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Richard Nixon
Richard Milhouse Nixon (b. January 9, 1913, in Yorba Linda, California) was the 37th President of the United States. He served from 1969 until 1974. Nixon remains the only president in American history to resign in office, which he did in the wake of the Watergate scandal. He was then succeeded by Vice President Gerald Ford in accordance with the U.S. Constitution.[1]
Biography
Early life
Nixon was born on January 9, 1913, in Yorba Linda, California. In high school, he earned a scholarship to Harvard University; however, due to his family's financial situation, he attended Whittier College instead.[2] There, he earned a reputation as a skilled debater and was elected student body president. Nixon earned his undergraduate degree in 1934. Then he attended Duke Law School, where he graduated near the top of his class. In 1942, Nixon enlisted in the United States Navy and served in the Pacific. He returned to the United States in 1946 and began his political career.[3]
Early political career
Prior to becoming President, Nixon served two terms as vice president under President Dwight Eisenhower. Before that, he had served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1946 to 1951 and in the United States Senate from 1951 to 1953. During his first campaign for president, Dwight Eisenhower selected Senator Nixon as his running mate. Eisenhower and Nixon went on to win in 1952 and 1956. As vice president, Nixon largely focused on issues of foreign policy, travelling throughout Asia and the Middle East and meeting with world leaders on behalf of President Eisenhower.[2] After serving two terms as vice president, Nixon won the Republican Party nomination for president in 1960. In that election, Nixon also participated in the first televised presidential debate. He narrowly lost to Democrat John F. Kennedy in one of the closest presidential elections in American history. [3] Two years later, Nixon also lost the California gubernatorial race.[4]
Presidency and post-presidency
After losing his bid for President of the United States and Governor of California, many assumed that Nixon's political career was over. However, Nixon staged a comeback and won the Republican nomination for president a second time in 1968. He went on to defeat his Democratic opponent, Vice President Hubert Humphrey and third-party candidate Governor George Wallace of Alabama. During his tenure, Nixon aimed to ease Cold War tensions by famously meeting with China's communist leader Mao Zedong and the leader of the Soviet Union, Leonid Brezhnev. He also ended America's involvement in Vietnam in 1973. In 1972, Nixon won re-election with one of the biggest landslides in American history. However, shortly after his inauguration, his administration became engulfed in the infamous "Watergate scandal," in which Nixon officials were caught breaking into Democratic National Committee offices. Realizing that he was almost certainly going to be impeached by the U.S. House of Representatives for his role in the Watergate scandal, Nixon became the first and only president in American history to resign. On August 9, 1974, Vice President Gerald Ford assumed the presidency.[5]
After leaving office, Nixon continued to travel around the world, and wrote several books on matters of domestic politics and foreign policy.[3]
Career
Below is an abbreviated outline of Nixon's academic, professional, and political career:[2]
- 1913: Born in Yorba Linda, California
- 1930-1934: Attended Whittier College in California and was elected student body president
- 1934-1937: Attended Duke Law School
- 1940: Married Pat Ryan in California
- 1942-1946: Served in the United States Navy until he was honorably discharged as a lieutenant commander
- 1947-1951: Congressman representing California's 12th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives
- 1951-1953: United States Senator from California
- 1953-1961: Vice President of the United States under Dwight Eisenhower
- 1960: Defeated by John F. Kennedy in the presidential election
- 1969-1975: President of the United States
- 1994: Nixon passed away at the age of 81.
State of the Union addresses
Speeches
Every year in office, the president of the United States addresses Congress on the present state of affairs as well as the administration's goals for the coming year.[6] Addresses made by presidents in their inauguration years are not technically "State of the Union" addresses and are typically held in February. Nixon, however, elected not to give a formal address in his 1969 inauguration year.[7] Following are pages with information on Nixons State of the Union addresses.
Written messages
Under the U.S. Constitution, the president is not required to deliver such addresses to Congress as speeches. In fact, every president from Thomas Jefferson (1801-1809) to Woodrow Wilson (1913-1921) simply delivered their message to Congress as a written message. Generally presidents chose one option or the other in a given year. In some years, however, Nixon opted to do both. Because the content of his written addresses differed from his speeches, the transcripts of his written addresses are included below:
1973
In 1973, Nixon broke tradition and delivered his annual remarks to Congress in a series of six written messages and delivered a series of five radio messages to the American people over a period of time. Each message covered a different topic. Transcripts of both the all of the written and spoken messages can be found here:
Elections
The five presidential elections that Nixon was a part of were significant for a number of reasons. First, Nixon is one of only a small handful of individuals to appear on the Presidential/Vice Presidential ticket of a major party in five separate elections. One of the only other people to have this distinction is Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who was on all five Democratic Presidential tickets from 1928-1944.
Additionally, Nixon's were some of the closest and most lopsided in American history. In 1960, Nixon lost the popular vote by one of the smallest margins in electoral history. 12 years later, Nixon was re-elected president in one of the largest presidential landslides.
1972
In his re-election campaign, Nixon defeated Democratic rival George McGovern in one of the largest landslides in American history. Only George Washington, James Monroe, and Ronald Reagan won higher percentages of electoral college votes than Nixon did in 1972.
| U.S. presidential election, 1972 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | Electoral votes | |
| Republican |  Richard Nixon/Spiro T. Agnew |
60.8% | 47,168,710 | 520 | |
| Democrat | George McGovern/R. Sargent Shriver | 37.6% | 29,173,222 | 17 | |
| Libertarian | John Hospers/Theodora Nathan | 0% | 3,674 | 1 | |
| American | John Schmitz/Thomas Anderson | 1.4% | 1,100,896 | 0 | |
| Socialist Workers | Linda Jenness/Andrew Pulley | 0.1% | 83,380 | 0 | |
| People's | Benjamin Spock/Julius Hobson | 0.1% | 78,759 | 0 | |
| Total Votes | 77,608,641 | 538 | |||
| Election results via: 1972 official election results | |||||
Other candidates that appeared on the ballot received less than 0.1% of the vote. Those candidates included: Louis Fisher, Gus Hall, Evelyn Reed, E. Harold Munn, John Mahalchik, Gabriel Green and various write-in candidates.[8]
1968
After winning the Republican primary, Nixon defeated Democratic Vice President Hubert Humphrey in the general election.
| U.S. presidential election, 1972 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | Electoral votes | |
| Republican | Richard Nixon/Spiro T. Agnew |
43.4% | 31,783,783 | 301 | |
| Democrat | Hubert Humphrey/Edmund Muskie | 42.7% | 31,271,839 | 191 | |
| American Independent | George Wallace/Curtis LeMay | 13.5% | 9,901,118 | 46 | |
| Other | Other | 0.3% | 243,259 | 0 | |
| Total Votes | 73,199,999 | 538 | |||
| Election results via: 1968 official election results | |||||
Other candidates that appeared on the ballot received less than 0.1% of the vote. Those candidates included: Henning Blomen, Dick Gregory, Fred Halstead, Eldridge Cleaver, Eugene McCarthy, E. Harold Munn and various write-in candidates.[9]
1962
In 1962, Nixon ran unsuccessfully for Governor of California. He lost to Democratic incumbent Pat Brown by a margin of 51.9% to 46.9%.[4] After losing, Nixon gave his famous "last press conference" in which he criticized the press for its alleged bias and said "You won't have Nixon to kick around anymore." Many saw this moment as the end of Nixon's political career.[10]
1960
Nixon lost to Senator Kennedy in one of the closest presidential elections in American history.
| U.S. presidential election, 1960 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | Electoral votes | |
| Democratic | John F. Kennedy/Lyndon Johnson |
50% | 34,220,984 | 303 | |
| Republican | Richard Nixon/Henry Lodge | 49.8% | 34,108,157 | 219 | |
| Democratic | Harry Byrd* | 0.2% | 116,248 | 15 | |
| Total Votes | 68,445,389 | 537 | |||
| Election results via: 1960 official election results | |||||
*15 electors chose to cast their vote for Virginia Senator Harry Byrd rather than the candidate they had pledged to vote for.[11]
Other candidates that appeared on the ballot received less than 0.1 percent of the vote. Those candidates included: Eric Haas, Rutherford Decker, Orval Faubus, Farrell Dobbs, Charles Sullivan, J. Bracken Lee, C. Benton Coiner, Lars Daly, Clennon King, and Merritt Curtis.[12]
1956
| U.S. presidential election, 1956 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | Electoral votes | |
| Republican | Dwight Eisenhower/Richard Nixon |
57.5% | 35,579,180 | 457 | |
| Democratic | Adlai Stevenson/Estes Kefauver | 42% | 26,028,028 | 73 | |
| Independent | Walter Jones/Herman Talmadge* | 0.3% | 196,318 | 0 | |
| State's Rights | T. Coleman Andrews | 0.2% | 108,956 | 0 | |
| Total Votes | 61,912,482 | 530 | |||
| Election results via: 1956 official election results | |||||
1 "faithless" elector chose to cast their vote for Walter Jones rather than Stevenson, the candidate whom they had pledged to vote for.[13]
Other candidates that appeared on the ballot received less than 0.1% of the vote. Those candidates included: Eric Haas, Enoch Holtwick, Farrell Dobbs, Harry Byrd, Darlington Hoopes, and Henry Krajewski.[14]
1952
| U.S. presidential election, 1952 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | Electoral votes | |
| Republican | Dwight Eisenhower/Richard Nixon |
55.3% | 34,075,529 | 442 | |
| Democratic | Adlai Stevenson/John Sparkman | 44.4% | 27,375,090 | 89 | |
| Progressive | Vincent Hallinan/Charlotta Bass | 0.2% | 140,746 | 0 | |
| Prohibition | Stuart Hamblen/Enoch Holtwick | 0.1% | 73,412 | 0 | |
| Total Votes | 61,664,777 | 531 | |||
| Election results via: 1952 official election results | |||||
Other candidates that appeared on the ballot received less than 0.1% of the vote. Those candidates included: Eric Haas, Darlington Hoopes, Douglas MacArthur, Farrell Dobbs, and Henry Krajewski.[15]
Personal
Note: Please contact us if the personal information below requires an update.
Nixon was married to Pat Nixon. The couple had two daughters together.[3]
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms President Richard Nixon. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
- Dwight Eisenhower
- Gerald Ford
- California
- United States House of Representatives
- United States Senate
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ Richard Nixon Foundation, "Richard Nixon – America’s 37th President," accessed November 20, 2015
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Richard Nixon Foundation, "Richard Nixon - A timeline," accessed November 20, 2015
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 History Channel, "Richard M Nixon," accessed November 20, 2015
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Join California, "1962 election results," accessed November 21, 2015
- ↑ The White House, "Richard M. Nixon," accessed November 24, 2015
- ↑ Congressional Research Service, "The President’s State of the Union Address: Tradition, Function, and Policy Implications," January 24, 2014
- ↑ The American Presidency Project, "State of the Union Addresses and Messages," accessed October 14, 2014
- ↑ U.S. Election Atlas, "1972 Presidential Election Results," accessed November 20, 2015
- ↑ U.S. Election Atlas, "1968 Presidential Election Results," accessed November 21, 2015
- ↑ University of Pennsylvania, "Richard Nixon, Press Conference, Nov 7, 1962," accessed November 21, 2015
- ↑ 270 to win, "1960 Presidential election," accessed November 24, 2015
- ↑ U.S. Election Atlas, "1960 Presidential Election Results," accessed November 21, 2015
- ↑ 270 to win, "1956 Presidential election," accessed November 24, 2015
- ↑ U.S. Election Atlas, "1956 Presidential Election Results," accessed November 21, 2015
- ↑ U.S. Election Atlas, "1952 Presidential Election Results," accessed November 24, 2015
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Lyndon Johnson |
President of the United States 1969-1974 |
Succeeded by Gerald Ford |
