I shall restein presidency effective at noon resign the presidency effective at noon tomorrow. Hi. Im director of the Richard Nixon president ial library and museum in california its my honor and privilege to take you on a tour today of our now watergate gallery. This was a challenge for us. I was asked to produce the gallery. It was one of my responsibilities when i joined the National Archives in 2006. Im a professional historian, but we write books. We generally dont do museum exhibits. So this is a challenge in public history. In other words, taking information and making it accessible to people who havent had a chance to prep for an exam before they walk into a new gallery. The other challenge is we inherited the National Archives took over the private Nixon Library. It was run from 1990 to 2007 by the private nixon foundations. We became responsible and one of the jobs was to make it a nonpartisan institution. We inherited a museum that was produced in the preweb period. So it la
To Domestic Policy Group within the nixon administration. Later he had developed a number of legacy forums that were held across the United States that represent policies and achievements of the administration. Then i heard he was writing about. When i finally met jeff he became a good friend i now understand all the current efficiencies made to the foundation and in particular in the nixon legacy. In the book you striving is finally here so we are very pleased to give them this opportunity its his first stop. The book came out on monday we are honored to have him here for the real scandal, geoff shepard. [applause] thank you, bill. Thank you, bill but its an honor to be here, and honored to have bill have the new head of the Richard Nixon foundation. As it turns out, the real watergate scandal is the trashing of our constitution and bill of rights and the successful effort to drive president nixon from office, to imprison his senior aides, to realign political power without the inconv
And my colleagues on this committee know full well that we cannot escape history. That the decision we must jointly make will itself be tested and tried by our fellow citizens, and by history itself. The magnitude of our mission is awesome. Theres no way to understate its importance. Nor to mistake its meaning. We have unsheathed the strongest weapon in the arsenal of congressional power. We personally, members of this committee, have felt its weight, and have perceived its dangers. The framers of the constitution, fearing an executive too strong to be contained, and constrained from injustice or subject to reproof arrayed the congress with the power to bring the executive into account, and into peril of removal for acts of treason, bribery, or other crimes of high and misdemeanors. Now the first responsibility facing members of this committee was to try to define what an Impeachable Offense is. The constitution doesnt define it. The precedents, which are sparse, do not give us any rea
Now, the purpose of any media to make the news, it is the purpose and the objective of the media to fairly report the news. Now to say as however, many weeks, everything that nixon knew, thats not proof. And i want to pose a point. I wonder what the prosecutor in the United States senator is going to do. I wonder what hes going to do. Is he going to plead his whole case on tapes because he cant use any of the witnesses we have. Any one of them testified no act of wrong doing on the part of the president. If you dont think so, go through the lot. Who is the man who handled the money. Louisiana rue, was there any involvement by the president . To the man who received the money, the attorney, did your client make any threat to get clemency from the president or any of his agents . The answer, no. As to the man who supposedly directed the payment of the money, the answer, no. Now with these kind of witnesses how do you prove that case before the senate . Is there a soul here who honestly b
Mr. Railsback . Chairman, thank you, and members of the committee by saying that you, mr. Chairman, i think in a rather difficult assignment with you because you know on many occasions i think you have handled yourself very well. And i think i can say for the most members of the committee that during these six months through the 38 volumes of evidence, the listening to the live witnesses morning, afternoon and night that i can be proud of my judiciary colleagues, most of them. I feel badly as Charlie Sandman did about the leaks, the selective leaks, some of which i think the newspapers made a mistake in playing. Although i know they have a job. I used to like to be on the House Judiciary Committee when we were worried about penal reform and juvenile delinquency, trying to improve some very important things in our country that needed improving, but im about to reconsider my assignment now that we have had amnesty, abortion, impeachment and now a bomb threat. Let me say that im one of th