Government: Watergate Timeline
Use the following Watergate Timeline to find examples of;
1.
2.
3.
4.
Checks and Balances
Obstruction of Justice
Violation of Constitutional Rights and Liberties
Evidence of President Nixon’s direct involvement in illegal activities.
A Complicated President
There have been many scandals throughout American presidential
history, but only one has ever brought down a presidency. To
understand Watergate, it is helpful to have an understanding of the
culture of the administration, and of the psyche of the man himself.
Richard M. Nixon was a secretive man who did not tolerate
criticism well, who engaged in numerous acts of duplicity, who kept
lists of enemies, and who used the power of the presidency to seek
petty acts of revenge on those enemies. As early as the 1968
campaign Nixon was scheming about Vietnam. Just as the
Democrats were gaining in the polls following Johnson's halting of
the bombing of North Vietnam and news of a possible peace deal,
Nixon set out to sabotage the Paris peace negotiations by privately
assuring the
Nixon campaigns in
California, 9/9/68
South Vietnamese military rulers a better deal from him than they
would get from Democratic candidate Hubert Humphrey. The
South Vietnamese junta withdrew from the talks on the eve of the
election, ending the peace initiative and helping Nixon to squeak
out a marginal victory.
Daniel Ellsberg head to
court to face charges
associated with his
leaking of the Pentagon
Papers to the press,
1971
During Nixon's first term he approved a secret bombing mission in
Cambodia, without even consulting or informing congress, and he
fought tooth and nail to prevent the New York Times from
publishing the infamous Pentagon Papers (described below). Most
striking, however, was Nixon's strategy for how to deal with the
enemies that he saw everywhere. Nixon sent Vice President Spiro
Agnew on the circuit to blast the media, protestors, and
intellectuals who criticized the Vietnam War and Nixon's policies.
Agnew spewed out alliterate insults such as "pusillanimous
pussyfooters", "nattering nabobs of negativism", and "hopeless,
hysterical hypochondriacs of history". He once described a group
of opponents as "an effete corps of impudent snobs who
characterize themselves as intellectuals."
November 5, 1968
 Richard Milhous Nixon, the 55-year-old former vice president who lost the presidency for
the Republicans in 1960, reclaims it by defeating Hubert Humphrey in one of the closest
elections in U.S. history.
 Promises to bring “law and order” to an increasingly lawless and turbulent decade in the
United States.
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Government: Watergate Timeline
January 21, 1969
 Nixon is inaugurated as the 37th president of the United States.
July 23, 1970
 Nixon approves a plan for greatly expanding domestic intelligence-gathering by the FBI,
CIA and other agencies.
 He has second thoughts a few days later and rescinds his approval.
 Nixon okays illegal wiretaps on some newspaper reporters.
June 13, 1971
 The New York Times begins publishing the Pentagon Papers - the Defense
Department's secret history of the Vietnam War.
 The Washington Post will begin publishing the papers later that same week.
 In response to this leak, the White House creates a political espionage group nicknamed
the “plumbers.”
August 21, 1971:
 *Nixon's Enemies List is started by White House aides to "use the available federal
machinery to screw our political enemies."
September 3, 1971
 The White House "plumbers" unit - named for their orders to plug leaks in the
administration - burglarizes a psychiatrist's office to find files on Daniel Ellsberg, the
former defense analyst who leaked the Pentagon Papers.
June 17, 1972
 Five men, one of whom says he used to work for the CIA, are arrested at 2:30 a.m.
trying to “bug” the offices of the Democratic National Committee at the Watergate hotel
and office complex.
 The goal of the break-in was to plant listening devices and gather damaging information
on Democratic Party leaders.
 James McCord and four Cuban Anti-Communists were arrested at the scene.
 Later Gordon Liddy and Howard Hunt would be connected with the covert operation.
June 19, 1972
 A GOP security aide, James McCord, is among the Watergate burglars. Former attorney
general John Mitchell, head of the Nixon reelection campaign, (CREEP) denies any link
to the operation.
August 1, 1972
 A $25,000 cashier's check, (from Kenneth Dahlberg) apparently earmarked for the Nixon
campaign, wound up in the bank account of a Watergate burglar. (Bernard Barker)
 Watergate defendants were paid “hush” money from a slush fund that was comprised of
money diverted from campaign contributions.
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Government: Watergate Timeline
September 29, 1972
 The Washington Post reports that John Mitchell, while
serving as attorney general, controlled a secret
Republican fund used to finance widespread
intelligence-gathering operations against the Democrats.
October 10, 1972
 FBI agents establish that the Watergate break-in stems from a
massive campaign of political spying and sabotage conducted
on behalf of the Nixon reelection effort.
November 7, 1972
 Nixon is reelected in one of the largest landslides in American
political history, taking more than 60 percent of the vote and
crushing the Democratic nominee, Sen. George McGovern of
South Dakota.
January 30, 1973
 Former Nixon aides G. Gordon Liddy and James W. McCord
Jr. are convicted of conspiracy, burglary and wiretapping in
the Watergate incident.
 Five other men plead guilty, but mysteries remain.
March 1973
 James McCord sends Federal Judge John Sirica a letter that
he lied under oath during his trial.
April 27, 1973
 L. Patrick Gray resigns after it comes to light that he
destroyed files from E. Howard Hunt's safe.
 William Ruckelshaus is appointed as his replacement.
April 30, 1973
 Nixon's top White House staffers, H.R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman, and Attorney
General Richard Kleindienst resign over the scandal.
 White House counsel John Dean is fired.
May 18, 1973
 The Senate Watergate Committee begins its nationally televised hearings.
 Attorney General-designate Elliot Richardson taps former solicitor general Archibald Cox
as the Justice Department's special prosecutor for Watergate.
June 3, 1973
 John Dean has told Watergate investigators that he discussed the Watergate cover-up
with President Nixon at least 35 times.
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Government: Watergate Timeline
June 13, 1973
 Watergate prosecutors find a memo addressed to John
Ehrlichman describing in detail the plans to burglarize the
office of Pentagon Papers defendant Daniel Ellsberg's
psychiatrist.
July 13, 1973
 Alexander Butterfield, former presidential appointments
secretary, reveals in congressional testimony that since 1971
Nixon had recorded all conversations and telephone calls in
his offices.
July 18, 1973
 Nixon reportedly orders the White House taping system
disconnected.
July 23, 1973
 Nixon refuses to turn over the presidential tape recordings to the Senate Watergate
Committee or the special prosecutor.
 Nixon cites “Executive Privilege.”
 The tapes are then subpoenaed, but Nixon still refuses.
October 10, 1973
 Spiro Agnew resigns as Vice President of the United States due to corruption while he
was the governor of Maryland.
 October 12, 1973: Gerald Ford is nominated as Vice President under the 25th
Amendment.
October 20, 1973
 Saturday Night Massacre: Nixon fires Archibald Cox and
abolishes the office of the special prosecutor.
 Attorney General Richardson and Deputy Attorney General
William D. Ruckelshaus resign.
 Pressure for impeachment mounts in Congress.
November 17, 1973
 Nixon declares, "I'm not a crook," maintaining his
innocence in the Watergate case. (Operation Candor)
December 7, 1973
 The White House can't explain an 18 ½-minute gap in one
of the subpoenaed tapes.
 Chief of Staff Alexander Haig says one theory is that "some
sinister force" erased the segment. Other tapes are
“missing.”
January 28, 1974
 Nixon campaign aide Herbert Porter pleads guilty to perjury.
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Government: Watergate Timeline
February 25, 1974
 Nixon personal counsel Herbert Kalmbach pleads guilty to two charges of illegal
campaign activities.
March 1974
 Mitchell, Haldeman, and Erlichman are indicted on conspiracy, obstruction of justice, and
perjury charges. (They will later be convicted) Nixon is named as an unindicted coconspirator.
April 5, 1974
 Dwight Chapin convicted of lying to a grand jury.
April 30, 1974
 The White House releases more than 1,200 pages of edited transcripts of the Nixon
tapes to the House Judiciary Committee, but the committee insists that the tapes
themselves must be turned over.
June 15, 1974
 Woodward and Bernstein's book All the President's Men is published by Simon &
Schuster
July 24, 1974
 The Supreme Court rules unanimously that Nixon must turn over the tape recordings of
64 White House conversations, rejecting the president's claims of executive privilege.
(Nixon v. United States)
 Congress moves to impeach Nixon.
July 27, 1974
 House Judiciary Committee passes the three articles of impeachment.
1. Obstruction of Justice
2. Abuse of Power
3. Failure to respond to a Senate Watergate Comm. Subpoena.
August 5, 1974
 Nixon releases three more tapes. These tapes show that Nixon was directly involved in
the cover-up of the break-in from the very beginning. “The Smoking Gun.”
August 8
 Key Republican Senators informed the President that, once impeached, enough votes
existed in the Senate to convict the President in the trial and remove him from office.
 That night, Richard Nixon addressed the nation from the Oval Office. He informed the
American people that he no longer had a base of support in Congress. Therefore, he
would not see the impeachment proceedings through to their conclusion. The nation
needed a full-time president. In the interests of the nation, he would resign. The
President said, "To continue to fight through the months ahead for my personal
vindication would almost totally absorb the time and attention of both the President and
the Congress in a period when our entire focus should be on the great issues of peace
abroad and prosperity without inflation at home. Therefore, I shall resign the Presidency
effective at noon tomorrow. Vice President Ford will be sworn in as President at that
hour in this office."
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Government: Watergate Timeline
August 9, 1974
 Richard Nixon becomes the first U.S. president to resign.
Vice President Gerald R. Ford assumes the country's highest
office.
 He will later pardon Nixon of all charges related to the
Watergate case. “Our long national nightmare is over.”
September 8, 1974
 President Ford ends investigations by granting Nixon a
pardon.
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