His presidency saw the reduction of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, détente with the Soviet Union and China, the Apollo 11 Moon landing, and the establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency and Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree from Whittier College in 1934 and a Juris Doctor from Duke University in 1937, practiced law in California, and then moved with his wife Pat to Washington, D.C., in 1942 to work for the federal government.

[39][40] In January 1938, Nixon was cast in the Whittier Community Players production of The Dark Tower in which he played opposite his future wife, a high school teacher named Thelma "Pat" Ryan.

In January 1945, he was transferred to the Bureau of Aeronautics office in Philadelphia, where he helped negotiate the termination of World War II contracts, and received his second letter of commendation, from the Secretary of the Navy[53] for "meritorious service, tireless effort, and devotion to duty".

Cronin shared with Nixon his 1945 privately circulated paper "The Problem of American Communism in 1945",[66] with much information from the FBI's William C. Sullivan who by 1961 headed domestic intelligence under J. Edgar Hoover.

As part of that effort, a "Pink Sheet" was distributed by the Nixon campaign suggesting that Douglas's voting record was similar to that of New York Congressman Vito Marcantonio, reputed to be a communist, and their political views must be nearly identical.

[96] Biographer Irwin Gellman, who chronicled Nixon's congressional years, said of his vice presidency: Eisenhower radically altered the role of his running mate by presenting him with critical assignments in both foreign and domestic affairs once he assumed his office.

[118] At the end of his term of office as vice president in January 1961, Nixon and his family returned to California, where he practiced law and wrote a bestselling book, Six Crises, which included coverage of the Hiss case, Eisenhower's heart attack, and the Fund Crisis, which had been resolved by the Checkers speech.

[113] The campaign was clouded by public suspicion that Nixon viewed the office as a stepping stone for another presidential run, some opposition from the far-right of the party, and his own lack of interest in being California's governor.

[137] He selected Maryland governor Spiro Agnew as his running mate, a choice which Nixon believed would unite the party, appealing both to Northern moderates and to Southerners disaffected with the Democrats.

In his inaugural address, which received almost uniformly positive reviews, Nixon remarked that "the greatest honor history can bestow is the title of peacemaker"[150]—a phrase that found a place on his gravestone.

[152] Nixon laid the groundwork for his overture to China before he became president, writing in Foreign Affairs a year before his election: "There is no place on this small planet for a billion of its potentially most able people to live in angry isolation.

[154] Nixon ultimately used the idea of gaining leverage against the Soviet Union through relations with China to obtain the support of key conservative figures including Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan.

[166] Nixon approved a secret B-52 carpet bombing campaign of North Vietnamese and Khmer Rouge positions in Cambodia beginning in March 1969 and code-named Operation Menu, without the consent of Cambodian leader Norodom Sihanouk.

[173] Nixon announced the ground invasion of Cambodia on April 30, 1970, against North Vietnamese bases in the east of the country,[174] and further protests erupted against perceived expansion of the conflict, which resulted in Ohio National Guardsmen killing four unarmed students at Kent State University.

When news of the leak first appeared, Nixon was inclined to do nothing; the Papers, a history of United States' involvement in Vietnam, mostly concerned the lies of prior administrations and contained few real revelations.

David Tal argues: The linkage between strategic arms limitations and outstanding issues such as the Middle East, Berlin and, foremost, Vietnam thus became central to Nixon's and Kissinger's policy of détente.

[187]Seeking to foster better relations with the United States, China and the Soviet Union both cut back on their diplomatic support for North Vietnam and advised Hanoi to come to terms militarily.

The truce negotiations rapidly escalated into a superpower crisis; when Israel gained the upper hand, Egyptian president Sadat requested a joint U.S.–USSR peacekeeping mission, which the U.S. refused.

[209] This could not be accomplished overnight, and the U.S. economy continued to struggle through 1970, contributing to a lackluster Republican performance in the midterm congressional elections (Democrats controlled both Houses of Congress throughout Nixon's presidency).

He defeated McGovern with over 60 percent of the popular vote, losing only in Massachusetts and D.C.[252] The term Watergate has come to encompass an array of clandestine and often illegal activities undertaken by members of the Nixon administration.

The Washington Post picked up on the story; reporters Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward relied on an informant known as "Deep Throat"—later revealed to be Mark Felt, associate director at the FBI—to link the men to the Nixon administration.

[139][253][254] In July 1973, White House aide Alexander Butterfield testified under oath to Congress that Nixon had a secret taping system and recorded his conversations and phone calls in the Oval Office.

[256] On October 10, 1973, Vice President Agnew resigned for reasons unrelated to Watergate: he was convicted on charges of bribery, tax evasion and money laundering during his tenure as governor of Maryland.

In a statement accompanying the release of what became known as the "Smoking Gun Tape" on August 5, 1974, Nixon accepted blame for misleading the country about when he had been told of White House involvement, stating that he had had a lapse of memory.

Nixon then released a statement: I was wrong in not acting more decisively and more forthrightly in dealing with Watergate, particularly when it reached the stage of judicial proceedings and grew from a political scandal into a national tragedy.

Eulogists at the Nixon Library ceremony included President Bill Clinton, former secretary of state Henry Kissinger, Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole, California governor Pete Wilson, and the Reverend Billy Graham.

To reclaim a respected place in American public life after his resignation, he kept traveling and thinking and talking to the world's leaders ... and by the time Bill Clinton came to the White House [in 1993], Nixon had virtually cemented his role as an elder statesman.

Nixon worked hard to find a middle ground between the hyperactivism of the growth liberals JFK and LBJ and the sort of minimalist government championed by Barry Goldwater and the Republican right.

[336] According to Black, Nixon thought that he was doomed to be traduced, double-crossed, unjustly harassed, misunderstood, underappreciated, and subjected to the trials of Job, but that by the application of his mighty will, tenacity, and diligence, he would ultimately prevail.