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00:11With the Watergate break-in fading from the news, mainstream Washington reporters struggled
00:18to spark public interest in the scandal, while one obscure California radio personality tried
00:24to convince the world that Watergate had exposed a very serious conspiracy.
00:30None of it had an impact, till one of the burglars dropped a bombshell, a letter pointing
00:35the finger directly at the White House.
00:47Okay.
00:49Put yourself in the shoes of someone working in the White House at the beginning of 1973.
00:55Someone working high up in the ranks.
00:58Someone close to President Nixon's inner circle.
01:03The President will be out in a moment to make a brief statement to you, ladies and gentlemen.
01:09The statement he will make to you is self-explanatory.
01:14Someone whose job it is to shield the President at all costs.
01:21The judicial process is moving ahead as it should.
01:25By March of 1973, that had become pretty hard to do.
01:31James McCord's letter to Judge Sirica, which claimed that the Watergate conspiracy went all
01:36the way to the top of the executive branch, all but pointed the finger right at the Oval
01:40Office.
01:41As I have said before, and have said throughout this entire matter, all government employees,
01:47and especially White House staff employees, are expected fully to cooperate.
01:54I condemn any attempts to cover up in this case, no matter who is involved.
02:02And with public pressure mounting, no one had the President's ear more on the Watergate problem
02:07than his senior counsel, John Dean.
02:11Let me tell you what happens after this.
02:15Once I really got down to the crunch and was trying to get him to deal with very serious
02:20problems, that's when I met the real Nixon.
02:38I said, Mr. President, people are going to go to jail.
02:42He said, like who?
02:43I said, like me, Mr. President.
02:46He says, no, no, no, the lawyers never go to jail, John.
02:49And on the morning of April 16th, the President called his counsel in for a meeting, perhaps
02:55to put that theory to the test.
03:01He slides two letters across the desk at me, and he says, he has prepared for my resignation.
03:20And they're remarkable open confessions to everything that's gone astray in the world.
03:26You know, that I'm confessing to.
03:31Imagine your John Dean, who had entered the White House as an ambitious 31-year-old political
03:36neophyte, now sitting across from the most powerful man in America, the man who is now
03:42demanding your loyalty to the bitter end.
03:45It was one of those pivotal moments in the Watergate story.
03:50The details of the letter.
03:53It's important to be the heart of the leader who follows to the fair firm.
03:58So that's why I like it.
04:00Go to the ground for that front.
04:01I understand.
04:04The truth is always true.
04:22It was a moment of reckoning for both Dean and Nixon, the importance of which, perhaps,
04:28neither fully understood at the time.
04:31Good evening.
04:32The biggest White House scandal in a century, the Watergate scandal, broke wide open today.
04:38The president's White House legal counsel, John Dean, has been fired.
04:42Reportedly, Dean is implicated in efforts to cover up the Watergate scandal.
04:48Up until this point in the story, people like Wright Patman and Bob Woodward had been trying
04:53to draw attention to what they saw as a rampant government conspiracy.
04:57And for a long time, their efforts went nowhere.
05:01But the tables were turning, rapidly.
05:05The firing of John Dean cued a new, unnerving chapter in the Watergate scandal.
05:10By spring of 1973, chaos was encircling the Oval Office, and the American public knew all
05:17about it.
05:18It's my constitutional responsibility to defend this great office against false charges.
05:26What was it like to live through Watergate without knowing how it was all going to end?
05:31Causing this nation to neglect matters of far greater importance.
05:38One way to find out is to look at that moment of American history as seen through the eyes
05:44of the people who lived it back when they had no idea what was coming.
05:49We learned the important lessons of Watergate.
05:51We can emerge from this experience a better and a stronger nation.
06:10And ahead on the last building on the left is the Watergate office building that you've
06:16been reading so much about the last few weeks.
06:19When stories about the Watergate scandal first started appearing, most people didn't understand
06:24what all the fuss was about.
06:26And the strange name Watergate simply added to the confusion.
06:30Now all that has changed.
06:32The name Watergate has become famous.
06:35Programs regularly scheduled for this time will not be seen today in order that we might
06:39bring you the following NBC News special report.
06:43May 17, 1973 was a bright spring day in Washington, D.C.
06:48It was also the first day of the Senate Watergate committee hearings.
06:53This is the Senate caucus room in Washington, D.C.
06:56As the Senate opens what is likely to become the most serious investigation it has ever made.
07:03Which, much to the frustration of the White House, was about to give the American public
07:07a front row seat to the scandal.
07:11That is the Senate committee, seven members, headed by Senator Sam Irvin of North Carolina.
07:18The committee will come to order.
07:20The leader of the committee was a relatively unknown senator by the name of Sam Irvin.
07:26We are beginning these hearings today in an atmosphere of utmost gravity.
07:31If the many allegations made to this day are true, then the burglars who broke into the
07:36headquarters of the Democratic National Committee at Watergate were in effect breaking into the
07:41home of every citizen of the United States.
07:46Because it was a Republican administration being investigated, the proceedings would have
07:51been easy to criticize as a partisan witch hunt.
07:57And that is one of the reasons Irvin, a Southern Democrat sympathetic to Nixon, was chosen
08:03to lead the committee.
08:04In a nation that still is the last best hope of mankind, in his eternal struggle to govern
08:10himself decently...
08:15The seven senators would be the public face of the committee.
08:19But working behind the scenes was a team of 80 legal staffers and investigators.
08:25I was initially unclear what it meant to be an investigator.
08:29Because remember, those headlines that everybody now knows about, they hadn't happened quite
08:33yet.
08:34They were...
08:35That's not true.
08:36They were in the midst of happening.
08:37They were in the midst of happening.
08:38But you're taking down the government.
08:40It's terrifying.
08:41I mean, what do I know about that?
08:44I'm Mary DiIorio.
08:45I was an investigator for the Senate Watergate Committee.
08:48My name is Mark Lakritz.
08:49I was an assistant counsel on the Senate Watergate Committee.
08:59Well, a funny thing happened in the summer of 1972.
09:04And on my first day at work, I saw the first paralegal that the firm had hired.
09:08That would be me.
09:09That would be me.
09:09But asked who this burst of energy was going through the archway, I just saw her for a flash.
09:15And then two days later, on an elevator, this young woman stepped in with a young partner.
09:21No, wait.
09:22No, it's my turn.
09:23Okay.
09:24On the lunch, this was Blue Blood, San Francisco, young partner.
09:29I thought, oh my God, this is so awesome.
09:32So I'm with this guy, getting onto a very crowded elevator.
09:37And he asked me, Mary, where are you from?
09:40And I said, Shaker Heights, Ohio.
09:41And from the back of this elevator comes this voice.
09:45And I turned to see who it is, and it's like Harpo Marx.
09:48It's this guy there with this huge head of curly hair.
09:51And he's saying, oh, I'm from Shaker Heights.
09:53And proceeds to follow us out the elevator, down the street, to the restaurant.
09:59Sometimes you just fall into things.
10:02You know, you don't have any intention, you just fall into things.
10:04It turns out that our very first date was the same night as the Watergate break hit.
10:10It was June 17th, 1972.
10:14It was the Watergate break-in and the subsequent events that occurred that brought us to Washington.
10:20The Senate today voted to make a full investigation of the Watergate case.
10:25Washington.
10:25Washington.
10:27I was the kid of the 60s.
10:29So the best I can say is anti-Vietnam, protester.
10:33I thought of myself as being sort of hip.
10:36And they weren't the only ambitious 20-somethings to arrive in D.C. looking to join the effort.
10:41Far from it.
10:43At some point, it was just irresistible.
10:45I just jumped in my Volkswagen and drove to D.C.
10:49I had friends here.
10:50I stayed at their house.
10:52My name is Gordon Friedman.
10:54And I was a staff assistant on the Senate Watergate committee.
10:59People came from all over and it was almost like, you know, moths coming to a light in
11:03some sense.
11:04There were a lot of law students.
11:06There were a lot of people that had some legal background.
11:08There were others that just found this interesting and showed up and interviewed.
11:12They just needed to staff like crazy.
11:14And, um, I think whomever of us were there and seemed to be able, we were hired.
11:24We had offices in the converted auditorium in the Dirksen Center office building.
11:30There was a big rundown space that was mainly storage.
11:36They brought in a bunch of, uh, cubicles.
11:39In that room, in that auditorium, we had about 80 people.
11:43Gordon took all the pictures you see here, which, remarkably, are the only record of
11:48the Congressional Committee working behind the scenes.
11:51My camera just lived with me, and if something looked interesting, I took a picture.
11:57Looking back at those photographs now, they pretty much give you a feeling of what it was
12:02like to be on that staff.
12:04It was personable, but purposeful.
12:07The committee staff was split into a Democratic team and a Republican team.
12:11And their investigative work formed the basis for the questions that the senators asked
12:15at public hearings.
12:17My day consisted of conducting interviews of potential witnesses and individuals that
12:23had information, issuing subpoenas to get documents.
12:27At one point, I went up to New York to go through John Mitchell's files in his apartment.
12:32I'm sure I'll see you in the morning.
12:34And, um, it took me most of the day to get through them.
12:38And I don't know where Martha was.
12:40She was still...
12:41Martha was back in Arkansas.
12:41Was she locked up someplace?
12:42She was locked up someplace.
12:45Mitchell sits back in his chair.
12:47Actually, he offered me a drink, and I said, no, I don't...
12:49He greets you with a drink.
12:50I don't drink while I'm working.
12:52And he said, oh, well, do you mind if I do?
12:54And he sits down in his rocking chair, and he misses it.
12:56So he slipped, he falls on the floor, the drink falls out of his hand, he falls back
13:00and hits his head.
13:01And my first thought is, holy shit, I can just see the headline of the New York Post,
13:06Watergate Investigator Kills Former Attorney General.
13:08Yeah, that's right.
13:09Fortunately, he was okay.
13:15Now you have the grunt work, because at the end of the day, which was like 9.30, 10 o
13:21'clock,
13:22these books had to be put together.
13:24And it was our responsibility to put a book together for each of the members of the committee.
13:29And that book would say, here's the witness, here's some potential questions, here's some
13:35backup documentation.
13:39Oh, for God's sakes, we were exhausted.
13:48Anything you want to know, let's talk it out.
13:51All right, can you answer me?
13:52I don't know the question, Mick.
13:55Was everybody in the family, were they in on the whole conspiracy?
14:00What conspiracy?
14:05Watergate, Senate hearings.
14:07This is the familiar scene, the Senate caucus room in the old Senate office building in
14:12Washington, D.C.
14:13Day two of the Watergate.
14:15Watergate, by this point, was a mystery.
14:18It was a mystery to be solved.
14:19It was something to be cracked.
14:23And that is James McCord, expected to be the star witness at today's hearings.
14:27I believe the committee is coming in now, Carl.
14:30I believe Senator Irving is coming now.
14:32Yes, he is.
14:32He may not be in camera view yet, but he will momentarily.
14:35Senator Irving, could you tell us what your committee has done?
14:37Not a word from Senator Irving.
14:39He walked by.
14:41He walked by as if we weren't there.
14:43Well, he seems to be in a rush to get these hearings started.
14:46And the thing is, people really wanted to see what's going to happen next.
14:51He's got his gavel in his hand, and I believe these hearings are about to get underway again.
14:56Maybe this would be a glimpse into the inner workings of the Nixon administration.
15:04Councilor Caldwell, first witness.
15:06Uh, yes, is it Officer Schockler?
15:14Uh...
15:15Now, now, Mr. Odle, would you please go to the chart?
15:23All of a sudden, we realized it wasn't just an investigation, but we were putting on a TV show every
15:28day.
15:29This is a chart of the committee for the re-election of the president.
15:33The staffers basically were the architects of the Irving committee hearings,
15:39and they decided to structure it like a pyramid.
15:43They began at the bottom, you know, the people who had the least power.
15:48The budget committee between the two committees...
15:51The first witness was the guy who was kind of like the accountant.
15:54There were three principal divisions, the political division...
15:57And he went through this boring recitation of, you know, how they requisitioned money to buy briefcases.
16:04And so I think part of what putting on the hearings was about was trying to script how to tell
16:11a story effectively...
16:13Mobile crime did a search of the whole six-floor complex, the conference room...
16:18And communicated effectively in the medium that we had at the time, which was a hearing that was being televised.
16:25Could you state briefly what, if anything, was found in that search of the hotel room?
16:29About $4,200 and $100 bills, all in sequence.
16:35Some electronic equipment.
16:37Part of that involved thinking, well, what's our plot today?
16:41The cover would be taken off of the telephone...
16:47And two of the wires would be interconnected within the phone itself...
16:52For the purpose of transmitting those conversations over the phone.
16:56You know, what's our story?
16:59Who's our character?
17:01Now, did you ever receive any telephone logs from Mr. McCord?
17:04Do you know Mr. McCord?
17:05Yes, I had met Mr. McCord.
17:08And how do we, how do we get that out?
17:10My employer was G. Gordon Liddy.
17:12Mr. Liddy had, had printed, uh, a stationery with the name gemstone across the top of it.
17:20Mr. Liddy occasionally, uh, did some fairly bizarre things.
17:24He gave, uh, uh, a secretary in our office a large poster of himself, uh...
17:31I don't, I don't know if we should pursue that any further, but, uh, what kind of picture was it?
17:36I believe it was a picture of himself with a bullhorn, and it, it may have had a, he may
17:41have had a gun in his hand, uh, conducting a raid of some kind.
17:44He was in front of a police car.
17:46There was another poster, as a matter of fact, him next to an airplane or, or something like that, but
17:51it was occasionally.
17:53There were a number of telegrams that were drafted and then sent.
17:57We spent a fair amount of time sort of thinking through what the questions were, how to ask the questions,
18:03who should ask the questions,
18:04and trying to script it, in a sense.
18:07Well, they destroyed before, after the break-in.
18:11They were destroyed after.
18:15Was there ever any consideration of presenting this material to the president?
18:21Again, Senator, I would not have been in a position to do that. It would have been people at the
18:25other level.
18:28With the Watergate hearings, the power of television is so clear. When you, when you have someone testifying, um, presumably
18:39telling the truth, you can see the person's face, you can pass your own judgment as to whether or not
18:45the person is telling the truth or lying.
18:49It was sort of this daily soap opera.
18:55Believe me.
18:59I didn't do anything that I shouldn't have done.
19:02I wanted to believe that then, and I want so much to believe it now.
19:12Is that correct?
19:14At least I can only speak for myself, Senator, but I think that's a correct statement.
19:28Over the course of that spring, the hearings started to take on a life of their own.
19:33We're waiting for the Senate Watergate committee to begin its hearings in the old Senate office building.
19:40We come to work and there were lines around the Russell office building of people trying to get into the
19:45hearing.
19:45And we realized that obviously something had happened.
19:50And it became sort of this communal event where people would watch the hearings and it was something you could
19:58then share with one another.
20:01I'm glad to see what's coming out is coming out. What's going on is really what the public needs.
20:06I hope that President Nixon isn't involved, but the way things look, things are pointing towards him.
20:11Everyone here in Washington today was talking about the Watergate cover-up, and there was practically no other topic of
20:17conversation.
20:18This morning at the White House...
20:20You get kind of a Watergate craze.
20:27I think what has happened, things have become almost like a game.
20:31Then there's the Watergate game.
20:33We call it takeoff on Monopoly.
20:35People were riveted. People were obsessed.
20:38I still think there are a lot of unanswered questions, and I haven't formed a conclusion in my own mind.
20:43You know, I had someone tell me that they were thrilled to have thrown out their back in the spring
20:49of 1973,
20:50because that meant they could sit home and watch Watergate hearings every day.
21:01One reason the public obsession got to this point was the emergence of vivid characters, which brings us back to
21:07Chairman Sam.
21:10There was a wise man named William Shakespeare that wrote a play called Henry the Poet.
21:14And in that one of his characters said,
21:17Had I but served my God with half the zeal, I served my king.
21:24He would not, in mine age, left me naked to mine enemies.
21:30You have...
21:35At least cut out the applause.
21:37He would say all these things like,
21:40Don't stand on the windy side of the law.
21:43I have a little book with the weather night.
21:47And just cracking up at some of the...
21:49I found this book in the garage.
21:53He said,
21:54It's more important for the American people to find out the truth about Watergate
21:59than just sending one or two people to jail.
22:02I think that's...
22:03That was...
22:05That's an important thing.
22:13Back then, I had long hair and a big handlebar mustache.
22:18And we started watching the Watergate hearings and it was riveting.
22:23And I thought Sam Irvin is a pretty substantial guy.
22:27Well, I'm sorry that my distinguished friend from Florida does not approve of my method of examining the witness.
22:34I'm an old country lawyer and I don't know the fine ways to do it.
22:37I just have to do it my way.
22:38I didn't say...
22:39I didn't say...
22:43I think if we have a fault at this time, it is a fault of conformity.
22:50We've had an effort to make people think the same thing,
22:54to entertain the same views, to support the same laws.
22:57I wrote to Senator Irvin and asked for a button, a Sam Irvin button for my button collection.
23:05And they said, he doesn't have any buttons.
23:08He's never had any buttons or used any buttons in his campaign.
23:12So I talked to my friend David about, well, maybe...
23:15Maybe we should print up some buttons.
23:19And one of David's friends did the logo and we called him Uncle Sam.
23:25Now, this statute has nothing to do with burglary.
23:28How do you know that, Mr. Chairman?
23:30Because I can understand English language.
23:32It's my mother tongue.
23:38Irvin had a very expressive face.
23:41And this was what Mr. Mitchell said.
23:45He had these bouncing eyebrows.
23:48These thick, tangly eyebrows.
23:51These eyebrows that would rise and fall, you know, quizzically.
23:54I will not support it. It was wrong.
23:57Well, the scriptures say that men love darkness rather than light because it needs evil.
24:01So, somebody that must have covered up something back in the scriptural days to quote that.
24:07He spoke in very oratund sentences about how the king's writ, you know, ended at the front door of the
24:14most humble cottager's home.
24:17And then we thought, well, maybe we should have a club and give away membership cards.
24:25And we thought that it would be fun to have card carrying.
24:28And if you sent us a self-addressed stamped envelope.
24:32It's an old Sam Irvin fan club.
24:34That's what we called it.
24:35It's essential for young people to be encouraged to participate in politics.
24:39When we first met him in his office there, he was kind of amused and confused and bemused by a
24:49couple of long-haired California hippies that started a fan club.
24:56I think that perhaps we've had too much emphasis on success.
25:03I thought that Southerners have a certain peculiarity due to the fact that all of their greatest heroes were men
25:11who failed.
25:12Because of his televised role, Senator Irvin emerged in the public consciousness as a custodian of democracy, a defender of
25:20the Constitution,
25:20and a hero to liberals looking to unseat what they saw as a corrupt Republican president.
25:26But to get the full picture, there's a little more you should know.
25:30Sam Irvin became a liberal hero, which required a little bit of amnesia on the part of liberals.
25:38Like myself, as a young California Democrat, I knew I was a member of the, you know, the civil rights
25:45movement was going on then.
25:50So I knew about his bad positions in my mind on that.
25:54Can we just lay out what were his views on civil rights?
26:02Hmm, all the positions on civil rights.
26:06He would have been on what I would have considered the wrong side of the issue.
26:11In other words, the greatest heroes of Southerners are men like Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson and Jeb Stewart.
26:21These men failed in their objective.
26:26Like most Southern Democrats at that time, he was conservative on racial issues.
26:34What about this problem, which we've heard so much about recently, of integration of the races in the schools?
26:42The people of North Carolina as a whole, both white and colored, before the integrated school system, the segregated school
26:54system as it now exists.
26:57And he became one of the authors of the 1956 Southern Manifesto, which was an absolutely impassioned defense of Southern
27:07segregation.
27:13We will leave you standing before the world and before your guards, splattered with the blood and wreaking with the
27:21stench of your Negro brother.
27:32Ultimately, national opinion becomes so great and so aroused that they have to end their brutality.
27:48Because to me, Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, Jeb Stewart, exemplified in their lives and in their deaths the
27:56truth stated in this little poem.
28:01Defeat may serve as well as victory to shake the soul and let the glory out.
28:08And it wasn't just the issue of integration that disturbed Senator Irvin.
28:13I think he was against the Equal Rights Amendment for women, too.
28:17I want me, I want you, I want you, I want you, I want you, I want you, I want
28:24you.
28:27Here is Senator Irvin, the chairman of the Select Committee.
28:32So Irvin was certainly not someone who would have been a hero
28:36to students, to liberals or radicals, by any stretch of the imagination.
28:42But in the course of the Watergate hearings develops this heroic aura.
28:50Back with our Watergate committee coverage in the Senate caucus room.
28:54It's jammed in there today.
28:57Sam Irvin was not the only character that captivated the imagination of the American public in this political soap opera.
29:04Almost daily, there was a new witness on television for the public to meet.
29:08Someone who would testify to the inner workings of the Nixon administration.
29:14The committee will come to order.
29:16Counsel will call the first witness.
29:18Mr. John W. Dean III.
29:21One of those witnesses was a man named John Dean.
29:25Stand up and raise your right hand.
29:27Remember him?
29:28What a witness.
29:29This was the crown jewel, so to speak.
29:31And he wasn't just the guy who was the assistant to the guy.
29:35He was the guy.
29:36Well, he was the White House counselor.
29:37That's what I'm saying.
29:40That's what I meant.
29:41He was the guy.
29:44He has not always told the truth before in hearings.
29:50What is in his head, we don't know.
29:52To fully grasp John Dean's star turn at the Watergate hearings,
30:00it helps to understand why he made the decision to testify in the first place.
30:05It was not an easy one.
30:08There may be more imposing structures than this, but few so loved.
30:13Here, each in his time has weighed the fateful decisions that have become our history.
30:25John Dean was 31 years old when he got offered what he knew was going to be a tough job,
30:31counsel to the President of the United States.
30:35At the time I was offered the job at the White House, I was at the Department of Justice.
30:42And my immediate superior was the Deputy Attorney General, Dick Kleindienst.
30:47And I told him of the offer, and he said,
30:51don't take it.
30:52He said, I wouldn't work at that zoo up the street
30:55if they paid me five times what they're paying me.
30:59In retrospect, this was quite a premonition.
31:03But Dean did not take the advice.
31:12I took the job because the title was too good to turn down.
31:19And in fact, what he found there impressed him.
31:25I found my colleagues to be very capable, truly the best and brightest.
31:32They could have walked out and gotten much higher paying jobs anywhere.
31:39And the senior staff was a highly disciplined White House, well organized.
31:45The chief of staff arrangements and the staffing setup has become the model for modern presidents.
32:04I thought Nixon was somebody who was a mature statesman type figure.
32:23John Dean was one of Nixon's aides who worked on the periphery of the Oval Office.
32:28He was present for plenty of official business,
32:31but his relationship to Nixon was not what you would call chummy.
32:35The president must be jealous of his time.
32:37The function of his staff is to assist the decision making process.
32:41Nobody in the White House staff, other than a small handful,
32:44really had a tight working relationship with him.
32:51Which brings us to the people who were in Nixon's inner sphere.
32:54John Ehrlichman and Bob Haldeman.
32:57Just shot sort of a montage of the leaders.
32:59John Ehrlichman and Bob Haldeman were considered by detractors as the Nazis
33:06because they had these German last names.
33:09It was entirely not fair, but they were considered the Berlin Wall
33:15because they shielded Nixon from anybody just barreling into the Oval Office.
33:23What my office did was all the grunt work.
33:27Ehrlichman really stayed close to the president for his legal advice.
33:33But that was all about to change.
33:40By late February, several months after the presidential election
33:44and a few weeks after the formation of the Senate Committee,
33:47John Dean found himself facing a new Nixon.
33:51On February 27th, he calls me out of the blue
33:56and he asked me to come over.
34:04And he tells me that he wants me to handle the Watergate problem.
34:16And I realized what had happened is post-election,
34:20he'd put Haldeman and Ehrlichman on the second term
34:23and doesn't want them tied up with Watergate, wants to get them out of it.
34:30Seems simple enough.
34:32Get the top brass out of the fray altogether.
34:35And as Dean was brought into the inner circle,
34:38a new face of the president emerged.
34:54He clearly likes me.
34:56He likes what the information I'm giving him.
35:04And he's showing off for me is what's really remarkable.
35:15Nixon is doing things like gossiping about former President Lyndon Johnson
35:19and Bobby Kennedy.
35:34And recently deceased FBI director J. Edgar Hoover.
35:45He's dangling access and power in front of Dean,
35:47trying to impress him.
35:50And Dean, for his part, is doing the same.
35:53Well, I think these hearings are going to be tough.
35:56I think they're going to be tough.
35:59I'm also convinced that we're going to make a whole road
36:01and put this thing in the funny pages of the history books
36:05rather than anything serious.
36:10The question was, why now?
36:15Why was Nixon bringing Dean into the fold now?
36:21After years of a relatively chilly relationship.
36:27I'd like to say this.
36:29Anything I may have done,
36:31I did for what I believe to be in the best interest of my country.
36:35The answer would reveal itself as months passed
36:37and the White House's efforts to wash its hands of the Watergate affair
36:41started to look increasingly futile.
36:50On the 19th of March,
36:53Howard Hunt has sent a threat to me directly.
36:57If he isn't paid $120,000,
37:01like yesterday,
37:03he's going to have seamy things to say
37:06about what he did for John Ehrlichman.
37:13And it just snapped.
37:18And I realized,
37:19I may blow up the whole dam deeper and deeper.
37:23And I don't know if it'll ever end.
37:34Two days later,
37:36Dean walked into the Oval Office
37:37to have a heart-to-heart with the president.
37:40His intention was to convince Nixon to cut his losses
37:43and end the cover-up altogether.
37:45I think that
37:48there's no doubt about the seriousness of the problem work we've got.
37:51I start by making sure I have his attention.
37:54We have a cancer
37:56within,
37:58close to the presidency,
37:59that's growing.
38:01It's growing daily.
38:02It's compounding.
38:04Here's what's happening right now.
38:07The blackmail is continuing now.
38:09And I said,
38:10Mr. President,
38:10there's no way to know how much these guys will ask
38:13and if they'll ever stop.
38:15I said,
38:15I think they'll keep going
38:16and we're going to be extorted indefinitely.
38:20We just don't know about those things.
38:21We're not used to,
38:22you know,
38:22we're not criminals.
38:23We're not used to dealing in that business.
38:25Plus, there's a real problem in raising money.
38:27This is what's funny.
38:31And I pulled out of thin air
38:33what I thought of a number that would offend him.
38:36I would say these people are going to cost
38:38a million dollars over the next few years.
38:43Out of nowhere,
38:44I pulled that thinking,
38:45what's that,
38:46five and a half million today's dollars,
38:48that that will offend him.
38:51But it was exactly the opposite reaction.
38:54You are the money
38:55and you need the money.
39:09So, I try to put him in a situation
39:11he's got to deal with.
39:13I said,
39:14Mr. President,
39:14people are going to go to jail.
39:16He said,
39:17like who?
39:17I said,
39:18like me,
39:19Mr. President.
39:20I said,
39:21Mr. President,
39:21I have been involved in obstruction of justice.
39:24It's something that,
39:25it's something that's not going to go away.
39:28What is it?
39:28It is not going to go away, sir.
39:31It's not going to go away.
39:33He really was just waiting for his fist
39:35to come down on the table
39:36and say,
39:37this has got to end.
39:45But this is the morning I meet Richard Nixon,
39:49the real Nixon.
39:59And I am deeply disappointed.
40:03Instead of taking his counsel's advice
40:04to stop the cover-up,
40:06Nixon doubled down.
40:08He sent Dean off to Camp David
40:10with instructions to write a report
40:12which would clear the White House
40:13of connection to the Watergate burglary
40:14once and for all.
40:15They want me to write a lie
40:18and the president can pull this out of the drawer
40:20and say,
40:21well,
40:21my counsel doesn't think anything is amiss here,
40:25so this has been what I've been relying on.
40:29I condemn any attempts
40:32to cover up in this case,
40:33no matter who is involved.
40:38It was around this time
40:39that Dean learned something else
40:41that Nixon was planning.
40:42It was a hint that would be the final test
40:44of his patience as counsel
40:45for the White House.
40:49I get wind from somebody
40:51on the White House staff
40:52that they figured out how to deal with it
40:55and they're going to make Mitchell
40:57responsible for the break-in
40:59Excuse me.
41:02And me, responsible for the cover-up.
41:06How did you find out
41:08what they're planning?
41:10I'm not sharing that today.
41:14So I'm giving you good nuggets,
41:17not every nuggets.
41:21Dean was at a crossroads
41:23because although it wasn't the whole story,
41:25the White House scheme
41:27to make him a scapegoat
41:28wasn't totally based on a fabrication.
41:31Dean had been complicit in protecting Nixon
41:33in the months after the break-in.
41:35His hands were far from clean.
41:38So he came to his own conclusions
41:40about what to do next.
41:42I got my secretary in.
41:44I said,
41:44Jane, I never talked to the press
41:46but I want you to read this
41:47to the Washington Post,
41:49the New York Times,
41:51and the Associated Press.
41:52I dictate a very brief statement to her
41:56about...
42:01If they think I am going to be their scapegoat...
42:05If they think I am going to be their scapegoat...
42:10They have made a very serious misjudgment.
42:28Oh, it was the perfect dream
42:36Nothing we could...
42:38Dean's lawyer,
42:40Charlie Schaefer,
42:41came to speak to us
42:45and indicated that Dean was willing to talk.
42:51My name is Jim Hamilton
42:53and I was Assistant Chief Counsel
42:55for the Senate Watergate Committee.
42:58I mean,
42:59I can remember being skeptical initially.
43:02I ended up spending a lot of time with John eventually
43:06going over his statement,
43:09you know, word for word.
43:12I mean, look,
43:13if somebody comes in
43:14and he says
43:15the President of the United States
43:16is involved in a cover-up
43:17of what somebody had called
43:19a third-rate burglary,
43:21you say,
43:22okay,
43:22let's test this.
43:23Let's make sure
43:24that what John Dean is saying
43:27is the truth
43:28and that he's not spinning some tail
43:30just to protect his rub.
43:36I suppose it's a cliché
43:38to suggest it isn't the heat,
43:39it's the humidity.
43:42June 1973,
43:44an unusually hot start to summer
43:46in Washington, D.C.
43:47With the kind of heat wave
43:48they've been having here in the East,
43:50temperatures well into the 90s
43:52and the humidity almost matching it,
43:54it pretty clearly is both the heat
43:55and the humidity.
43:57The summer was really hot.
43:59It was hot and muggy.
44:01It was awful summer, yeah.
44:01Just stifling.
44:02It was like a steam bath.
44:03In the meantime,
44:04the advice is
44:05don't overexate.
44:06Fuck.
44:07Fuck.
44:08And then,
44:09it was time for Dean
44:10to go public.
44:14While the committee staff
44:15had done all they could
44:16to confirm what he was about to say,
44:18they were still on edge.
44:21A million people,
44:22you put him on national television,
44:24you're taking a chance.
44:25The White House
44:26has moved to discredit him.
44:29There was a campaign here.
44:30There were going to be people
44:31that didn't believe him.
44:33And there will be men in this room
44:36with calendars,
44:36checking what the White House said
44:39against what Dean said.
44:41And if he turned out to be a liar,
44:43it would have been disastrous for the committee.
44:47So it was a tenuous moment.
44:50He added that poster.
44:51John, we've just been given
44:52the first half
44:54of Mr. Dean's testimony.
44:56It looks like a copy
44:57of Gone with the Wind.
45:00When one of the network anchormen
45:02was kind of previewing the testimony
45:05and was kind of paging through,
45:06you could almost see the color
45:08drain from his face.
45:09But I have read it.
45:10I won't give the plot away.
45:12It's going to be an interesting morning.
45:13And so everybody has to stay tuned.
45:16Mr. Dean,
45:17you have a statement
45:18you wish to present to the committee.
45:20That's correct, Mr. Dash.
45:22Had I known
45:23I was going to have to read it,
45:25I would not have written 60,000 words,
45:28which even then was bare bones.
45:34To one who was in the White House
45:36and became somewhat familiar
45:37with its inner workings,
45:39the Watergate matter
45:40was an inevitable outgrowth
45:42of a climate of excessive concern
45:45over the political impact
45:46of demonstrators,
45:48excessive concern over leaks,
45:51an insatiable appetite
45:53for political intelligence,
45:54all coupled
45:55with a do-it-yourself
45:57White House staff
45:58regardless of the law.
46:00John Dean had quite
46:01the story to tell.
46:03Turning now
46:03to the so-called plumbers unit
46:06that was created
46:07to deal with leaks.
46:08And he made sure
46:09to tell it in a very specific way.
46:11I first heard
46:12of the plumbers unit.
46:13John was a very cool customer.
46:17Herman Talmadge,
46:18who was a member of the committee,
46:19once said that Dean was,
46:22appeared so cool
46:23he looked like he could have
46:24performed open-heart surgery
46:26in the back of a pickup truck.
46:27These discussions
46:28would not go on in the office
46:30of the Attorney General
46:31of the United States
46:32and the meeting
46:33should terminate immediately.
46:35At this point,
46:36the meeting ended.
46:37John Dean,
46:38John Dean,
46:38in a very sort of monotone
46:40tone of voice,
46:41couldn't sound
46:42less enthused
46:44or less excited
46:45about the information
46:46that he's passing along.
46:47But,
46:48he was saying
46:49the craziest things!
46:51He told me to shred the documents
46:53and deep-six the briefcase.
46:55I asked him
46:56what he meant
46:56by deep-six.
46:58He leaned back
46:59in his chair and said,
47:00when you cross over the bridge
47:01on your way home,
47:02just toss the briefcase
47:04into the river.
47:05I thought about
47:06what he had told me to do
47:07and was very troubled.
47:09I really...
47:09Also, to add to that,
47:10the thing that was surprising
47:12was his amazing recall
47:16for detail.
47:17We were really lucky.
47:19We were really lucky
47:19that John Dean...
47:20He's a lawyer's...
47:20Yeah, lawyer's lawyer.
47:22I would now like to turn
47:24to the meetings
47:25I had with the President
47:26in February and March
47:27of this year.
47:29It was at this time
47:30we discussed
47:31preventing anybody
47:32from going
47:32before any Senate committee
47:34until the matter...
47:35The real meat
47:36of his testimony,
47:37the substance of it,
47:39the part that made it
47:40most dangerous
47:41for Richard Nixon
47:43was that very slowly,
47:45very methodically
47:45and with great detail
47:48he went through meeting...
47:50The meeting on February 28th.
47:51By meeting...
47:52Meeting on March 13th.
47:53By meeting.
47:54Meetings on March 20th.
47:55The times he had met
47:56with Richard Nixon
47:57in the Oval Office...
47:58Meeting of March 21st.
47:59...and discussed
48:00the conspiracy
48:02to cover up the crime
48:04and Richard Nixon's
48:05connection to the crime.
48:06He asked me
48:07how much it would cost.
48:08I told him
48:09I could only make an estimate
48:10that it might be
48:11as high as a million
48:12is no problem.
48:14Over six hours
48:15I tear up the cover-up.
48:17The real breaking point
48:18for me was John Dean.
48:22When you're only a staffer,
48:25a council...
48:26Boy, that tastes...
48:27That tastes...
48:27Committee.
48:28Page 14 of your testimony,
48:30you referred to another
48:32incident that occurred.
48:33John Dean lived
48:34across the street
48:34from me
48:35in Alexandria, Virginia.
48:38He didn't trust me
48:39at the outset
48:41but...
48:42Eventually,
48:43we've got to become
48:44friends.
48:46He indicated to you
48:48that Mr. Hoover...
48:49Part of the testimony,
48:50right?
48:51In which Lowell Wyke
48:52basically is going
48:53on and on about something
48:54that John Dean knows
48:55is going nowhere.
49:03And almost out of pity
49:05for him,
49:05he seems to kind of...
49:06Continually being updated.
49:11And these are lists
49:12of people that basically
49:14we're going to do our best
49:15to destroy.
49:16You can't imagine
49:18how profoundly disconcerting
49:20this was to people.
49:22I'm not going to ask
49:23who was on it.
49:26I'm afraid you might answer.
49:29And these lists
49:30were produced in evidence,
49:32right?
49:32And suddenly,
49:33people find out
49:34that the White House
49:35considers, you know,
49:36Carol Channing,
49:37the Broadway star
49:37who starred in
49:38Hello, Dolly!
49:39as an enemy.
49:40You know,
49:40Joe Namath
49:41is one of their enemies.
49:42Reporters are their enemies.
49:43You know,
49:44the heads of the networks
49:45are their enemies.
49:47And the White House
49:48now had a new enemy.
49:50Dean's testimony
49:51was explosive.
49:54His deadpan implication
49:55of the president's
49:56objected Nixon
49:57to a kind of scrutiny
49:58that up until this point
49:59he had been able
50:00to avoid.
50:03At that point,
50:04the Republicans
50:05went into attack mode
50:06of trying to tear
50:07his testimony apart.
50:10Former White House aide
50:11Charles Colson
50:12said today
50:13that the president
50:13had been misled
50:14about Watergate
50:15by John Dean
50:16and others
50:16who Colson said
50:17were trying
50:18to protect themselves.
50:20And speaking to a Democrat...
50:21Oh, they were doing
50:21everything
50:22that they could conceive of
50:24to try to discredit me.
50:26According to
50:27Joseph Alsop
50:28who was basically
50:29the most prominent
50:30and respected columnist
50:32of the time
50:33who was acting
50:34on kind of
50:35leaked White House intelligence,
50:37John Dean
50:38was a smooth-faced
50:39young man
50:40who was reportedly
50:41obsessed
50:42by fear of going
50:43to jail
50:44because of consciousness
50:45of his own
50:46good looks.
50:49He said that the idea
50:50of this case
50:51turning on
50:51the self-serving allegations
50:53of a bottom-dwelling slug
50:55like Dean
50:56was enough
50:56to make all
50:57common-sensible
50:58Americans exclaim
50:59this can't go on.
51:01I felt
51:02neither like
51:03a pariah
51:04nor a hero
51:05in testifying.
51:06What I felt
51:07like was a fact witness
51:09is which I was.
51:11And I was trying
51:12to end
51:15this episode
51:16so it would go away
51:18and wouldn't haunt me
51:19for the rest of my life.
51:24But in some ways,
51:25Dean's five days
51:26on the stand
51:27in 1970
51:27testifying before a committee
51:28about his time
51:29as White House counsel.
51:31I accepted
51:32the invitation
51:33to come to
51:33Markle's perspective
51:34on the Mueller report.
51:36But this time,
51:37the circumstances
51:38had more to do
51:38with the 45th president
51:40than it did
51:41with the 37th.
51:42So-called Watergate roadmap.
51:44Well, guess what?
51:44This committee
51:45is now hearing
51:46from the 70s
51:47and they want
51:47their star witness back.
51:51But back to 1973
51:52for a moment.
51:54And I earnestly pray
51:55that this committee
51:57reaches the truth
51:58in this entire matter
51:59and reaches it
52:01as quickly as possible
52:02because I think
52:03that there's a terrible cloud
52:04over this government
52:05that must be removed
52:07so that we can have
52:08effective government.
52:12Since Mr. Dean
52:13has testified
52:14under an order
52:16of immunity,
52:17I would think
52:18that this counselor
52:19would be wise
52:20to give him the same advice
52:22that I used to give
52:23my clients
52:24and that is keep his mouth shut.
52:30John Dean won himself
52:31a place in history
52:32this week.
52:33His word is now
52:34in the record.
52:36Now it will be up
52:37to other witnesses
52:37to dispute that word
52:39if they wish.
52:40That's the big question.
52:41Did he manage
52:42to prove presidential
52:43involvement in the Watergate?
52:46After this testimony,
52:48the fact of the matter is
52:49it's just his word
52:50against the president's.
52:54After my testimony,
52:55there was a lot of polling
52:57on who do you believe,
52:58Dean or Nixon.
53:00And I was holding my own
53:02with the president
53:03at that point.
53:04So there was a big debate
53:05as to who is telling the truth.
53:09And it riled up
53:11the American public so much
53:12that Dean was fearing
53:13for his life.
53:15In fact,
53:16I've had a recommendation
53:17that I go into
53:18the witness protection program.
53:20the threats are so serious
53:22against me.
53:25And so I was in and out
53:27of the witness protection program
53:28for the next 18 months.
53:33I left town.
53:34I was down in Florida.
53:40Dean didn't much want
53:42to be seen again.
53:44And he wasn't.
53:50until he was called upon
53:51in July of 1973.
53:53I got a call from Sam Dash.
53:56Sam Dash was the chief counsel
53:58of the Senate Watergate Committee.
54:00It was on a Friday afternoon.
54:02He said,
54:03you need to come up
54:04and meet with me
54:04on Sunday.
54:05It's essential.
54:06I said, what for, Sam?
54:08He said, I can't tell you.
54:10The purpose of the meeting
54:11was cloaked in secrecy.
54:13But Dean knew
54:14that Sam Dash wouldn't
54:16have called him
54:16unless it was for a good reason.
54:18Sam is panicked.
54:19And that's why he asked me to,
54:21he said, I got to meet
54:22with you Sunday.
54:26Well,
54:27what had happened is
54:29it had come out
54:31that indeed
54:32there were still lots
54:34of skeletons in the closet.
54:35Suddenly the capsule fills
54:37with water and sinks.
54:38Sailors in deep sea diver suits
54:39are going to the rescue.
54:41Dean's testimony
54:42paved the way
54:43for another revelation
54:44by a Nixon aide.
54:46But wait a minute.
54:46Wait a minute.
54:47Stay with me.
54:48It was as clear
54:49as Sam Dash's panicked voice.
54:52Something serious
54:53was happening.
54:55No, no.
54:55Let me get there.
54:56Let me get there.
54:57The capsule is radioactive.
55:00I knew it was
55:02the story of the decade.
55:03It had to be.
55:04Wake up a different adventure
55:05every day with G.I. Jones.
55:09Good evening.
55:10There was a surprise witness
55:11at the Watergate hearings today
55:13and he made a dramatic disclosure.
55:15Alexander Butterfield.
55:16Mr. Butterfield,
55:17I understand you previously
55:18were employed by the White House.
55:20Is that correct?
55:22That's correct.
55:25If I could pick a pinnacle,
55:27it was Alexander Butterfield.
55:29Where the hell did you get this?
55:31Because I'm thinking to myself,
55:32holy smoke.
55:33It's a secret I've been keeping
55:35for two years.
55:35And even though we didn't
55:37sign anything in blood,
55:39it was very clear,
55:41understanding,
55:42that nobody would ever say
55:44anything to anybody.
55:48Well, I was, you know,
55:51we've gone a long road on this thing now.
55:53I thought it was an impossible path
55:55to hold together until after the election,
55:58until things just started pouring out
56:00that we've made it this far.
56:03And I'm convinced we're going to make it
56:05the whole road and put this thing in
56:06and the funny case of the history books
56:10rather than anything serious.
56:13Well, good luck.
56:14All right.
56:18I've learned there.
56:18way to live.
56:18But anyway,
56:20I did the job as an evil
56:23And if I did this,
56:24If I said anything,
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