Episode 57 RICHARD NIXON The Man Who Saved the Union (Part 4) Kent State and the Lincoln Memorial
George H.W. Bush 1990 - 1991 The Sweep of History
English - November 16, 2021 10:00 - 43 minutes - 30.1 MB - ★★★★★ - 2 ratingsPolitics News History politics history government republican democrat independent speeches world war 2 vietnam war lyndon johnson Homepage Download Apple Podcasts Google Podcasts Overcast Castro Pocket Casts RSS feed
After President Nixon announced he would cut the Ho Chi Minh Trail and take military action in Cambodia, college campuses across the nation exploded. Riots and demonstrations shut down several colleges and led to a nightmare scenario at Kent State in Ohio.
It was there that four young people would lose their lives when National Guardsman, themselves very young, fired on protesters at a demonstration against the actions in Cambodia and in opposition to the war in Vietnam. The country looked to be coming apart at the seems. At first President Nixon was defiant and in frustration called several of the demonstrators "Bums", which only added to the already enflamed situation.
As all of the tension built the tension began to show on Richard Nixon. He was struggling at how to get control of this war before it ended up being his war. As his advisor Patrick Moynihan said, years later, "If we stayed Lyndon Johnson's war would become Richard Nixon's war and by the time the year was through half the people seemed to think he started it." Richard Nixon began to struggle to find sleep and his advisors began to report erratic behavior.
It was then that Richard Nixon decided to reach out to the young college age demonstrators that had descended on Washington D.C. Late in the middle of the night, or better described early morning hours, of May 09, 1970, Richard Nixon went nearly alone except for his valet, Manolo Sanchez, to the Lincoln Memorial. It was a visit that has been heavily maligned by Nixon haters for years. It was called weird, crazy, and mocked, but in reality it was a genuine attempt to hear from his constituents, to understand their feelings and to convey to them that he really cared for their futures.
It was a truly remarkable moment.
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