Our Criminals in Chief

Richard Nixon announced he was resigning his presidency 50 years ago tomorrow, Aug. 8, 1974. Why did he resign? He knew he was going to be impeached and convicted by each House of Congress. Why was Congress about to do that? The House Judiciary Committee had drafted articles of impeachment making the case that Nixon had criminally broken the law.

The first article was obstruction of justice. It begins: “Richard M. Nixon, in violation of his constitutional oath faithfully to execute the office of President of the United States and, to the best of his ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States, and in violation of his constitutional duty to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, has prevented, obstructed and impeded the administration of justice.”

After the 1972 Watergate burglary by “agents” of Nixon’s reelection campaign, Nixon, “using the powers of his high office, engaged personally and through his close subordinates and agents, in a course of conduct or plan designed to delay, impede and obstruct the investigation of such illegal entry; to cover up, conceal and protect those responsible; and to conceal the existence and scope of other unlawful covert activities,” the article reads.

Nixon ordered his staff to have the CIA block the FBI’s investigation into the source of the funding for the burglary.

These were official acts the president took.

Until 2024 no one, except a few fringe fanatics, could imagine justices – who for decades disassembled about being strict constructionists ruling only on the words in the Constitution as they had meaning in 1789 – would brazenly create new doctrine: a radical assertion that the president is above the law and immune from prosecution if he breaks its while performing official duties.

But on July 1, six justices decided “the nature of presidential power entitles a former president to absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority. And he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity from prosecution for all his official acts.” That is from the Trump case.

Under that scheme, Nixon might still be president. If immune from prosecution, he can use the law to cover up that he broke the law.

Today’s trouble placing American presidents above the law was born with President Gerald Ford’s pardon of Richard Nixon.

Ford was doubly wrong, first in shielding Nixon from prosecution of crimes he likely committed as president. Second, instead of ending “our long national nightmare” – his words – he halted the process of justice.

In his action, Ford proved this is not a nation of law, but of men if they are powerful people. He set the precedent that presidents are above the law. They get protected and coddled by their peers.

How very different from countries all around the world. Lots of presidents go to jail. Two French presidents, Jacques Chirac and Nicolas Sarkozy have. So have Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, an Israeli president and elected leaders of Argentina, Brazil, Peru, South Korea and Taiwan. Google it and read the long list of elected leaders convicted by their countries’ courts.

In the United States we hand out get out of jail cards before our presidents are prosecuted. Here, the ruling class protects its own. That is what this ideologically driven Supreme Court majority has done.

After taking his oath, Ford also said, “Our Constitution works; our great Republic is a government of laws and not of men. Here the people rule.”

No. For a month later he pardoned Nixon, shielding him from prosecution and setting a precedent that presidents are above the law.

No, six Republican-appointed Supreme Court justices rule, based on the fundamental principle that those who have five votes win.

By letting the guilty walk their minions are encouraged. The body politic – the mass of common citizens – has been left with a festering wound that generations later – through the end of the twentieth century and up to today – has infected and poisoned the entire political system.