STEVE EMBER: Welcome to THE MAKING OF A NATION -- American history in VOA Special English. I’m Steve Ember.
This week in our series, we tell the story of the thirty-eighth president of the United States.
GERALD FORD: “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.”
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Gerald Ford was sworn into office on August ninth, nineteen seventy-four. Ford was vice president to Richard Nixon, who had announced the day before that he would resign.
If Nixon had not resigned, he might have been removed from office. Congress had been moving to charge him with corruption in the Watergate case.
At his swearing-in ceremony, the new president spoke about the nation’s future.
GERALD FORD: "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."
He went on to say:
GERALD FORD: "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."
Gerald Ford became the only leader in American history to have served both as vice president and president without being elected.
Richard Nixon chose him as vice president in October nineteen-seventy-three. That was when Nixon's former vice president, Spiro Agnew, resigned because of criminal charges that he failed to pay his taxes.
When Nixon himself resigned, Ford became president.
Ford was a longtime congressman from the state of Michigan. He was well-liked by his congressional colleagues. His education was in economics and political science at the University of Michigan. Then he attended Yale Law School. During World War Two, he served as a Naval officer in the Pacific.
After the war, Ford entered politics. He was a member of the Republican Party. He was first elected to the House of Representatives in nineteen forty-eight. He won re-election twelve times. Republicans in the House elected him the minority leader during the administration of Democratic President Lyndon Johnson.
Ford was still minority leader when Richard Nixon, a fellow Republican, was elected president in nineteen sixty-eight. In his leadership position, Ford helped win approval of a number of Nixon's proposals. He became known for his strong loyalty to the president. It was no surprise, then, when Nixon named Ford as vice president.
Gerald Ford was an "accidental president." He came to office in a sudden turn of events. Almost as suddenly, he had to decide what to do about the former president.
After Nixon left office, he could have been charged with crimes for his part in covering up the events of Watergate. Instead, one month after Nixon resigned, President Ford settled the question. He pardoned Nixon for any crimes that he might have committed.
The pardoning of Nixon made many Americans angry. Some believed he should have been put on trial. They thought he might have answered more questions about Watergate if he had not been pardoned.
Ford said he pardoned Nixon in an effort to unite the country. For a while, though, the pardon only seemed to intensify the divisions.
REPRESENTATIVE ELIZABETH HOLTZMAN: "And I wondered if anyone had brought to your attention the fact that the Constitution specifically states that, even though somebody is impeached, that person shall nonetheless be liable to punishment according to law.”
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