Mr. Chief Justice, my dear friends, my fellow Americans:
The oath that I have taken is the same oath that was taken by George Washington and by every President under the Constitution. But I assume the Presidency under extraordinary circumstances never before experienced by Americans. This is an hour of history that troubles our minds and hurts our hearts.
Therefore, I feel it is my first duty to make an unprecedented compact with my countrymen. Not an inaugural address, not a fireside chat, not a campaign speech–just a little straight talk among friends. And I intend it to be the first of many.
I am acutely aware that you have not elected me as your President by your ballots, and so I ask you to confirm me as your President with your prayers. And I hope that such prayers will also be the first of many.
If you have not chosen me by secret ballot, neither have I gained office by any secret promises. I have not campaigned either for the Presidency or the Vice Presidency. I have not subscribed to any partisan platform. I am indebted to no man, and only to one woman–my dear wife–as I begin this very difficult job.
I have not sought this enormous responsibility, but I will not shirk it. Those who nominated and confirmed me as Vice President were my friends and are my friends. They were of both parties, elected by all the people and acting under the Constitution in their name. It is only fitting then that I should pledge to them and to you that I will be the President of all the people.
Thomas Jefferson said the people are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty. And down the years, Abraham Lincoln renewed this American article of faith asking, “Is there any better way or equal hope in the world?”
I intend, on Monday next, to request of the Speaker of the House of Representatives and the President pro tempore of the Senate the privilege of appearing before the Congress to share with my former colleagues and with you, the American people, my views on the priority business of the Nation and to solicit your views and their views. And may I say to the Speaker and the others, if I could meet with you right after these remarks, I would appreciate it.
Even though this is late in an election year, there is no way we can go forward except together and no way anybody can win except by serving the people’s urgent needs. We cannot stand still or slip backwards. We must go forward now together.
To the peoples and the governments of all friendly nations, and I hope that could encompass the whole world, I pledge an uninterrupted and sincere search for peace. America will remain strong and united, but its strength will remain dedicated to the safety and sanity of the entire family of man, as well as to our own precious freedom.
I believe that truth is the glue that holds government together, not only our Government but civilization itself. That bond, though strained, is unbroken at home and abroad.
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.
Our Constitution works; our great Republic is a government of laws and not of men. Here the people rule. But there is a higher Power, by whatever name we honor Him, who ordains not only righteousness but love, not only justice but mercy.
As we bind up the internal wounds of Watergate, more painful and more poisonous than those of foreign wars, let us restore the golden rule to our political process, and let brotherly love purge our hearts of suspicion and of hate.
In the beginning, I asked you to pray for me. Before closing, I ask again your prayers, for Richard Nixon and for his family. May our former President, who brought peace to millions, find it for himself. May God bless and comfort his wonderful wife and daughters, whose love and loyalty will forever be a shining legacy to all who bear the lonely burdens of the White House.
I can only guess at those burdens, although I have witnessed at close hand the tragedies that befell three Presidents and the lesser trials of others.
With all the strength and all the good sense I have gained from life, with all the confidence my family, my friends, and my dedicated staff impart to me, and with the good will of countless Americans I have encountered in recent visits to 40 States, I now solemnly reaffirm my promise I made to you last December 6: to uphold the Constitution, to do what is right as God gives me to see the right, and to do the very best I can for America.
God helping me, I will not let you down.
Thank you.
Bush has rwice successfully passed himself off as a “regular guy” to roughly half the population on Election Day. But Ford will always be te ultimate Regular Guy President to me.
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He got there through some luck and some planning (you don’t get picked for VP by being the ten thousandth visitor to the White House). He was prone to mistakes, not obsessed with his image, just someone doing the best he could with what he had. Didn’t make all the right calls, but made a lot of them, particularly when it counted most. Despite my admiration for many other figures, I always thought that Ford tried harder and wanted more to do right by the American people than most any other president.
It might have dragged on and roiled political debates in this country–but Nixon was certainly guilty of many crimes.
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And if he had been convicted in a court of law, might that event have emboldened some in our government to stand up to the current President’s abuses in 2003 and 2004? Might Nixon’s conviction have given pause to some of our current administration’s members as they twisted intelligence to get the war the President wanted, as they established secret prisons & torture procedures, and as they circumvented FISA?
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Does convicting powerful men of crimes deter others from breaking the law?
…if that arguement were true, then the death penalty deter others from killing.
You’re making the analogy that harsh punishment:harsher punishment::no punishment:punishment. Don’t think it’s apot.
“does conviction powerful men deter other powerful men from committing crimes?”
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I have known for a long time that the death penalty doesn’t deter murders–at least this is seen when states with and without capital punishment are compared. But doesn’t our criminal justice system offer some level of deterrence? I recall my college philosophy prof saying that certainty of punishment was more effective than severity of punishment in terms of deterrence. If people like Alberto Gonzales or Donald Rumsfeld thought they might have to endure a trial or fines or incarceration, might they have gone along with the lawbreaking so easily?
When Ted and Caroline Kennedy presented Ford with the Profile in Courage Award a few years ago I remember it being accompanied by clips of Ted lambasting Ford for the pardon. Ted said at the ceremony that over time he has come to see that it was the right decision for the nation, and that he was wrong.
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I’m too young to remember the events, but I have to imagine that Watergate is in the mind of everyone who aspires to number 1600. I don’t think a criminal conviction on top of a disgraced resignation would add much too it.
Ted was right at the time, but he’s enough of a man to know when to say he was wrong, even if he wasn’t.
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It’s not so important whether Nixon would have been convicted or acquitted (although there’s never been any evidence to exonerate him), but some justice would have come from asking the questions and getting some answers. The pardon deprived the nation of a healthy discussion it needed to have.
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For thirty years the conventional wisdom was in line with Ford’s assertion that he did it to heal the country. As of today — according to Bob Woodward in the Boston Globe— we can stop saying that.
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Thirty years later, I still feel cheated.
He did campaign schools, and he said one really interesting thig. He said – if Google had existed, there would have been no Watergate break-in. EVERYTHING that the Plumbers hoped to find in that file cabinet is now on-line. So- when you declare for office, first thing you do is Google your opponent – and then Googgle yourself!
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Nixon aspired to do great things, and pulled a couple off – normalized relations with China, for instance. It is interesting to imagine how his shortened term – like that of Kennedy – would have played out.
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Personally, I always thought Ford to be an amiable dunce, well suited to his career as an Amway dealer. But sometimes, nice is what is needed, and God knows, we aren’t in any danger of having nice guys elected to the Presidency.