Richard Nixon 1968-1974

When was Nixon elected

1968 election

MLK assassinated

4 April 1968

Bobby Kennedy assassinated

5th June 1968 @ California primary

Kerner Report

February 1968 ‘separate and unequal’

1968 social unrest- protests

in the first 6 months of 1968 40,000 students took part in demonstrations

Tet Offensive

January 1968

Walter Cronkite ‘mired in stalemate’

February 1968

Approval rates of LBJ and Vietnam

By February 1968- 60% US disapproved of Johnsons handling of the war

LBJ televised speech announcing Paris negotiations

31st May 1968

New Hampshire democrat primary

March 1968

McCarthy 42%

LBK 48%- decides not to run again

LBJ announces decision not to run for 1968 presidential election

31st March 1968

who replaced LBJ as another democrat candidate

Hubert Humphrey

Democrat primaries

Bobby Kennedy won Indiana

McCarthy won Oregon- BKs first defeat

Bobby Kennedy won California

Hubert Humphrey announced as official democrat presidential candidate

Democratic National convention- 28th August 1968

Dixiecrat candidate?

George Wallace

George Wallace appoints VP Curtis Lemay- spoke of using nuclear weapons in Vietnam ‘bombsy twins’

October 1968

Hubert Humphreys Salt Lake City speech- distanced him from Johnsons foreign policy and proposed stopping bombing in NV

October 1968

acceleration of the Paris negotiations

27 October 1968- US and NV agreed to stop bombing and properly negotiate from 2 Nov

SV President- Thieu- not informed- Nixon exploited this by sending a letter bigging himself off- sabotage

1968 Presidential election results

Nixon 43.4% popular vote- 32 states

Humphrey 42.7% popular vote- 13 states

Wallace- 13.5% popular vote- 5 states

Nixon’s VPs

Spiro Agnew- resigned 10 October 1973- accused oof extortion + bribery

Gerald Ford- became President 9th August 1974

Secretary of State

William Rogers

National Security advisor

Henry Kissinger- powerful in foreign policy

Chief of Staff

Bob Haldeman

Domestic affairs advisor

John Ehrlichman

Attorney

when did the Republican party shift begin?

1964- Barry Goldwater ran for President- 5/6 deep South states won by Goldwater- democrats lost the South

Nixon’s Silent Majority speech

3rd November 1969- Vietnam

1972 Election Results

Nixon 46.7 mil popular vote- 520 ECV

McGovern- 28.9 mil popular vote- 17 ECV

Eliminated the ‘Post Office department in cabinet;

1971

Refused to pass the ‘Clean Water Act’

1972

Domestic policy- welfare

closed 59 Job Corps centre’s

Family Assistance Plan- $1600 yearly- rejected by Congress

1971- Child Development Act- free childcare to mother- Nixon vetoed

increased federal spending on education, private healthcare and social security

Domestic Policy- racial inequality

Busing- 20 April 1971 ‘Swann V Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education’- SC upheld busing

1974- ‘Miliken V Bradley’ SC justified continued defacto segregation if it was geographical not intentional

Domestic policy- law and order

1966 ‘Miranda V Arizona’ SC ruling gave the accused more rights than the victims- code of conduct for police investigations

1970- prosecuted the Chicago 8

Nixon invited Elvis Presley to the White House

1971

Newsweek poll 1969 showed — Americans believed protestors were treated too leniently

84%

Students blew up buildings at the University of Colarado

October- November 1969

Ohio state university students demanded the admission of more black students

October- November 1969- 7 shot

what caused increase protests

Spring 1970- Nixon extended the Vietnam war to Cambodia- anti-war protests in 80% universities

Kent State University (Ohio) protest

4 May 1970- 4 students shot

Jackson State University Protest

14 May 1970- killed 2 students + injured 12

Hard Hat Riot- NYC

8 May 1970- construction workers attacked protestors

Vietnam war veterans threw away their medals at the Washington capitol

23rd April 1971

Gallup opinion polling company stopped doing monthly surveys in favor of Vietnam as they reached a low of —

May 1971- 28%

Nixon declared the war was over 3 times to deter anti-war protests

1969,1972, 1973

how Nixon attempted to relate to youth

Tricia Nixon hosted WH tea for Finch college alumni- invited Grace Slick- planned to lace the punch with LSD- invite withdrawn

adjustments to the draft for the Vietnam war

August 1972- students over 20 no longer called up

1973- removed the draft

success of Busing because by 1970 less than — AA students in segregated schools

10%

Executive order 11246 ‘Philadelphia plan’

affirmative action- required government contractors in Philadelphia to hire minority workers until they had reached their target

universities began ‘black studies’ courses

Harvard, Duke and Cornell

First Black Congress women

1968- Shirly Chrisholm

Black congressional caucus formed- 13 members

1971

1968 inflation

4.7%

By 1970 unemployment

6%

New economic policy

August 1971

peacetime wage-price freeze, devaluation of dollar

July 1973 further devaluation of the dollar

Abandoned wage and price controls

1973

‘Great inflation of —’

1973

America consumed — world oil

1/3

— American oil came from the Middle East

30%

Arab-Israeli War ‘Yom Kippur’ war

1973

Organisation of Petroleim Exporting Countries’ OPEC ban on trade with US

1973

— % price increase in oil

387%

Americans paid — more for heating oil and petrol

30%

Nixon’s key policies in Vietnam

Peace with honor

Vietnamisation

Secret diplomacy

Nixon’s 1968 Election proposal on Vietnam

‘secret plan’

‘Madman Theory’- wanted NV to think he would do anything

1968 conversation with Bob Haldeman

Mai Lai Massacre exposed

1969

Nixon extended the Vietnam war to Laos and Cambodia

1970

Lam Son Offensive- Vietnamisation

1971- 5000 SV troops

Bombed Hanoi and Port of Haiphong

1972

1972 polls showed — felt it was important that SV didn’t fall to the communists

74%

North Vietnam proposed peace deal

October 1972

Christmas bombing camapign NV

Winter 1972

Paris Peace Accords

23rd January 1973

Henry Kissinger context

Grew up in Germany as an orthodox Jew

Witnessed impact of Treaty of Versailles 1919

Family fled 1938

Drafted to WW2 1943

returned to US and went Havard 1947

‘realpolitik’

Kissinger secretly visited China- Zhou Enlai- Maos deputy

1971

Kissinger visits Moscow to organize talks on nuclear weapons

before Nixon’s visit 22 May 1972

Nixon visits Moscow

22 May 1972

SALT 1- Strategic Arms Limitations Treaty

May 1972- froze teh number of strategic

Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty

1972- limited the number of locations a country could protect with missiles to 2

Four Powers Agreement- Britain, France, USSR, US

September 1971- soviets recognised Western access rights to West Berlin

Basic Treaty- East + West Germany

1972- recognising their permanence and validity

Breznev visited Washington

1973

Castro regime in Cuba asked US (via USSR) to promise not to attack

1970

Soviets began to expand their naval base in Cuba- potential Cuban Missile Crisis 2.0

October 1970

election of socialist president Salvador Allende in Chile

1970

US cut — million in American aid to Chile

$70 million

coup de-tat in Chile led to a dictatorship under General Augusto Pinochet

September 1973

The Zhenbao Island Incident

1969- 7 month war between China and Soviets

‘— —’ democracy in china

ping pong

The Pentagon Papers leaked

June 1971- Daniel Ellsburg- published by NYT

The leak of the pentagon papers leads to the creation of…

CREEP

The Plumbers

5 men arrested inside the Watergate hotel, contact Howard Hunt (ex-CIA and member of CREEP) on one of their phones

17 June 1972

the 5 men indited for conspiracy, burglary + $500,000 from CREEP used to pay legal fees

15 September 1972

Reported that one of the burglars worked for the Republican party

19 June 1972

Nixon suggested using the CIA to block FBI investigation into Watergate- this became the ‘smoking gun’ tape which was released August 1974

23rd June 1972

Washington journalist Bob Woodward began to receive classified intelligence from a source known as — eventually found to be —

Deep throat- Mark Flet director of the FBI

Burglars convicted by Judge John Sircia

January 1973

Judge Sirica receives a letter alleging perjury in the trial to cover up the role of the White House

March 1973

Nixon’s advisors John Ehrlichman and Bob Haldeman implicated in the scandal — and later — reisgn

17 April 1973

30 April 1973

Senate committee established to look into the Waterg