What exactly did Richard Nixon do so wrong?

Answer 1

Does anyone believe that Nixon was NOT trying illegally to protect guilty members in his administration, who afterall were doing his bidding and went to jail for it, whether or not he personally told them to bug the Democratic Reelection Committee. And there is, of course, the famous 'smoking gun' tape, which convinced members of his own party that he should be impeached. If he hadn't resigned, he'd have been convicted and gone to jail. So, WHO believes he was innocent? Perhaps the same people who believe the earth is 6,000 years old, i.e. true believers!

For another point of view...

1. In 1964 president Johnson asked Congress permission for war against North Vietnam and he got it. Many people think that Nixon should have asked the same every time he extended the war. But in the mean time many congresmen and senators had changed their minds about this never ending war and the answer could have been negative.

It was difficult for Nixon however to ask permission because then the ennemy would have known about his plans beforehand. He did discus the matter with some individual senators.

2. When Hunt, Liddy and McCoy organized the burglary in the Watergate building, Nixon knew nothing about it and when he heard about it, he was told that no people in the White House were involved. So he tried to suppress further investigation of the FBI, not because to protect guilty people, but because unnecessary publicity would be damaging for the election and for innocent people.

The FBI and the CIA convinced him that this was not a case of national security and that suppressing would be unlawful. So within two weeks he said "go ahead" to the FBI-chief.

The tapes do not prove that Nixon ordered the burglary or that he definitively hid the truth. In the opnion of people however hen obstructed justice by not giving the tapes immediately so that his considering of hiding the truth was unnoticed for many months. But Nixon was forgotton his considerations two years earlier and did not know about that smoking gun tape. What he wanted to hide were all kinds of conversations that had nothing to do with Watergate.

Everythings shows that the senators were not after the truth, but for political reasons after Nixon. Because there was so little evidence for the Watergate case, they used the tapes to prove that Nixon committed all kinds of crimes.

All these people do not consider the fact that a war was goning on inside the country about civil rights. And that a war was going on in Vietnam; that publication of the secret Pentagon Papers could possibly endanger American soldiers in Vietnam. Foreign leaders were amazed about all the fuss. What amazes me however is that after all these years Americans still take Watergate seriously.

Back to another point of view, answering the question, Why take Watergate seriously?...

What Nixon did wrong was to think he could get away with abusing the power of the Executive branch, a classic case of paranoid hubris. The American people, Republicans as well as Democrats, were horrified to learn what dirty tricks the Nixon Administration and the Nixon Reelection Committee were up to.

Impeachment is by definition and practice a political act involving, not the courts, but the Legislative branch. The act of lying to the American people on serious matters, part of the famous 'cover-up', was enough to get him impeached. His erratic behavior (inspired by hatred of his progressive 'enemies' who he was out to get) frightened the country, not to mention the world, and contributed to his downfall. For a detailed month by month account of those momentous days read Elizabeth Drew's Washington Journal.

No one thought then, and only the extreme right-wing thinks now, that Nixon was innocent or unfairly treated by a democratic system that proved, to liberals and conservatives alike, that it worked. Future presidents will think twice. That's why Watergate is taken seriously.

Answer 2

The charges all centered around Nixon's belief that the Presidency was above the law.

Three articles of impeachment (for abuse of power, obstruction of justice, and contempt of Congress) were drafted by Congress but the case never proceeded.

Nixon resigned to make impeachment a moot point and Ford's pardon of Nixon made indictment impossible.

Answer 3

Breaking congressional law of wiretapping without a warrant and trying to claim he was above the law ("executive privilege" was what he called it). He also refused to comply with subpoenas from the Supreme Court to hand over recorded tapes of his phone calls, with interfered with the trial, a federal crime.

Answer 4

Nixon's big mistake was attempting to cover up the Watergate burglary. I do not think he knew about the burglary before it happened, but if he did, that was his first big mistake. One could also fault him for having a campaign staff that wanted to win so bad that it engaged in such dirty tricks.

Answer 5

President Richard Nixon was using wiretaps and he also refused to comply with handing over potential evidence. President Nixon resigned from office in 1974.

Answer 6

Richard Nixon's alleged wrongdoing was trying to cover up the events of Watergate. Richard Nixon was never accused of ordering the Watergate break-in.