ames Reston, Jr. took leave from teaching during the summer of 1973 to witness the Senate Watergate Committee hearings as he worked with his coauthor on what became the first fullâ??length book to advocate for Richard Nixon's impeachment. During the following summer, he returned to Washington, D.C., to witness the final act of the impeachment drama, attending the Watergate trials, Supreme Court deliberations over executive privilege, House Judiciary Committee hearings to consider and eventually vote on articles of impeachment, and press briefings at the White House after the release of the “smoking gun” tape.
The following are several entries from "The Impeachment Diary" (Arcade Publishing, October 2019), the almost daily chronicle that Reston kept of those heady, uncertain times, when a president, having been investigated by a special counsel and Congress, was called to account for acts contrary to his oath and office, and fundamental questions about the Constitution were engaged.
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