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Washington, D.C. June 17, 1972
Five men break into the Democratic National Committee headquarters in the Watergate Office
Building.
They tried to set up a wiretap and photograph confidential Democratic Party documents.
However, the police caught them in the act and arrested them.
Little did most know, these men were connected with the Committee for the Re-Election of
the President, or CRP, or CREEP (hee hee), the organization directly tied to President
Richard Nixon in order to help him get re-elected.
Flash forward to May 1973, and thanks to multiple ongoing investigations, now more and more
Americans are thinking the Nixon administration was directly linked to the Watergate break-in.
The U.S. Senate Watergate Committee began public hearings, and the Nixon administration
appointed Archibald Cox to lead a separate, independent investigation.
Flash forward again to July 1973, and Americans found out that there is a new system in the
White House that automatically records everything in the Oval Office and Cabinet Room.
In other words, if Nixon was in on the Watergate break-in or even if he just knew about it
and was trying to cover it up, there could be evidence of it in the recordings.
Cox, as well as the Senate, immediately subpoenaed the White House recordings, or required that
they be submitted to court as evidence.
However, Nixon refused to release them, citing his “executive privilege” as the president.
He even ordered Cox to drop his subpoena, and after Cox refused, Nixon had him fired.
Not a good look there, Nixon.
But the investigations only picked up.
In what eventually became known as The Watergate Scandal, a total of 69 people were indicted
and 48 people convicted for either participating in, aiding in, or covering up information
about the Watergate break-in.
MANY of these folks were top Nixon administration officials.
By early 1974, it seemed pretty clear that President Nixon had at least known about the
Watergate break-in and tried to cover it up.
However, there was little solid evidence, and Nixon had still refused to give up the
recordings.
On March 1, 1974, a grand jury, or special jury selected to see if an accusation was
valid or not, indicted SEVEN former aides of Nixon, who later simply became known as
the “Watergate Seven.”
Nixon could feel the walls closing in on him.
In April, the dude who took Cox’s place to investigate the Watergate break-in, Leon
Jaworski, had another subpoena, but this one just ordered Nixon to release certain tapes
and papers.
Well, Nixon could feel the heat, but still didn’t want to release the recordings.
Instead, he turned over edited transcripts of some of the conversations.
After Nixon’s lawyer, James St. Clair, asked Judge John Sirica of the U.S. District Court
for the District of Columbia to reverse the subpoena, Judge Sirica said:
“The President wants me to argue that he is as powerful a monarch as Louis XIV (14th),
only four years at a time, and is not subject to the processes of any court in the land
except the court of impeachment.”
Oh snap there, Judge.
So uh yeah.
Sirica denied the motion and ordered Nixon turn over the tapes by May 31st.
In response, Nixon and Jaworski appealed directly to the Supreme Court, who heard oral arguments
on July 8th.
Justice William Rehnquist, who had close connections with several of the Watergate conspirators,
decided to recuse himself from the case, or excuse himself since he might be too biased.
Again, Nixon argued he had “executive privilege,” which apparently I forgot to define earlier
in this video.
Uh, “executive privilege” just means that a President can withhold information from
the public IF it’s in the public’s best interest.
Whatever that means, amirite?
Anyway, Nixon said executive privilege gave him the power to withhold the tapes.
He also argued that the whole matter shouldn’t even be dealt with in the courts since it
was a dispute WITHIN the executive branch.
Besides, even if the judicial branch WAS to chime in, it should respect the need for executive
confidentiality, man.
So the main thing the Court first had to figure out was whether or not they had the authority
to determine if a President was ok to use executive privilege in certain circumstances.
And they determined that they DID.
On July 24, 1974, the Court announced they had sided against Nixon.
It was unanimous.
The Court said that a claim of executive privilege by the President in this case was unconstitutional.
Therefore, Nixon had to deliver the subpoenaed recordings ASAP.
While the Court acknowledged that executive privilege did exist…it was a legit thing
in certain areas of military or diplomatic affairs, the Court could also step in if they
thought the executive privilege violated the “fundamental demands of due process of law
in the fair administration of justice.”
In other words, if executive privilege was preventing the courts from doing their jobs,
then it could be overridden.
United States v. Nixon was a landmark case that solidified the idea that no one, not
even the President, is above the law.
It was the first case in which the Supreme Court ruled that executive privilege exists,
but it said that it is a QUALIFIED privilege as opposed to an ABSOLUTE one.
In the case with Nixon’s secret recordings, it was in the public interest to have them
released, and in the end, most people just came to realize that Nixon wanted them secret
not to protect the country, but only to protect himself.
In fact, just 16 days after the decision, Nixon became the first and only President
in American history to resign.
I’ll see you for the next Supreme Court case, jury!
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So what are YOUR thoughts on executive privilege?
Should the President ever be above the law?
Which Supreme Court case should I cover for this series next?
Ok that’s enough questions.
What am I?
A lawyer?
I’d like to hear from you.