{"id":270,"date":"2023-03-13T17:32:11","date_gmt":"2023-03-13T17:32:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/ppschis1220ushistsincecivilwar\/chapter\/module-6-2\/"},"modified":"2023-04-28T20:31:15","modified_gmt":"2023-04-28T20:31:15","slug":"module-6-2","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/ppschis1220ushistsincecivilwar\/chapter\/module-6-2\/","title":{"raw":"6.2 The Rise and Fall of Richard Nixon","rendered":"6.2 The Rise and Fall of Richard Nixon"},"content":{"raw":"
\r\n\r\n[caption id=\"\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"700\"]\"Photograph Richard Nixon campaigns in Philadelphia during the 1968 presidential election. National Archives<\/a>.[\/caption]\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nBeleaguered by an unpopular war, inflation, and domestic unrest, President Johnson opted against reelection in March 1968\u2014an unprecedented move in modern American politics. The forthcoming presidential election was shaped by Vietnam and the aforementioned unrest as much as by the campaigns of Democratic nominee Vice President Hubert Humphrey, Republican Richard Nixon, and third-party challenger George Wallace, the infamous segregationist governor of Alabama. The Democratic Party was in disarray in the spring of 1968, when senators Eugene McCarthy and Robert Kennedy challenged Johnson\u2019s nomination and the president responded with his shocking announcement. Nixon\u2019s candidacy was aided further by riots that broke out across the country after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. and the shock and dismay experienced after the slaying of Robert Kennedy in June. The Republican nominee\u2019s campaign was defined by shrewd maintenance of his public appearances and a pledge to restore peace and prosperity to what he called \u201cthe silent center; the millions of people in the middle of the political spectrum.\u201d1<\/sup><\/a> This campaign for the \u201csilent majority\u201d was carefully calibrated to attract suburban Americans by linking liberals with violence and protest and rioting. Many embraced Nixon\u2019s message; a September 1968 poll found that 80 percent of Americans believed public order had \u201cbroken down.\u201d\r\n\r\nMeanwhile, Humphrey struggled to distance himself from Johnson and maintain working-class support in northern cities, where voters were drawn to Wallace\u2019s appeals for law and order and a rejection of civil rights. The vice president had a final surge in northern cities with the aid of union support, but it was not enough to best Nixon\u2019s campaign. The final tally was close: Nixon won 43.3 percent of the popular vote (31,783,783), narrowly besting Humphrey\u2019s 42.7 percent (31,266,006). Wallace, meanwhile, carried five states in the Deep South, and his 13.5 percent (9,906,473) of the popular vote constituted an impressive showing for a third-party candidate. The Electoral College vote was more decisive for Nixon; he earned 302 electoral votes, while Humphrey and Wallace received only 191 and 45 votes, respectively. Although Republicans won a few seats, Democrats retained control of both the House and Senate and made Nixon the first president in 120 years to enter office with the opposition party controlling both houses.\r\n

Once installed in the White House, Richard Nixon focused his energies on American foreign policy, publicly announcing the Nixon Doctrine in 1969. On the one hand, Nixon asserted the supremacy of American democratic capitalism and conceded that the United States would continue supporting its allies financially. However, he denounced previous administrations\u2019 willingness to commit American forces to Third World conflicts and warned other states to assume responsibility for their own defense. He was turning America away from the policy of active, anticommunist containment, and toward a new strategy of d\u00e9tente.2<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\r\nPromoted by national security advisor and eventual secretary of state Henry Kissinger, d\u00e9tente sought to stabilize the international system by thawing relations with Cold War rivals and bilaterally freezing arms levels. Taking advantage of tensions between communist China and the Soviet Union, Nixon pursued closer relations with both in order to de-escalate tensions and strengthen the United States\u2019 position relative to each. The strategy seemed to work. Nixon became the first American president to visit communist China (1971) and the first since Franklin Roosevelt to visit the Soviet Union (1972). Direct diplomacy and cultural exchange programs with both countries grew and culminated with the formal normalization of U.S.-Chinese relations and the signing of two U.S.-Soviet arms agreements: the antiballistic missile (ABM) treaty and the Strategic Arms Limitations Treaty (SALT I). By 1973, after almost thirty years of Cold War tension, peaceful coexistence suddenly seemed possible.\r\n\r\nSoon, though, a fragile calm gave way again to Cold War instability. In November 1973, Nixon appeared on television to inform Americans that energy had become \u201ca serious national problem\u201d and that the United States was \u201cheading toward the most acute shortages of energy since World War II.\u201d3<\/sup><\/a> The previous month Arab members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), a cartel of the world\u2019s leading oil producers, embargoed oil exports to the United States in retaliation for American intervention in the Middle East. The embargo launched the first U.S. energy crisis. By the end of 1973, the global price of oil had quadrupled.4<\/sup><\/a> Drivers waited in line for hours to fill up their cars. Individual gas stations ran out of gas. American motorists worried that oil could run out at any moment. A Pennsylvania man died when his emergency stash of gasoline ignited in his trunk and backseat.5<\/sup><\/a> OPEC rescinded its embargo in 1974, but the economic damage had been done. The crisis extended into the late 1970s.\r\n\r\nLike the Vietnam War, the oil crisis showed that small countries could still hurt the United States. At a time of anxiety about the nation\u2019s future, Vietnam and the energy crisis accelerated Americans\u2019 disenchantment with the United States\u2019 role in the world and the efficacy and quality of its leaders. Furthermore, government scandals in the 1970s and early 1980s sapped trust in America\u2019s public institutions. In 1971, the Nixon administration tried unsuccessfully to sue The New York Times<\/em> and The Washington Post<\/em> to prevent the publication of the Pentagon Papers, a confidential and damning history of U.S. involvement in Vietnam commissioned by the Defense Department and later leaked. The papers showed how presidents from Truman to Johnson repeatedly deceived the public on the war\u2019s scope and direction.6<\/sup><\/a> Nixon faced a rising tide of congressional opposition to the war, and Congress asserted unprecedented oversight of American war spending. In 1973, it passed the War Powers Resolution, which dramatically reduced the president\u2019s ability to wage war without congressional consent.\r\n\r\nHowever, no scandal did more to unravel public trust than Watergate. On June 17, 1972, five men were arrested inside the offices of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) in the Watergate Complex in downtown Washington, D.C. After being tipped off by a security guard, police found the men attempting to install sophisticated bugging equipment. One of those arrested was a former CIA employee then working as a security aide for the Nixon administration\u2019s Committee to Re-elect the President (lampooned as \u201cCREEP\u201d).\r\n\r\nWhile there is no direct evidence that Nixon ordered the Watergate break-in, he had been recorded in conversation with his chief of staff requesting that the DNC chairman be illegally wiretapped to obtain the names of the committee\u2019s financial supporters. The names could then be given to the Justice Department and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to conduct spurious investigations into their personal affairs. Nixon was also recorded ordering his chief of staff to break into the offices of the Brookings Institution and take files relating to the war in Vietnam, saying, \u201cGoddammit, get in and get those files. Blow the safe and get it.\u201d7<\/sup><\/a>\r\n

Whether or not the president ordered the Watergate break-in, the White House launched a massive cover-up. Administration officials ordered the CIA to halt the FBI investigation and paid hush money to the burglars and White House aides. Nixon distanced himself from the incident publicly and went on to win a landslide election victory in November 1972. But, thanks largely to two persistent journalists at The Washington Post<\/em>, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, information continued to surface that tied the burglaries ever closer to the CIA, the FBI, and the White House. The Senate held televised hearings. Citing executive privilege, Nixon refused to comply with orders to produce tapes from the White House\u2019s secret recording system. In July 1974, the House Judiciary Committee approved a bill to impeach the president. Nixon resigned before the full House could vote on impeachment. He became the first and only American president to resign from office.8<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\r\nVice President Gerald Ford was sworn in as his successor and a month later granted Nixon a full presidential pardon. Nixon disappeared from public life without ever publicly apologizing, accepting responsibility, or facing charges.\r\n

For more information on Watergate and Richard Nixon, please explore the following resources and watch the following videos:<\/strong><\/p>\r\n

Farnsworth, Malcolm. Watergate.info.<\/em> Accessed January 11, 2019.<\/a><\/p>\r\n

Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum. Watergate.info.\u201cWatergate Exhibit Evidence.\u201d National Archives<\/em>. Accessed January 11, 2019.<\/a><\/p>\r\n