Ford and Nixon
It is difficult for an outsider to say whether President Ford was justified in offering a Pardon to his unhappy predecessor, as he h.as now done: there have been for some time powerful advocates of such a course — and powerful advocates against it, who Maintained that it would be wrong to allow the former President to escape punishment if his aides and counsellors were to be given their just deserts. In any event Mr Nixon is far from out of the legal wood since, despite the amnesty, he may have to aPPear as a witness in several trials, he may have to endure a number of civil suits, and he will have the taxman beating a path to his door. What can be said, however, is that the pressures on President Ford not to Pardon were very much greater than those to pardon, so the new President has taken the more difficult course. What is more, he has clearly taken it for the right reason — in order the better to bind up the wounds of his people. He has signalled the end of the involvement of this or any other American administration in the Watergate affair, and has thus written finis to an agonising chapter in American political history. What happens after this has no Political dimension.
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