I am not a crook!
It was on November 17, 1973 (39 years ago today) that President Richard M. Nixon made his famous and oft-quoted remark "I am not a crook!" He made the remark at a televised press conference in a long and somewhat rambling response to a reporter from a newspaper in Tennessee. At the end of the answer he said:
"So that when I, in 1968, decided to become a candidate for President, I decided to clean the decks and to put everything in real estate. I sold all my stock for $300,000--that is all I owned. I sold my apartment in New York for $300,000--I am using rough figures here. And I had $100,000 coming to me from the law firm.
"And so, that is where the money came from. Let me just say this, and I want to say this to the television audience: I made my mistakes, but in all of my years of public life, I have never profited, never profited from public service--I have earned every cent. And in all of my years of public life, I have never obstructed justice. And I think, too, that I could say that in my years of public life, that I welcome this kind of examination, because people have got to know whether or not their President is a crook. Well, I am not a crook. I have earned everything I have got."
A transcript of much of that press conference can be found here and following is a YouTube video of Nixon making that statement:
The press conference occurred amid the Watergate investigation, and just over a month after the October 10th resignation of Vice President Agnew amid allegations against Agnew, unrelated to Watergate, of bribery, tax evasion and money laundering from when he was Maryland's governor.
A legal battle continued over the release of tapes of conversations that Nixon had in the oval office and in April of the following year Nixon announced the release of 1,200 pages of transcripts of White House conversations between him and his aides. The House Judiciary Committee began impeachment hearings against Nixon on May 9, 1974, which were televised on the major networks. These hearings resulted in votes for articles of impeachment, the first being 27–11 in favor on July 27, 1974 on obstruction of justice.
On July 24, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the full tapes, not just selected transcripts must be released.
Even with support diminished by the continuing series of revelations, Nixon hoped to ride out the storm. However, one of the new tapes, recorded soon after the break-in, demonstrated that Nixon had been told of the White House connection to the Watergate burglaries soon after they took place, and had approved plans to thwart the investigation. In a statement accompanying the release of the "Smoking Gun Tape" on August 5, 1974, Nixon accepted blame for misleading the country about when he had been told of the truth behind the Watergate break-in, stating that he had a lapse of memory. He met with Republican congressional leaders soon after, and was told he faced certain impeachment in the House and had, at most, 15 senators prepared to vote for his acquittal—far fewer than the 34 he needed to avoid removal from office. Faced with that reality, Nixon resigned from office on August 9, 1974, the only president ever to do so.
"So that when I, in 1968, decided to become a candidate for President, I decided to clean the decks and to put everything in real estate. I sold all my stock for $300,000--that is all I owned. I sold my apartment in New York for $300,000--I am using rough figures here. And I had $100,000 coming to me from the law firm.
"And so, that is where the money came from. Let me just say this, and I want to say this to the television audience: I made my mistakes, but in all of my years of public life, I have never profited, never profited from public service--I have earned every cent. And in all of my years of public life, I have never obstructed justice. And I think, too, that I could say that in my years of public life, that I welcome this kind of examination, because people have got to know whether or not their President is a crook. Well, I am not a crook. I have earned everything I have got."
A transcript of much of that press conference can be found here and following is a YouTube video of Nixon making that statement:
The press conference occurred amid the Watergate investigation, and just over a month after the October 10th resignation of Vice President Agnew amid allegations against Agnew, unrelated to Watergate, of bribery, tax evasion and money laundering from when he was Maryland's governor.
A legal battle continued over the release of tapes of conversations that Nixon had in the oval office and in April of the following year Nixon announced the release of 1,200 pages of transcripts of White House conversations between him and his aides. The House Judiciary Committee began impeachment hearings against Nixon on May 9, 1974, which were televised on the major networks. These hearings resulted in votes for articles of impeachment, the first being 27–11 in favor on July 27, 1974 on obstruction of justice.
On July 24, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the full tapes, not just selected transcripts must be released.
Even with support diminished by the continuing series of revelations, Nixon hoped to ride out the storm. However, one of the new tapes, recorded soon after the break-in, demonstrated that Nixon had been told of the White House connection to the Watergate burglaries soon after they took place, and had approved plans to thwart the investigation. In a statement accompanying the release of the "Smoking Gun Tape" on August 5, 1974, Nixon accepted blame for misleading the country about when he had been told of the truth behind the Watergate break-in, stating that he had a lapse of memory. He met with Republican congressional leaders soon after, and was told he faced certain impeachment in the House and had, at most, 15 senators prepared to vote for his acquittal—far fewer than the 34 he needed to avoid removal from office. Faced with that reality, Nixon resigned from office on August 9, 1974, the only president ever to do so.