Mr. Fasano’s English Class

I remember clearly the day Nixon resigned.

On this day in 1972, five men were arrested inside the Democratic National Committee’s (DNC) office. They were later charged with attempted burglary and attempted interception of telephone and other communications. On September 15, a grand jury indicted them and two other men (E. Howard Hunt, Jr. and G. Gordon Liddy) for conspiracy, burglary and violation of federal wiretapping laws.

The purpose of the break-in is slightly complex, but here goes. Former Howard Hughes business associate John H. Meier, working with Hubert Humphrey, wanted to feed misinformation to Richard Nixon. Meier told Richard Nixon’s brother, Donald, that he was sure the Democrats would win the election since they had a lot of information on Nixon’s illicit dealings with Howard Hughes that had never been released. Meier told Donald Nixon that Larry O’Brien, the Chairman of the DNC, had the information. This provided the President with the motivation to order the break-in of O’Brien’s office as he wanted to see if anything was going to break before the election.

All seven men arrested were either directly or indirectly employees of President Nixon’s Committee to Re-elect the President, CREEP, and many people, including the trial judge, John J. Sirica, suspected a conspiracy involving higher-ups in the government. The scandal revealed the existence of a White House dirty tricks squad, which was behind an orchestrated campaign of political sabotage, an enemies list, a “plumbers” unit to plug political leaks and a secret campaign slush fund associated with CREEP, all with high-level administration involvement. It brought into the open the involvement of Attorney General John N. Mitchell in the dirty tricks, funds and cover-up, as well as key White House advisers, all of whom went to prison for these crimes, for sentences of one to four years. The jail terms had been shortened on the basis of the high level of the convicted, and their cooperation in the hearings.