Our text book touched upon President Clinton and how much of the population felt about his choices and then his decision to lie to everyone, and called into questions his personal ethics. But if looking back, one of the most famous scandals is that of Watergate which happened under Nixon’s tenure as President. I won’t go into details about the Watergate Scandal but the name implies everything.
Deciding which ethic violation is more important is up to each individual person. I personally feel as if Nixon violated both value ethics and moral ethics in his cover up attempts of raising hush money for the burglars, attempting to stop the FBI from investigating, destroying evidence and firing staff members.
The lesson commentary describes values as: “enduring beliefs that a specific mode of conduct or end-state of existence is personally and socially preferable to alternative modes of conduct of end-states.” (PSU WC p. 3) The commentary then describes morals as: “the motivation behind behavior that is influence by decisions of what is right and wrong.” (PSU WC p. 3) Not one person will have the exact same values and morals as another, but there is a general sense of common values and morals that everyone knows, whether they follow them or not. Many find lying, spying, and attempting to cover up those very actions unethical because they violate both a sense of values and morals. Spying and attempting to cover up crimes are both punishable by law and during the time Nixon was orchestrating those very things, it made many question his ethics and his leadership.
As president Nixon knew that he was expected to behave a certain way and in a way better than others. Presidents are the most highly scrutinized position of power in the US and behaving in any way that causes the American people to question ethics can completely discredit yourself among the general population. This is exactly what happened to Nixon, as the investigation developed further, and more facts were released the general population became uneasy and upset about his actions. Nixon eventually resigned as President of the United States, where he was almost immediately pardoned by his successor Gerald Ford.
Overall I don’t believe that President Nixon’s values and morals were on par with what is consider the norm. He was spying by recording conversations, he lied multiple times, and he attempted to cover up the scandal and his involvement with the scandal in order to try and save himself. These very actions are still considered offensive even in today’s society which is vastly different than it was then. Nixon simply wanted to win the next election that badly that he was willing to basically cheat to do so.
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