General outline

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General outline I. Overview Time-line II.
Watergate A criminal definition III. The Fourth
Estate Before, during after 1. Post-Tet 2.
During Watergate 3. Post-Watergate IV.
Trajectory chart
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Congratulations!

• Dr. Julie Ferris!

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• Overview What Was Watergate?
• "Watergate" is a general term used to describe a
  complex web of political scandals between 1972
  and 1974.
• The word refers to the Watergate Hotel in
  Washington D.C.
• In addition to the hotel, the Watergate complex
  houses many business offices, including the
  office of the Democratic National Committee was
  burgled on June 17th, 1972.

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"Watergate" is now an all-encompassing term used
to refer to

• political burglary
• bribery
• extortion
• wiretapping (phone-tapping)
• conspiracy

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• AND
• obstruction of justice
• destruction of evidence
• tax fraud
• illegal use of the Central Intelligence Agency
  (C.I.A.)
• illegal use of the Federal Bureau of
  Investigations (F.B.I.)
• illegal campaign contributions
• use of public (taxpayers') money for private
  purposes
• Source webusers.anet-stl.com/civil/govlieswaterg
  ate.html

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Nixon campaigns, 1968
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Nixon on the beach
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I. Time-line
1966 Washington Post hires Bernstein 1971
Woodward
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• 1972, June 17 (230 AM) Watergate burglars
  arrested

G. Gordon Liddy
E. Howard Hunt
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Ideological commitment, yes. Moral
complications, no.
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1972-73 The Washington Posts staff dedicates
itself to the developing story.
Ben Bradlee, Editor
Katherine Graham, Publisher
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Carl Bernstein, Catherine Graham Bob Woodward
at the Washington Post, ca. 1972
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Aug.-Oct. 1972Woodward Bernstein break the
case with investigative reporting

• They
• tied burglars to the White House
• implicated former AG John Mitchell as the source
  of the burglars funding
• exposed Nixons dirty tricks campaign strategy
• connected the White House appointments secy.
  directly to the break-in, and
• identified Nixon chief-of-staff H.R. Haldeman to
  payments made from a secret campaign fund.
  (Streitmatter, p. 207)

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1973, August VP Spiro Agnew faces charges of
tax evasion, leading to his resignation.
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Pop culture responds
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1973, May AG Elliott Richardson appoints a
special prosecutor, Archibald Cox. 1973, Oct.
The Saturday Night Massacre where Nixon has
Robert Bork fire Cox, after Richardson and Dep.
AG Wm. Ruckleshaus had resigned to avoid the duty.
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1974, June 24 The 18-minute gap on the office
tapes.

• The smoking gun
• Rosemary Wood

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1974, August 9 Nixon resigns
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III. The Fourth Estate Before, during and after
1. Post-Tet (1968) 2.) During Watergate Deep
Throat Code name for Woodward Bernsteins
secret source.
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Mainstream opponent of the Posts

• e.g.
• Newsweek
• AP
• UPI
• The New York Times
• The Washington Star
• El Diario de Los Americas.

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The interpretive approach to cases like Watergate
shows that the exception highlights the
rule. (Remember James Carey John Pauley in
David Mindichs article on Douglass.)
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3.) Post-Watergate keywords

• Retrenchment
• Revisionism

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IV. Trajectory chart

• From the radical perspective of The Post
• Outsiders/opponents? The mainstream press and the
  White House
• Goal for change? Exposing the president as a
  criminal
• Mainstream presss ideological base? Preserving
  the status quo uninterested in rocking the boat.
• Outcome? Nixon resigns the Fourth Estate returns
  to normal, a less confrontational relationship
  to govt.