974, the House Judiciary Committees recommended impeachment with Nixon finally resigning on 9th August 1974. Three charges that were brought against him for the impeachment were abuse of presidential powder, causing obstruction in the way of justice, and disobeying subpoenas. Though seven White House officials were charged with the involvement in the cover-up and burglary, Nixon was never indicted. Though Jaworski had substantial evidence to indict Nixon, the president was pardoned of all his offenses by the next President Gerald Ford.
Conclusion
Watergate scandal brought forth an array of clandestine and illegal activities conducted by the Nixon administration. It is one of the significant incidents in the US politics as it shows how the people in power can misuse their power to achieve their ends. Nixon out of his desperation to win the re-election of 1972 wanted to hinder the plans of his political opponents and people whom he was suspicious of by eavesdropping their conversation. He maintained a list of his enemies and appointed his aides to the task of bugging the offices of the Democratic opponents and people he did not trust. After the Watergate burglary incident took place, two young reporters with the help of FBI uncovered the involvement of White House aides to the break-in. Though their reports were initially dismissed by the Nixon administration as untrue and as political vendetta against President Nixon, the President did everything in his power to cover up his actions by putting pressure on FBI to halt its investigation, by refusing to comply with subpoenas and turn over the alleged tapes, and by asking to fire the special prosecutor Cox. However, the Supreme Court ruling and the smoking gun tape ultimately brought to the fore Nixon’s involvement in the whole incident and ultimately led to his resignation.
References
Fremon, D. (1998). The Watergate scandal in American history. Springfield, NJ: Enslow Publishers.
Welch, S. (2007). Political Scandal and the Politics of Exposure: From Watergate to Lewinsky and Beyond. Politics & Ethics Review, 3(2), 181-199.
Tracy, K. (2007). The Watergate Scandal. Hockessin, Del.: Mitchell Lane Publishers.
Olson, K. W. (2003). Watergate: the presidential scandal that shook America. Choice Reviews Online, 41(04), 41-2472-41-2472.
Elish, D. (2004). The Watergate scandal. New York: Children's Press.
