President Johnson and I have a lot in common. We were both born in small towns and we're both fortunate in the fact that we think we married above ourselves.
— Richard M. Nixon
As this long and difficult war ends, I would like to address a few special words to the American people: Your steadfastness in supporting our insistence on peace with honor has made peace with honor possible.
Tonight - to you, the great silent majority of my fellow Americans - I ask for your support.
Certainly in the next 50 years we shall see a woman president, perhaps sooner than you think. A woman can and should be able to do any political job that a man can do.
Watergate had become the center of the media's universe, and during the remaining year of my presidency the media tried to force everything else to revolve around it.
The American people are entitled to see the president and to hear his views directly, and not to see him only through the press.
A man is not finished when he is defeated. He is finished when he quits.
I wish I could give you a lot of advice, based on my experience of winning political debates. But I don't have that experience. My only experience is at losing them.
No event in American history is more misunderstood than the Vietnam War. It was misreported then, and it is misremembered now.
My own view is that taping of conversations for historical purposes was a bad decision on the part of all the presidents. I don't think Kennedy should have done it. I don't think Johnson should have done it, and I don't think we should have done it.
If I were to make public these tapes, containing blunt and candid remarks on many different subjects, the confidentiality of the office of the president would always be suspect.
It is necessary for me to establish a winner image. Therefore, I have to beat somebody.
I can see clearly now... that I was wrong in not acting more decisively and more forthrightly in dealing with Watergate.
If you want to make beautiful music, you must play the black and the white notes together.
Remember, always give your best. Never get discouraged. Never be petty. Always remember, others may hate you. But those who hate you don't win unless you hate them. And then you destroy yourself.
Those who hate you don't win unless you hate them, and then you destroy yourself.
The memory of that scene for me is like a frame of film forever frozen at that moment: the red carpet, the green lawn, the white house, the leaden sky. The new president and his first lady.
The presidency has many problems, but boredom is the least of them.
If we take the route of the permanent handout, the American character will itself be impoverished.
In the television age, the key distinction is between the candidate who can speak poetry and the one who can only speak prose.
It I talked about Watergate, I was described as struggling to free myself from the morass. If I did not talk about Watergate, I was accused of being out of touch with reality.
You won't have Nixon to kick around anymore, because, gentlemen, this is my last press conference.
Our chief justices have probably had more profound and lasting influence on their times and on the direction of the nation than most presidents.
If an individual wants to be a leader and isn't controversial, that means he never stood for anything.
It's a piece of cake until you get to the top. You find you can't stop playing the game the way you've always played it.
Unless a president can protect the privacy of the advice he gets, he cannot get the advice he needs.
There will be no whitewash in the White House.
I can take it. The tougher it gets, the cooler I get.
I have impeached myself by resigning.
We are not spending the Federal Government's money, we are spending the taxpayer's money, and it must be spent n a way which guarantees his money's worth and yields the fullest possible benefit to the people being helped.
We cannot learn from one another until we stop shouting at one another - until we speak quietly enough so that our words can be heard as well as our voices.
What starts the process, really, are laughs and slights and snubs when you are a kid. If your anger is deep enough and strong enough, you learn that you can change those attitudes by excellence, personal gut performance.
I have never been a quitter. To leave office before my term is completed is opposed to every instinct in my body. But as president I must put the interests of America first Therefore, I shall resign the presidency effective at noon tomorrow.
My strong point, if I have a strong point, is performance. I always do more than I say. I always produce more than I promise.
My concern today is not with the length of a person's hair but with his conduct.
I've never canceled a subscription to a newspaper because of bad cartoons or editorials. If that were the case, I wouldn't have any newspapers or magazines to read.
Don't get the impression that you arouse my anger. You see, one can only be angry with those he respects.
You've got to learn to survive a defeat. That's when you develop character.
Tell them to send everything that can fly.
Any lady who is first lady likes being first lady. I don't care what they say, they like it.
I let the American people down.
People have got to know whether or not their president is a crook. Well, I'm not a crook. I earned everything I've got.
The press is the enemy.
You must pursue this investigation of Watergate even if it leads to the president. I'm innocent. You've got to believe I'm innocent. If you don't, take my job.
Once you get into this great stream of history, you can't get out.
The Cold War isn't thawing; it is burning with a deadly heat. Communism isn't sleeping; it is, as always, plotting, scheming, working, fighting.
I gave 'em a sword. And they stuck it in, and they twisted it with relish. And I guess if I had been in their position, I'd have done the same thing.
Defeat doesn't finish a man, quit does. A man is not finished when he's defeated. He's finished when he quits.
