Richard Nixon

Richard Milhous Nixon was born on January 9, 1913, on his parents’ lemon ranch in Yorba Linda, California, and grew up in nearby Whittier. His father, Francis Anthony “Frank” Nixon (1878–1956), was a citrus farmer who, after the ranch failed in 1922, opened a grocery store and gas station in Whittier; his mother was Hannah Milhous Nixon (1885–1967). Both parents were Quakers.⁠[1][2]

He was the second of five brothers: Harold (1909–1933), Donald (1914–1987), Arthur (1918–1925) and Edward (1930–2019). His younger brother Arthur died after a short illness, and his older brother Harold after a long one.⁠[2][3]

Nixon attended Whittier High School from 1928 to 1930 and entered Whittier College in September 1930, studying there until 1934. In 1934 he won a scholarship to Duke University School of Law, graduating in June 1937. Afterward he was turned down for jobs with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and several prestigious law firms.⁠[2][3]

Nixon was admitted to the California bar on November 9, 1937, and joined the Whittier firm of Wingert and Bewley, becoming a partner in Bewley, Knoop and Nixon on January 1, 1939. He also took part in local civic life, serving on the Whittier College board of trustees and acting with the Whittier Community Players.⁠[2][3]

Nixon met Thelma Catherine “Pat” Ryan on January 16, 1938, while acting with the Whittier Community Players, and they married on June 21, 1940, in the Presidential Suite of the Mission Inn in Riverside, California.⁠[2][3]

On a law professor’s recommendation, Nixon moved to Washington in January 1942 to work for the Office of Price Administration. On June 15, 1942, he was commissioned a lieutenant (junior grade) in the U.S. Navy, entering Naval Training School on August 17; he served in the South Pacific from 1943 to 1945 and was promoted to lieutenant on October 1, 1943.⁠[2][3]

He was released from active duty in March 1946 as a lieutenant commander, having received two Letters of Commendation, the American Campaign Medal, the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal and the World War II Victory Medal; he was promoted to commander in the Naval Reserve on June 1, 1953, and retired on June 1, 1966.⁠[2]

On November 6, 1946, Nixon defeated Jerry Voorhis, a five-term New Deal Democrat, by more than 15,000 votes and was sworn in to the House on January 3, 1947. The Miller Center notes that his campaign tied Voorhis to “the PAC” using a bulletin about a different committee; Voorhis pointed out the mix-up, but the damage was done.⁠[2][3]

Nixon was given a seat on the House Un-American Activities Committee by House Republicans and in 1948 led its investigation of the former State Department official Alger Hiss, which brought him national prominence; the Miller Center notes that evidence presented to HUAC and at two trials showed that Hiss had passed information to the Soviets. The Nixon Library’s biography states that intelligence released decades later by the U.S. and Russian governments confirmed Hiss’s guilt. That year Nixon was reelected to the House with the endorsement of both parties.⁠[3][2][1]

In 1950 Nixon defeated Helen Gahagan Douglas for a U.S. Senate seat from California by more than half a million votes. His campaign distributed a “pink sheet” comparing her voting record with that of Vito Marcantonio, which Nixon called the “Douglas-Marcantonio axis,” and he acquired the nickname “Tricky Dick.” He served in the Senate from December 1, 1950, to January 1, 1953.⁠[2][3]

In 1952 Dwight D. EisenhowerDwight D. EisenhowerDwight D. Eisenhower (1890–1969) was an American army general and politician who served as supreme commander of Allied forces in western Europe during World War II and as the 34th president of the United States, a Republican, from 1953 to 1961.Open the full entry chose Nixon as his running mate. After a New York PostNew York PostThe New York Post is a daily newspaper in New York City, published by New York Post Media Group, a News Corp company.Open the full entry story about a secret trust fund for him, Nixon defended himself in a televised address, the “Checkers Speech,” which was widely praised. On November 4, 1952, the Eisenhower-Nixon ticket won by about seven million votes, and Nixon was inaugurated as vice president on January 20, 1953.⁠[3][2]

As vice president, Nixon toured South America, where a mob in Caracas stoned his motorcade, confrontations that raised his popularity at home. When Eisenhower suffered a heart attack, Nixon’s steady handling of the government earned strong press reviews, and the ticket was reelected on November 6, 1956. In 1959 he debated Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev at an American exhibition in Moscow, an exchange known as the “kitchen debate.”⁠[3][2]

In 1960 Nixon, as the Republican presidential nominee, lost to John F. KennedyJohn F. KennedyJohn F. Kennedy (1917–1963) was an American politician who represented Massachusetts in the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate and served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 to 1963. The youngest person elected president and the first Roman Catholic to hold the office, he was assassinated in Dallas on November 22, 1963.Open the full entry by fewer than 120,000 popular votes (0.2 percent), in what the Miller Center calls the closest presidential election of the 20th century. The Nixon Library’s biography says many observers concluded that the first televised debate was the turning point. The Nixon family left Washington in January 1961.⁠[2][3]

From March 13, 1961, Nixon practiced law in Los Angeles; his bestselling book Six Crises was published on March 29, 1962. In 1962 he lost the California governor’s race to Edmund G. “Pat” BrownBrown UniversityBrown University is a private nonprofit research university in Providence, Rhode Island, and a member of the Ivy League. Chartered by Rhode Island's colonial legislature in 1764, it is known for its undergraduate Open Curriculum, which has no common required core. Christina H. Paxson, president since July 2012, announced on August 3, 2026, that the 2026–27 academic year would be her last in office. As of October 1, 2026, the search for Brown's 20th president remained underway.Open the full entry by nearly 300,000 votes and then called his remarks to reporters his “last press conference.”⁠[2]

From 1963 to 1967 he practiced law in New York City. In 1964 he campaigned for the Republican presidential nominee, Barry Goldwater, which the Miller Center says won him the gratitude of conservatives. In 1967 he published “Asia After Vietnam” in Foreign Affairs.⁠[2][4]

In 1968 Nixon won the presidency with nearly 500,000 more popular votes than the Democratic nominee, Hubert Humphrey; the third-party candidate George Wallace won nearly ten million popular votes and 46 electoral votes. Nixon was inaugurated on January 20, 1969.⁠[2]

Nixon sought “peace with honor” in Vietnam, gradually withdrawing U.S. troops and shifting combat roles to South Vietnamese forces under “Vietnamization”; U.S. troop strength fell from 543,000 in April 1969 to zero on March 29, 1973. At the same time he resumed the bombing of North Vietnam that Lyndon B. JohnsonLyndon B. JohnsonLyndon B. Johnson (1908–1973) was an American politician who served Texas as a U.S. representative and senator and led the Senate Democrats, became vice president in 1961 and succeeded to the presidency on the assassination of John F. Kennedy in 1963, serving as the 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. His administration enacted the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and other “Great Society” legislation while expanding the U.S. military commitment in the Vietnam War.Open the full entry had suspended in October 1968 and widened the air and ground war into Cambodia and Laos. Henry KissingerHenry KissingerHenry Kissinger (1923–2023) was a German-born American diplomat and political scientist who served as US national security adviser from 1969 to 1975 and as the 56th secretary of state from 1973 to 1977, the first person to hold both posts at once. He led the opening to China, détente and arms control talks with the Soviet Union, the Vietnam ceasefire negotiations and shuttle diplomacy in the Middle East, and shared the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize with Le Duc Tho; his role in Chile, Cambodia, South Asia and East Timor drew lasting criticism.Open the full entry served as his national security adviser.⁠[5][2]

On July 25, 1969, he set out the Nixon Doctrine, and on August 8 he proposed the Family Assistance Plan, which Congress did not approve. During the Apollo 11 Moon landing on July 20, 1969, he spoke by telephone from the Oval Office with Neil Armstrong and Buzz AldrinBuzz AldrinBuzz Aldrin is a retired U.S. Air Force colonel and former NASA astronaut who performed three extravehicular activities on Gemini XII in 1966 and, as Apollo 11 lunar module pilot in 1969, became the second person to walk on the Moon.Open the full entry.⁠[2][1]

In the spring of 1970 U.S. and South Vietnamese forces attacked North Vietnamese sanctuaries in Cambodia. On May 4, 1970, at Kent State University, Ohio National Guard soldiers fired into a crowd of about 2,000 protesters, killing four and wounding nine.⁠[5]

On July 9, 1970, Nixon put forward the plan for the Environmental Protection Agency, and on December 31 he signed the Clean Air Act. His administration also helped bring about the peaceful desegregation of public schools in the South.⁠[2][1]

The Pentagon Papers, a 47-volume, 7,000-page top-secret study of U.S. involvement in Vietnam from 1945 to 1967 commissioned by Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, were completed five days before Nixon’s inauguration. Daniel Ellsberg, one of the analysts working on the study through the RAND Corporation, copied and leaked it, and The New York Times began publishing it on June 13, 1971. On June 14 Attorney General John Mitchell ordered the paper to stop; when it refused, the government obtained a restraining order, and on June 30, 1971, the Supreme Court ruled 6–3 in the paper’s favor.⁠[6]

To stop the leaks, Nixon had his staff create the White House Special Investigations Unit, known as the “Plumbers,” whose members included Egil Krogh, David Young, E. Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy and whose tactics included burglary, bugging and intimidation. The government charged Ellsberg and Anthony J. Russo under the Espionage Act of 1917, but Judge William M. Byrne Jr. dismissed the case because of governmental misconduct and illegal evidence gathering.⁠[6]

On June 30, 1971, the 26th Amendment, lowering the voting age to 18, was adopted. On August 15, 1971, Nixon announced wage and price controls and ended the gold standard.⁠[2]

After 21 years of estrangement, the two countries began low-level contacts in 1970, trade and travel restrictions were lifted in 1971, and Henry Kissinger held secret talks. From February 21 to 28, 1972, Nixon visited Beijing, Hangzhou and Shanghai, the first sitting U.S. president to visit China; the visit ended with the Shanghai Communiqué, in which the United States formally recognized the “one-China” principle.⁠[5][2]

In May 1972 Nixon made a state visit to the Soviet Union and signed 10 formal agreements, the most important being the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT I), based on talks begun in 1969, and the Basic Principles of U.S.-Soviet Relations, which set out the framework of détente. The Nixon Library’s biography describes it as the first comprehensive nuclear weapons limitation pact between the superpowers.⁠[5][2]

On June 17, 1972, five men were arrested while trying to repair surveillance equipment in the Democratic National Committee offices at the Watergate complex in Washington; one, James W. McCord Jr., was security chief of the Committee to Re-elect the President, and the other four had been recruited by the former Central Intelligence Agency operative E. Howard Hunt. The next day The Washington PostThe Washington PostThe Washington Post is an American daily newspaper founded in Washington in 1877, known for its role in the Pentagon Papers case and the Watergate investigation. Run by the Meyer–Graham family for eighty years from 1933, it has been owned personally by Jeff Bezos since 2013.Open the full entry published a story by Alfred E. Lewis, Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward.⁠[7][8][9]

In the days after the arrests, Nixon secretly directed White House counsel John Dean to oversee a cover-up, obstructed the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s inquiry and authorized secret cash payments to the burglars; on June 23, 1972, he ordered, through channels, that the FBI investigation be curtailed, an order later revealed by the tapes. Woodward and Bernstein relied heavily on an unnamed source called “Deep Throat,” whom W. Mark Felt identified as himself in 2005. On September 15, 1972, seven men were indicted for their roles in the break-in.⁠[9][8][7]

In November 1972 Nixon defeated the Democratic nominee, George McGovern, by 520 electoral votes to 17 with nearly 61 percent of the popular vote, winning everywhere except MassachusettsMassachusettsMassachusetts (officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts) is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States; its capital and largest city is Boston. One of the original 13 states, it ratified the U.S. Constitution on February 6, 1788, the sixth state to do so. Its population in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020) was 7,029,917.Open the full entry and the District of Columbia.⁠[2][8]

In October 1972 Henry Kissinger and North Vietnamese Foreign Minister Le Duc Tho reached an agreement, and Kissinger announced “Peace is at hand,” but it broke down over South Vietnamese objections; in late December 1972 the United States carried out an 11-day bombing campaign against Hanoi and other cities, the “Christmas bombings.” On January 27, 1973, the Paris peace accords ending U.S. involvement in Vietnam were signed, providing for an immediate cease-fire, the withdrawal of all U.S. military personnel and the release of all prisoners of war. Kissinger and Le Duc Tho were awarded the 1973 Nobel PrizeNobel PrizeThe Nobel Prize is an international award established under the will of Alfred Nobel, comprising five prizes in physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and peace, awarded since 1901; its funds are managed by the Nobel Foundation, whose Board is based in Stockholm. The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, established in 1968, is not a Nobel Prize.Open the full entry for Peace; Le Duc Tho declined it.⁠[5][2]

The break-in trial opened on January 8, 1973, and Liddy and McCord were convicted on all counts on January 30. On February 7 the Senate created the Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities, chaired by Sam Ervin, which began public hearings on May 17. On April 30 H. R. Haldeman, John Ehrlichman and Attorney General Richard Kleindienst resigned and John Dean was fired; on May 18 Attorney General Elliot Richardson appointed Archibald Cox as special prosecutor.⁠[7][10][9]

On July 16, 1973, Alexander Butterfield revealed to the Senate committee the White House taping system, which had recorded Oval Office conversations since 1969. On July 23 Nixon refused to give the tapes to Cox and the Senate investigators, who issued subpoenas. On October 20, in the “Saturday Night Massacre,” Nixon ordered Richardson to fire Cox; Richardson refused and resigned, Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus also left, and Acting Attorney General Robert Bork removed Cox, an action a federal district court later ruled illegal. Nixon released seven of the nine tapes Cox had requested, one of which contained an 18½-minute gap.⁠[7][9][10]

On October 10, 1973, Vice President Spiro Agnew pleaded no contest to tax evasion and resigned. Nixon nominated Gerald FordGerald FordGerald Ford (1913–2006) was an American politician who represented Michigan in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1949 to 1973 and became House minority leader in 1965. In 1973 he became the first vice president appointed under the 25th Amendment, and after Richard Nixon resigned in 1974 he served as the 38th president of the United States until 1977.Open the full entry to succeed him, and Ford took office as vice president on December 6, 1973.⁠[2][1]

On February 6, 1974, the House authorized the Judiciary Committee’s impeachment inquiry, and the committee began impeachment proceedings on May 9. Special prosecutor Leon Jaworski subpoenaed 64 tapes. On July 24, 1974, the Supreme Court unanimously rejected Nixon’s claims of executive privilege and upheld the special prosecutor’s subpoena for the tapes.⁠[7][10][9]

The House Judiciary Committee adopted three articles of impeachment on July 27, 29 and 30, 1974, covering obstruction of the investigation of the break-in, misuse of powers in violation of his oath of office, and failure to comply with House subpoenas.⁠[7]

On August 5, 1974, Nixon released the transcript of a June 23, 1972, conversation in which using the Central Intelligence Agency to block the FBI’s Watergate investigation was discussed. On the evening of August 8 he announced his resignation, effective at noon the next day, and on August 9, 1974, Gerald Ford succeeded him as president.⁠[9][2]

On September 8, 1974, Gerald Ford pardoned Nixon. Nixon said he regretted “not acting more decisively and forthrightly in dealing with Watergate.”⁠[7][2]

After leaving office Nixon returned to San Clemente, California, and later settled in Saddle River, New JerseyNew JerseyNew Jersey is a state in the eastern United States on the Atlantic Ocean, bordered by New York State, Delaware, and Pennsylvania, with the Hudson River forming its northeastern boundary and the Delaware River its western boundary; its capital is Trenton and its largest city is Newark. One of the original 13 colonies, it became the third state to ratify the U.S. Constitution on December 18, 1787, and its population in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020) was 9,288,994.Open the full entry. He traveled widely in the United States and to dozens of countries, completed a number of books and called this period his “wilderness years”; his successors often consulted him on matters of state. He made a five-week fact-finding trip to Asia and Europe in August–September 1985 and met Mikhail Gorbachev in 1986.⁠[11][1][2]

Nixon raised funds for the library through the Richard Nixon Foundation. In 1987 the city of Yorba Linda bought nine acres from the local school district and deeded them to the foundation, and ground was broken on December 2, 1988. The Richard Nixon Library and Birthplace was dedicated on July 19, 1990, with George H. W. Bush, Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan joining Nixon before a crowd of more than 50,000. Nixon’s birthplace house had been designated a National Historic Landmark in 1973.⁠[12][11]

In 2007 the library joined the National Archives and Records Administration, which now houses Nixon’s presidential materials there; the redesigned museum and new galleries were dedicated on October 14, 2016.⁠[13]

Nixon died in New York City on April 22, 1994, at age 81, and was buried on April 27, 1994, in Yorba Linda, California, at the Nixon Library beside his wife, Pat Nixon.⁠[1][11]

Nixon and Pat Nixon had two daughters: Patricia “Tricia,” born in Whittier on February 21, 1946, and Julie, born in Washington, D.C., on July 5, 1948. Pat Nixon died on June 22, 1993, in Park Ridge, New Jersey.⁠[2]

The Miller Center’s essay judges that until Watergate Nixon was “the dominant politician of the Cold War,” and that both his rise and his fall were “spectacular”; the historian Garry Wills coined the phrase “The Denigrative Method” for Nixon’s campaign style.⁠[4][3]

BritannicaEncyclopædia BritannicaEncyclopædia Britannica is a general English-language encyclopedia first published in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1768; the name also refers to its publisher, Chicago-based Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. (which presents itself as The Britannica Group). The print edition ended in 2012, and the company’s main businesses since then have been the online encyclopedia Britannica.com, digital education products for schools and libraries, and Merriam-Webster dictionaries.Open the full entry calls Watergate the worst political scandal in United States history and suggests that the opening to China may have been Nixon’s most significant foreign policy achievement; the White House Historical Association’s essay says his second term was largely consumed by Watergate.⁠[9][5][11]

Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum: Official website: https://www.nixonlibrary.gov/ (opens in a new window).⁠[2]

Richard Nixon Foundation: Official website: https://www.nixonfoundation.org/ (opens in a new window).⁠[12]