Impeachment process of Richard Nixon

Dénouement

Even with support diminished by the continuing series of revelations, Nixon hoped to fight the impeachment charges. But on July 24, the Supreme Court had ruled unanimously in United States v. Nixon that the full Nixon White House tapes, not just selected transcripts, must be released.

As a consequence, on August 5, 1974, the White House released a previously unknown audio tape from June 23, 1972. Recorded only a few days after the break-in, it documented the initial stages of the coverup: it revealed Nixon and aide H. R. Haldeman meeting in the Oval Office and formulating a plan to block investigations by having the CIA falsely claim to the FBI that national security was involved. This demonstrated that Nixon had been told of the White House connection to the Watergate burglaries soon after they took place, and had approved plans to thwart the investigation. In a statement accompanying the release of what became known as the "Smoking Gun Tape", Nixon accepted blame for misleading the country about when he had been told of White House involvement, stating that he had a lapse of memory.

The release of the "smoking gun" tape destroyed Nixon politically. The ten congressmen who voted against all three articles of impeachment in the House Judiciary Committee announced they would all support impeachment when the vote was taken in the full House. Representative Wiggins in particular dropped his support for Nixon after the revelation of this tape.[30] Wiggins said, however, he would still oppose some of the passed articles that were not affected by the new revelation. Sandman announced that he too would vote for impeachment on the House floor after the release of the transcript, as did all of the Republicans who had voted against the articles in committee.

On the night of August 7, 1974, Senators Barry Goldwater and Hugh Scott and Congressman John Jacob Rhodes met with Nixon in the Oval Office and told him that his support in Congress had all but disappeared. Rhodes told Nixon that he would face certain impeachment when the articles came up for vote in the full House. Goldwater and Scott told the president that there were not only enough votes in the Senate to convict him, but that no more than 15 Senators were willing to vote for acquittal – far fewer than the 34 he needed to avoid removal from office. Realizing that he had no chance of staying in power, Nixon decided to go out on his own.

And so with impeachment and removal by the Senate all but certain, on August 9, 1974, Nixon became the first president to resign.