THE WATERGATE SCANDAL 

by Brooklyn Jessee

The year was 1972 when three burglars broke into Democratic offices. The world didn’t know it, but this would kickstart one of the biggest scandals in US history. The story of Richard Nixon’s fall from presidency due to his corrupt ways. This is the story of the Watergate scandal.

Sometime in May 1972, members of Nixon’s committee broke into the Democratic Party’s National Committee office to bug the building and steal top-secret documents. This went mostly unnoticed, however the bugging devices they used failed to function, and five more burglars were sent in to replace the wiretaps. This too, would have gone unnoticed if not for the valiant work of security guard Frank Wills, who acted on his suspicions and called the police. They arrived in time to catch the robbers and arrest them. While Nixon was not immediately suspected for this scandal, suspicions were raised when one of the burglars had a reelection committee member's phone number. This, however, did not stop the man from becoming president in November of 1972.

    While Nixon’s speeches on his lack of involvement helped him into being reelected, his claims were soon found to be false. Evidence of Nixon paying off the burglars to keep quiet was found, and it was discovered that the president had used his position to purposefully obstruct justice by ordering the CIA to disrupt the FBI’s investigation of him. Though the FBI led the investigation, it would not have gone nearly so far if not for the efforts of Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein. They, with the help of an anonymous informant that went by the name ‘Deep Throat’, aided greatly in the uncovering of President Nixon’s misdeeds.

Some of Nixon’s aides testified in court that Nixon had been secretly recording conversations in the oval office, and if prosecutors could get those tapes, they could convict Nixon of his crimes. He fought to keep the tapes, but when prosecutor Archibald Cox refused to give up, he had the man fired. In retaliation, members of the Justice Department officials quit in a protest called the Saturday Night Massacre. This took place in October of 1973. In July of 1974, the supreme court ordered Nixon to release the tapes. He finally did on August 5 of 1974, and resigned a few days later on August 8. Vice-President Gerald Ford, after being sworn in as president, pardoned Richard M. Nixon of any crimes he had committed.

While Nixon himself was never held accountable for his crimes, his associates were not given such luxury. Several of them were sent to prison and served more than a year. Nixon himself died on April 22 1994, never admitting to his wrongdoings. His acts fueled a growing lack of trust between the US government and US citizens.

Events Leading Up To The Resignation

 The events leading up to Richard Nixon's resignation caused the public's opinion to change drastically. As you can see from this chart, when Nixon was in his first year of his presidency, he had an approval rating of almost 75%. As the scandal began to unfold his rating dropped to below 50%. Just after the Senate hearings on May 18, 1973, 19% of the people began to think he should be removed from office.  That number continued to grow as more and more of the scandal was revealed. By July 28, 1974, the House Committee was recommending impeachment and almost 50% of the country thought he should be removed from office. All of these events led to Nixon Resigning on August 8, 1974. 

How does this relate to current events?

Today, scandals are everywhere in government. It's so normal that many Americans just accept it as part of everyday life.  It is really challenging to know which sources to trust and when something is a true scandal and when the opposing side is just making things up. One example was former President Trump being impeached twice which is unprecedented.  He was acquitted both times.

Sources

Lee, Karen. “Watergate Scandal - Topics on Newspapers.com.” Topics, 29 Nov. 2018, https://www.newspapers.com/topics/vietnam-war/watergate-scandal/.

“Watergate: The Scandal That Brought down Richard Nixon.” Watergateinfo, https://watergate.info/.

(1942-2015), Andrew Kohut. “From the Archives: How the Watergate Crisis Eroded Public Support for Richard Nixon.” Pew Research Center, Pew Research Center, 30 May 2020, https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/09/25/how-the-watergate-crisis-eroded-public-support-for-richard-nixon/.

Zurcher, Anthony. “Trump Impeachment Trial: What Verdict Means for Trump, Biden and America.” BBC News, BBC, 13 Feb. 2021, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-56057849.

“Watergate Scandal.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., https://www.britannica.com/event/Watergate-Scandal.

Source Reflection:

I was only able to use digital sources for this project because we live in Abu Dhabi and there aren't libraries here. I was able to look at some newspaper articles and I thought it was really interesting to see the perspective at the time.  It is somewhat different from more current sources because they were closer to the action and it was much more real for them. Today, the Watergate Scandal just feels like another piece of history that we don't think much about, especially with all the scandals we have in our current society. It's interesting to see how much the political climate has changes. Overall, I think it's good to have both sources because the sources from the time are more raw and might be more accurate because it was happening right in front of them.  Later sources are also valuable because they provide perspective and the events can be viewed with the knowledge and insights we have gained since the event.