The Watergate Scandal :: President Richard Nixon

The tapesThe hearings held by the Senate Watergate Committee, in which Dean was the star witness and in which many former(a) former key administration officials gave dramatic testimony, were broadcast through close to of the summer, causing devastating political damage to Nixon. The Senate investigators also discovered a crucial fact on July 13 Alexander Butterfield, deputy participator to the President, revea guide during an interview with a committee staff member that a tape system in the White House automatically recorded everything in the Oval Officetape recordings that could prove whether Nixon or Dean was telling the truth about key meetings. The tapes were soon subpoenaed by both be and the Senate.Nixon refused, citing the theory of executive privilege, and consistent Cox, via Attorney General Richardson, to drop his subpoena. Coxs refusal led to the "Saturday Night Massacre" on October 20, 1973, when Nixon compelled the resignations of Richardson and then his de puty in a search for someone in the Justice Department willing to give the gate Cox. This search ended with Robert Bork, and the new acting department head ignore the special prosecutor. Allegations of wrongdoing caused Nixon to famously state "I am non a crook" in front of 400 Associated Press managing editors at Walt Disney World in Florida on November 17.While Nixon continued to refuse to overrule over actual tapes, he did agree to release edited transcripts of a large number. These largely confirmed Deans account, and caused further embarrassment when a crucial, 18 portion of one tape, which had never been out of White House custody, was make to have been erased. The White House blamed this on Nixons secretary, Rose bloody shame Woods, who said she had accidentally erased the tape by pushing the wrong pick pedal on her tape player while answering the environ. However, as photos splashed all over the press showed, for Woods to answer the phone and keep her foot on the pedal involved a debauch that would have challenged many a gymnast. She was then said to have held this stick for the full 18 minutes. Later forensic analysis determined that the breach had been erased severalperhaps as many as nine generation over, refuting the "accidental erasure" explanation..This issue of access to the tapes went all the way to the compulsory Court and on July 24, 1974 the Court unanimously ruled in fall in States v. Nixon that Nixons claim of executive privilege over the tapes was void and they further ordered him to surrender them to special prosecutor Leon Jaworski.