WATERGATE: Was The Nixon White House Involved?                  What was Watergate? "Watergate" is a term used to describe a complex web of political scandals occurring between 1972 and 1974. On January 20, 1969, Richard M. Nixon had become the thirty-seventh president of the United States. As Nixon entered the White House, he was "full of bitterness and anger about past defeats, and about years of perceived slights from others in the political establishment." Nixon, a Republican, once stated that, "Washington …showed first 75 words of 3212 total…

…showed last 75 words of 3212 total…Rather than face almost assured impeachment, Nixon resigned on August 9, the first U.S. president to do so. A month later his successor, Gerald Ford pardoned him for all crimes he might have committed while in office; Nixon was then immune from fedral prosecution. President Nixon and his cabinet members failed to realize that the constitutional system of checks and balances would work to prevent abuses as it was intended to by the Founding Fathers.