give me a name like that but backwards is spelled suffer. and and i was the deputy chief counsel of the senate watergate committee under center sam irvin the man i'm worship most in public life. and we were also proud to work for him. on may 17th 1973 out of this very room. chairman, sam irvin began hearing from the watergate scandal these hearings touched the heartstrings of america and ended up helping mold. what we thought would be the future of constitutional government. as then minority leader mike mansfield said no one in the entire senate was better equipped. to handle this thing called watergate than senator sam j irvin. i worked for center sam jay irvin for 10 years. and i can personally attest. that things were different then than they are now. civility reigned remember that word civility and all of and all the people who were here some 60 years ago know that that is the case. too much civility is absent today. consider the level of viteral and the political discourse that exists in government today and even in the halls of congress i cannot emphasize enough the importance of the relationship between democratic senator, sam j ervin. and republican howard baker last chairman. okay. welcome to tennessee. they made a pact in the very beginning that this would be a non-person hearing the sole purpose of which was to uncover the truth. it's hard to imagine this happening today. because it required level heads and plain old-fashioned civility. they prove that a congressional committee devoid of malice and political bias. good fulfill expunctional of informing the public and then proposed legislation that would prevent this egregious scandal from ever happening again. they knew that only a well-functioning separation of powers. could ensure democracy in our great country for generations. today we commemorate the 55th anniversity of watergate break-in, which carl bernstein and bob's newspaper called think of minor event about that about that size and the washington post and in my mind the pivotal lynchpin of solving what center urban called a national tragedy. was the committee discovery of a secret tasting taping system. installed in president nixon's white house and other presidential offices. these tapes prove that white house john council john dean who testified before the committee for days? had been telling the truth in laboriously. of days revealing that nixon and his leadership team were deeply involved in a massive cover-up designed to conceal the entire watergate affair. a chain of events that included the commission of crimes did we learn lesson? i fear not. the committee followed the money it's investigation and found that huge sums of unaccountable campaign money a road democracy. today we have the same problem. the citizens united decision and my mind one of the worst supreme court ruling star history. opened the floodgates for corruption just as with watergate. today is electrical process as a washington in unlimited and shameful amounts of money. democracy will survive as senator irvin said in remember this it is quote the last best. hope of mankind. in his eternal struggle to govern himself decently and effectively. and in my viewmocracy will prevail because it must thank you. know ladies and john. i want to call up here real quickly. so the the folks that made this possible they are. sponsors and their people that gave of their human earthly wealth to make sure you had a good time and if you'll come up one in time gene voice it was assistant council council sitting here and john mayall. john elmore investigator mike carpenter investigator going up here. michael hirshman deputy chief investigator stephen leopold the renowned canadian and how in the hell did get out there? investigator i'll never know how he got on but somehow he sneak past me at you. oh, he was one of those okay, lacy pressveld investigator jim stewart investigator assistant chief counsel, jim hamilton he was a neighbor from south. from south of carolina started to say south america but south carolina be fine now gordon friedman come up here make gordon. gordon has been so. sorry, lord. gordon has helped keep this thing together for so many years. we had we had a 20th what to get reunion in here and i remember connie chung back in the back. they're smoking away on cigarettes. and and running gene and carl every time i saw connie chung she was running in high heels faster than i could run. gordon has been working on a watergate website. it's called watergate dot org. he's worked with the 45th and and he has been instrumental in the 50th and gordon. is there anything more you need to tell about how to get of you? well. gate dot org just go there because what happens here tonight is wonderful, but it's what we do after tonight to keep our eyes open and our voices in the public sphere about these issues because they're not going to go away with the current situation. it's something to face. yeah. okay. sorry. let me just repeat that. so what happens here tonight? it's important, but what's really important is what happens afterwards so we have to really be vigilant going forward. there's some loopholes in the constitution and in our judicial system and really it's up to the public at the end to be responsible and to have a voice so we're going to have watergate.org and we're gonna start a little nonprofit nonprofit to keep the lights on. thank you rufus. thanks for all your help. rachel and judy dash, please stand up and let us say hello to you. their father sam sam dash was the real star of the show. he and i worked very hard together and sam dash never quit to eat. i don't know when he ate. he was a fantastic chief counsel and could have been anybody put their any better. they could have anybody better put there than the deputy chief counsel that i well. no, i didn't that at all. so i want to also say that we thank amy enright her company has helped us with this on. her company is named newton street publications. and cheryl mattingly my executive assistant who grow? yeah, sissy baker is here who sissy baker? oh. sissy baker here that's howard baker's daughter. oh my god. i love your father. one time one time sissy. i was running for governor. and he he called me. he said roof saw come over and come out for you against you whichever will help. and i said, well senator come out come over and please come out for me, but he didn't quite break that he didn't go down that hard. is joy reid here tonight? i think joy was in here a moment ago. of the readout bob woodward is somewhere hiding or did he leave? there's my friend bob woodward bob. i won't bob and carl to come up just a minute because i got to tell you guys what to do for a change. come on up here. they well you all right, you boys are at it. three minutes supposed to say something. we were not expecting to speak. and i'll just say the following. this was a triumph of democracy. what occurred in this room? and and every aspect of this country's great culture was involved. press the legislative branch the judiciary both parties supreme court and it worked. and i think if that were to be the legacy of watergate. this would be a moment. of greatness that we lack today. thank you. i remember after carl and i had done our stories in the washington post and most people did not believe them. they thought it was inconceivable and i got a call from senator irvin's office since it come on up want to talk and so went into his office and he said we're gonna investigate watergate mike mansfield had selected him to do it and he said gee we'd like to have your sources. and i said a we're not going to give them to you. because i think that would break down a barrier between the government and a free press and he said i understand but we're going to do it anyway, and literally what he said, maybe we'll find out what jeb magruder did. he kept the ball the the bar really low and then he conducted what is the gold standard of congressional investigations nixon miss calculated as you many of you recall. nixon said i'm gonna invoke executive privilege and not let hold them in urlachman and mitchell testify then nixon in one of his many delusions thought well, no, i'll let him testify they'll help me and of course they came up and tore. nixon apart and then this led to the the discovery of the tapes and of course irvin, i'm sorry to go over three minutes, but you're used to it. okay, then. the great thing other than the investigation that senator irvin did is his final report, which is four or five thousand pages and in it. he asked the question. what was watergate and he answered it and he said watergate was an attempt to subvert and destroy the process of selecting presidential candidates and a president exactly and then he goes through this, you know, he wouldn't and never evaded the tough questions and he said why water came, why did this happen and his answer and it's the end of his report the lust for power. thank you. well, i mentioned a good friend of mine the dean of the campbell law school. dean rich leonard came up. i called him on the phone. i said dean you need to go to washington. he said, okay. i don't i don't know how i finagled it. but there he is dean rich leonard of the campbell university law school and former federal judge. and now ladies and gentlemen, you you get a program that i think you will quite like and i'm not going to jump on anybody and choke them to death. i will certainly make certain quivering moments if you start going over richard. and uh so i i will i might just gave me the finger. i think that's richard benavisti. uh jill wine banks is on the next panel. and jill you need to come on up here. and kick it off. in fact, i want to tell you about this lady having been a lawyer for a long time. i think she explains complex legal issues. better than anybody i've ever seen on tv jill come up, please and convene your your your table and and you have with you, of course, my friend richard benavisti the deputy chief counsel deputy chief investor of prosecutor of the special prosecution team and jim hamilton our our jim hamilton to handle the one of the issues of the the three-pronged watergate investigation and a long time friend. and we're looking. for ms. holtzman, how are we going to handle that amy? yeah, we've got oh good lord. i love my congresswoman ross. and i want to call up also my congresswoman deborah ross. from the second congressional district in north carolina. she's a brilliant lady. and and the next panel will be gene boyce who's going to tell you how this how he discovered the tapes. this is after this battle. so jill, you are the boss here. happy new year they didn't. hi everyone. i know that you all want to be mingling. so we're going to keep our program tight. but i am very happy to be here and i can you all see or should we move chairs so that it's okay. all right good. we're going to talk about what watergate was all about from both the senate point of view, and i'm sorry that former congresswoman. liz holtzman isn't here and i'll speak in part for her. i've gotten to be friends with her. and so i'll sort of say some of the things i think she would have said and then we'll try to finish up quickly. and so we have as you've already heard richard benvenista who to me will always be rick even though he hates me when i say that and he he's going to retaliate by calling me jilly bean. so i'm preempting him. and of course jim hamilton who is going to be wonderful and congresswoman deborah ross who will talk about some of the things that need to be done now and maybe can talk about some of the things that we did after watergate in terms of congressional legislation that has been undone by the supreme court. let me start with you jim. you have described the watergate hearings which it's hard for me to believe having only seen them on television that it was in this room because it seems so small compared to what i saw. but you've described it as being the most successful the most consequential and the most um riveting of all congressional investigations and it certainly is true in american history. this lasted 51 days and 80 to 85 percent of all american households watched and they were riveted and they didn't watch for an hour. they watched for a minimum of 30 hours. obviously, we're in a slightly different time, but i want you to talk about maybe just quickly five reasons. why you think that that was the most riveting and most consequential? there's a microphone. why you'd take one? maybe you should stand up. so people can really see. yeah just stand right here. yeah. no, no. try this one. it's on. how about now? okay. technology has never been my strength. you know, i think they all uh, maybe five reasons why the senate water aid committee was the most successful the most riveting and most consequential in history and let me just describe those to you very briefly. the first is the scope. of the wrongdoing that we found because watergate was not only the break-in and the cover-up. it was a series of noxious dirty tricks a lot of their name by the way at ed muskie because he was the strongest candidate against nixon. there were massive illegal campaign contributions and then there was something called the responsiveness program which gordon friedman over there found in the national archives, which was his scheme to use the bureaucracy to re-elect nixon fortunately a lot of members of the bureaucracy just balked they weren't going to go along with it. the second reason i think that watergate was so successful was the cast of characters. just think about the people involved. i mean for the committee you had sam irvin who was a folk hero. you had dana norway who was a war hero. and the other other side you had richard nixon. who to be the best known man in america was still one of the most mysterious men in america you had four cubans who had bay of pigs and cia backgrounds who had done all types of nefarious things you had gordon liddy and howard hunt. who never saw a condestine nefarious scheme that they wouldn't follow no matter how how doomed to failure it was and then you had the the trio from the white house chuck colson, uh, john ehrlichman bob halderman, who would make your the hair stand up in the back of your neck when you heard him in uh testifying the the third reason that i think watergate was so successful was there was good staff work and let's give credit to sam dash. his daughters are here. let's give credit to sam. sam knew sam knew how to tell a story and that's what he did the summer of 1973. watergate was the best soap opera on television. it was appointment television as the new york times said one day 60 million people heard john dean. talk about a cancer growing on their presidency. the fourth reason that i think watergate was so successful and rufus has already mentioned. this was that it was done in a way where partisanship was secondary. there was a legitimate effort to find the truth. let me give you just a few facts that maybe today in this in the context of what's going on now seem incredible. the watergate committee was set up by a vote of 77 to nothing in the united states senate. the decision to subpoena president nixon after we found the tapes and then to sue him when he stiffed us was by a unanimous vote of the watergate committee. the questions that were asked to uncover the tapes both in private session and at public hearing were questions by republican staffers and the watergate committee report that bob referred to this huge report, which i think was 1200 pages of text and then many append appendices that was adopted by unanimous vote by the committee would this happen today? gee, i don't think so. and of course the final reason that a watergate the watergate committee was such a great success was that we discovered the white house tapes that brought down a corrupt president. i think gene is going to talk to you about that. thanks joe. rick let me call on you to maybe talk a little bit more about the role of the watergate special prosecution office and why? we were so successful both in the trial and in you can stand in front if you want with that. i want to stand next to you. let me say a thing about watergate. uh, yeah, let me do this. um all three branches of government a special prosecutor and an implacable press were responsible. for the extraordinary result unique i think for any country in the world. to investigate itself and to come to a conclusion uh that ultimately rid us of a corrupt. president of the united states and terminated his second term. it was the result of the laws that were on the books being applied. by extraordinary people extraordinary people who stepped up and did the work. now it could have ended differently at any point if nixon had destroyed the tapes that we subpoenaed. even up to the moment that we were to get them. i think he would have survived served out the rest of his term wounded. yes. but he would have survived. and let me suggest to you that. this country would have survived nixon's. second term whatever you say about nixon and there's a lot to say about his criminality and his penchant for authoritarianism. he was an individual who had a sense of shame. at the end of the day his sense of shame was on display. watergate did not pose. a threat to the continuation of our government as we see it. i cannot say the same. about donald trump donald trump was and is an existential threat. to our democracy short and simple it was the individuals. operating within our system who are responsible for the conclusion. of the watergate saga our ability to get the tapes. uh and to then pass them along to the house impeachment committee along with a road map prepared by our dear friend and colleague george frampton who's here tonight? george stand up george say hello. we built on the great work that the senate committee did. and we expanded on it and we were able to get evidence that they were denied. and that evidence put the nails in richard nixon's coffin. let me conclude my remarks. by calling out the names of the heroes of watergate who are no longer with us. judge john j sarika senator, sam irvin sam dash peter rodino john door archibald cox henry ruth james neal leon jaworski and catherine graham. the way may we find those heroes to guide us through the troubling? months and years ahead. thank you. and of course richard meant to include senator howard baker. he has captured something that is really true, which is it was a time when there was bipartisanship. there were facts that mattered all the networks had the same facts. it was an extraordinary time of compromise democrats and republicans dined together and worked together and got things done. there was unanimous support for the legislation that followed the trial and the hearings and we aren't there now and i think that's what's really so sad is that we don't have those people coming forward now and we need that but let's go on with the questions. i want to ask one more question of you richard. you're not done yet. um. come up jack one of the issues. we were successful in of course prosecuting the aids and we named richard nixon as an unindicted co-conspirator, which was in part necessary in order to introduce the tapes into evidence in the trial. he had to be a co-conspirator. this wasn't a vindictive act. it was a necessary act. it was also part of the fact that those were what the evidence showed and we worried about things like jury nullification if the aids were being tried and the leader wasn't and there was a big debate in the office about whether he should be indicted twice once was as a sitting president and once was the day he resigned and in the period before he got pardoned and so i'd like you, you know, richard and i do not agree on this. um, i was for indictment. both times both as sitting president and agai