Archibald cox biography channels
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Wertheimer v. Nixon ultimately found someone who was willing to do the job. He was chosen by the New York City school system to help settle a teacher strike in 1967, and by Columbia University to investigate riots on its campus in 1968. In 2000, he joined a lawsuit against the FEDERAL ELECTION COMMISSION, claiming that political partyfinanced advertisements in support of presidential candidates were illegal.
The Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities was also conducting an investigation and was then holding public hearings. President JOHN F. KENNEDY sought him out as a campaign adviser in the 1960 election. Though three of Nixon's senior staff had been sacked, the president was refusing to surrender any of the Oval Office recordings of conversations he had had with them about the break-in.
But after evidence suggested a connection to White House aides, he promised to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate. He wanted Cox gone. When the war ended, he returned to Harvard Law School, this time as a professor. When the Senate investigation revealed the existence of audio tapes ordered by President Nixon, Special Prosecutor Cox subpoenaed them from his employer.
After two appeals of the subpoenas were turned down, the president offered to give the Senate and Cox written summaries of what was on the tapes.
He resigned, as did his deputy, William D. Ruckelshaus. Robert H. Bork, who as solicitor general was the third-ranking officer of the Justice Department, dismissed Cox.
Almost overnight, from Capitol Hill and in the national media, came the sounds of protest and dismay. More than a million telegrams demanding impeachment poured into congressional offices.
Newspaper editorial writers and columnists made somber references to an "attempted coup d'etat." Cox appeared on the cover of Newsweek magazine, wearing his trademark bow tie, neatly knotted as always.
He held various federal positions in the area of LABOR LAW during the 1940s and 1950s, including that of head of the Korean War–era Wage Stabilization Board following an appointment in 1952 by President HARRY S. TRUMAN. The book focuses on Cox's long and distinguished career as a public servant. Richardson refused and resigned, as did his deputy William Ruckelshaus.
While there, he became adviser and speech-writer for John F. Kennedy, then the junior senator from Massachusetts. His lawyers argued that Cox's request breached the constitutional separation of powers between judiciary and executive. In his later years, he has advocated reform of campaign finance laws, delivering several speeches about the ethics of campaign financing in presidential elections.
After winning office, the president rewarded Cox by appointing him U.S. solicitor general, the attorney who argues government cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. In 2001, Cox was honored with the Presidential Citizens Medal for exemplary public service.
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Cox is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the recipient of eight honorary law degrees from U.S.universities.
In 1997, Cox was the subject of a biography entitled Archibald Cox: Conscience of a Nation by Ken Gormley. Cox put pressure on Nixon to release the recordings. They plainly saw the job as a bed of nails and Cox now seemed to be proving their point.
Against massive political and legal obstruction, he was trying to obtain some of the White House's most confidential material, hoping it would expose President Nixon's part in the attempted cover up of this historic "third-rate burglary".