History
Gerald Ford
Gerald Ford was the 38th President of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977. He assumed office after Richard Nixon's resignation and is best known for his efforts to heal the nation following the Watergate scandal. Ford's presidency was marked by economic challenges and foreign policy issues, and he is remembered for his pardoning of Nixon.
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eBook - ePubThe Presidents and the Constitution
A Living History
- Ken Gormley(Author)
- 2016(Publication Date)
- NYU Press(Publisher)
President Gerald R. Ford, a member of Congress on the verge of retirement, was selected by President Nixon to serve as vice president when Spiro T. Agnew abruptly resigned after being charged with accepting bribes. Within months, Ford would become president when Nixon himself was forced to resign in the wake of the Watergate scandal. An honest, square-jawed, straight-shooting Midwesterner, Ford pardoned Nixon, believing a pardon was the best thing for the country. The Nixon pardon—as well as Ford’s standing up to Congress on other issues—quickly ended Ford’s honeymoon and wrecked his chances for election in 1976. Yet Ford’s steady handling of the presidency during the unstable aftermath of Watergate ended up setting the nation on a safer course.Introduction
Gerald R. Ford never planned to become the thirty-eighth president of the United States. He recited the oath of office having never run on a national ticket for the presidency or vice presidency; nor had he ever served in the Senate or as a state governor. He had aspired to be Speaker of the House, but because Republicans were not the majority party during most of Ford’s time in the legislature, he had to settle for the role of minority leader.After serving twenty-five years in the House of Representatives representing Michigan’s Fifth District, Ford found himself sitting in the Oval Office after a series of unlikely events that had elevated him to the presidency. Ford assumed the office on August 9, 1974, a little over a week after investigators discovered the smoking-gun tape that proved President Nixon’s knowledge of the Watergate cover-up and led to his resignation. On becoming president, Ford famously announced: “Our long national nightmare is over.”1It is tempting to view the 895-day Ford term as a placeholder or an accidental presidency and to consider Ford’s legacy simply as that of a healer who brought the country back together after the Watergate scandal, one of the greatest challenges to the rule of law the country ever faced. A closer look, however, reveals that Ford made another major contribution: holding the line for presidential power against Congress. Coming to office on the heels of Nixon’s “imperial presidency,” Ford struggled to preserve executive power and to prevent the presidency from becoming “imperiled.”2Gerald Rudolph Ford began life on July 14, 1913, as Leslie Lynch King Jr. in Omaha, Nebraska. Dorothy, his mother, and Leslie Lynch King Sr., his biological father, divorced shortly after the future president’s birth. Dorothy and her son moved to Grand Rapids, Michigan, where she met and married a small-business owner, Gerald Ford Sr., after whom her son was renamed. Growing up, Ford had three half-brothers and led a normal family life, earning money by helping out in his stepfather’s paint and varnish store. He was a gifted football player who starred in high school and later at the University of Michigan. In 1941, he graduated from Yale Law School, where he had helped put himself through school by coaching football.3
eBook - ePubPresidents' Secrets
The Use and Abuse of Hidden Power
- Mary Graham(Author)
- 2017(Publication Date)
- Yale University Press(Publisher)
6 Gerald Ford: A Time of ReckoningAmid suspicions generated by the Vietnam War, the Watergate scandal, and revelations of a generation of misdeeds by secretive intelligence agencies, President Gerald Ford presided over a historic expansion of government openness and restraint of presidents’ authority to act secretly and unilaterally. Known for his honesty and integrity, Ford engaged in open debate with Congress about the limits of executive secrecy and carried out new laws that subjected presidents’ decisions and intelligence agencies’ plans to congressional and court review. Ford’s two and a half years in office ushered in a generation of more practical openness and more accountable secrecy.“IN ALL MY PUBLIC AND PRIVATE ACTS as your president, I expect to follow my instincts of openness and candor.” A few minutes after noon on August 9, 1974, Gerald R. Ford delivered a brief inaugural address. The sixty-one-year-old president stood in front of gold curtains in the formal East Room of the White House, before a seated group of congressional leaders, members of the diplomatic corps, and family members. He wore a dark blue suit and a red, white, and blue tie. His wife Betty wore a favorite light blue jersey dress dry-cleaned the night before. Their four children sat in the front row. Ford had just been sworn in as the nation’s thirty-eighth president.It was a hastily arranged affair. President Richard M. Nixon had told his vice president only the day before that he planned to resign. Until then, Ford—and the nation—had been uncertain whether Nixon would fight the House Judiciary Committee’s impeachment charges for covering up his administration’s role in the Watergate burglary. Nixon had tried to hide White House links to burglars caught breaking into the Democratic National Committee’s offices during the 1972 presidential campaign. The burglars were trying to fix their illegal wiretap of the committee’s phones.
eBook - ePub- Yanek Mieczkowski(Author)
- 2005(Publication Date)
- The University Press of Kentucky(Publisher)
In part, the reversal of fortune was prompted by the Vietnam War, which ate away at Americans’ trust in their leaders, increased budget deficits and economic instability, and made Americans question whether the country should lead the free world so actively. By 1973, fewer young men described themselves as willing to go to war to defend America’s interests or maintain its world power. 7 A neo-isolationist mood gripped the country, and it tightened as the economy deteriorated and Americans encountered difficulty in finding fuel to run their cars and heat their homes. 8 Then came Watergate and Nixon’s resignation, and the country felt shattered. These untoward circumstances help to explain a sentence on a display at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum in Grand Rapids, Michigan: “Gerald Ford may have been among the unluckiest presidents of the 20th century.” The nation’s only unelected president, he came to the Oval Office during a constitutional crisis, without a mandate, and amid horrendous economic conditions. The country suffered double-digit inflation and soon fell into a deep recession. Preoccupation with domestic issues reduced the presidential authority of previous post–World War II decades, because in foreign policy presidents carried the greatest prestige and enjoyed a rally-around-the-flag effect. With domestic problems, Americans voiced more dissenting views. To make matters worse, Americans were cynical after Watergate, yet Ford had to summon their support while negotiating with aggressive opposition in Congress. The treacherous political environment was one of the worst that any chief executive has ever faced. How Ford addressed these challenges furnishes a compelling story of presidential leadership. Cleaning Up Messes Watergate and the “credibility gap” left from previous presidential administrations presented a personally demanding challenge to Ford. Although Watergate was shocking, Americans had been losing confidence in government for several years
eBook - ePubFight House
Rivalries in the White House from Truman to Trump
- Tevi Troy(Author)
- 2020(Publication Date)
- Regnery History(Publisher)
Gerald Ford Defined by Rivalry: Robert Hartmann versus Donald Rumsfeld and Dick CheneyG erald Ford became president in August of 1974 with little executive preparation for an extremely challenging task. Although he had been a congressman from Michigan for decades, he had never run for president, and he is the only person to become president without running on a national ticket first. After ascending to the vice presidency via appointment, he only served in that position for nine months in a collapsing Nixon administration before taking on the top job. When he did so, he had to learn how to do the job, manage two competing staffs, and reassure a worried nation, all at the same time. As a result, while the Ford administration was one of the shortest in American history, it was also one of the most tumultuous in terms of staff infighting.Too Nice for the Job?
When one thinks of Gerald Ford the man, incessant conflict does not come to mind. In fact, a startling number of descriptions of Ford focus on what a nice guy he was. Brent Scowcroft, who would replace Kissinger as national security advisor, observed that “there is no guile, no convolution, no complexity with Gerald Ford. He was comfortable in who he was.”1 Ford’s manner served him well in his tenure as a congressman from Michigan and as House minority leader, the post from which he gained the vice presidency. As Stephen Hess wrote, “As the House minority leader, Ford’s skills as a consensus builder and compromiser were practically a job description.”2As president, though, Ford’s niceness was part of the problem. Immediately after acknowledging that Ford had the right skills and temperament for his House job, Hess also noted that “running the White House required a more commanding approach.”3 Donald Rumsfeld, who served in the House with Ford before becoming his White House “staff coordinator”—the title the Ford administration gave to the chief of staff role—had a similar view. He explained that “President Ford came into office with wonderful training and success that didn’t suit him for an executive function. He started out functioning basically like a legislator.”4 Robert Hartmann, a Ford loyalist and speechwriter who would be at the heart of much of the conflict in the Ford administration, told Ford directly and in his typically earthy way that Ford was too soft: “You don’t suspect ill motives of anyone until you’re kicked in the balls three times. As a human being, that’s a virtue. As a president, it’s a weakness.”5
eBook - ePub- Marcus A. Stadelmann(Author)
- 2020(Publication Date)
- For Dummies(Publisher)
As the Watergate affair continued, it became increasingly clear to Ford that he might become president. Early in the summer of 1974, Ford’s personal advisor Phil Buchen began to set up a transition team, without Ford’s direct knowledge, just in case.On August 8, 1974, President Nixon announced his resignation to the U.S. public. One day later, Gerald Ford became the new president. He had an unenviable task ahead of him. He needed to reassure the nation and restore faith in the presidency.President Ford is the only person in U.S. history to serve as both vice president and president without being elected to either office. He was appointed to both positions.President Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr. (1974–1977)
On August 9, 1974, Ford addressed the nation to reassure the U.S. public. He announced that the long nightmare was over and that it was time to go on with politics as usual.A month later, Ford destroyed his presidency for the good of the country when he announced that he had issued a full pardon to former President Nixon. The media and many U.S. citizens were incensed. Calls poured in, condemning Ford’s actions. His approval rating fell from 71 percent to 50 percent. Ford lost all the goodwill that he had accumulated in Congress. His presidency seemed doomed.Why did he do it? A public trial of the president of the United States would have undermined the U.S. position abroad and split the U.S. public. Ford knew this and was willing to sacrifice his own career to save the country international embarrassment.Taking on domestic problems
The 1974 Congressional election gave the Democratic Party an overwhelming majority in Congress. Now Ford faced a hostile Congress. Over the next two years, Congress overrode more than 20 percent of Ford’s vetoes, the highest percentage in over a century.To make matters worse, the economy took a nosedive. Inflation skyrocketed, driven by increased government spending and an increase in the price of oil. Ford cut government spending to help combat the rise in inflation. By the time he left office, inflation had fallen from 11.2 percent to 5.3 percent.
eBook - ePubThe Modern American Presidency
Second Edition, Revised and Updated
- Lewis L. Gould(Author)
- 2009(Publication Date)
- University Press of Kansas(Publisher)
Ford deemed the presidency as a place where things should be done rather than as an arena for posturing and self-indulgence. While he retained the organizational structure of a strong White House chief of staff, he dismantled the machinery that had sustained Nixon’s permanent campaign. He also abandoned his predecessor’s efforts to reshape the structure of the federal government. 1 The relief that the nation felt at the departure of Nixon and the end of what Ford called “our long national nightmare” over Watergate gave the new president a thirty-day honeymoon. The press-driven euphoria vanished when in early September Ford pardoned Nixon for his Watergate crimes. Unless the country wanted to subject the former president to the rigors of a criminal trial, the decision made sense. The problem was with the timing and the appearance that a deal had been possible between Ford and Nixon. In a sense, the Ford presidency never recovered from the impact of the Nixon pardon. 2 That was too bad, because the Ford administration cast a shadow forward into the three Republican presidencies that took place between 1981 and 2002. Many of the key officials in the Ford White House and the president’s election campaign in 1976 were significant figures in the administrations of Ronald Reagan, George Herbert Walker Bush, and George W. Bush. Though Ford did not succeed in mastering the demands of the modern presidency himself, his tenure in the White House provided instructive examples to major participants in the Republican party about how the mistakes of the Nixon-Ford era could be avoided in the future. Gerald Ford came to the White House in August 1974 from a long career in the House of Representatives, where he first served in 1949. His tenure as a lawmaker exceeded even that of Lyndon Johnson’s. Since his goal was to be Speaker of the House in what was then the unlikely event of a Republican majority, Ford did not have to develop administrative skills in running his own House office
eBook - ePubEyewitness To Power
The Essence of Leadership Nixon to Clinton
- David Gergen(Author)
- 2001(Publication Date)
- Simon & Schuster(Publisher)
The fourteen months that followed were among my happiest in government. Jerry Ford’s decency made everyone feel welcome on his team. His stance on public issues—hard-line in international affairs, fiscally conservative in economic matters, moderate to liberal on social issues—was also four-square with my own beliefs. A member of the staff need not agree with everything a president believes, but a basic compatibility is infinitely desirable. Philosophically, I happened to be more on Ford’s wavelength—and, indeed, Nixon’s—than those of either Reagan or Clinton, so I soon felt right at home. With some notable exceptions, the men and women Ford had assembled around him were also public-spirited, honorable people who worked hard to restore the integrity and moral authority of the presidency. For all of its internal strife, the Ford White House was a good place to be.Cautionary Tales from His Early Days
When I returned to the White House, Ford was still suffering from a tumultuous, rocky start to his presidency. There is nothing more important to the success of an actor, it is said, than his performance in his first scene and in his last. One shapes his character for the entire play, the other the memories that the audience carries from the theater. The same applies in politics and in other fields of leadership.That was certainly what Gerald Ford experienced in his presidency. For a brief, ethereal moment, the country fell in love with him. His inaugural address was a welcome relief to a people torn apart by scandal, war, and a deteriorating economy. His quiet dignity and lack of pretense provided exactly the stabilizing force that people sought. One morning, the press watched him making breakfast for his wife, Betty, and he became the boy next door. Columnists invented an “English muffin theory of history”—the idea that any man good enough to make English muffins for his wife in the morning must be good enough to run a country.Americans like straight talk and old-fashioned values in their president, and that’s exactly what they saw now. There was an air of Harry Truman about him as he talked plainly to the country and brought a down-home feel to the White House. The Truman parallel ran deep. Both men became president amidst a national crisis; both had to make excruciating decisions; both were simple men from the Midwest, devoted to family; in both cases, their honesty and integrity comforted the nation. Despite great uncertainty about their abilities and intelligence, each of them then saw his approval ratings shoot into the stratosphere in the first days in office, only to fall sharply thereafter.
eBook - ePubDual Citizens
Politics and American Evangelicalism
- Timothy D. Padgett(Author)
- 2020(Publication Date)
- Lexham Press(Publisher)
With all eyes on the vice-presidential post, the Ford family is hesitant about discussing the possibility of his becoming president (the family believes President Nixon will see his term through), Michael said. “Dad takes one step at a time.”Ford, a leader of the congressional prayer groups, spends time in prayer meetings with presidential assistant Melvin Laird, says Zeoli. “He [Ford] has a real evangelical involvement.” To help him along, Zeoli sends him a weekly letter containing a Bible verse and a prayer.The Ford family’s lifestyle has changed from the moment he was picked as Agnew’s successor, said Michael. “But I think it’s brought about a real revival of our dependence and trust in God. I think all of these events show that God is going to work his will for the glory of his Kingdom.”*August 30, 1974THE EDITORSFIFTEEN TURBULENT YEARST he last fifteen years probably have been the most turbulent in the history of the United States since the adoption of the Constitution and the inauguration of President George Washington.During the last decade and a half John F. Kennedy was assassinated; the armed forces fought in Viet Nam and finally came home; Lyndon B. Johnson was eliminated from the 1968 presidential campaign by the pressures of an unpopular war despite his election in 1964 by a great landslide; Robert Kennedy was assassinated at a time when his candidacy for the office of president was reaching a high tide; Richard Nixon won the election in 1968 with the promise to end the war in Viet Nam and bring peace to the world. The end of Nixon’s first term was marred by the Watergate charges, but his reelection was an overwhelming victory against Senator George McGovern, whose campaign never got off the ground.Early in his second term Nixon succeeded in bringing U.S. participation in the Viet Nam war to a conclusion. Not long thereafter came the exposure and finally the resignation from the vice-presidency of Spiro Agnew, whose “law and order” mentality was grossly at variance with his personal practices. Meanwhile the Watergate situation was moving slowly but inexorably to a climax, which finally came on the evening of August 8, when President Nixon announced to the nation that he would resign the following day.
eBook - ePubShadow
Five Presidents And The Legacy Of Watergate
- Bob Woodward(Author)
- 2012(Publication Date)
- Simon & Schuster UK(Publisher)
“Oh, Jesus Christ Almighty!” Hartmann shouted in anguish. “Throw the whole rest of it away, just don’t throw that sentence away.” His voice cracked. “That’s the only thing that you’re going to say that anybody will ever remember!” Promising the end of the nightmare will make it true, Hartmann felt. He expected it would be the headline and the lead in every story, or certainly in the first paragraph. Hartmann said it had been a nightmare for Nixon’s friends and enemies, torn either by their role in defending a corrupt man or in destroying a Republican presidency. Hartmann virtually got on his knees and begged. He practically wept. He threatened, stopping short of saying he would quit. Hartmann couldn’t have been driven out with whips. He saw himself as about to become number one to the new number one.“Ummm,” Ford finally said, “maybe you’re right.” On Friday, August 9, 1974, Nixon formally resigned and Ford was sworn in as president. Speaking afterwards in the East Room, Ford promised a new era.“I feel it is my first duty to make an unprecedented compact with my countrymen.“I believe that truth is the glue that holds government together, not only our government but civilization itself. “In all my public and private acts as your president, I expect to follow my instincts of openness and candor with full confidence that honesty is always the best policy in the end. “My fellow Americans, our long national nightmare is over.”It was the phrase that did end up in all the news stories and accounts—a blunt acknowledgment that Nixon and Watergate were wrong. Nixon’s much photographed departure by helicopter from the White House seemed to symbolize the end of the scandal.The outpouring of goodwill toward Ford in the first week of his presidency was immense. There was a sense of cleansing and simplification. Nixon’s crisis had created the feeling of national siege. Ford had punctured the tension. He brought enormous relief, promised to restore trust through his directness and informality. Even before being sworn in, Ford asked Haig to tell the Marine Band not to play “Hail to the Chief” or “Ruffles and Flourishes”; his alma mater’s “Michigan Fight Song” would suffice. The morning of his first full day as president, he toasted his own English muffins. The muffins and the “Michigan Fight Song”
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