Video: 'Nixon before resignation and full speech'

(Thursday, August 8, 1974, 9:01 p.m. EDT; during the Watergate scandal) — Richard Milhous Nixon, the 37th President of the United States, announced tonight in a conciliatory address on national television that he had given up his long and arduous fight to remain in office and would resign, effective at noon tomorrow (click here for a clip of Aug. 8, 1974, from ‘The Presidents: Nixon’ at 2:41:20). .

At that hour, Vice President Gerald Ford will be sworn in as the 38th President to service out the 895 days remaining in Nixon’s second term.

Nixon, appearing calm and resigned to his fate, became the first U.S. president to resign from office:

I have never been a quitter. To leave office before my term is completed is abhorrent to every instinct in my body. But as President, I must put the interest of America first. America needs a full-time President and a full-time Congress, particularly at this time with problems we face at home and abroad.

To continue to fight through the months ahead for my personal vindication would almost totally absorb the time and attention of both the President and the Congress in a period when our entire focus should be on the great issues of peace abroad and prosperity without inflation at home.

Therefore, I shall resign the Presidency effective at noon tomorrow. Vice President Ford will be sworn in as President at that hour in this office.

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