Politics
In his inaugural address in January, President Richard M. Nixon said that he saw his second term as '... the chance ... to restore respect for law....' The restoration got off to a slow start during the next 12 months, and the White House's role in it was not exactly what the president had in mind.
By fall his vice-president had resigned and been placed on probation after pleading nolo contendere to a charge of income tax evasion; his former attorney general and former secretary of commerce were facing trial for perjury and conspiracy to defraud the United States; his 1972 deputy campaign director was threatened with jail; and two men who had worked for the White House were in prison.
The Agnew affair.
The most astonishing blow was the resignation of Vice-President Spiro T. Agnew on October 10, the same day he pleaded nolo contendere to a charge of income tax evasion. Agnew was only the second vice-president in the history of the United States to resign his office. The first was John C. Calhoun, who in 1832 left to take a Senate seat from South Carolina.
On August 6, Agnew announced that he had been informed that he was under investigation for possible violation of criminal statutes. From that time until his resignation he steadfastly maintained his innocence. In court in Baltimore on October 10, however, he stated, 'I admit that I did receive payments during the year 1967 which were not expended for political purposes and that, therefore, these payments were income taxable to me in that year and that I so knew.'
Other charges against Agnew, including bribery and extortion, were dropped. Summarizing the case that the government had put together, then Attorney General Elliot Richardson stated that '... this evidence establishes a pattern of substantial cash payments to the defendant during the period when he served as governor of Maryland in return for engineering contracts with the state of Maryland.' According to the attorney general, Agnew had also been receiving funds illegally from the early 1960's, when he was a Maryland county executive, until December 1972, when he was vice-president.
Agnew received a sentence of three years' probation and was fined $10,000. And his troubles were not yet over. Although prosecutors in Maryland agreed not to pursue any possible state criminal charges against him, the Internal Revenue Service was still combing through Agnew's tax returns for further unreported income, with the possibility that more penalties might be assessed. The state bar association also began disbarment proceedings.
The Ford nomination.
The 25th Amendment to the Constitution provides that when 'there is a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both houses of Congress.' On October 12, just two days after Agnew's resignation, President Nixon announced his choice before a festive gathering at the East Room of the White House: Gerald R. Ford, Jr. (R, Mich.), a U.S. representative for 25 years and House minority leader since 1965, would be the 40th vice-president of the United States. The nomination won favorable reaction from both Republicans and Democrats—even Ford's ideological opponents conceded his integrity and fairness—and in any ordinary year would have had smooth sailing through Congress.
But this was not an ordinary year, and the ghosts of Agnew, Eagleton, and Watergate haunted Ford's confirmation hearings. House and Senate panels sought to determine, first, whether anything in Ford's past disqualified him for the vice-presidency and, second, what kind of president Ford might make if President Nixon were forced to step down.
On the first score the results were reassuring. The FBI conducted an intensive investigation and came up with little. Ford voluntarily turned over all his financial records for an IRS audit, and when notified that he had underpaid his 1972 income tax by $435.77, he promptly paid it. During Senate Rules Committee hearings the most serious charges were brought by lobbyist Robert Winter-Berger, the author of The Washington Payoff. Winter-Berger alleged that Ford had been treated for a year by a New York psychotherapist, Dr. Arnold Hutschnecker; Hutschnecker denied it, and so did Ford. Winter-Berger also claimed that he himself had passed on to Ford some $15,000 'to get an ear in court.' None of this was documented; all of it Ford denied; and Winter-Berger's sworn statement was sent to the Justice Department for possible prosecution for perjury.
On matters of high policy Ford presented himself as loyal to President Nixon but independent-minded. He would, he said, have surrendered the tapes to Judge Sirica earlier than the president had chosen to; and on executive privilege he tried to steer a middle course between confidentiality and disclosure. Overall, Senate Rules Committee Chairman Howard Cannon (D, Nevada) described him as a 'very open, forthright witness, not at all evasive.'
