Nov 25, 2009 · William P. Rogers held two cabinet positions; he was U.S. Attorney General under President Eisenhower and U.S. Secretary of State under President Nixon. Is …
President Nixon had upended the Justice Department, having let go of his attorney general, deputy attorney general and the special counsel investigating the Watergate scandal.
The Saturday Night Massacre was a series of events that took place in the United States on the evening of Saturday, October 20, 1973, during the Watergate scandal. U.S. President Richard Nixon ordered Attorney General Elliot Richardson to fire Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox; Richardson refused and resigned effective immediately.Nixon then ordered Deputy Attorney …
Feb 23, 2019 · Kleindienst served as attorney general (President Nixon) from Feb. 15, 1972 to May 25, 1973. He was born in Winslow, AZ (Aug. 5, 1923) and attended Harvard University. He served in the Army from 1943 to 1946. Kleindienst served in the Arizona House of Representatives from 1953 to 1954. He was in private practice before becoming Deputy AG in 1969.
ELVING: It would come to be known as the Saturday Night Massacre. From that night on, the battle over the White House tape recordings transfixed much of official Washington. Both the House and Senate were controlled by Democrats and swiftly obsessed by the tapes. Nixon fought on in private and in public.
Here's Ron Elving, NPR's senior editor and correspondent, with the story of the Saturday Night Massacre. It's why we call him professor Ron. (SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING) UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #1: The Democratic National Committee is trying to solve a spy mystery.
U.S. President Richard Nixon ordered Attorney General Elliot Richardson to fire Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox; Richardson refused and resigned effective immediately.
Leon Jaworski was appointed as the new special prosecutor on November 1, 1973, and on November 14, 1973, United States District Judge Gerhard Gesell ruled that the dismissal had been illegal. The Saturday Night Massacre marked the turning point of the Watergate scandal as the public, while increasingly uncertain about Nixon's actions in Watergate, ...
Origin of the phrase. The actual origin of the phrase is unknown; it first appeared in writing two days after the events, in a Washington Post article by David S. Broder on October 22, but even in that article, Broder writes that the events were already "being called" the Saturday Night Massacre.
Nixon then ordered the third-most-senior official at the Justice Department, Solicitor General Robert Bork, to fire Cox. Bork carried out the dismissal as Nixon asked. Bork stated that he intended to resign afterward, but was persuaded by Richardson and Ruckelshaus to stay on for the good of the Justice Department.
On Friday, October 19, 1973, Nixon offered what was later known as the Stennis Compromise – asking the infamously hard-of-hearing Senator John C. Stennis of Mississippi to review and summarize the tapes for the special prosecutor's office.
Initially, the Nixon White House claimed to have fired Ruckelshaus, but as an article published the next day by The Washington Post pointed out, "The letter from the President to Bork also said Ruckelshaus resigned", catching Nixon lying.
Nixon's presidency succumbed to mounting pressure resulting from the Watergate scandal and its cover-up. Faced with almost certain impeachment and conviction, Nixon resigned. In his posthumously published memoirs, Bork said Nixon promised him the next seat on the Supreme Court following Bork's role in firing Cox.
Levi served as attorney general (President Bush) from Jan. 14, 1975 to Jan. 20, 1977. He was born in Chicago, IL (May 9, 1942) and attended the University of Chicago and Yale University. During WWII, he served in the DOJ Anti-Trust Division. Before being named AG, he was served in various leadership roles at the the Univeristy of Chicago, being named president in 1968. He was also a member of the White House Task Force on Education, 1966 to 1967. Died March 7, 2000.
The US Attorney General (AG) is the head of the US Department of Justice and is the chief law enforcement officer of the US government. These are the Attorney Generals from 1960 to 1980.
Nixon then appointed Elliot Richardson, his secretary of defense, to succeed Kleindienst as attorney general. He gave Richardson open-ended authority to “make all decisions bearing on the prosecution of the Watergate case and related matters.".
However, the person with authority to dismiss Cox, Nixon’s Attorney General Elliot Richardson, refused to carry out the order. Instead, Richardson resigned.
Most plausible, according to Drew, is Ehrlichman's allegation that Nixon personally erased the tapes, presumably because they contained yet more discussion of a cover-up. Three days after the tapes’ existence became known to the public, Nixon resigned from the presidency.
After the failure of the Stennis Compromise, Nixon ordered Richardson to dismiss Cox. Richardson refused and resigned, as did his deputy, Ruckelshaus. Bork ultimately was the one to fire Cox.
One of the most controversial episodes of the Watergate scandal, the so-called “Saturday Night Massacre” came on October 20, 1973, when embattled President Richard Nixon fired Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox and accepted the resignations of Attorney General Elliot Richardson and Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus.
On October 20, 1973, in an unprecedented show of executive power, Nixon ordered Attorney General Elliot Richardson and Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus to fire Cox, but both men refused and resigned their posts in protest.
Hillary Clinton accepts Democratic nomination, becoming first woman to lead a major U.S. political party. Nixon’s attack on his own Justice Department came with grave consequences. More than 50,000 concerned citizens sent telegrams to Washington, and 21 members of Congress introduced resolutions calling for Nixon’s impeachment .
Archibald Cox, a Harvard law professor and former U.S. solicitor general, was tapped to investigate the incident in May 1973. He soon clashed with the White House over Nixon’s refusal to release over 10 hours of secret Oval Office recordings, some of which implicated the president in the break-in. On October 20, 1973, in an unprecedented show ...