{"id":1881,"date":"2021-07-30T05:35:07","date_gmt":"2021-07-30T05:35:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/?post_type=chapter&#038;p=1881"},"modified":"2022-09-29T00:59:03","modified_gmt":"2022-09-29T00:59:03","slug":"the-impact-of-the-watergate-crisis","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/chapter\/the-impact-of-the-watergate-crisis\/","title":{"raw":"The Impact of the Watergate Crisis","rendered":"The Impact of the Watergate Crisis"},"content":{"raw":"<section id=\"fs-idp182841984\" data-depth=\"1\">\r\n<div class=\"textbox learning-objectives\">\r\n<h3>Learning Objectives<\/h3>\r\n<ul>\r\n \t<li>Explain the sequence of events in the Watergate scandal that culminated in Richard Nixon's resignation<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Describe Gerald Ford\u2019s domestic policies and milestones in foreign affairs during his presidency<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<h2 data-type=\"title\">The Watergate Crisis<\/h2>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp250227872\">Initially, Nixon was able to hide his connection to the break-in and the other wrongdoings alleged against members of CREEP. However, by early 1973, the situation quickly began to unravel. In January, the Watergate burglars were convicted, along with operatives Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy.\u00a0In February, confronted with evidence that people close to the president were connected to the burglary, the Senate appointed the Watergate Committee to investigate. Ten days later, in his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, L. Patrick Gray, acting director of the FBI, admitted destroying evidence taken from Hunt\u2019s safe after the burglars were caught.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp247748816\">On March 23, 1973, trial judge John\u00a0Sirica publicly read a letter from one of the Watergate burglars, alleging that perjury had been committed during the trial. Less than two weeks later, Jeb Magruder, a deputy director of CREEP, admitted lying under oath and indicated that John\u00a0Dean and John Mitchell,\u00a0respectively the White House counsel and the director of CREEP, were also involved in the break-in and its cover-up. Dean confessed, and on April 30, Nixon fired him and requested the resignation of his aides John Ehrlichman and H. R. Haldeman, also implicated. To defuse criticism and avoid suspicion that he was participating in a cover-up, Nixon also announced the resignation of the current attorney general, Richard Kleindienst, a close friend, and appointed Elliott Richardson to the position. In May 1973, Richardson named Archibald Cox special prosecutor to investigate the Watergate affair. In March 1974, Haldeman, Ehrlichman, and Mitchell were indicted and charged with conspiracy.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp39797632\">Without evidence clearly implicating the president, the investigation might have ended if not for Alexander Butterfield, a low-ranking member of the administration.\u00a0Butterfield's testimony revealed\u00a0that a voice-activated recording system had been installed in the Oval Office,\u00a0and thus the President\u2019s most intimate conversations had been caught on tape. Cox and the Senate subpoenaed them.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div class=\"textbox examples\">\r\n<h3>Watch It<\/h3>\r\nThe timeline and participants in the Watergate scandal can be difficult to follow. Watch this video to better understand how the scandal unfolded.\r\n\r\n<center><iframe src=\"\/\/plugin.3playmedia.com\/show?mf=8207365&amp;p3sdk_version=1.10.1&amp;p=20361&amp;pt=375&amp;video_id=IHnmriyXYeg&amp;video_target=tpm-plugin-msalnktk-IHnmriyXYeg\" width=\"800px\" height=\"450px\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0px\" marginheight=\"0px\"><\/iframe><\/center><center>You can view the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/course-building.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/US+history+II\/TheWatergateScandalTimelineandBackground.html\">transcript for \u201cThe Watergate Scandal: Timeline and Background\u201d here (opens in new window).<\/a><\/center>&nbsp;\r\n\r\nYou can listen here to excerpts from <a href=\"http:\/\/nixontapes.org\/transcripts.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Nixon\u2019s White House tapes<\/a>. Note that some of the recordings are a bit difficult to hear because of static.\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp209951952\">Nixon, however, refused to hand the tapes over and cited executive privilege, the customary\u00a0right of the president to refuse certain subpoenas. When he offered to supply summaries of the conversations, Cox refused his half-measure. On October 20, 1973, in an event that became known as the Saturday Night Massacre, Nixon ordered Attorney General Richardson to fire Cox. Richardson refused and resigned, as did Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus when confronted with the same order. Control of the Justice Department then fell to Solicitor General Robert Bork, who complied with Nixon\u2019s order. In December, the House Judiciary Committee began its own investigation to determine whether there was enough evidence of wrongdoing to impeach the president.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n[caption id=\"\" align=\"alignright\" width=\"390\"]<img src=\"https:\/\/s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/courses-images-archive-read-only\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/884\/2015\/08\/23203416\/CNX_History_30_04_Tapes.jpg\" alt=\"A photograph shows President Nixon seated at a desk by several microphones, holding papers as he prepares to address the nation.\" width=\"390\" height=\"254\" data-media-type=\"image\/jpeg\" \/> <strong>Figure 1<\/strong>. In April 1974, President Richard Nixon prepares to address the nation to clarify his position on releasing the White House tapes.[\/caption]\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp15458528\">The public was enraged by Nixon\u2019s actions. It seemed as though the president had placed himself above the law. Telegrams flooded the White House. The House of Representatives began to discuss impeachment. In April 1974, when Nixon agreed to release transcripts of the tapes, it was too little, too late.\u00a0While there was 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.\u201d[footnote]Schulman, Seventies, 44.[\/footnote]\u00a0Yet, while revealing nothing about Nixon\u2019s knowledge of Watergate, the transcripts showed him to be\u00a0profane, scheming, and prejudicial.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp12347600\">At the end of its hearings, in July 1974, the House Judiciary Committee voted to proceed with the\u00a0impeachment process. However, before the full House could vote, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered Nixon to release the actual tapes of his conversations, not just transcripts or summaries. One of the tapes revealed that he had in fact been told about White House involvement in the Watergate break-in shortly after it occurred. In a speech on August 5, 1974, Nixon, pleading a poor memory, accepted blame for the Watergate scandal. Warned by other Republicans that he would be found guilty by the Senate and removed from office, he resigned from the presidency on August 8.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp11960688\">Nixon's resignation did little to abate the scandal's impact on the public.\u00a0Instead, it fed a growing suspicion of government felt by many. The events of Vietnam had already shown that the government could not be trusted to protect the interests of the people or tell them the truth. For many, Watergate confirmed these beliefs, and the suffix \u201c-gate\u201d attached to a word has since become shorthand for a political scandal.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\r\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/09ce097a-c0ae-4e8c-a91e-b6eeda0851f9\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/section><section id=\"fs-idp258057712\" data-depth=\"1\">\r\n<h2 data-type=\"title\">Ford, Not a Lincoln<\/h2>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp56515600\">With Nixon's resignation, the new president was navigating uncharted territory. Gerald R. Ford had been a well-liked Republican leader in the House of Representatives.\u00a0He became\u00a0the first vice president chosen under the terms of the Twenty-Fifth Amendment, which provides for the appointment of a vice president in the event the incumbent dies or resigns; Nixon had appointed Ford, a longtime House representative from Michigan known for his honesty, following the resignation of embattled vice president Spiro T. Agnew over a charge of failing to report income\u2014a lenient charge since this income stemmed from bribes he had received as the governor of Maryland. Ford was also the first vice president to take office after a sitting president\u2019s resignation, and the only chief executive never elected either president or vice president.<\/p>\r\nWhen Ford took the oath of office on August 9, 1974, he understood that his most pressing task was to help the country move beyond the Watergate scandal. His declaration that \u201cOur long national nightmare is over.\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0. [O]ur great Republic is a government of laws and not of men\u201d was met with almost universal applause.\u00a0Ford took steps to humanize the presidency; he joked that he was \"a Ford, not a Lincoln,\" signaling a step back from grand ambitions. He often insisted on replacing the presidential anthem \"Hail to the Chief\" with his college's fight song (the University of Michigan, where had played football) and even cleaned up after his dog.\r\n\r\nFord's honeymoon period with the public did not last long.\u00a0One of Ford's first actions as president was to grant Richard Nixon a full pardon, citing the need for the nation to heal and move past the trauma of Watergate. Ford thus prevented Nixon\u2019s indictment for any crimes he may have committed in office and ended criminal investigations into his actions. The public reacted with suspicion and outrage. Many were convinced that the extent of Nixon\u2019s wrongdoings would now never be known and he would never be called to account for them. Instead of promoting healing, as Ford had hoped, the pardon further stoked mistrust of those in power.\u00a0When Ford chose to run for the presidency in 1976, the pardon returned to haunt him.\r\n<figure id=\"CNX_History_30_04_Pardon\">\r\n\r\n[caption id=\"\" align=\"alignright\" width=\"390\"]<img src=\"https:\/\/s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/courses-images-archive-read-only\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/884\/2015\/08\/23203417\/CNX_History_30_04_Pardon.jpg\" alt=\"A photograph shows Gerald Ford seated at a desk with a sheet of paper before him, speaking into a microphone.\" width=\"390\" height=\"253\" data-media-type=\"image\/jpeg\" \/> <strong>Figure 2<\/strong>. In one of his first actions as president, Gerald R. Ford announced a full pardon for Richard Nixon on September 8, 1974. Nixon had appointed Ford vice president after the resignation of Spiro Agnew.[\/caption]<\/figure>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp244123136\">As president, Ford confronted\u00a0a raft of challenging\u00a0issues, such as inflation, a depressed economy, and chronic energy shortages. He established his policies during his first year in office, despite opposition from a heavily Democratic Congress. In October 1974, he labeled inflation the country\u2019s most dangerous public enemy and sought a grassroots campaign to curtail it by encouraging people to be disciplined in their consuming habits and increase their savings. The campaign was titled \u201cWhip Inflation Now\u201d and was advertised on brightly colored \u201cWin\u201d buttons volunteers were to wear. When\u00a0inflation was compounded by sluggish economic growth\u2014a phenomenon known as <strong>stagflation<\/strong>\u2014Ford shifted to measures aimed at stimulating the economy. Still fearing inflation, however, he vetoed a number of nonmilitary appropriations bills that would have increased the already-large budget deficit.<\/p>\r\n<p id=\"fs-idp174769536\">Ford\u2019s economic policies ultimately proved unsuccessful. Because of opposition from a Democratic Congress, his foreign policy accomplishments were also limited. When he requested money to assist the South Vietnamese government in its effort to repel North Vietnamese forces, Congress refused. Ford was more successful in other parts of the world. He continued Nixon\u2019s policy of d\u00e9tente with the Soviet Union, and he and Secretary of State Kissinger achieved further progress in the second round of SALT talks.<span style=\"color: #ff6600;\">\u00a0<span style=\"color: #000000;\">In<\/span><\/span> August 1975, Ford went to Finland and signed the <strong>Helsinki Accords<\/strong> with Soviet premier Leonid Brezhnev. This agreement essentially accepted the territorial boundaries that had been established at the end of World War II in 1945. It also exacted a pledge from the signatory nations that they would protect human rights within their countries. Many\u00a0Americans of Eastern European ancestry\u00a0protested Ford\u2019s actions because it seemed as though he had accepted the status quo and left their homelands under Soviet domination. Others considered it a belated American acceptance of the world as it really was.<\/p>\r\n\r\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\r\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/f59a2ffd-e14a-4817-9e38-3dba8fbdf77c\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<div class=\"textbox learning-objectives\">\r\n<h3>Glossary<\/h3>\r\n<strong>executive privilege<span style=\"color: #008000;\">:<\/span>\u00a0<\/strong>the right of the U.S. president to refuse subpoenas requiring him to disclose private communications on the grounds that this might interfere with the functioning of the executive branch\r\n\r\n<strong>Helsinki Accords<\/strong>: an agreement between the United States, Europe, and the Soviet bloc that recognized each region's territorial holdings and eased tensions among the major world powers\r\n\r\n<strong>stagflation:\u00a0<\/strong>an economic dilemma experienced by the United States in the 1970s that combined high inflation with slow economic growth\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/section>","rendered":"<section id=\"fs-idp182841984\" data-depth=\"1\">\n<div class=\"textbox learning-objectives\">\n<h3>Learning Objectives<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>Explain the sequence of events in the Watergate scandal that culminated in Richard Nixon&#8217;s resignation<\/li>\n<li>Describe Gerald Ford\u2019s domestic policies and milestones in foreign affairs during his presidency<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<h2 data-type=\"title\">The Watergate Crisis<\/h2>\n<p id=\"fs-idp250227872\">Initially, Nixon was able to hide his connection to the break-in and the other wrongdoings alleged against members of CREEP. However, by early 1973, the situation quickly began to unravel. In January, the Watergate burglars were convicted, along with operatives Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy.\u00a0In February, confronted with evidence that people close to the president were connected to the burglary, the Senate appointed the Watergate Committee to investigate. Ten days later, in his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, L. Patrick Gray, acting director of the FBI, admitted destroying evidence taken from Hunt\u2019s safe after the burglars were caught.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idp247748816\">On March 23, 1973, trial judge John\u00a0Sirica publicly read a letter from one of the Watergate burglars, alleging that perjury had been committed during the trial. Less than two weeks later, Jeb Magruder, a deputy director of CREEP, admitted lying under oath and indicated that John\u00a0Dean and John Mitchell,\u00a0respectively the White House counsel and the director of CREEP, were also involved in the break-in and its cover-up. Dean confessed, and on April 30, Nixon fired him and requested the resignation of his aides John Ehrlichman and H. R. Haldeman, also implicated. To defuse criticism and avoid suspicion that he was participating in a cover-up, Nixon also announced the resignation of the current attorney general, Richard Kleindienst, a close friend, and appointed Elliott Richardson to the position. In May 1973, Richardson named Archibald Cox special prosecutor to investigate the Watergate affair. In March 1974, Haldeman, Ehrlichman, and Mitchell were indicted and charged with conspiracy.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idp39797632\">Without evidence clearly implicating the president, the investigation might have ended if not for Alexander Butterfield, a low-ranking member of the administration.\u00a0Butterfield&#8217;s testimony revealed\u00a0that a voice-activated recording system had been installed in the Oval Office,\u00a0and thus the President\u2019s most intimate conversations had been caught on tape. Cox and the Senate subpoenaed them.<\/p>\n<div class=\"textbox examples\">\n<h3>Watch It<\/h3>\n<p>The timeline and participants in the Watergate scandal can be difficult to follow. Watch this video to better understand how the scandal unfolded.<\/p>\n<div style=\"text-align: center;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/plugin.3playmedia.com\/show?mf=8207365&amp;p3sdk_version=1.10.1&amp;p=20361&amp;pt=375&amp;video_id=IHnmriyXYeg&amp;video_target=tpm-plugin-msalnktk-IHnmriyXYeg\" width=\"800px\" height=\"450px\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0px\" marginheight=\"0px\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: center;\">You can view the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/course-building.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/US+history+II\/TheWatergateScandalTimelineandBackground.html\">transcript for \u201cThe Watergate Scandal: Timeline and Background\u201d here (opens in new window).<\/a><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>You can listen here to excerpts from <a href=\"http:\/\/nixontapes.org\/transcripts.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Nixon\u2019s White House tapes<\/a>. Note that some of the recordings are a bit difficult to hear because of static.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p id=\"fs-idp209951952\">Nixon, however, refused to hand the tapes over and cited executive privilege, the customary\u00a0right of the president to refuse certain subpoenas. When he offered to supply summaries of the conversations, Cox refused his half-measure. On October 20, 1973, in an event that became known as the Saturday Night Massacre, Nixon ordered Attorney General Richardson to fire Cox. Richardson refused and resigned, as did Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus when confronted with the same order. Control of the Justice Department then fell to Solicitor General Robert Bork, who complied with Nixon\u2019s order. In December, the House Judiciary Committee began its own investigation to determine whether there was enough evidence of wrongdoing to impeach the president.<\/p>\n<div style=\"width: 400px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/courses-images-archive-read-only\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/884\/2015\/08\/23203416\/CNX_History_30_04_Tapes.jpg\" alt=\"A photograph shows President Nixon seated at a desk by several microphones, holding papers as he prepares to address the nation.\" width=\"390\" height=\"254\" data-media-type=\"image\/jpeg\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\"><strong>Figure 1<\/strong>. In April 1974, President Richard Nixon prepares to address the nation to clarify his position on releasing the White House tapes.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p id=\"fs-idp15458528\">The public was enraged by Nixon\u2019s actions. It seemed as though the president had placed himself above the law. Telegrams flooded the White House. The House of Representatives began to discuss impeachment. In April 1974, when Nixon agreed to release transcripts of the tapes, it was too little, too late.\u00a0While there was 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.\u201d<a class=\"footnote\" title=\"Schulman, Seventies, 44.\" id=\"return-footnote-1881-1\" href=\"#footnote-1881-1\" aria-label=\"Footnote 1\"><sup class=\"footnote\">[1]<\/sup><\/a>\u00a0Yet, while revealing nothing about Nixon\u2019s knowledge of Watergate, the transcripts showed him to be\u00a0profane, scheming, and prejudicial.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idp12347600\">At the end of its hearings, in July 1974, the House Judiciary Committee voted to proceed with the\u00a0impeachment process. However, before the full House could vote, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered Nixon to release the actual tapes of his conversations, not just transcripts or summaries. One of the tapes revealed that he had in fact been told about White House involvement in the Watergate break-in shortly after it occurred. In a speech on August 5, 1974, Nixon, pleading a poor memory, accepted blame for the Watergate scandal. Warned by other Republicans that he would be found guilty by the Senate and removed from office, he resigned from the presidency on August 8.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idp11960688\">Nixon&#8217;s resignation did little to abate the scandal&#8217;s impact on the public.\u00a0Instead, it fed a growing suspicion of government felt by many. The events of Vietnam had already shown that the government could not be trusted to protect the interests of the people or tell them the truth. For many, Watergate confirmed these beliefs, and the suffix \u201c-gate\u201d attached to a word has since become shorthand for a political scandal.<\/p>\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_09ce097a-c0ae-4e8c-a91e-b6eeda0851f9\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/09ce097a-c0ae-4e8c-a91e-b6eeda0851f9?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_09ce097a-c0ae-4e8c-a91e-b6eeda0851f9\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<section id=\"fs-idp258057712\" data-depth=\"1\">\n<h2 data-type=\"title\">Ford, Not a Lincoln<\/h2>\n<p id=\"fs-idp56515600\">With Nixon&#8217;s resignation, the new president was navigating uncharted territory. Gerald R. Ford had been a well-liked Republican leader in the House of Representatives.\u00a0He became\u00a0the first vice president chosen under the terms of the Twenty-Fifth Amendment, which provides for the appointment of a vice president in the event the incumbent dies or resigns; Nixon had appointed Ford, a longtime House representative from Michigan known for his honesty, following the resignation of embattled vice president Spiro T. Agnew over a charge of failing to report income\u2014a lenient charge since this income stemmed from bribes he had received as the governor of Maryland. Ford was also the first vice president to take office after a sitting president\u2019s resignation, and the only chief executive never elected either president or vice president.<\/p>\n<p>When Ford took the oath of office on August 9, 1974, he understood that his most pressing task was to help the country move beyond the Watergate scandal. His declaration that \u201cOur long national nightmare is over.\u00a0.\u00a0.\u00a0. [O]ur great Republic is a government of laws and not of men\u201d was met with almost universal applause.\u00a0Ford took steps to humanize the presidency; he joked that he was &#8220;a Ford, not a Lincoln,&#8221; signaling a step back from grand ambitions. He often insisted on replacing the presidential anthem &#8220;Hail to the Chief&#8221; with his college&#8217;s fight song (the University of Michigan, where had played football) and even cleaned up after his dog.<\/p>\n<p>Ford&#8217;s honeymoon period with the public did not last long.\u00a0One of Ford&#8217;s first actions as president was to grant Richard Nixon a full pardon, citing the need for the nation to heal and move past the trauma of Watergate. Ford thus prevented Nixon\u2019s indictment for any crimes he may have committed in office and ended criminal investigations into his actions. The public reacted with suspicion and outrage. Many were convinced that the extent of Nixon\u2019s wrongdoings would now never be known and he would never be called to account for them. Instead of promoting healing, as Ford had hoped, the pardon further stoked mistrust of those in power.\u00a0When Ford chose to run for the presidency in 1976, the pardon returned to haunt him.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"CNX_History_30_04_Pardon\">\n<div style=\"width: 400px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/courses-images-archive-read-only\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/884\/2015\/08\/23203417\/CNX_History_30_04_Pardon.jpg\" alt=\"A photograph shows Gerald Ford seated at a desk with a sheet of paper before him, speaking into a microphone.\" width=\"390\" height=\"253\" data-media-type=\"image\/jpeg\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\"><strong>Figure 2<\/strong>. In one of his first actions as president, Gerald R. Ford announced a full pardon for Richard Nixon on September 8, 1974. Nixon had appointed Ford vice president after the resignation of Spiro Agnew.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p id=\"fs-idp244123136\">As president, Ford confronted\u00a0a raft of challenging\u00a0issues, such as inflation, a depressed economy, and chronic energy shortages. He established his policies during his first year in office, despite opposition from a heavily Democratic Congress. In October 1974, he labeled inflation the country\u2019s most dangerous public enemy and sought a grassroots campaign to curtail it by encouraging people to be disciplined in their consuming habits and increase their savings. The campaign was titled \u201cWhip Inflation Now\u201d and was advertised on brightly colored \u201cWin\u201d buttons volunteers were to wear. When\u00a0inflation was compounded by sluggish economic growth\u2014a phenomenon known as <strong>stagflation<\/strong>\u2014Ford shifted to measures aimed at stimulating the economy. Still fearing inflation, however, he vetoed a number of nonmilitary appropriations bills that would have increased the already-large budget deficit.<\/p>\n<p id=\"fs-idp174769536\">Ford\u2019s economic policies ultimately proved unsuccessful. Because of opposition from a Democratic Congress, his foreign policy accomplishments were also limited. When he requested money to assist the South Vietnamese government in its effort to repel North Vietnamese forces, Congress refused. Ford was more successful in other parts of the world. He continued Nixon\u2019s policy of d\u00e9tente with the Soviet Union, and he and Secretary of State Kissinger achieved further progress in the second round of SALT talks.<span style=\"color: #ff6600;\">\u00a0<span style=\"color: #000000;\">In<\/span><\/span> August 1975, Ford went to Finland and signed the <strong>Helsinki Accords<\/strong> with Soviet premier Leonid Brezhnev. This agreement essentially accepted the territorial boundaries that had been established at the end of World War II in 1945. It also exacted a pledge from the signatory nations that they would protect human rights within their countries. Many\u00a0Americans of Eastern European ancestry\u00a0protested Ford\u2019s actions because it seemed as though he had accepted the status quo and left their homelands under Soviet domination. Others considered it a belated American acceptance of the world as it really was.<\/p>\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_f59a2ffd-e14a-4817-9e38-3dba8fbdf77c\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/f59a2ffd-e14a-4817-9e38-3dba8fbdf77c?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_f59a2ffd-e14a-4817-9e38-3dba8fbdf77c\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"textbox learning-objectives\">\n<h3>Glossary<\/h3>\n<p><strong>executive privilege<span style=\"color: #008000;\">:<\/span>\u00a0<\/strong>the right of the U.S. president to refuse subpoenas requiring him to disclose private communications on the grounds that this might interfere with the functioning of the executive branch<\/p>\n<p><strong>Helsinki Accords<\/strong>: an agreement between the United States, Europe, and the Soviet bloc that recognized each region&#8217;s territorial holdings and eased tensions among the major world powers<\/p>\n<p><strong>stagflation:\u00a0<\/strong>an economic dilemma experienced by the United States in the 1970s that combined high inflation with slow economic growth<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n\t\t\t <section class=\"citations-section\" role=\"contentinfo\">\n\t\t\t <h3>Candela Citations<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t <div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t <div id=\"citation-list-1881\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <div class=\"licensing\"><div class=\"license-attribution-dropdown-subheading\">CC licensed content, Original<\/div><ul class=\"citation-list\"><li>Modification, adaptation, and original content. <strong>Authored by<\/strong>: Mark Lempke for Lumen Learning. <strong>Provided by<\/strong>: Lumen Learning. <strong>License<\/strong>: <em><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"license\" href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-sa\/4.0\/\">CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike<\/a><\/em><\/li><\/ul><div class=\"license-attribution-dropdown-subheading\">CC licensed content, Shared previously<\/div><ul class=\"citation-list\"><li>US History. <strong>Provided by<\/strong>: OpenStax. <strong>Located at<\/strong>: <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/openstaxcollege.org\/textbooks\/us-history\">http:\/\/openstaxcollege.org\/textbooks\/us-history<\/a>. <strong>License<\/strong>: <em><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"license\" href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/\">CC BY: Attribution<\/a><\/em>. <strong>License Terms<\/strong>: Access for free at https:\/\/openstax.org\/books\/us-history\/pages\/1-introduction<\/li><\/ul><div class=\"license-attribution-dropdown-subheading\">All rights reserved content<\/div><ul class=\"citation-list\"><li>The Watergate Scandal: Timeline and Background. <strong>Provided by<\/strong>: WatchMojo. <strong>Located at<\/strong>: <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=IHnmriyXYeg&#038;feature=emb_imp_woyt\">https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=IHnmriyXYeg&#038;feature=emb_imp_woyt<\/a>. <strong>License<\/strong>: <em>Other<\/em>. <strong>License Terms<\/strong>: Standard YouTube License<\/li><\/ul><\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t <\/section><hr class=\"before-footnotes clear\" \/><div class=\"footnotes\"><ol><li id=\"footnote-1881-1\">Schulman, Seventies, 44. <a href=\"#return-footnote-1881-1\" class=\"return-footnote\" aria-label=\"Return to footnote 1\">&crarr;<\/a><\/li><\/ol><\/div>","protected":false},"author":23592,"menu_order":14,"template":"","meta":{"_candela_citation":"[{\"type\":\"cc\",\"description\":\"US History\",\"author\":\"\",\"organization\":\"OpenStax\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/openstaxcollege.org\/textbooks\/us-history\",\"project\":\"\",\"license\":\"cc-by\",\"license_terms\":\"Access for free at https:\/\/openstax.org\/books\/us-history\/pages\/1-introduction\"},{\"type\":\"original\",\"description\":\"Modification, adaptation, and original content\",\"author\":\"Mark Lempke for Lumen Learning\",\"organization\":\"Lumen Learning\",\"url\":\"\",\"project\":\"\",\"license\":\"cc-by-sa\",\"license_terms\":\"\"},{\"type\":\"copyrighted_video\",\"description\":\"The Watergate Scandal: Timeline and Background\",\"author\":\"\",\"organization\":\"WatchMojo\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=IHnmriyXYeg&feature=emb_imp_woyt\",\"project\":\"\",\"license\":\"other\",\"license_terms\":\"Standard YouTube License\"}]","CANDELA_OUTCOMES_GUID":"f1806333-132a-42bc-9336-6e4a27b480c4,5cbc132f-7105-4db9-a465-dbc7468901bf,d1d952ac-99a6-4f8f-a44a-f793f303e6de","pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-1881","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":389,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/1881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23592"}],"version-history":[{"count":29,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/1881\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9694,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/1881\/revisions\/9694"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/389"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/1881\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=1881"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=1881"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=1881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}