The Watergate Scandal
The Watergate Scandal
Victoria Daniele
Constitutional History
May 19, 2013
The Watergate Scandal involved a number of illegal activities that were designed to help President Richard Nixon win re-election. The scandal involved burglary, wiretapping, campaign financing violations, and the use of government agencies to harm political opponents. A major part of the scandal was also the cover-up of all these illegal actions. The Watergate Scandal got its name from the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C. This large office building was the home of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) headquarters, and the site of the break-in that began the largest scandal in American politics. However, even before the break-in, President Nixon had begun illegal operations.
In January 1972, G. Gordon Liddy[->0], general counsel to the Committee for the Re-Election of the President[->1] (CRP), presented a campaign intelligence plan to CRP's Acting Chairman Jeb Stuart Magruder[->2], Attorney General John Mitchell[->3], and Presidential Counsel John Dean[->4], that involved extensive illegal activities against the Democratic Party[->5]. Mitchell viewed the plan as unrealistic, but two months later was alleged to have approved a reduced version of the plan which involved burgling the Democratic National Committee's (DNC) headquarters at the Watergate Complex[->6] in Washington, D.C. The ostensible purpose of this was to photograph documents and install listening devices. Liddy was nominally in charge of the operation, but has since insisted that he was duped by Dean and at least two of his subordinates. These included former CIA officers E. Howard Hunt[->7] and James McCord[->8], then CRP-Security Coordinator; John Mitchell had by then resigned as Attorney General to become chairman of the CRP."WATERGATE RETROSPECTIVE: THE DECLINE AND FALL"[->9], Time Magazine, August 19, 1974
After two attempts to break into the Watergate Complex failed to yield information of
Victoria Daniele
Constitutional History
May 19, 2013
The Watergate Scandal involved a number of illegal activities that were designed to help President Richard Nixon win re-election. The scandal involved burglary, wiretapping, campaign financing violations, and the use of government agencies to harm political opponents. A major part of the scandal was also the cover-up of all these illegal actions. The Watergate Scandal got its name from the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C. This large office building was the home of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) headquarters, and the site of the break-in that began the largest scandal in American politics. However, even before the break-in, President Nixon had begun illegal operations.
In January 1972, G. Gordon Liddy[->0], general counsel to the Committee for the Re-Election of the President[->1] (CRP), presented a campaign intelligence plan to CRP's Acting Chairman Jeb Stuart Magruder[->2], Attorney General John Mitchell[->3], and Presidential Counsel John Dean[->4], that involved extensive illegal activities against the Democratic Party[->5]. Mitchell viewed the plan as unrealistic, but two months later was alleged to have approved a reduced version of the plan which involved burgling the Democratic National Committee's (DNC) headquarters at the Watergate Complex[->6] in Washington, D.C. The ostensible purpose of this was to photograph documents and install listening devices. Liddy was nominally in charge of the operation, but has since insisted that he was duped by Dean and at least two of his subordinates. These included former CIA officers E. Howard Hunt[->7] and James McCord[->8], then CRP-Security Coordinator; John Mitchell had by then resigned as Attorney General to become chairman of the CRP."WATERGATE RETROSPECTIVE: THE DECLINE AND FALL"[->9], Time Magazine, August 19, 1974
After two attempts to break into the Watergate Complex failed to yield information of