A review by lauraellis
Richard Nixon: The Life by John A. Farrell

challenging dark informative medium-paced

4.0

Very well-written, rational, evenhanded biography of a talented but troubled president who is frequently viewed as a traitor and who betrayed his oath and the Constitution through Watergate, but also accomplished some very good things during his Presidency, either affirmatively in foreign affairs, such as the original SALT treaty with the former USSR, his trip to China, and ending the Vietnam War (albeit for the same terms he could have achieved four years previously, thus being responsible for millions of lives, American and Southeast Asian) or more passively, such as civil rights and poverty-prevention programs.  According to historians, he was the one of two presidents who contributed the most to the desegregation of schools as he enforced the law against de jure segregation in the South.  But he did not publicize this, but very publicly demonstrated through coded language that he supported Northern and other whites fight not to bus children or take other measures to desegregate schools that were segregated due to practice, red-lining, or other practices.  He was not from the Conservative Goldwater-Reagan-Trump wing of his party, but he was an anti-semite, was prejudiced against many groups, and he was someone who was willing to lie or break the rules to obtain power right from his earliest contested elections, e.g., his first race, against Rep. Jerry Voorhis; his race against Helen Gahagan Douglas.  He was capable of great kindnesses, and in his earlier years he was admired by African-Americans such as Rev. Martin Luther King and Jackie Robinson, but over time, beginning with the election of 1960, he lost their respect and backing due to his refusal to publicly support African-Americans in their fight for civil rights.  Overall, while he did have some admirable accomplishments, I still believe that he was not a good man and he did many things that I believe were wrong in his career, including his foiling of Johnson’s attempts to resolve the Vietnam War, his prolongation of the Vietnam War, and, of course, Watergate and all that surrounded it.  Also, many of his principles and guiding beliefs were not ones I share.