RN

by Richard Nixon

  Just as Kissinger was about to leave, I took him from the Lincoln Sitting Room into the Lincoln Bedroom right next to it. In Lincoln’s time, long before the West Wing had been built, this had been the President’s office. It contains one of the five copies of the Gettysburg Address in Lincoln’s own handwriting, as well as the desk he used at his summer White House—the Old Soldiers’ Home in the District of Columbia.

  I told Kissinger that I realized that, like me, he was not one to wear his religion on his sleeve. I said that we probably had different religious beliefs if we were to examine them in a strictly technical way, but that deep down I knew he had just as strong a belief in a Supreme Being—just as strong a belief in God—as I did. On an impulse I told him how every night, when I had finished working in the Lincoln Sitting Room, I would stop and kneel briefly and, following my mother’s Quaker custom, pray silently for a few moments before going to bed. I asked him to pray with me now, and we knelt.

  After Kissinger left, I went back to work on the speech. I wrote: “As a private citizen, I shall continue to fight for the great causes to which I have been dedicated throughout my service as congressman, senator, Vice President, and President—peace not just for Americans, but for all nations, prosperity, justice, and opportunity.”

  A President’s power begins slipping away the moment it is known that he is going to leave: I had seen that in 1952, in 1960, in 1968. On the eve of my resignation I knew that my role was already a symbolic one, and that Gerald Ford’s was now the constructive one. My telephone calls and meetings and decisions were now parts of a prescribed ritual aimed at making peace with the past; his calls, his meetings, and his decisions were already the ones that would shape America’s future.

  Ziegler arrived and described the technical arrangements for the resignation speech and the departure ceremony.

  As we walked out of the Lincoln Sitting Room, I asked Manolo to go ahead of us and turn on all the lights. From the outside the second floor of the White House must have looked like the scene of a festive party.

  Ziegler and I went into each room: the Queen’s Bedroom, the Treaty Room, the Yellow Oval Room that Pat had just redecorated and which we had scarcely had a chance to enjoy.

  “It’s a beautiful house, Ron,” I said, as we walked down the long hallway under the glow of the crystal chandeliers.

  I asked Manolo to wake me at nine in the morning, and I started toward my room.

  “Mr. President,” Ziegler called, “it’s the right decision.”

  I nodded. I knew.

  “You’ve had a great presidency, sir,” he said as he turned away.

  Thursday, August 8, 1974, was the last full day I served as President of the United States. As on other mornings of my presidency, I walked through the colonnade that had been designed by Thomas Jefferson, through the Rose Garden, and into the Oval Office.

  I called Haig in and told him that I wanted to veto the agricultural appropriations bill we had discussed in the Cabinet meeting on Tuesday, because I did not want Ford to have to do it on his first day as President. Haig brought the veto statement in, and I signed it. It was the last piece of legislation I acted on as President.

  At eleven o’clock Steve Bull came in and said, “Mr. President, the Vice President is here.”

  I looked up as Jerry Ford came in, somber in his gray suit. His eyes never left me as he approached. He sat down at the side of the desk, and for a moment the room was filled with silence.

  Then I said, “Jerry, I know you’ll do a good job.”

  I have never thought much of the notion that the presidency makes a man presidential. What has given the American presidency its vitality is that each man remains distinctive. His abilities become more obvious, and his faults become more glaring. The presidency is not a finishing school. It is a magnifying glass. I thought that Jerry Ford would measure up well under that magnification.

  We talked about the problems he would face as soon as he became President in almost exactly twenty-four hours. I stressed the need to maintain our military strength and to continue the momentum of the peace initiatives in the Middle East. Above all, I said, we must not allow the leaders in Moscow or Peking to seize upon the traumatic events surrounding my resignation as an opportunity to test the United States in Vietnam or anywhere else in the world. We must not let the Communists mistakenly assume that executive authority had been so weakened by Watergate that we would no longer stand up to aggression wherever it occurred.

  I said that I was planning to send messages to all the major world leaders that Jerry Ford had been one of the strongest supporters of my policies and that they could count on him to continue those policies with the same firmness and resolve.

  Ford asked if I had any particular advice or recommendations for him. I said that as far as I was concerned, the only man who would be absolutely indispensable to him was Henry Kissinger. There was simply no one else who had his wisdom, his tenacity, and his experience in foreign affairs. If he were to leave after I resigned, I said, our foreign policy would soon be in disarray throughout the world. Ford said firmly that he intended to keep Kissinger on for as long as he would be willing to stay.

  I also urged him to keep Haig as Chief of Staff, at least during the transition period. Haig, I assured him, was always loyal to the commander he served, and he would be an invaluable source of advice and experience in the days ahead when there would inevitably be a scramble for power within both the Cabinet and the White House staff.

  I told Ford that I would always be available to give him advice at any time, but I would never interject myself in any way into his decision-making process. He expressed appreciation for this attitude and said that he would always welcome any of my suggestions, particularly in foreign affairs.

  I do not think that Ford knew that he had not been my first choice for Vice President when Agnew resigned, or that he had come in fourth in the informal poll I had taken among Republican leaders. I knew that there were many who did not share my high opinion of Ford’s abilities. But I had felt then that Jerry Ford was the right man, and that was why I chose him. I had no reason to regret that decision.

  It was noon. It was time for him to go.

  “Where will you be sworn in?” I asked as we walked to the door. He said that he had decided not to go to the Capitol because his former colleagues there might turn the occasion into some kind of celebration. I said that I planned to be gone by noon; if he liked, he could be sworn in in the White House, as Truman had been.

  I told him about the call I had received from Eisenhower the night before I was inaugurated on January 20, 1969, when he had said that it would be the last time he could call me “Dick.” I said, “It’s the same with me. From now on, Jerry, you are Mr. President.”

  Ford’s eyes filled with tears—and mine did as well—as we lingered for a moment at the door. I thanked him for his loyal support over the last painful weeks and months. I said that he would have my prayers in the days and years ahead.

  After Ford left, I once again walked the familiar route to the EOB office. The West Wing was strangely quiet. Desks that had never been uncluttered were cleared. Only the steady ringing of the phones gave the place a sense of purpose, of life. Everything else seemed frozen.

  Fred Buzhardt came in and showed me a letter from Haldeman’s attorney, requesting a presidential pardon. Haldeman, ever the efficient Chief of Staff, had included a specially typed page to insert in my resignation speech announcing the pardon and proclaiming a Vietnam amnesty. I told Buzhardt to call the other lawyers after the speech and tell them that I had said no. It was a painful decision not to grant his request, but tying their pardon to the granting of amnesty to Vietnam draft dodgers was unthinkable. And to grant a blanket pardon to all those involved in Watergate would have raised the issue to hysterical political levels. I felt it was vital for the country that my resignation be a healing action, and in the climate then prevailing I was afraid that to couple resignation with a blanket
Watergate pardon would vitiate its healing effect.

  Haig and Ziegler joined us. Haig had just come from meeting with Jaworski to inform him that I was going to resign. I had told him that I wanted no bargaining with Jaworski. I would not be coaxed out of office by any special deals, or cajoled into resigning in exchange for leniency. I was not leaving from fear, and I would take my chances. “Some of the best writing in history has been done from prison,” I said. “Think of Lenin and Gandhi.”

  Haig said Jaworski believed I had made the right decision, and from their conversation he got the impression that I had nothing further to fear from the Special Prosecutor. I said that, considering the way his office had acted in the past, I had little reason to feel reassured.

  Frankly, it galled me that people might think that my decision had been influenced by anything as demeaning as the fear of prosecution, or that the Special Prosecutor and other attackers had forced me out of office. I did not care what else people thought as long as they did not think that I had quit just because things were tough.

  I turned to Ziegler and said, “How can you support a quitter? You know, when I was a kid I loved sports. I remember running the mile in track once. By the time we reached the last fifty yards, there were only two of us straggling in for next to last place. Still, I sprinted those last yards just as hard as if I were trying for the first-place ribbon. I have never quit before in my life. Maybe that is what none of you has understood this whole time. You don’t quit.”

  Rose came in to get my final changes for the resignation speech. She was going to type it on the special large-face typewriter we used so that I would not have to wear my glasses on television. She was wearing a pink dress and pink shoes in an attempt, I knew, to defy the darkness of the day.

  She said that the family had discussed it, and they wanted to be in the Oval Office when I delivered the speech so that the whole world could see they were with me. I said it was simply out of the question, because I would not be able to get through the speech without breaking up if they were even nearby. She said that they had anticipated my feeling, and so at least wanted to be in the next room when I spoke. I asked her to explain that this was something I would have to do alone, and, as a favor to me, to ask them to stay in the Residence and watch the speech from there.

  She said that she also thought I should know that Air Force Colonel Theodore Guy, the head of the POW organization, had called in tears, saying that Rose must not let me resign. I had not given up on them, he had said, and they would not give up on me.

  That afternoon I wanted to go from the EOB office back to the White House without any of the usual groups of staff or press or police watching or taking photographs. Ziegler carried out my wishes completely, and we saw no one as he and I made the short walk.

  Packing boxes lined the halls of the Family Quarters. I shaved and showered and then picked out the suit and tie that I had worn in Moscow in 1972 when I delivered my speech on television to the Soviet people. It was slate blue, light in texture, and consequently cool under the hot television lights.

  I went back to the EOB for a brief meeting with the congressional leaders to inform them officially that I had decided to resign.

  I wanted it to be easy for them, and dignified. These men were veterans, and they knew that the coming and going of Presidents, whatever the individual or personal consequences, is not the only thing that matters to the country.

  They were right on time, at 7:30 P.M. Carl Albert, the Speaker of the House, was the first to enter.

  Before I said a word he blurted out, “I hope you know, Mr. President, that I have nothing to do with this whole resignation business.” I said, “I understand, Carl.” We talked about coming to Capitol Hill together in the same freshman class in 1947.

  I told them all that I had appreciated their support on many issues through the years, and that I was especially grateful for their support during the last Soviet Summit, when I knew that partisan pressures and temptations had been very great. I said that I had always respected them when they had opposed my policies. I was looking directly at Mike Mansfield when I said this, but he did not react at all. He just sat there in a more dour mood than usual, puffing on his pipe. I said, “Mike, I will miss our breakfasts together,” and he nodded, but without much responsiveness. Hugh Scott was cordial and more sympathetic than Mansfield. John Rhodes played his usual pleasant but noncommittal role.

  Jim Eastland was the only one who seemed really to share my pain. As a Southerner and a conservative, he was always one of the most underestimated men in the Senate. Throughout my career he had been one of my most trusted counselors. In his face was a look of understanding that spoke more than volumes of words.

  Finally I rose and put my arm on Carl Albert’s shoulder. “I’ll miss our breakfasts, too, Carl,” I said.

  We said goodbye, and they left.

  I took a look around the office. My eyes ran over the familiar elephants, the gavels, the framed cartoons and plaques, the books, and the pictures of Pat and Tricia and Julie. I walked out and closed the door behind me. I knew that I would not be back there again.

  I walked quickly into the Cabinet Room. Forty-six men were crowded around the table and in the chairs along the walls. Forty-six friends and colleagues in countless causes over three decades. Some of these men had already been in the House for years before I arrived as a freshman from Whittier; some of them had arrived with me in 1947, full of hope and dreams and plans for America. Together over the past five and a half years we had worked together time and again to form the slim but sturdy coalitions that repeatedly beat back the Goliath of liberal Democrats and liberal Republicans in the Senate and the House.

  I started to talk about the great moments we had shared together. Without them, I said, it would have been impossible for me to take the initiatives that led to the new relationships with China and Russia, to progress toward peace in the Middle East, and, above all, to the ending of the war in Vietnam on an honorable basis and the return of our POWs.

  I said that I wanted to stay and fight, but that a six-month trial in the Senate was too long for the country. I said that a full-time President would be needed now for the tough calls that would be coming up. The presidency is bigger than any man, I said, bigger than any individual President, and even bigger than their great loyalty. Now it was Jerry Ford they must support with their votes, their affection, and their prayers.

  The emotional level in the room was almost unbearable. I could see that many were crying. I looked at my watch. It was approaching 8:30. I had been talking for almost half an hour. When I heard Les Arends, one of my closest and dearest friends, sobbing with grief, I could no longer control my own emotions, and I broke into tears.

  “I just hope that I haven’t let you down,” I said, as I tried to stand up. Everyone was jammed together so tightly that my chair would not move, and Bill Timmons had to pull it back for me. I left the room.

  A few minutes later Haig came into the small office next to the Oval Office where I was looking over my speech. He had witnessed the scene in the Cabinet Room, and he was concerned that I might not be able to get through the broadcast. I said, “Al, I’m sorry I cracked up a bit in there, but when I see other people cry, particularly when they are crying for someone else rather than themselves, it just gets to me. I’ll be all right now, so there’s nothing to worry about.”

  He said, “Mr. President, the whole group was deeply touched. I know you are going to be able to make a great speech tonight.” He left the room, and I sat there by myself.

  Two minutes before nine o’clock I went into the Oval Office. I sat in my chair behind the desk while the technicians adjusted the lighting and made their voice check.

  At forty-five seconds after nine, the red light on the camera facing my desk went on—it was time to speak to America and the world.

  I began by saying how difficult it was for me to leave the battle unfinished, but my lack of congressional support would paralyze the
nation’s business if I decided to fight on.

  In the past few days . . . it has become evident to me that I no longer have a strong enough political base in the Congress to justify continuing that effort. As long as there was such a base, I felt strongly that it was necessary to see the constitutional process through to its conclusion, that to do otherwise would be unfaithful to the spirit of that deliberately difficult process, and a dangerously destabilizing precedent for the future.

  But with the disappearance of that base, I now believe that the constitutional purpose has been served, and there is no longer a need for the process to be prolonged.

  Then I came to the most difficult sentence I shall ever have to speak. Looking directly into the camera, I said,

  Therefore, I shall resign the presidency effective at noon tomorrow.

  I continued:

  By taking this action, I hope that I will have hastened the start of that process of healing which is so desperately needed in America.

  I regret deeply any injuries that may have been done in the course of the events that led to this decision. I would say only that if some of my judgments were wrong—and some were wrong—they were made in what I believed at the time to be in the best interest of the nation.

  I talked briefly about America and about the world. I talked about my own attempts in twenty-five years of public life to fight for what I believed in. I recalled that in my first inaugural address I had pledged to consecrate myself and my energies to the cause of peace among nations. I went on:

  I have done my very best in all the days since to be true to that pledge. As a result of these efforts, I am confident that the world is a safer place today, not only for the people of America, but for the people of all nations, and that all of our children have a better chance than before of living in peace rather than dying in war.