President Ford Crisis, and Watergate Aftermath

Preview Assignment Each table will discuss and predict what kinds of issues that President Ford would have to confront after Nixon’s resignation.

Gerald Ford Becomes President Page 27 timeline book. August 9, 1974, in the East Room of the White House, Gerald R. Ford took the oath of office as president.

President Ford President Ford’s task was straightforward: he had to relieve the anger and anxiety in the country and to give Americans a sense that a decent, respectable person was in the White House. There was an almost palpable sigh of relief, with Ford’s approval rating reaching 70 percent.

Ford Pardons Nixon Thirty days after President Ford took office, on Sunday, September 8, he gave Richard Nixon and "full, free, and absolute pardon for all Watergate crimes."

Ford’s Reasoning The degrading spectacle of a former President in a prisoner’s dock. The near impossibility of finding an open- minded jury anywhere in the country. Even if Nixon was tried, in the end, he might be found innocent; or even if not, perhaps a future president would pardon him after all the tumult.

Domestic Crisis The American economy was sputtering, with both inflation and unemployment on the rise. Crude oil prices skyrocketed to ten times their pre-1973 levels and gas prices doubled at the pump—conditions which, combined with severe oil shortages, made for a gloomy economic environment.

Stagflation Conventional thinking about the economy held that high prices meant a growing economy, a healthy business environment, and low unemployment. America's economy in the 1970s confounded these expectations, however, as both unemployment soared and inflation grew.

Busing Page 10 timeline book. In the summer of 1974, a Boston judge ordered the city school system to integrate immediately schools that were segregated and in close proximity by busing black students to predominantly white schools, and vice versa.

Busing Mobs of whites greeted black children with taunts and obscenities, and fights broke out between black and white students inside the schools. The violence only worsened throughout the fall, culminating in the stabbing of a white student and a subsequent riot.

Busing The movement of large numbers of white families to suburbs of large cities, so-called white flight, reduced the effectiveness of the policy.

Pop Culture Deaths of Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin. Page 3 timeline book.

Death of Jimi Hendrix On September 18, 1970, Jimi Hendrix died in London, 27 years old. In the days before his death, Hendrix had been in poor health, due in part to fatigue caused by overworking, a chronic lack of sleep, and an illness assumed to be influenza- related.

Death of Janis Joplin October 4, The official cause of death was an overdose of heroin, possibly compounded by alcohol. With the death of Jimmy Hendrix 16 days earlier, the music world had been deeply shocked.

Other Members of the “27” Club Brian Jones – Founder and original bandleader of the Rolling Stones. Jim Morrison – Lead Singer of the Doors Died along with Janis Joplin and Jimmy Hendrix between 1969 and Kurt Cobain, and Amy Winehouse.

All Along the Watchtower by Jimi Hendrix "There must be some kind of way out of here, " Said the joker to the thief, "There's too much confusion, I can't get no relief. Business men – they drink my wine Plowmen dig my earth None of them along the line Know what any of it is worth." "No reason to get excited, " The thief – he kindly spoke, "There are many here among us Who feel that life is but a joke But you and I we've been through that And this is not our fate So let us not talk falsely now The hour's getting late." All along the watchtower Princes kept their view While all the women came and went Bare-foot servants too Outside in the cold distance A wild cat did growl Two riders were approaching And the wind began to howl, hey.