United States v. Nixon

The Cover-up

1. Regardless of the outcome, should the President of the United States have a right to privacy in regards to the Oval Office tapes? Explain.

I believe that the President of the United States should not have a right to privacy in regards to the Oval Office tapes. I believe this because if the president were to talk about illegal things how would the FBI know about it without having access to the tapes. The tapes can be something useful to see what the president is up to, whether he or she is doing something illegal or unlawful. The president knows that he or she is being taped anyways so why would he or she talk about things that might be illegal or unlawful when he or she could talk someplace else where it isn't recorded. Since the tape recordings are in the Oval Office the government and all that apply should be able to have the tapes not the president because in the Oval Office he or she talks about all the governmential, financial, and more things concerning the United States. Therefore, the government should be able to see or have the tapes to see that the president is doing what he or she is supposed to be doing.


2. Was President Nixon justified when he fired special prosecutor Archibald Cox? Explain.

President Nixon was not justified when he fired special prosecutor Archibald Cox because the only reason that he fired Cox was to stop him and the court from getting the tapes which would have gotten him impeached. Archibald Cox was determined to get the tapes from President Nixon, however Nixon didn't want to give up the tapes and Cox would have taken them from him. So to keep the possession of the tapes with him he fired Cox, which is kind of like intervening justice because Cox would have gotten the tapes and President Nixon prevented that.

3. Was Nixon creating a Constitutional crisis by refusing to hand-over the tapes? Explain.

Yes President Nixon was creating a Constitutional crisis by refusing to hand-over the tapes. This is true because it made Congress question whether the President had the authority or right to keep the tapes. The Supreme Court knew that the tapes had evidence on it that would impeach the president, however Nixon wouldn't give them up. If they both knew that there was evidence and that the president would be impeached who had the authority to have the tapes? Congress had to decide whether the tapes were owned by the president or if they were the federal government's property. They were divided because it is the president speaking, however the tapes are in the Oval Office which are part of the White House therefore part of the federal government.


Closure

4. Why do you think the American public was so outraged by Watergate?

I think that the American public was so outraged because the President didn't come out and admit to his crime and the fact that the Supreme Court couldn't really do anything to get the tapes because there was nothing in the Constitution saying that they could take them. The President kept denying that he was apart of the burglary and refused to hand-over the tapes, the public then knew that he was hiding something and might've lied that he knew anything about the burglary. In this situation it's similar to a child lying to his parents after breaking a vase or something and the child just gets in even more trouble after he or she lies because the parents are more angry at the fact that he or she lied to them. The America public were probably more outraged at the President because he lied to them.

5. Do you think President Nixon should have resigned? Explain.

I do believe that President Nixon should have resigned because there was no way that he would have won. The Supreme Court had all the evidence they needed to impeach him and there was no way out of him leaving the presidency. Why bother going through the legal processes of impeaching the president when it could be easier to just resign, it'd be a lot faster and possibly people would forget about it quicker. Also, if he resigned he might leave with some pride or dignity rather than being kicked out. Since President Nixon resigned it's kind of like him admitting to his crime and if he didn't he'd be almost saying or lying again that he didn't do which would make him look worse (therefor less dignity).

6. Do you think President Nixon should have been prosecuted? Explain.

Yes, I believe that President Nixon should have been prosecuted because if he wasn't he probably would have been president for the rest of his term and probably would have gotten more power as president. He was the president that pushed a lot of power to the executive branch (president), and if this happened there would have been no way that Congress would've have added an ammendment saying that the president didn't have ownership over the Oval Office tapes nor would they have realized that the President's powers were becoming too much (the president was getting too much power). Since the President was prosecuted Congress realized how much power the president had and that he shouldn't have that much power, plus they were able to deal with sticky issues like what the president has ownership of in the White House.

Watergate: Nixon's Downfall

1. How are the "plumbers" connected to President Nixon?

The "plumbers" or burglars that were hired by President Nixon to break into the DNC, are connected to President Nixon because he paid them about $450,000 to keep them silent and all the photographs or documents they took or photographed were shredded so that there wouldn't be any evidence that they took anything from DNC. Woodward and Bernstein looked into the Watergate burglary while no one else did, so they made the connections with the burglars or Watergate to the President and his administration. For example, they made links to many members of the adminstration to the burglary.

2. Who was the judge? Why did he hand out maximum sentences?

The judge was John Sirica. He handed out maximum sentences because he believed that the burglars didn't act by themselves, that they had outside help.

3. How were Mitchell and Dean connected to Nixon?

Mitchell and Dean were connected to Nixon by Nixon being accused of trying to cover-up the burglary. Nixon "dismissed" Dean from office and replaced Mitchell with Kleindienst, which was seen as an attempt at covering up the scandal by Nixon.

4. How were Haldeman and Erlichman connected to Nixon?

Haldeman and Erlichman were connected to Nixon because he had announced their resignition from the White House, and after President Nixon released the real tapes there were conversations between Nixon and Haldemen (and probably Erlichman) where they discussed strategies for covering up the burglary and scandal.

5. What did the following men tell the Senate about Nixon?

a. Dean told the Senate what the president knew, when he knew it, and that he, the president, and a couple other advisors had a meeting discussing the strategies to continue the deceit.

b. Butterfield told the Senate that President Nixon had taped all of his meetings and discussions, which some were about the deceit and scandal. He also said that the recordings and tapes were made so that it would be easier for President Nixon to write his memoirs.

6. Who was fired or forced to resign in the "massacre"?

Attorney General Richardson and the deputy attorney general resigned after refusing to fire Archibald Cox. Then General Robert Bork finally fired Cox, however Cox's replacement (Leon Jaworski) was just as determined to get the tapes from Nixon.

7. Why weren't investigators satisified with the transcripts?

The investigators weren't satisfied with the transcripts because they were edited and there was one section where about eighteen minutes nobody talked or said anything, it was expunged so that the investigators wouldn't know what Nixon and Haldeman had said. The secretary said that she accidentally deleted them.

8. What did the tapes reveal?

The tapes revealed that President Nixon new about the role of the administrators in the burglary and that he approved the plan to distract or take the investigation away from the FBI. Also, it revealed the eighteen minute conversation between Haldeman and Nixon which ended up disclosing the investigation completely, in other words the investigation and trial came to a conclusion.

9. Why did Vice President Spiro Agnew resign?

Vice President Spiro Agnew resigned because it was revealed that he took bribery from engineering firms while he was the governor of Maryland, and he thought that he'd be impeached because he thought he had no chance in winning the trial. He probably thought this because of the trial and testimonies of Nixon's scandal, he saw that the President was going down in flames and probably wanted to resign or leave with some dignity and didn't want everyone to take the time to go through trials and etcetera when he knew that he would lose.

10. What did the House Judiciary Committee charge President Nixon with?

The House Judiciary Committee charged President Nixon with high crimes and misdameanors. They decided that the president should be impeached because of the scandal, which the crimes and misdameanors of the scandal made the committee discuss and decide wheither or not President Nixon should be impeached. Also, they convicted him with obstruction of justice, abuse of power, and contempt of Congress for not obeying to release the tapes to Congress after they told him to.

11. How did the Watergate scandal create a constitutional crisis?

The Watergate scandal created a constitutional crisis by Congress having to revisit the constitution. They had to fix how much power the President could have and fix the guidelines for the reasons why a president should be considered or should be impeached.