Editing Archibald Cox (section)

===Saturday Night Massacre===
{{main|Saturday Night Massacre}}
Doyle was able to use his press contacts to secure the ballroom of the [[National Press Club (United States)|National Press Club]] for the 1:00&nbsp;p.m. press conference on Saturday, October 20. It was to be broadcast live on NBC and CBS and a summary would be shown during half-time of the football game being shown on ABC. Cox that morning was quite concerned about whether he would be able to take the president on alone. He was well aware that he had no institutional support, and the apparent defection of Sam Ervin of the Senate Watergate Committee profoundly troubled him. "Spineless!" he remarked on reading of it.{{sfn|Doyle|1977|p=174}} He was also concerned about lack of political support.{{efn|Although political support would have helped level the balance of power, Cox felt it inappropriate for a prosecutor to set out to build it. Heymann said: "In the ominous days before the Saturday Night Massacre when Cox might well have been marshaling political support, he did not, and found himself quite alone among the responsible figures in insisting on access to the crucial tapes when the Senators most involved had accepted an inadequate substitute. He didn't think a prosecutor should be marshaling Congressional support. Indeed, he regretted deeply the few hesitant steps he had taken in that direction when he earlier had reason to fear interference with the execution of the law."<ref>{{cite journal|url=http://heinonline.org/HOL/Page?handle=hein.journals/hlr118&start_page=11&collection=journals&set_as_cursor=0&men_tab=srchresults&id=37|last=Heymann|first=Philip B.|title=Archibald Cox|journal=Harvard Law Review|volume=118|number=1|date=November 2004|pages=11, 13|access-date=May 1, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160605083233/http://heinonline.org/HOL/Page?handle=hein.journals%2Fhlr118&start_page=11&collection=journals&set_as_cursor=0&men_tab=srchresults&id=37|archive-date=June 5, 2016|url-status=live|df=mdy-all}}</ref>}} Just six days before Senator [[George McGovern]] had told the [[American Civil Liberties Union|ACLU]], which had just taken out newspaper ads calling for Nixon's impeachment, that there was not yet support for it; in fact, there was not even enough strength in the opposition to override vetoes.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/5105508/mcgovern_before_the_aclu/|last=AP wire service|title=McGovern Would Delay Nixon Impeachment|work=[Hagerstown, Md.] Daily Mail|date=October 15, 1973|page=2|via=newspapers.com|access-date=April 30, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160601193215/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/5105508/mcgovern_before_the_aclu/|archive-date=June 1, 2016|url-status=live|df=mdy-all}}</ref> As for Nixon's statement itself, influential members seemed behind it: Republican Senate minority leader [[Hugh Scott]] called it a "very wise solution." Democratic Speaker [[Carl Albert]] characterized it, noncommitally, as "interesting." Even Senate majority leader [[Mike Mansfield]] said it was a way "to avoid a constitutional confrontation."<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/5105536/reaction_to_nixon_statement_on_tapes/|last=UPI|title=Senators Criticize Proposal|work=New Castle [Pa.] News|date=October 20, 1973|page=1|via=newspapers.com|access-date=April 30, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160601201521/https://www.newspapers.com/clip/5105536/reaction_to_nixon_statement_on_tapes/|archive-date=June 1, 2016|url-status=live|df=mdy-all}}</ref> When Joseph Connolly called an aide to liberal Republican Senator [[Richard Schweiker]], he was told that the senator "can't get out front on this."{{sfn|Doyle|1977|p=178}} At the office, the lawyer staff assembled to discuss the matter as a group for the first time. Philip Heymann had flown in from Cambridge to lend support. They offered contradictory advice, and Cox asked them to go to their offices to write up suggestions for him.{{sfn|Doyle|1977|pp=176, 178}} At 11:00&nbsp;a.m. he met them again and gave something of a valedictory and urged them to continue working if he were fired. At 12:30, Cox, Phyllis, James Doyle, and John Barker walked to the National Press Club. "He was plenty upset," said Barker.{{sfn|Gormley|1997|p=348}}

[[File:Archibald Cox-October 20, 1973.png|thumb|right|Archibald Cox at the National Press Club on October 20, 1973]]
Richardson was on the phone when Cox arrived and read to him the text of a letter he had sent to the president that day in which he said that Nixon's instructions gave him "serious difficulties" and outlined several steps that still might save the compromise.{{sfn|Doyle|1977|pp=178–179, 180}} Phyllis, holding his hand, walked him to the stage, where they were photographed. Cox then sat down at the table and began his impromptu remarks.<ref>The press conference can be viewed in the [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cxfwE-ADebM CBS News Special Report] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170510103338/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cxfwE-ADebM |date=2017-05-10 }} live broadcast. Excerpts of the remarks were published in {{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1973/10/21/archives/excerpts-from-transcript-of-coxs-news-conference-on-nixons-decision.html|title=Excerpts From Transcript of Cox's News Conference on Nixon's Decision on Tapes|work=New York Times|date=October 21, 1973|page=60|url-access=subscription|access-date=July 25, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180725215255/https://www.nytimes.com/1973/10/21/archives/excerpts-from-transcript-of-coxs-news-conference-on-nixons-decision.html|archive-date=July 25, 2018|url-status=live|df=mdy-all}}</ref>

Heymann thought he started out nervous, defensively saying that he was "not out to get the president …"{{sfn|Gormley|1997|p=350}} Once he got into the details of the history and significance of the dispute over the tapes, which involved a patient explanation of criminal procedure, evidence, administrative and constitutional law, he relaxed. Doyle said: "He was folksy, unpretentious, disarming. He seemed the country lawyer, talking good sense."{{sfn|Doyle|1977|p=181}} While he used simple terms and short sentences, he was not patronizing or supercilious. "He offered a masterful professorial performance, designed to explain the legal and constitutional confrontation in terms that struck at the core of the layman's treasured values essential to the American system."{{sfn|Kutler|1990|p=405}} He defended established institutions and regular procedure. By contrast, the president's proposal involved deciding that a "court order would not be obeyed." In the place of evidence, which Cox sought, the president proposed providing "summaries"  while the genuine, irrefutable evidence, the tapes of what actually transpired, would be available to only two or three men, "all but one of them the aides to the president and men who have been associated with those who are the subject of the investigation." In describing the course of the negotiations for all information, he showed how the White House lawyers had stalled from the beginning. But he never attacked anyone, at one point taking Buzhardt off the hook: "he has behaved in dealing with me in an entirely honorable way —except that he's too damn slow." With the questions that followed, Cox spent more than an hour, at the end of which his staff handed out copies of the various proposals and correspondence that took place during the week. It was so persuasive a performance that [[Sarah McClendon]], White House correspondent known for her sharp questions, approached Cox and said: "I want to shake your hand, you are a great American."{{sfn|Gormley|1997|p=352}} Doyle wrote that it was "the most unusual press conference I have ever attended. The hard-bitten, cynical press corps was rooting for Archibald Cox."{{sfn|Doyle|1977|p=185}} John Douglas said: "It was one of the most spectacular performances, one of two or three press conference ever held in this country which have had a significant effect on public opinion."<ref name=CSMSatNight>{{cite news|last=Sweeney|first=Louise|title=Archibald Cox|work=Christian Science Monitor|date=June 6, 1980|df=mdy-all|id = {{ProQuest|1039163450}}}}</ref>

The press conference also unravelled the Nixon-Haig plan. Cox did not resign, nor was he cowed by the president's directive. Moreover, instead of exploiting Richardson's reputation for integrity to his own advantage (a key feature on which the plan was based), the president was forced to act in his own name, and Cox was able to draw Richardson to his side by defending him as honorable. So the White House decided to fire Cox. It was unable, however, to make either Richardson or his deputy [[William Ruckelshaus]] carry out the order. Each resigned in turn rather than fire Cox, although the White House later claimed it fired Ruckelshaus. Solicitor General [[Robert Bork]] (third in line at the Justice Department) in a face-to-face meeting with the president agreed to issue the order as the acting attorney general and he also decided not to resign after so doing.{{efn|Nixon's purported reason for firing Cox, as relayed by Haig, was that Cox had embarrassed Nixon during sensitive negotiations during the Middle East war.{{sfn|Richardson|1976|p=39}} Richardson's advice to Bork, not to resign, or at least not to resign after firing Cox, was an important factor for Bork. But "[w]hy Bork acted as he did, exactly how he acted, and what were the consequences of his acts, became matters of some dispute."{{sfn|Kutler|1990|p=407}}}} As for the termination itself, Bork sent a written order to Cox by messenger that evening to Cox's home.{{efn|Richardson called Cox earlier that afternoon, informing him that he and Ruckelshaus had resigned and that Bork would be firing him. Cox explained: "Sometime further on, the phone rang and it was the White House operator trying to get our address, and letting us know there was a letter to be delivered. And the messenger got lost in nearby Virginia. Instead of getting there in 20 minutes as he could have, it took him more than an hour. I think when I got the letter, the first thing I said to my wife and daughter was, 'I think they at least owed it to me to send me somebody with a jacket and necktie.' That's the kind of silly remark you make in moments of emotion … I was much more concerned about the issues."<ref name=CSMSatNight/>}}

The White House then fatally overplayed its hand. At 8:25&nbsp;p.m. press secretary [[Ron Ziegler]] announced what would become known as the "[[Saturday Night Massacre]]." He explained that Cox had been fired, but added, somewhat gratuitously (and, as it would ultimately transpire, inaccurately), "the office of the Special Prosecution Force has been abolished as of approximately 8 P.M. tonight."{{sfn|Emery|1994|p=400}} Haig compounded the bad publicity by publicly sealing the offices of the Special Prosecutor as well as those of Richardson and Ruckelshaus. He explained his conduct by saying: "You would turn the country into a banana republic if you allowed defiance of the president."{{sfn|Genovese|Morgan|2012|pp=72–73}} To Judge Sirica, who watched it on television, it was the cordoning off of the Special Prosecutor's offices that looked like part of a Latin American coup.{{sfn|Sirica|1979|p=130}} Fred Emery wrote for the ''Times of London'' that there was "a whiff of the Gestapo in the chill October air."{{sfn|Emery|1994|p=401}} FBI agents showed up at the Special Prosecutor's offices at 9:00&nbsp;p.m. and briefly prevented deputy prosecutor Henry Ruth from entering. Staffers inside were told they were not permitted to remove any documents, official or personal. At a hastily arranged press conference in the library of the building, Ruth and Doyle explained that they had taken copies of major memos to a safe place the night before, but that they were concerned about the vast amount of material still in the office that had not been presented to the grand jury. Doyle read Cox's statement on his termination: "Whether we shall continue to be a Government of laws and not of men is now for Congress and ultimately the American people."<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1973/10/21/archives/cox-office-shut-on-nixons-order-fbi-agents-impound-files-and.html|last=Oelsner|first=Lesley|title=Cox Office Shut on Nixon's Order: F.B.I. Agents Impound Files and Personal Papers|work=New York Times|date=October 21, 1973|page=60|access-date=April 28, 2016|url-access=subscription|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170715070312/http://www.nytimes.com/1973/10/21/archives/cox-office-shut-on-nixons-order-fbi-agents-impound-files-and.html|archive-date=July 15, 2017|url-status=live|df=mdy-all}}</ref>

[[File:NYTimes Saturday Night Massacre Front Page.gif|thumb|left|Front page of the ''New York Times,'' October 21, 1973, announcing the [[Saturday Night Massacre]] amid mounting tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union over possible armed conflict in the Middle East.]]
The actions of Nixon and his aides that night produced "results precisely the opposite to what the president and his lawyers had anticipated." Instead of simply removing Cox, "they raised a 'firestorm' of protest that permanently scarred Nixon's credibility with the public, and, most damagingly, with Congressional Republicans and Southern Democrats."{{sfn|Kutler|1990|p=406}} Public reaction, even though it was a holiday weekend, was swift and overwhelming. About 450,000 telegrams and cables reached the White House and Congress. Mail and wires were put in bundles then sorted by state. The deluge eclipsed any previous record.{{sfn|Gormley|1997|pp=361–362}} Outside the White House, marchers held signs saying "Honk for Impeachment"; car horns were heard in downtown Washington day and night for two weeks.<ref>{{harvnb|Kutler|1990|p=410}}; {{harvnb|Gormley|1997|p=362}}; {{harvnb|Emery|1994|p=402}}.</ref> But more concerning to the White House must have been the political reaction. On Sunday [[John B. Anderson]], Chairman of the [[Republican Conference of the United States House of Representatives|House Republican Conference]], predicted that "impeachment resolutions are going to be raining down like hailstorms."{{sfn|Emery|1994|p=402}} [[George H. W. Bush]], then Chairman of the [[Republican National Committee]], was so concerned over the electoral consequences that he visited the White House, hoping to persuade the president to rehire Richardson for damage control, perhaps as ambassador to the U.S.S.R.{{sfn|Gormley|1997|p=362}} On Tuesday, Speaker [[Carl Albert]] began referring impeachment resolutions to the House Judiciary Committee with the consent of Gerald Ford.{{sfn|Emery|1994|p=404}} Nixon lawyer Leonard Garment said that the White House was paralyzed. "[H]e thought of little else except to marvel 'over the mischief we had wrought and the public relations disaster we had brought on ourselves.'"{{sfn|Kutler|1990|p=410}}

In the end, Nixon did not even achieve the short-term tactical benefit the maneuver was designed to afford him. On Tuesday afternoon eleven lawyers from the Special Prosecutor's force convened with Wright and Buzhardt in the courtroom of Judge Sirica, for further proceedings on the subpoenas. That weekend Sirica drafted an order to show cause why Nixon should not be held in contempt. He was thinking of a $25,000 to $50,000 a day fine until the president complied.{{sfn|Sirica|1979|pp=167–180}} To everyone's amazement, Wright announced that the president was prepared to produce all the material ordered.{{sfn|Emery|1994|p=406}} Not long afterward, [[Leon Jaworski]] would be appointed Special Prosecutor and, because of Nixon's wounded public standing, was given even more independence than Cox had. Cox would not be part of any of it, however, for after a brief farewell meeting with his staff (whom Jaworski would keep), advising them how important it was that they continue and assuring them of Jaworski's good faith,{{efn|Jaworski at Robert Kennedy's request prosecuted Governor [[Ross Barnett]] of Mississippi for contempt over the integration of the University of Mississippi by Medger Evers. Cox had been so impressed with his integrity (as a Southerner taking on a segregationist politician) and his talent that he split his argument time with him before the Supreme Court.{{sfn|Gormley|1997|p=163}}}} he and Phyllis drove off in their pickup truck to their place in [[Brooksville, Maine]].

Cox's colleague and friend [[Philip Heymann]] described the effect of that weekend from Cox's address, through the massacre and the reaction:
{{Blockquote|text=President Nixon asked the country to understand his firing an honest prosecutor so that he could get on with national security business. Cox spoke to the American people about the primacy of the rule of law even during a near-confrontation with the Soviet Union over the Yom Kippur war. Unfrightened, unpretentious, talking from the very depths of his convictions and loyalties to hundreds of millions of individual Americans as one citizen to another, Archie reversed a congressional retreat and found a nation following him along the path of freedom. The people and the Congress rallied to the cause of a professor who, without a hint of anger, spoke mildly about our history and principles, and who made clear that what would happen to him was not an issue. After that the executive was again bound by the laws that make men free, and Archie became a national symbol of the triumph of law.<ref name="HarvTrib">{{cite web|url=http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/2004/06.03/15-cox.html|title=Archibald Cox dies at 92|work=Harvard University Gazette|date=June 3, 2004|access-date=March 12, 2016|archive-url=https://archive.today/20160316132441/http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/2004/06.03/15-cox.html|archive-date=March 16, 2016|url-status=live|df=mdy-all}}</ref>}}

Cox's case on the tapes did not go to the Supreme Court, but when the president tried to resist a later subpoena by Jaworski, the case made its way to the Court. On July 24, 1974, only three days after oral argument, United States Supreme Court voted by 8 to 0 to reject Nixon's claims of [[executive privilege]] and enforced the subpoena requiring the release of the tapes.{{efn|''[[United States v. Nixon]]'', 418 U.S. 683 (1974) (opinion by Chief Justice Burger, joined in by all except Associate Justice [[William H. Rehnquist]] who did not participate in the deliberations). Justice Rehnquist had recused himself on the ground that as an assistant attorney general during Nixon's first term, he had taken part in internal executive-branch discussions of the scope of executive privilege.}} Fifteen days later Nixon announced his decision to resign as president effective the next day, August 8, 1974. Many legal experts outside of the United States were shocked at how legal process, particularly one issued at the request of a subordinate official, could require the head of state to do anything. Cox wrote of one scholar who said: "It is ''unthinkable'' that the courts of any country should issue an order to its Chief of State."<ref>{{cite book|last=Cox|first=Archibald|title=The Court and the Constitution|page=[https://archive.org/details/courtconstit00coxa/page/7 7]|location=Boston, Massachusetts|publisher=Houghton Mifflin|year=1987|isbn=0395379334|url=https://archive.org/details/courtconstit00coxa/page/7}}</ref> Cox spent much of the rest of his career writing on the unique place of the Court in the American system of government. As for this particular case, when it was all over, ''Times'' legal correspondent Anthony Lewis gave chief credit for the extraordinary result to Cox: 
{{Blockquote|text=If Cox and his staff had not been so able and dogged, they easily could have fallen in a dozen procedural holes along the way in the tapes case. …But plainly there was more to that Saturday night and its aftermath. It all depended on public attitudes—and they in turn depended on the public's reading of one man's character. I am convinced myself that the character of Archibald Cox was essential to the result. Nixon and his men never understood it; they assumed that Cox must be a conspirator, like them, when he was so straight as to approach naivete. [Cox said on taking the job]: "I think sometimes it is effective not to be nasty, in a nasty world—although it may take a little while for people to realize that."<ref name="LewisTrib"/>}}