Unbiased University: The Biggest Government Scandals Throughout U.S. History (Part I)

Summary

UNBIASED Politics Podcast Summary

Unbiased University: The Biggest Government Scandals Throughout U.S. History (Part I)

Host: Jordan Berman
Date: April 16, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this episode of the “Unbiased University” series, host and lawyer Jordan Berman delivers an in-depth, nonpartisan walkthrough of four landmark U.S. government scandals: the Crédit Mobilier scandal, the Teapot Dome scandal, the Pentagon Papers controversy, and Watergate. Each case is explained with focus on historical context, core legal and political issues, how the schemes operated, and the long-term impact on American governance. The episode is structured as an approachable “condensed law school class,” with the aim that listeners will be more informed citizens capable of understanding the underpinnings of current political scandals.

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Key Scandals Discussed

1. Crédit Mobilier Scandal (00:30–15:32)

Background and Context

• Set in the 1860s, post-Civil War era, during the building of the transcontinental railroad.
• Federal government incentivized railroad construction through bonds and land grants (checkerboard pattern of land allocation).

How the Scheme Worked

• Congress chartered the Union Pacific Railroad (private but government-created and subsidized).
• Union Pacific created a shell company, Crédit Mobilier of America, to act as its own construction contractor.
• Executives controlled both entities; they awarded themselves construction contracts at inflated rates.
• Profits were funneled back to the same small circle of insiders.

Political Corruption Uncovered

• Oakes Ames (member of Congress and investor) distributed Crédit Mobilier stock to lawmakers at below-market prices, tying Congressional interests to ongoing fraud.
• The scandal surfaced in 1872 via the New York Sun investigation “King of Frauds.”

Investigations and Consequences

• Congressional committees confirmed massive overpayments and insider enrichment.
• Outcome: “Not much. In February 1873, the House voted to censure both Oakes Ames and a representative named James Brooks. But a censure is just a formal reprimand. You don’t lose your seat in Congress. Nothing happens to you.” (Berman, 14:15)
• Few left office; some, like future President James Garfield, were untouched.
• Lasting Impact: Led (much later) to conflict of interest statutes, financial disclosure, and improved oversight mechanisms.

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2. Teapot Dome Scandal (19:39–28:35)

Context and Setup

• Occurred in the early 1920s: first major bribery scandal.
• Oil reserves (Teapot Dome, Elk Hills, Buena Vista Hills) had been set aside for Navy use.
• Shift in law (Mineral Leasing Act of 1920) gave the executive branch authority to lease federal lands.

Scheme Execution

• Secretary of the Interior Albert Fall persuaded President Harding to transfer control of reserves from the Navy to the Interior Department.
• Awarded secret, no-bid oil leases to private companies: Sinclair’s Mammoth Oil (Teapot Dome, WY), Doheny’s Pan American Petroleum (CA).
• Local producers and newspapers spotted irregularities, prompting Senate investigation.

Investigation and Uncovering Bribery

• Senator Thomas Walsh led the inquiry.
• Fall’s sudden wealth (debt repayments, property purchases) raised flags.
• “Walsh eventually uncovered that Doheny… had arranged for his son to deliver $100,000 in cash to Fall … Sinclair … transferred about $233,000 in bonds and other benefits to Fall and his family… The timing lined up almost exactly with the leases.” (Berman, 21:12)

Legal Action and Consequences

• Civil: Supreme Court voided corrupt leases, restoring federal control.
• Criminal: Fall was convicted (first Cabinet official imprisoned for acts in office); other oilmen acquitted of bribery but punished for contempt and jury tampering.
• Legacy: Two foundational Supreme Court holdings:
  • Congress’s implied power to conduct investigations and compel testimony (McGrain v. Daugherty, 1927).
  • Congress’s right to enforce subpoenas (Sinclair v. U.S., 1929).
• “Before Watergate, Teapot Dome was widely viewed as the most serious political scandal in American history.” (Berman, 25:28)

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3. The Pentagon Papers (28:36–33:56)

Background

• Refers to a classified Defense Department study, commissioned in 1967, of U.S. political/military involvement in Vietnam (1945–1967).
• Daniel Ellsberg, former Marine and analyst, became disillusioned by government deception regarding the Vietnam War.
• Secretly photocopied classified report; unsuccessfully tried to have Congress enter it into the record (invoking Speech and Debate Clause protections).

The Leak and Legal Battle

• In 1971, Ellsberg gave documents to NY Times reporter Neil Sheehan.
• NY Times published a series exposing that presidential administrations had publicly misrepresented Vietnam involvement.
• Nixon DOJ sought to halt publication (citing national security), leading to New York Times v. United States.

Supreme Court Ruling

• Court ruled the government couldn’t invoke “prior restraint” without proof of immediate, serious threat—not just political damage.
• “The Supreme Court said the government could not use what’s called prior restraint to block the press from publishing the documents. In order to stop the publication ... the government has to show an immediate, serious threat, not just political damage.” (Berman, 31:00)

Aftermath

• Nixon administration charged Ellsberg and Russo, but trial was dismissed after it was revealed the “Plumbers” (a White House unit) illegally broke into Ellsberg’s psychiatrist’s office.
• The Pentagon Papers leaked amidst growing anti-war sentiment, severely eroding public trust in government.
• Full declassification only occurred in 2011.

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4. Watergate Scandal (37:28–50:54)

Setup and Break-In

• “If you’ve ever heard someone slap gate onto the end of anything, it traces back to this scandal…” (Berman, 37:38)
• June 1972 break-in at DNC headquarters at the Watergate complex, orchestrated by operatives connected to Nixon’s reelection campaign (CREEP) and White House “Plumbers.”
• Security guard detected the break-in, leading to arrests; links to Nixon campaign funds quickly established.

Cover-Up and Escalation

• Nixon and aides attempted to limit the FBI investigation via the CIA (“smoking gun tape”).
• White House paid hush money to the burglars, aiming to prevent testimony.
• Publicly, the White House downplayed the event: “Press Secretary Ron Ziegler famously called it a third rate burglary.” (Berman, 38:38)

Unraveling

• Investigation deepened via Congressional hearings (Sam Ervin’s committee), aggressive Washington Post reporting (Woodward & Bernstein), and testimony from White House insiders (notably John Dean).
• Revelation of Nixon’s Oval Office taping system turned focus to documentary proof.

Legal Showdown and the ‘Saturday Night Massacre’

• Nixon refused to hand over tapes, citing executive privilege; fired Special Prosecutor Cox after Attorney General and Deputy AG refused and resigned/fired—event dubbed “Saturday Night Massacre.”
• “This whole chain of events became known as the Saturday Night Massacre. And eventually Nixon was forced to appoint a new special prosecutor…” (Berman, 44:48)

Resolution

• United States v. Nixon: Supreme Court ruled executive privilege was not absolute; tapes had to be released.
• The “smoking gun tape” revealed Nixon’s involvement in obstruction.
• Faced with certain impeachment and removal, Nixon resigned August 8, 1974; VP Gerald Ford became president and soon pardoned Nixon.
• Many Nixon officials were convicted for conspiracies, perjury, and obstruction.

Enduring Legacy

• Watergate reforms: Federal Election Campaign Act amendments (contribution and spending limits, campaign finance transparency, creation of the FEC), Ethics in Government Act (special prosecutor guidelines, expanded disclosure), and FOIA amendments (improved public access to government documents).
• “Watergate had some pretty significant impacts as far as shaping federal policy. And to this day, Watergate is still one of the biggest scandals in U.S. history.” (Berman, 50:30)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Congressional Reform Failures:
  “Not much. In February 1873, the House voted to censure both Oakes Ames and a representative named James Brooks. But a censure is just a formal reprimand. You don’t lose your seat in Congress. Nothing happens to you.” (Berman, 14:15)

• On the Supremacy of Teapot Dome Pre-Watergate:
  “Before Watergate, Teapot Dome was widely viewed as the most serious political scandal in American history.” (Berman, 25:28)

• On Press Freedom in Pentagon Papers:
  “The Supreme Court said the government could not use what’s called prior restraint to block the press from publishing the documents. In order to stop the publication ... the government has to show an immediate, serious threat, not just political damage.” (Berman, 31:00)

• On Watergate’s Cultural Legacy:
  “If you’ve ever heard someone slap gate onto the end of anything, it traces back to this scandal…” (Berman, 37:38)

• On Watergate’s Impact:
  “Watergate had some pretty significant impacts as far as shaping federal policy. And to this day, Watergate is still one of the biggest scandals in U.S. history.” (Berman, 50:30)

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Timestamps

• 00:30 – Introduction and episode structure
• 01:40 – Crédit Mobilier scandal: origins, mechanism, exposure, aftermath
• 15:32 – [Break/Ads]
• 19:39 – Teapot Dome scandal: context, execution, investigation, legal consequences, reforms
• 28:36 – Pentagon Papers: leak, Supreme Court ruling, long-term impact
• 33:56 – [Break/Ads]
• 37:28 – Watergate: break-in, cover-up, investigation, tapes, Nixon resignation, reforms
• 50:30 – Episode wrap and preview of Part II

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Flow and Tone

• The episode maintains a neutral, fact-first, and explanatory tone.
• Berman uses clear analogies (“condensed law school education”), legal explanations, and frequent references to how these past scandals shaped current systems.
• Select historical “fun facts” and connections between past and present make complex history approachable and relevant.

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Conclusion

This rich episode offers practical insight into four foundational government scandals by unpacking how each unfolded, what legal lessons emerged, and why these historical moments continue to inform today’s political and legal environment. The content is rigorously factual and nonpartisan, making it an essential listen for anyone wanting to understand American political accountability. Stay tuned for Part II, which promises further instructive cases from U.S. history (Whiskey Ring, Iran-Contra Affair, Clinton-Lewinsky scandal).

Transcript

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Welcome back to Unbiased, your favorite source of unbiased news and legal analysis. Welcome back to Unbiased Politics and to the Unbiased University series. In today's episode we are talking about some of the biggest government scandals in US history. So in part one of this two part series, we are going to walk through four major scandals that reshaped politics in their own way. Okay, so we'll start with the Credit Mobile Mobilier scandal. The Then we'll go on to the Teapot Dome scandal. Then we'll talk about the Pentagon Papers and Watergate. Then in part two of this two part series, which will be the next episode, we'll cover three more scandals. So in each episode we'll cover some very early scandals and then also some more recent scandals. Some of them involved bribery, some involved secret foreign policy operations, some involved obstruction of justice, and some just involve serious personal misconduct. Some. So by the end of this episode, you will have a full understanding of what these scandals involved and in some cases, how they changed the way Washington operates. For those of you tuning in for the first time, I want you to think of this Unbiased university series as a condensed law school education. I want you to imagine that every time you're tuning into one of these episodes, you are sitting down in a 30 to 45 minute law school class with me as your professor. And in each class we cover a different topic and talk about various cases and laws that have shaped those topics. And by the end of this series, you will have obtained your imaginary degree from Unbiased University, which means that you'll be fully prepared for this show when I come back from maternity leave and get back to reporting on current events. Because all of these concepts we're talking about in each of these episodes are all in the background of every single current event that we talk about. So it's really important that we all understand them. And, and with that said, let's talk about some scandals. We'll start in the early, not early, well, early days, but in the 1860s with one of the Earliest major corruption scandals in federal history. That is the Credit Mobilier scandal. So the Credit Mobilier scandal was really the first show of government corruption. And we'll start this story with the fact that in the early 1860s, okay, think about, you know, travel, logistics, the layout of the land, all those things wasn't exactly easy to get around the country. So to get from the east coast, where everything was pretty much happening, to the west coast, you'd have to spend months traveling by wagon. You'd have to cross over, cross over some pretty intense terrain. You could also travel by ship, but you'd have to go around South America or through Central America. So the west coast was very much geographically isolated from the rest of the country. And when you think about things, not only personal travel, but things like military logistics and the economy, the way the country was so spread out meant that moving military, military resources was incredibly inefficient. And economically, the country wasn't yet fully integrated. Also, this is around the time of the Civil War. And the Civil War really highlighted the need for a solution. So it, in 1862, Congress passed the Pacific Railroad act, which authorized the construction of a railroad from the Missouri river to the Pacific Ocean. And the thought there was that a cross country railroad would serve not only as an economic development project, but it would also serve as a national security priority, because you could move troops and supplies and mail and information at a much quicker speed than you could before. So how Congress set this whole thing up was like this. It passed the Pacific Railroad act, which allowed it to charter private corporations and subsidize them for purposes of building the railroad. In other words, the government would create these private companies and then help pay for their work on the railroad through an incentive structure. And one of those corporations that Congress created was Union Pacific Railroad. Union Pacific Railroad was a private company, but of course created by Congress. And for the purpose of building west from Nebraska until it connected with the railroad coming from California, that was its purpose. And as we said before, Congress also subsidized Union Pacific through an incentive structure. So for every mile of track that Union Pacific completed, Union Pacific would receive federally backed government bonds, which were essentially loans backed by the federal government. And the bond amounts were tiered. So Union Pacific would get approximately $16,000 per mile on level ground, $32,000 per mile on plateau or rolling terrain, and then up to $48,000 per mile in mountainous areas. On top of that, the government also gave Union Pacific land as it built the railroad, which was basically just another incentive because the company would accumulate more and more land as it built, and then it could eventually either sell the land for know, more of a profit, or it could develop the land. But the way the government awarded the land is it divided the land into these square mile sections so it almost looked like a checkerboard if you were looking at it from above. So Union Pacific would get every other section along the route and then the government would keep the sections in between. And the reason the government did it this way is because once the railroad was built, the land near the tracks became more valuable, right? Towns would pop up, businesses would move in, new transportation would generally be easier. So that land would be more valuable not only for Union Pacific, but also for the government. So as you can probably see, profit for Union Pacific was tied primarily to how many miles of track were completed. It wasn't necessarily tied to cost efficiency or long term profitability or anything like that. So again, Congress creates Union Pacific as this private company to build this railroad and gave it both cash and land and land incentives and based on miles built. But then Union Pacific went out and hired another company as the construction contractor for the project. It was a financial company called the Pennsylvania Fiscal Agency. And you're probably wondering, why would Union Pacific hire a financial company to do construction work? Why wouldn't they hire a construction company to do construction work? And the answer is that Union Pacific's poll plan was to actually take over the Pennsylvania Fiscal Agency and repurpose it into a construction company. And the reason they wanted to do it this way is because the Pennsylvania Fiscal Agency already had a legal charter from the state, so they didn't need to create a whole new corporation from scratch. It was already incorporated, and its state charter gave it some pretty significant financial powers like buying and selling bonds, holding securities and guaranteeing obligations, which meant that it, it was more structured to move large amounts of money around. And it was mostly an inactive company, so it was fairly easy to take control of. So while the Pennsylvania Fiscal Agency didn't have construction experience, that's not why Union Pacific was hiring. Union Pacific didn't care about that. Union Pacific was hiring it because its ultimate goal was to take control of it. And that is what happened in 1864, two years after the Pacific Railroad act was enacted. In an executive at Union Pacific named Thomas Durant acquired control of the Pennsylvania Fiscal Agency. He thereafter changed the name of the Pennsylvania Fiscal Agency to Credit Mobilier of America. And under new ownership, the company was repurposed as a construction company. But it still had these Broad financial powers that were granted to it in its state. State charter. So at this point, there were two companies at play, right? You had Union Pacific, which was the railroad company receiving the federal money. And then you had Credit Mobilier, which was the construction company building the railroad or at least contracting the work to subcontractors. The problem was the same group of men controlled both companies. And because the same people controlled both companies, they were essentially hiring themselves, right? So essentially, Credit Mobile. Yay. Would receive the contracts to build sections of the railroad from Union Pacific. It would charge Union Pacific inflated rates. And because the same men were running both companies, Union Pacific would then approve the payments to Credit Mobilier, no matter how inflated they were. And the bills would be paid to Credit Mobilier using federally backed bonds and land grant value. But all of Credit Mobilier's profit was going to the same group of men. So Credit Mobilier ends up making massive profits during the railroad construction by overbilling Union Pacific. Fast forward to 1869, and the railroad is done. Okay, it's finished. But that's where a man named Oakes Ames comes in. Oakes Ames was a member of Congress. He was also an investor in Union Pacific and an investor in Credit Mobilier. So he liked this insider enrichment because it benefited him. He was thriving. So he decides what he's going to do. He's going to offer Credit Mobilier stock to other members of Congress at below market prices. Because that way, whoever buys in will now also financially benefit if the company keeps receiving government funds. And that's exactly what happened. You had these lawmakers that were now shareholders in this company that was making its profit off of financial help from the government. So why wouldn't lawmakers continue to give money to Union Pacific, which then pays the bills at Credit Mobilier? Of course they would. So this goes on for a few years. Three years later, in September 1872, during President Ulysses S. Grant's reelection campaign, a newspaper called the New York sun publishes an investigation called the King of Frauds. And the investigation detailed almost everything. The inflated construction contracts, insider enrichment, the distribution of Credit Mobilier stock to members of Congress. And in response to this report, Congress forms these investigative committees in both the House and the Senate to investigate everything further. Oaks Ames, of all people, testified before the committees and produced records of the stock transactions. And in the end, the House investigation confirmed that Credit Mobilier had received extremely favorable contracts, that there had been significant overcharges and insider profits, and that Ames had offered Stock or related opportunities to lawmakers. So what were the consequences? Not much. Okay. In February 1873, the House voted to censure both Oaks Ames and a representative named James Brooks of New York. He was connected to the scheme as a director of a related company. But a censure is just a formal reprimand. You don't lose your seat in Congress. Nothing happens to you. It's basically just Congress saying, hey, we, we don't like what you did. And no one was criminally convicted either. Some of the implicated officials did end up leaving office, but others stayed. Some even went on to do more. Take James Garfield. He managed to get away unscathed, and he eventually became president. So the railroad continued operating, the profits already taken were kept, and things just kind of kept moving. But that is the Credit Mobile scandal. And today we have federal conflict of interest statutes, we have congressional financial disclosure requirements, we have ethics committees, we have stronger congressional oversight mechanisms. But those things didn't exist. It didn't exist back then. And Credit Mobile really serve as the first exposure to corruption in the federal government. So now let's talk about the Teapot Dome scandal in the 1920s, this was the first big bribery scandal involving the federal government. Essentially, the secretary of the interior secured these secret leases of oil reserves to private oil companies and ended up accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes. So back in the early 1900s, the Navy was transitioning from, from coal powered ships to oil powered ships. Oil powered chips were just faster and more efficient. But oil came with a little more vulnerability because if, let's say, war broke out and, you know, private oil supplies were disrupted, the Navy could then face a fuel shortage. So to prevent that, there were three presidents, Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and Woodrow Wilson that started setting aside federal lands that were thought to have very large underground oil reserves. And the lands were designated as naval petroleum reserves. By the 1910s, there were three major reserves that had been established, and these were Elk Hills in California, Buena Vista Hills in California, and Teapot Dome in Wyoming. Together, these reserves were thought to have millions of barrels of oil. So the federal government's plan was to leave them mostly untouched in case of an emergency. But then in 1920, Congress passed the Mineral Leasing act, which, which changed federal policy. So before 1920, federal mineral lands were often just sold outright. But with the Mineral Leasing act as the name implies, the government was shifting to leasing. And these leases were, would be given to private companies in exchange for royalties. And the law applied pretty broadly to federal oil lands. And not only that, but it gave the executive branch significant discretion in issuing these leases, meaning even though the naval oil reserves had been set aside by executive order prior to this Mineral Leasing act, the executive branch had authority to lease pretty much any federal oil lands. The law didn't explicitly prohibit leasing these naval reserves so long as the leases were properly authorized. So shortly after that law was enacted, Senator Albert Fall became Secretary of the Interior under President Harding. Fall was a proponent of opening western lands, including public lands, to private development. So very shortly after his appointment, he managed to persuade President Harding to transfer control of these Naval petroleum reserves from the Navy Department to the Interior Department. And, and that was done via executive order in 1921. And the reason that mattered is because originally the Navy controlled the oil reserves that had been previously set aside in case of emergency. But when that control was transferred, the Secretary of the Interior can now lease this land and other lands to private companies. And that's where the scandal really starts. But now that we have that background, we're actually going to take a quick break here. When we come back, we'll dive into what the scandal entailed and how it was uncovered.

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Before the break, we talked about Albert Fall becoming Secretary of the Interior and gaining control of these Naval petroleum reserves after Congress gave the executive branch the authority to lease federal oil lands. So before or between 1921 and 1922, fall ended up awarding the leases for Teapot Dome in Wyoming to Harry F. Sinclair's Mammoth Oil Company, and then the Elk Hills and Buena Vista Hills leases in California to Edward L. Doheny's Pan American Petroleum and Transport Company. These leases were negotiated privately between Fall and the oil companies, and they were awarded without any sort of competitive bidding. So there was no process in which multiple companies submitted offers for the leases. Instead, Fall just negotiated directly with Sinclair and Doheny behind closed doors, and they were done. Under the leases, the companies had to pay royalties and at least on paper, build storage facilities and provide oil for the Navy. Nothing really seemed too suspect at this point, right? The, the, the leases seemed as if they were in line with the law. And really because of that, there weren't, there weren't any, there were no red flags. But the scandal kind of surfaced in, in another way. So local residents and independent oil producers in Wyoming saw Sinclair's crews setting up their drilling equipment on Teapot Dome. They thought this land was reserved exclusively for the, for the Navy. So independent oil producers complained that they had never been given a chance to compete for a lease. And newspapers picked up the story. And that's how it got the public's attention. And from there, Wyoming Senator John Kenrick introduced a resolution asking for more information about the Teapot Dome lease. More, more lawmakers got on board with this, and the Senate Committee on Public Lands and Surveys ended up opening an investigation. One senator in particular, Senator Thomas Walsh, took on the role of lead investigator. And over the course of several years, he managed to follow this paper trail because again, nothing stood out from the leases themselves, they looked as if they followed the law. But when Walsh started looking into Falls finances, that's when things kind of got a little bit questionable. Okay, so Fall had never been considered a rich man. But shortly after those leases were signed, he. He was suddenly paying off debts. He. He bought a ranch. He renovated his property. He was kind of thriving. So Walsh eventually uncovered that Doheny, the man who held the leases for Elk Hills and Buena Vista Hills, had arranged for his son to deliver $100,000 in cash to Fall. But the money was characterized as a personal loan. Similarly, Walsh found out that Sinclair, the man that held the lease for Teapot dome, transferred about $233,000 in bonds and other financial benefits to Fall and his family. And the timing of these transfers lined up almost exactly with the leases. And neither transaction had ever been publicly disclosed. Fall was adamant about the fact that these were just regular private loans from friends and had nothing to do with the leases. But investigators were not convinced by that. Okay, so President Harding ends up dying in 1923, while this investigation was still kind of unfolding and Vice President Coolidge became president, Vice President Coolidge appointed two special prosecutors, one Republican and one Democrat, to pursue both civil and criminal cases related to these leases. On the civil side, the United States sued to cancel the leases. So in Mammoth Oil Company and United States and Pan American Petroleum and Transport Company vs United States, the Supreme Court held that all three leases had been obtained through corruption and without a proper legal basis.

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And consequently, the courts voided the contracts and returned the reserves to. To federal control. On the criminal side, Fall was prosecuted for accepting a bribe. He was convicted in 1929. He was fined $100,000, and he was sentenced to a year in prison. And this was a big deal because it was the first time a former US Cabinet official was punished criminally for conduct, you know, committed in office. Doheny and Sinclair were ultimately acquitted of bribery. But. But Sinclair did serve some time for contempt of Congress and contempt of court because he had actually refused to answer certain questions and. And tampered with a jury. So he served time for that, but not the bribery. Now, as far as how Teapot Dome changed the political landscape there, there were two Supreme Court decisions that came from it that are so frequently cited today. So the first one is McGrain versus Doherty. This is a 1927 case. And the Supreme Court held that Congress has an implied power to conduct investigations and to compel witnesses to testify when their work is connected to its. To its legislative Functions and that we see all the time today when congress is investigating things, that is where it got its implied power to do so. In Sinclair vs United States, which was a 1929 case, the supreme court upheld the criminal contempt conviction of Harry Sinclair for refusing to testify fully before the senate and that affirmed that congress can enforce subpoenas and punish non cooperation. So teapot Dome was a big deal. It definitely changed some things or led to some changes. And even I would go as far as to say, before Watergate, Teapot Dome was widely viewed as the most serious political scandal in American history. And we will get to Watergate by the end of this episode. But first we have to talk about the Pentagon papers. The Pentagon papers was another major controversy. It happened the year before Watergate. And just so we're all on the same page, the the term Pentagon papers refers to this highly classified study that was conducted by the department of defense. The study was commissioned by secretary of defense Robert McNamara in 1967, and its purpose was to look at u. S. Political and military involvement in Vietnam from 1945 to 1960. This was a massive internal study that took about 18 months to complete. It included 47 volumes, roughly 3,000 pages. There was a narrative analysis and 4,000 pages of supporting documents. To complete it, analysts pulled material from classified archives at the department of defense, the state department, and the CIA. Now, keep in mind that while this study was being conducted, the United States was still active, actively fighting in Vietnam. While this study was ongoing, more than 5, 500,000 US troops had been deployed. But one of the analysts who worked on this study was a man named Daniel Ellsberg. He was a former U.S. marine Corps officer, and he originally supported U.S. involvement in Vietnam. But by night, by 1969, he had kind of changed his position. He felt the United States no longer had a realistic path to victory, and more importantly, felt that the American public was being misled about the scope and direction of the war. So Ellsberg decided he was going to secretly photocopy portions of this classified report. And once he did that, he brought copies to members of congress, hoping they would enter the documents into the congressional record. Because if a lawmaker had formally introduced the material as part of an official legislative proceeding, that action would have been constitutionally protected under what's called the speech and debate clause. In other words, members of congress cannot be prosecuted for legislative acts including statements or materials entered into the official record. So that would have allowed the documents to become public without the executive branch being able to charge the lawmaker for disclosing the classified material. But no lawmaker was willing to do this. Importantly, the speech and debate clause would not have protected Ellsberg himself. It only protects members of congress. So even if a senator had read the documents into the record, Ellsberg could have still been prosecuted. So he wasn't necessarily bringing the materials to congress to protect himself. He was bringing it to congress to make the documents public through this constitutional channel. But as I said, no lawmaker was willing to do that. By the way, the. The reason Ellsberg wasn't prosecuted at this point is because the executive branch didn't know that he had copied these documents. Yet he went to members of congress very quietly with the material. Yes, but no lawmaker ever reported him, which, which is interesting. Then two years later, in 1971, while Ellsberg was working at MIT, he decides he is going to give portions of these documents to a New York Times reporter named Neil sheehan. And on June 13, 1971, the New York Times published a series of front page articles based on the information contained within the Pentagon Papers. And these released sections of the papers show that multiple administrations. Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy and Johnson had all publicly presented a more limited picture of US Involvement in Vietnam than internal government documents revealed. The article detailed involvement all the way back to Truman's decision to provide military assistance to France in its fight against the communist led Viet Minh, which showed U.S. involvement in Vietnam's in Vietnam way before the 60s. And it also highlighted Johnson's plans to expand the war in 1964, even while publicly saying he had no intentions of escalating the conflict. So the Pentagon papers showed that American involvement had been building gradually across multiple presidencies. Then after a third article was published by the Times, the Nixon DOJ attempts to stop the publication of the papers, arguing that publication would damage national security. And this led to a very famous supreme court case called New York Times versus United States, which we briefly touched on in episode two of Unbiased University. And in that case, the supreme court said the government could not use what's called prior restraint to block the press from publishing the documents. In other words, in order to stop the publication of information before it's released, the government has to show an immediate state serious threat, not just political damage, you know, not just potential embarrassment, an immediate serious threat. And the administration could not meet that standard. So at this point, portions of the Pentagon papers were publicly circulating, and other publications, in addition to the New York Times were also publishing the contents of the papers. Some of the most concerning revelations in the Pentagon Papers involved the Kennedy administration. So, for example, the document showed that the United States had supported the 1963 coup that overthrew South Vietnamese. The South Vietnam president. And after that coup, he was killed by South Vietnamese military leaders. So although the papers didn't necessarily say the U.S. you know, directly ordered his assassination, they did show American officials were aware of and supportive of removing the president from power. And then this ended up raising some questions about how involved the US really was behind the scenes, because publicly, the United States was saying it was just advising South Vietnam and it was helping South Vietnam, you know, defend itself from a communist takeover. But then these Pentagon papers show that America's involvement was. Was more than that. It was potentially helping to shape the leadership in Vietnam. And people then wondered, well, if the United States was backing the removal of a foreign leader and that leader ended up dead, how involved was the United States really in all of this? So it was a lot of that. And the papers also pushed back on official claims about the bombing campaign in North Vietnam. So publicly, Americans were told the bombing was weakening the Vietnamese government. But then internally, the documents were suggesting that there were doubts about whether the bombings were actually making a meaningful difference. So the big theme was that there was this difference between what officials were saying publicly to the. To. To, you know, Americans and what internal reports were showing, probably privately. Now, after the Supreme Court's ruling in favor of the publications in the New York Times case, the Nixon administration ends up charging Daniel Ellsberg and Anthony Russo, who was the researcher that helped Ellsberg copy the documents with conspiracy, espionage, and theft of government property. Their trial started in 1973, but their case was ultimately thrown out when it was re revealed that a secret White House unit known as the Plumbers had broken into Ellsberg's psychiatrist's office in 1971 to gather damaging information about him. And we will talk more about that when we get to Watergate in just a minute. But that is the gist of the Pentagon Papers scandal. The reason this was such a big deal is because it was obviously a massive leak of classified information. But also the papers were leaked at this time, where, you know, support for US Involvement in the Vietnam war from the American public was dwindling. And by the time the papers were published, the United States had. Had been involved in the Vietnam war for a very long time, spanning five presidencies. And public opposition was. Was steadily increasing as a lot of Americans were kind of questioning not only the moral justification, but also the legal basis for America's expanding role in the war. And at the same time, trust and official statements about the war's progress was dwindling as well. And the release of the Pentagon Papers confirmed those doubts. In 1971, the papers were actually published in book format titled the Pentagon Papers. But because the leaked documents only included portions of the study, the book didn't include the entirety of classified documents. Certain portions of the study remained classified until 2011, when the federal government released the full 7,000 pages, 40 years after the initial portions were published by the New York Times. Let's take our second and final break here. When we come back, we will finish this episode talking about Watergate. 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Welcome back. Okay, let's talk about Watergate, one of the biggest US government scandals to date. You now, if you've ever heard someone slap gate onto the end of anything, it traces back to this scandal, most recently following the release of more Epstein files. We've been hearing people talk about Pizzagate because of the many references to pizza in the files. And while those references have nothing to do with Watergate, Watergate is where the gate suffix comes from. So in the early 1970s, the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C. it was just another office and hotel development along the Potomac. But in June 1972, it also has the headquarters of the DNC, the Democratic National Committee, and a late night break in at the DNC and the efforts to hide it would soon expose how far an administration was willing to go to protect itself and ultimately lead to the resignation of President Nixon. So Nixon took office in 1969 during the Vietnam War. This was a difficult time in the United States as we just kind of talked about a lot of anti war protests, anger over the draft, there was a decline in public trust, there was political polarization. There was a lot going on inside the White House. Nixon and his aides felt that there were adversaries within the government that were leaking information to the press. And that fear was pretty much confirmed in 1971 when the Pentagon Papers scandal took place. Shortly after that scandal, Nixon and his aides created this undercover White House unit that was informally and quite creatively known as the Plumbers. So their job was to stop leaks, okay? But in practice, the Plumbers were doing some illegal things. They broke into Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist's office, as we talked about, and they, you know, they went pretty far to carry out their mission. Meanwhile, Nixon was running a reelection campaign, and the campaign operated through this organization called the Committee to Reelect the President, which raised lots of money. And sometimes those funds would be used to surveil opponents and carry out these undercover operations. Well, one of those operations took place on June 17, 1972. Five men wearing business suits and surgical gloves broke into the DNC offices carrying cameras, bugging equipment, and large amounts of cash. And their mission was twofold. They were going to install listening devices and in the dnc, and they were going to take pictures of documents that might provide some political intelligence for Nixon's reelection campaign. But while the men were inside, a security guard noticed tape over one of the door latches and called the police officers showed up, caught the men inside. The men were arrested. One of the men, James McCord, turned out to be the security coordinator for Nixon's campaign. Two other men, Howard Hunt, a former CIA officer, and G. Gordon Liddy, a former FBI agent, were both tied to the White House and to Nixon's campaign. And the cash that the men were carrying was traced back to Nixon's campaign funds. So from the start, it's pretty clear that this break in was tied to the President. Okay. Publicly, though, the White House was trying to minimize it. So press Secretary Ron Ziegler famously called it a third rate burglary. And Nixon himself maintained that neither he nor his senior staff had any knowledge of it. Privately, though, the administration was kind of handling things a little bit differently. Within days of this happening, Nixon met with his chief of staff, H.R. haldeman, to discuss asking the CIA to tell the FBI to scale back its Watergate investigation. And they tried to justify scaling back the investigation by arguing that the investigation might interfere with national security operations. But regardless of the justification, that conversation was secretly recorded on, on Nixon's taping system. It would later become known as the smoking gun tape. But I digress. So while all of this is happening, people linked to Nixon's campaign raised more than $150,000 in payments to the men who committed the burglaries to try to get them to stay silent about higher ups and to incentivize them to, to take a guilty plea to avoid a trial. Because a trial is where things tend to come out. Now this is what we call obstruction of justice. It is illegal. You, you cannot offer someone money to influence their testimony or conceal facts in a criminal case. So that just added a whole other layer to this scandal. But despite the break in, Nixon ended up winning the 1972 election in a landslide. He won 49 of the 50 states. And for a while, people saw Watergate as just this kind of like weird, isolated campaign scandal. The dots weren't all connected yet. It wasn't until the criminal cases moved forward that that public perception really changed. So the men who broke into the DNC were tried before a judge in, in 1973. So several men pled guilty, but two, including McCord, were convicted at trial. And in a, in an attempt to get a lighter sentence before McCord's sentencing, he sent the judge a letter letting the judge know that perjury had been committed in court and that higher level officials were actually involved in the break in and cover up. Around the same time, two reporters at the Washington Post, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, continued to publish stories about the break in. Specifically stories that connected the men who broke in secret campaign funds and senior officials. And in reporting these stories, they relied on an anonymous FBI source who was later revealed as a man named Mark Felt. Eventually, through all of this reporting, it became more clear that this was not just a weird, isolated break in. It was more of a systematic campaign of political espionage and obstruction. So in February 1973, the Senate unanimously created the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities, commonly called the Urban Committee, named after its chair Sam Ervin and the committee, as part of its Congressional powers, had broad authority to subpoena documents and witnesses related to Nixon's 1972 re election campaign, Watergate, and any potential cover up. The Congressional hearings were televised in May 1973. They ran through the summer. Millions of Americans tuned in to watch these hearings and one of the key witnesses was John Dean, the former White House counsel. Dean testified that there had been this coordinated effort to obstruct the FBI's investigation. There had been payments of hush money to keep the men who committed the break in silent. There had been discussions inside the White House about all of this and, and that the President had been informed of and improved of aspects of the plan. Up until this point, Nixon denied having any knowledge of the incident. Right then, in July 1973, Alexander Butterfield, a former presidential aide, revealed in his testimony that Nixon had installed this secret voice activated taping system in certain rooms of the White House, including the Oval Office. And with that information, Congress now knew that if those tapes had been preserved, they could provide exact evidence of what, what was said and, and who said it when it was said, all of, all of this information. So Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox, who was appointed to conduct an independent investigation, and the Senate Committee both subpoenaed these tapes. And Nixon initially refused to hand over the tapes, but because he argued that they were covered by executive privilege, which is this idea that Presidents can keep certain communications private in order to make informed decisions and speak openly with their staff. The idea there is that if Presidents know their communication can be leaked, they're not going to have the most effective presidency. And therefore some communications do need to remain private. What Nixon offered to do instead was provide written summaries of these recordings. But Cox said no. He said only the original recordings would be accepted. So what does Nixon do? Nixon orders Attorney General Elliot Richardson to fire Cox. Richardson refused to fire Cox. He resigns. The Deputy Attorney General also refused to fire Cox and he was fired. Solicitor General Robert Bork, next in line at the doj, did ultimately carry out the order and fired Cox. But this only resulted in more public attention. In fact, this whole chain of events became known as the Saturday Night Massacre. And eventually Nixon was forced to appoint a new special prosecutor, Leon Jaworski, who again demanded the tapes. Okay, so this person took over for Cox and again said, no, you got to give us the tapes. Well, legal battles over access to the recordings moved through the courts. And in a famous case, United States versus Nixon, the Supreme Court unanimously held that while executive privilege does exist, it is not absolute. And that a generalized desire for confidentiality could not outweigh the need for evidence in a criminal case. So the court essentially created this balancing test. You had the President's interest in confidentiality versus the judicial branch's need for evidence in criminal proceedings. And that is a test the courts still use today. But in accordance with that ruling, the court ordered Nixon to turn over the tapes, with an exception for any portions that genuinely involved national security secrets. When those tapes were ultimately released, they were very incriminating. One specific tape, dated June 23rd 3rd, 1972, now known as the Smoking Gun tape, showed Nixon approving attempts to limit the FBI's investigation just six days after the break in. Other recordings caught conversations about hush money payments, attempts to use federal agencies to reward allies and punish enemies, strategy discussions to mislead investigators in the public. So the tapes were definitely incriminating. Meanwhile, the House Judiciary Committee had opened a formal impeachment inquiry. After reviewing witness testimony and tape transcripts, the committee ended up approving three articles of impeachment. Obstruction of justice, abuse of power, and contempt of Congress for defying subpoenas. And support for these articles was bipartisan, including Republicans who felt the evidence against the President was just very overwhelming. And it became clear that if the full House voted on the impeachment articles and the case went to the Senate for trial, and Nixon would almost certainly be removed from office. So rather than face impeachment and a trial in the Senate, he announced on August 8, 1974, that he was going to resign from office. He left the very next day, and Vice President Gerald Ford was sworn in as president. Nixon became the first and so far only president to resign from office. And a month after Ford's swearing in, Ford. Ford issued a full and unconditional pardon for any federal crimes Nixon had committed or might have committed while he was in office. And this essentially just prevented any criminal prosecution of Nixon at all. Many of Nixon's top officials, though, including former Attorney General John Mitchell, Nixon's Chief of Staff H.R. haldeman, and Domestic policy advisor John Ehrlichman, were convicted of conspiracy, obstruction of justice and perjury. Now, remember, in episode 12, we talked about the hidden power players in Washington and we talked about campaign finance laws and specifically the Federal Election Campaign act as well as its subsequent amendments. Well, in response to Watergate, Congress passed those amendments to the Federal Election Campaign act, which put limits on individual and campaign contributions, put limits on campaign spending, required stricter disclosures of donors, created stronger reporting requirements, and most importantly, created the fec, the Federal Election Commission. So that was a result of Watergate. And I just think it's so fun when we can kind of connect the dots through these Unbiased University episodes. I love that. But Congress also passed the Ethics in Government act, which was also post Watergate, and it created these new systems for appointing special or independent prosecutors and increase financial disclosure requirements for federal officials. The Freedom of Information Act Amendments were also passed post Watergate, which made it easier for the public and the press to obtain government records. So Watergate had some pretty significant impacts as far as shaping federal policy. And to this day, Watergate is still one of the biggest scandals in government scandals in U.S. history. And that is what I have for you. I hope you enjoyed today's class at Unbiased University. Make sure you tune into part two of the Biggest Government Scandals in US History, where we will cover the Whiskey Ring, the Iran Contra affair, and the Clinton Lewinsky scandal.

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