former acting attorney general about subvert

to seal the offices of the special prosecutor, which made the events of that evening-quickly dubbed the Saturday Night Massacre-sound very much like a domestic coup d’état, although it was nothing of the sort. The White House chief of staff, Alexander Haig, then told the Deputy Attorney General, William Ruckelshaus, to fire Cox, informing him, “Your Commander-in-Chief has given you an order.” Ruckelshaus resigned, too, and Robert Bork, the Solicitor General, in the order of succession, became the acting Attorney General-at which point the order to fire Cox was carried out. Richardson, resigned when he was informed that Cox, whom he’d appointed, would be dismissed. (A spokesman said that it would be “carried out with thoroughness and vigor.”) The Attorney General, Elliot L. The next day, though, he left, not of his accord: Nixon announced that he was abolishing the office of the Watergate prosecutor, and that its work would be transferred to the Justice Department. When a reporter asked Cox, on his way out of the office that night, if he intended to resign, Cox replied, “No-hell, no.”

Cox wanted the tapes, and it was easy to see that his defiance, or courage, was not going to lead to a happy conclusion. On October 19, 1973, a Friday, it became clear that the Justice Department’s special Watergate prosecutor, Archibald Cox, would not obey President Nixon’s order to be content with the summaries of recordings of Nixon and White House aides.

Former acting attorney general about subvert