This week marks the 20th anniversary of history's most famous botched burglary, when five men broke into the Democratic national headquarters in the Watergate Building in Washington, D.C. President Richard Nixon called it "a third-rate burglary" and claimed no White House involvement, but it turned out to be the linchpin in his determined effort to win a re-election landslide.
The burglars were looking for "political intelligence" about Democratic candidates. It not only suggested a lack of presidential conscience, it was one of numerous "dirty tricks" carried out by the Committee to Re-elect the President.Coupled with the massive Watergate cover-up, the tricks included wiretapping, political sabotage, money laundering, payments of "hush money" to silence the Watergate burglars, the use of the IRS to punish Nixon's "enemies" through unjustified audits, and the use of the CIA and FBI to obstruct justice.
It was the latter that led to Nixon's resignation. A plethora of evidence resulted from extensive use of tape recordings of conversations between the president and his staff, and the "smoking gun" tape proved obstruction of justice.
Although Nixon has never acknowledged his own wrongdoing, there are other beneficial results of the scandal. The most obvious is proof that the system could work to correct a crisis of mammoth proportions. It demonstrated that checks and balances could rescue the country from disaster even if it took time to do so.
Nevertheless, 20 years later, shadows still darken the nation's political consciousness. Many citizens remain disillusioned and wary of their leaders.
Executive privilege is alive and well, in spite of Nixon's persistent use of it to keep his tapes from prosecutors. When the Supreme Court ordered him to turn over the tapes, they also protected the right of the president in future cases to refuse the demands of Congress and the courts.
The lack of an equivalent to a "smoking gun" was a major factor in the unwillingness of Congress to press the Iran-Contra scandal against President Ronald Reagan. A rare standard of certainty was set for the future that is perhaps impossible to match.
Nixon's rather innovative domestic program - in health care, welfare, student loans, revenue sharing and the environment - have been scrapped by his party, even though Republicans have held the presidency almost exclusively since Watergate.
Two years after the break-in, freshmen members of Congress came into office in high numbers as part of the 1974 reform campaign. They were 92 strong, the largest number of House freshmen since 1948, and they had the voting strength to do most of what they wanted. They represented more than a quarter of House Democrats and nearly a fifth of the entire House.
Their work has gotten mixed reviews. They challenged the strict seniority rules of the House, they toppled once powerful Southern Democratic committee chairmen, they spread power through more subcommittees, and they dramatically enlarged staffs. They also helped enact sweeping campaign contribution and financial disclosure changes. Critics today think these changes contributed to a general governmental gridlock.
As the nation notes the anniversary of Watergate, Americans would do well to retain it sufficiently in our minds so we can avoid repeating it. Most important in this election year is that we study the candidates and the issues closely and choose a president very carefully.