Gerald Ford Dies

Gerald R. Ford, 38th President of the United States, died five years ago. He lived longer than any other president, dying in late 2006 at 93 years, 165 days of age, of arteriosclerotic cerebrovascular disease and diffuse arteriosclerosis -- which is to say, old age.

But he almost died a young man's death in war, during his service as an officer on the USS Monterey (CVL-26), a light aircraft carrier on which he was director of physical training, a gunnery officer, and an assistant navigator. On December 18, 1944, Lt. Ford was deck officer during the midnight to 4 a.m. watch. A typhoon blasting through the Philippine Sea buffeted the ship -- a storm so intense that it sank three U.S. destroyers that were part of Adm. William Halsey's Third Fleet, as was the Monterey.

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Exhausted, Ford went below decks after his watch, but didn't sleep long. "Waking, I thought I could smell smoke," Ford said in his 1979 memoir, A Time to Heal. "I went up the passageway and out to the catwalk on the starboard side which runs around the flight deck, where I started to climb the ladder. As I stepped on the flight deck, the ship suddenly rolled about 25 degrees. I lost my footing..."

John J. Kruzel, writing for the American Forces Press Service, continues the story: "The two-inch steel ridge around the edge of the carrier slowed him enough so he could roll and twist into the catwalk below the deck. As [Ford] later stated, 'I was lucky; I could have easily gone overboard.' "

The future president also risked his life that same day by leading the fire brigade that extinguished the fire that was ravaging the ship. "At the height of the storm, 100-knot winds and towering waves rocked the Monterey and several fighter planes tore loose from their cables and collided into one another," Kruzel says. "The collisions ignited aircraft gas tanks, and soon the hangar deck was ablaze. Because of a quirk in the Monterey's construction, flames were sucked into the air intakes leading to the lower decks, spreading the fire inside the ship.

“Into this furnace, Ford led his men, his first order of business to carry out the dead and injured. Hours later, he and his team emerged burned and exhausted, but they had put out the fire.”

Moore Misses Ford, Thanks to Sipple

Sara Jane Moore went down in history on September 22, 1975, as the first woman to fire a shot at a U.S. president -- Gerald Ford, as it happened. She wasn't the first woman to point a loaded gun at him, of course. That infamous distinction belongs to "Squeaky" Fromme, who pointed a gun at President Ford only 17 days earlier, though it misfired when she pulled the trigger.

Moore missed. A bystander named Oliver Sipple had grabbed her arm, and prevented a second shot as well.

It was a good deed that didn't go unpunished. As Lynne Duke wrote in the Washington Post in 2006, "... Oliver 'Billy' Sipple just happened to be standing in the path of history, right next to Sara Jane Moore, the would-be assassin, as she raised a .38 and aimed it at President Gerald R. Ford outside San Francisco's St. Francis Hotel.

"Sipple, a former Marine and Vietnam vet, saw the gun. He grabbed Moore's arm as she fired and saved a president's life. Afterward, he told people anybody would have done the same.

"Only later, after he was outed in the media as a gay man, after his parents back in Detroit were hounded and teased about their gay son -- only then would he realize the personal price to be paid....

"Oliver Sipple flew to Detroit to try to put his parents at ease, to explain 'that he wasn't embarrassing my father in any way, because he wasn't in the same state with him and he was an adult and should be able to live the way he wanted to.'

"The family became estranged... Oliver was not disowned, as some reports of that time said. But the family needed to absorb what had happened.

"Back in San Francisco, Oliver fought a battle on another front, against the media. He filed a $15 million lawsuit against seven newspapers, accusing them of invading his privacy."

After a few years, he lost his case. Oliver Sipple's unfortunate story is, of course, more complicated than these short excepts, involving lingering suffering from his time in Vietnam, a reported decision by Harvey Milk to publicize Sipple's orientation, heavy drinking, bad health and death in 1989. The full article is here, and more on Sipple is here, and on many other web sites.

Elizabeth Ann Bloomer Warren Ford, 1918-2011, requiescat in pace

First Lady of the United States, 1974-77

December 31, 2007:Dead Presidents Daily's Last Post

Dead Presidents Daily was intended to be a project for 2007, a year now over, and so this is the last posting for this blog. I hope my handful of readers have enjoyed it. It's been rewarding on this end, teaching me more than I would have imagined about presidents and the presidency and a slew of tangential information.

News of the dead presidents goes on, however. On the last day of 2007, the San Francisco Chronicle reported: "Sara Jane Moore, the self-styled radical who earned an infamous role in the parlous politics of 1970s America by trying to assassinate President Gerald Ford in San Francisco, was paroled Monday from a Bay Area federal prison after serving more than 30 years, a spokesman for the federal Bureau of Prisons said.

"Moore, 77, who was serving a life sentence, was released from the Federal Correctional Institution in Dublin, and it was not immediately known where she went, bureau spokesman Mike Truman said. She will be under supervised parole for at least five years, federal authorities said."

December 26, 1972 & 2006: Harry Truman and Gerald Ford Die

Today is the first anniversary of Gerald Ford's death, and the 35th anniversary of the passing of Harry Truman. Ford lived longer than any other person who held that office, besting old intramural rival Ronald Reagan only about six weeks before his (Ford's) death. Ford also was the third-oldest vice president; only Levi P. Morton (96) and John Nance Garner (98) lived longer. Truman didn't do so badly in terms of longevity, either. He lived to be 88, and as such is number five among presidents in lifespan, after Ford, Reagan, John Adams and Hoover.

Ford was also a member of that informal club, presidential short-timers. In fact, among all holders of the office, he was president for less time than all but four others: William Henry Harrison, whose famously abbreviated term lasted about a month in 1841; the unlucky James Garfield, who died that the spoils system might end, after 199 days as president in 1881; Zachary Taylor (one year, 128 days), who withstood bad army food much of his adult life but not bad cherries on the Fourth of July, 1850; and Warren Harding, who shocked the nation in 1923 by dropping dead before the enfeebled former President Wilson, serving only two years and 151 days.

Gerald Ford was president a little longer than Harding, two years and 164 days, and among presidents who survived their time in office, his was the shortest service. Millard Fillmore, who lived on after his presidency to be the first citizen of Buffalo and a Know-Nothing besides, was in office a little longer than Ford, occupying the White House for two years and 236 days.

Short time is actually fairly common in the rough-and-tumble of the US presidency. Among the 41 individuals who were president in the past – not counting the current officeholder, since history isn’t done with him yet, and counting Grover Cleveland only once for this purpose – only 11 have held the office eight years or longer (FDR being the obvious “or longer” in this category), 12 if you count George Washington. The time between Washington’s inauguration on April 30, 1789, and the end of his presidency on March 4, 1797, was only seven years and 308 days, but the government was new and things couldn’t be ready in time for an on-time swearing in, so I’m inclined to credit him the full eight years. Another seven men held the office for less than eight but more than four years; a dozen held office exactly four years; and ten didn’t even get a full term.

Eight years or more (in order, including Washington): Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Jackson, Grant, Cleveland, Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Reagan, Clinton.

Between four and eight years: Lincoln, McKinley, Theodore Roosevelt, Coolidge, Truman, Lyndon Johnson, Nixon.

Four years exactly: John Adams, John Q. Adams, Van Buren, Polk, Pierce, Buchanan, Hayes, Benjamin Harrison, Taft, Hoover, Carter, George H.W. Bush.

Less than four years: William Henry Harrison, Tyler, Taylor, Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, Garfield, Arthur, Harding, Kennedy, Ford.

December 9, 1975: Ford to New York: Don't Drop Dead After All

The New York Daily News published on of the most famous headlines of the 1970s in the fall of 1975: "Ford to City: Drop Dead." The city was on the verge of bankruptcy and wanted federal assistance. President Ford was a little more than reluctant to agree to whatever bailout Congress might provide. As the story under the headline said:

"President Ford declared flatly today that he would veto any bill calling for 'a federal bail-out of New York City' and instead proposed legislation that would make it easier for the city to go into bankruptcy.

"In a speech before the National Press Club, Ford coupled repeated attacks on the city’s fiscal management with a promise that if default came, the federal government would see to it that 'essential public services for the people of New York City' would be maintained...

"The ferocity of Ford’s attack on the city’s spending – he likened it to an 'insidious disease' – appeared to doom chances for passage of any congressional plan to help New York avert default through federal loan guarantees.

" 'I can tell you now that I am prepared to veto any bill that has as its purpose a federal bailout of New York City to prevent a default,' the President said."

On December 9, 1975, however, Ford did sign another sort of a fiscal rescue for the city of New York -- a series of loans that Congress had approved, $2.3 billion each year through mid-1978. Each loan had to be repaid within the year it was made.

November 27, 1973:The Senate Confirms Ford as VP

The 25th Amendment to the US Constitution specifies that in filling a vacancy in the vice presidency -- something that occurred no fewer than 16 times before the amendment was adopted in 1967 -- the president's choice needs confirmation "by a majority vote of both houses of Congress."

In 1973, such a confirmation happened for the first time when Richard Nixon selected Gerald Ford to fill the vacancy created by Spiro Agnew's resignation. The Senate voted first, 34 years ago today, and it was an overwhelming vote in favor of Ford. Perhaps that was partly because Ford was not Nixon's first choice; he was his last choice.

Ford's biography on the US Senate web site has this to say: "Nixon knew that Democrats felt apprehensive about confirming someone who might be a strong contender for the presidency in 1976 and that they preferred 'a caretaker Vice President who would simply fill out Agnew's unexpired term.' Nixon wanted to appoint his Treasury Secretary, John Connally, but after meeting with the Democratic congressional leadership he concluded that Connally would have a difficult time being confirmed. At Camp David, Nixon prepared an announcement speech with four endings, one each for Nelson Rockefeller, Ronald Reagan, Connally, and Ford. Looking through the names that Republican party leaders had suggested, he found that Rockefeller and Reagan had tied, Connally was third, and Ford last. However, among members of Congress, including such Democrats as Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield and House Speaker Carl Albert, Ford's name came in first and, as Nixon noted, 'they were the ones who would have to approve the man I nominated.' As Speaker Albert later asserted, 'We gave Nixon no choice but Ford.'

"The Watergate scandal had so preoccupied and weakened Nixon that he could not win a fight over Connally. Choosing either Rockefeller or Reagan would likely split the Republican party. That left Ford. Nixon reasoned that, not only were Ford's views on foreign and domestic policy practically identical with his, but that the House leader would be the easiest to confirm. He had also received assurances that Ford 'had no ambitions to hold office after January 1977,' which would clear the path for Connally to seek the Republican presidential nomination...

"Ford's nomination was subject to confirmation in both the Senate and House, where Democrats held commanding majorities... Liberals expressed displeasure with Ford's conservative voting record on social welfare and other domestic issues and his undeviating loyalty to President Nixon's foreign policies but did not believe they could withhold confirmation merely because of policy disagreements. A few liberals, led by New York Rep. Bella Abzug, tried to block action on Ford's nomination, anticipating that Nixon's eventual removal would make House Speaker Albert president. Albert, however, pushed for Ford's speedy confirmation...

"On November 27 the Senate voted 92 to 3 to confirm Ford, and on December 6, the House agreed, 387 to 35 (with Ford voting "present"). President Nixon wanted Ford to take the oath of office in the East Room of the White House, but Ford thought it more appropriate to hold the ceremony in the Capitol, where he had served for a quarter of a century..."

November 12, 2006:Ford Outlasts Them All (So Far)

A year ago, Gerald Ford surpassed Ronald Reagan as the longest-lived president at 93 years and 121 days. Ford was near death at the time, however, and died 45 days later. Reagan himself had bested Herbert Hoover in early 2001 and John Adams in late 2001 to surpass the previous longest and second-longest presidential lifespans.

George HW Bush and Jimmy Carter would each have to live 10 more years to top Ford and Reagan, and Bill Clinton would have to live another 32 years.

Currently there are three living former presidents. From the inauguration of George W. Bush to the death of Ronald Reagan, there were five, which was only the third time that many former presidents have been alive. It was also the longest period with five ex-presidents kicking around -- more than three years, compared with the roughly 15 months between the inauguration of Bill Clinton and the death of Richard Nixon, and the 10 months between the inauguration of Abraham Lincoln and the death of John Tyler.

Three former presidents is a fairly common number, beginning all the way back in 1817, when James Monroe took office. All the previous presidents except Washington -- John Adams, Jefferson and Madison -- were still alive at the time, and in fact all of them survived Monroe's eight years in office.

October 6, 1976:Ford Misspeaks

In the second presidential debate of the 1976 election, held 31 years ago today, President Gerald Ford made a gaffe that hasn't yet been forgotten. In a discussion of US-Soviet relations, New York Times associate editor Max Frankel asked the president whether the Russians had gotten the better deal with the signing of the Helsinki Accords the previous year, which essentially confirmed the boundaries of Eastern Europe that had been drawn by Stalin a generation earlier.

MR. FRANKEL: Mr. President, I'd like to explore a little more deeply our relationship with the Russians. They used to brag back in Khrushchev's day that because of their greater patience and because of our greed for - for business deals that they would sooner or later get the better of us... We've virtually signed, in Helsinki, an agreement that the Russians have dominance in Eastern Europe... Is that what you call a two-way street of traffic in Europe?

MR. FORD: I believe that we have negotiated with the Soviet Union since I've been president from a position of strength. And let me cite several examples.... If we turn to Helsinki - I'm glad you raised it, Mr. Frankel. In the case of Helsinki, 35 nations signed an agreement, including the secretary of state for the Vatican - I can't under any circumstances believe that His Holiness the Pope would agree by signing that agreement that the 35 nations have turned over to the Warsaw Pact nations the domination of Eastern Europe. It just isn't true. And if Mr. Carter alleges that His Holiness by signing that has done it, he is totally inaccurate. Now, what has been accomplished by the Helsinki agreement? Number one, we have an agreement where they notify us and we notify them of any military maneuvers that are to be be undertaken. They have done it. In both cases where they've done so, there is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe and there never will be under a Ford administration.

MR. FRANKEL: I'm sorry, I - could I just follow - did I understand you to say, sir, that the Russians are not using Eastern Europe as their own sphere of influence in occupying most of the countries there and making sure with their troops that it's a Communist zone, whereas on our side of the line the Italians and the French are still flirting with the possibility of Communism?

MR. FORD: I don't believe, Mr. Frankel, that the Yugoslavians consider themselves dominated by the Soviet Union. I don't believe that the Romanians consider themselves dominated by the Soviet Union. I don't believe that the Poles consider themselves dominated by the Soviet Union. Each of those countries is independent, autonomous: it has its own territorial integrity and the United States does not concede that those countries are under the domination of the Soviet Union. As a matter of fact, I visited Poland, Yugoslavia and Romania to make certain that the people of those countries understood that the president of the United States and the people of the United States are dedicated to their independence, their autonomy and their freedom.

With his response to the follow-up question, Ford ignored the maxim about what to do when you're in a hole -- namely, quit digging any deeper. Years later, when there really was no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe -- no Soviets at all, for that matter -- Ford told Jim Lehrer of PBS that "there's no question I did not adequately explain what I was thinking. I felt very strongly, and I, of course, do so today, that regardless of the number of Soviet armored divisions in Poland, the Russians would never dominate the Polish spirit. That's what I should have said. I simply left out the fact that at that time in 1976, the Russians had about 10 to 15 divisions in Poland. Well, of course the presence of those divisions indicates a domination physically of the Poles, but despite that military occupation of Poland by the Soviets, it never in any way ever destroyed the strong, nationalistic spirit of the Polish people... I get a little satisfaction that maybe I was right in 1976."

September 28, 1974:Betty Ford's Mastectomy

Less than two months after she became first lady, Betty Ford underwent a mastectomy for cancer in her right breast, on September 28, 1974. In previous years, such surgery would have probably been private, perhaps even secret, but the Fords chose to inform the public.

"Mrs. Ford's deliberately frank and outspoken handling of her own surgery for breast cancer when she was First Lady set a visible example that influenced women nationwide, and it helped prompt a significant change in public attitude," noted an article in the health section of the New York Times published in 1987.

"Within weeks thousands of women who had been reluctant to examine their breasts inundated cancer screening centers. One of those following Mrs. Ford's example was Happy Rockefeller, the wife of the Vice President, Nelson A. Rockefeller. She, too, had breast cancer and underwent a mastectomy. Mrs. Rockefeller and many others said Mrs. Ford's example gave them the courage to discuss their experiences openly.

"Doctors discovered a lump in Mrs. Ford's breast in a routine examination in 1974. Entering the hospital for a biopsy on Sept. 27, she and President Ford put on a brave face...

"The biopsy confirmed the presence of cancer the next day, and she had the breast removed, along with the muscle connecting her upper arm to her chest. Cancer cells were found in just two lymph nodes and treatment proved to be effective."

Effective indeed. Not only did she survive the affliction, at 89 she's currently the third-longest-lived first lady, surpassing Edith Wilson in that distinction this summer. Among first ladies, only Bess Truman and Lady Bird Johnson have lived longer (97 and 94, respectively).

September 27, 1964:The Warren Commission Report

The President's Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy released its final report this day in 1964. Informally known as the Warren Commission, after its chairman, Chief Justice Earl Warren, its last surviving member was Gerald Ford. Since the commission released its 888-page report, the human imagination has been working overtime to deny its essential conclusion:

"The Commission has found no evidence that either Lee Harvey Oswald or Jack Ruby was part of any conspiracy, domestic or foreign, to assassinate President Kennedy. The reasons for this conclusion are:

"(a) The Commission has found no evidence that anyone assisted Oswald in planning or carrying out the assassination. In this connection it has thoroughly investigated, among other factors, the circumstances surrounding the planning of the motorcade route through Dallas, the hiring of Oswald by the Texas School Book Depository Co. on October 15, 1963, the method by which the rifle was brought into the building, the placing of cartons of books at the window, Oswald's escape from the building, and the testimony of eyewitnesses to the shooting.

"(b) The Commission has found no evidence that Oswald was involved with any person or group in a conspiracy to assassinate the President, although it has thoroughly investigated, in addition to other possible leads, all facets of Oswald's associations, finances, and personal habits, particularly during the period following his return from the Soviet Union in June 1962.

"(c) The Commission has found no evidence to show that Oswald was employed, persuaded, or encouraged by any foreign government to assassinate President Kennedy or that he was an agent of any foreign government, although the Commission has reviewed the circumstances surrounding Oswald's defection to the Soviet Union, his life there from October of 1959 to June of 1962 so far as it can be reconstructed, his known contacts with the Fair Play for Cuba Committee and his visits to the Cuban and Soviet Embassies in Mexico City during his trip to Mexico from September 26 to October 3, 1963, and his known contacts with the Soviet Embassy in the United States...

"(e) All of the evidence before the Commission established that there was nothing to support the speculation that Oswald was an agent, employee, or informant of the FBI, the CIA, or any other governmental agency. It has thoroughly investigated Oswald's relationships prior to the assassination with all agencies of the U.S. Government. All contacts with Oswald by any of these agencies were made in the regular exercise of their different responsibilities...

"Because of the difficulty of proving negatives to a certainty the possibility of others being involved with either Oswald or Ruby cannot be established categorically, but if there is any such evidence it has been beyond the reach of all the investigative agencies and resources of the United States and has not come to the attention of this Commission."

September 8, 1974:Ford Pardons Nixon

According to the US Constitution, Article II, Section 2, the President of the United States has wide latitude in granting pardons for offenses against the United States: "The President ... shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment." Since Washington's time, various presidents have used that power to various degrees.

In living memory, no pardon kicked up a storm like Gerald Ford's pardoning of Richard Nixon, ahead of any conviction or even indictment of the former president, on this day 33 years ago. There was the cry of "corrupt bargain" at the time (though not quite in those old-timey words), but in more recent years this opinion has faded somewhat in favor of the contention -- which Ford said all along -- that current President Ford essentially got tired of dealing with the distraction that was former President Richard Nixon, and dreaded a protracted effort to try him.

This is the entire text of the pardon:

"By the President of the United States of America, a Proclamation

"Richard Nixon became the thirty-seventh President of the United States on January 20, 1969 and was reelected in 1972 for a second term by the electors of forty-nine of the fifty states. His term in office continued until his resignation on August 9, 1974.

"Pursuant to resolutions of the House of Representatives, its Committee on the Judiciary conducted an inquiry and investigation on the impeachment of the President extending over more than eight months. The hearings of the Committee and its deliberations, which received wide national publicity over television, radio, and in printed media, resulted in votes adverse to Richard Nixon on recommended Articles of Impeachment.

"As a result of certain acts or omissions occurring before his resignation from the Office of President, Richard Nixon has become liable to possible indictment and trial for offenses against the United States. Whether or not he shall be so prosecuted depends on findings of the appropriate grand jury and on the discretion of the authorized prosecutor. Should an indictment ensue, the accused shall then be entitled to a fair trial by an impartial jury, as guaranteed to every individual by the Constitution.

"It is believed that a trial of Richard Nixon, if it became necessary, could not fairly begin until a year or more has elapsed. In the meantime, the tranquility to which this nation has been restored by the events of recent weeks could be irreparably lost by the prospects of bringing to trial a former President of the United States. The prospects of such trial will cause prolonged and divisive debate over the propriety of exposing to further punishment and degradation a man who has already paid the unprecedented penalty of relinquishing the highest elective office of the United States.

"Now, THEREFORE, I, GERALD R. FORD, President of the United States, pursuant to the pardon power conferred upon me by Article II, Section 2, of the Constitution, have granted and by these presents do grant a full, free, and absolute pardon unto Richard Nixon for all offenses against the United States which he, Richard Nixon, has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 20, 1969 through August 9,1974.

"IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this eighth day of September, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and seventy-four, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and ninety-ninth.

"GERALD R. FORD"

September 5, 1975:Squeaky Attempts an Assassination

On September 5, 1975, Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme -- Manson Family nutjob, not quite 27 -- became the first woman known to attempt an assassination of a US president, Gerald Ford. She pointed a .45 Colt semiautomatic at the president as he was gladhanding a crowd in Sacramento, Calif., but it didn’t fire when she squeezed the trigger. She’d apparently forgotten to put a round in the firing chamber.

From an account in Newsweek the week after the attempt: “Ford awoke at 6 that morning in his sixth-floor suite at the Senator Hotel. With his usual verve, he conferred with aides and then sat through the Annual Host Breakfast of California businessmen whose 1,000 or so members gave him a rousing reception.

“Outside the hotel, the Secret Service and Sacramento police had taken what they believed were adequate security precautions. Ford was scheduled to walk up a broad, curving pathway that led to the rear steps of the capitol building, and police lines had been set up to keep the crowds in check at the left of the walk. An encouraging throng of state employees, newsmen and rubberneckers had turned out to wait for the President, and no one really noticed anything unusual when the girl in red strolled up and took a place in the crowd under a stately magnolia near the President's line of march.

“Shortly after 10 a.m., and slightly behind schedule, Ford swept through the lobby of the Senator Hotel and trotted out to the street. He blinked in the bright morning sunlight and headed for the capitol. Instantly spotting the friendly crowd, he cheerfully moved forward, double-pumping hands and smiling every step of the way. Then suddenly, recalled Karen Skelton, a 14-year-old who was standing next to the girl in red, ‘the color went out of his face.’

" ‘He was smiling and as soon as he touched my hand, he turned pale and pulled away,’ " said Irene Morrison, 28, a secretary who had turned out to see the President. The girl in red had stepped forward, reached under her dress and then straightened up. ‘I extended my left hand to her -- that's when I saw the gun,’ Ford told Newsweek’s Thomas M. DeFrank later. ‘Then Ernie [Secret Service agent Ernie Luzania] grabbed me and I was gone.’ "

“The weapon also caught the eye of Larry M. Buendorf, 37, a crack Secret Service agent, former Navy pilot and expert skier who has served as the President's body man all over the world. ‘Gun!’ he bellowed to his colleagues and he leapt forward to grab Squeaky's pistol and twist her gun hand behind her back. His shout set off an immediate action drill the Secret Service uses for emergencies. ‘Let's go,’ yelled Luzania, the acting chief of Ford's security detail. With that he lunged into the President, buckling Ford's knees - to reduce his target profile…”

“Within seconds other agents formed a protective human cocoon around their charge. ‘Everyone get out of the way, get out of here,’ roared one agent. The flying wedge carried the President by the scruff of his blue suit to safety. ‘Are you all right, sir?’ a reporter asked when the President reached the capitol steps. ‘Sure,’ he replied - in a shaken voice that barely rose above a whisper.

Meanwhile, Buendorf had forced Squeaky to drop the gun. By one account, she shouted, ‘Don't get excited. It didn't go off. It didn't go off. Can you believe it?’ Buendorf muscled her up against a tree, borrowed a pair of handcuffs from a Sacramento cop and manacled his charge. Some eyewitnesses reported later that Squeaky bleated a final verbal assault on Ford: ‘He is not a public servant.’

“For the time being, no one could tell whether she had pulled the trigger. When investigators examined the gun they found that it had four bullets in its seven-slug clip - but the firing chamber itself was empty. During the scuffle a few witnesses heard an ominous click, but no one heard a shot. One educated guess was that Squeaky had cocked the gun's hammer with her thumb (hence the click) but had forgotten the essential step of pulling back the slide that shoves a bullet into the firing chamber.”

Except for a few days in December 1987, when she managed to escape from a federal prison in West Virginia, Fromme has spent her days since 1975 behind bars, serving a life sentence.

Today is also the day in 1905 when the Treaty of Portsmouth, ending the war between Russia and Japan, was signed. The ever-versatile Teddy Roosevelt, 26th President of the United States, brokered the peace. For his efforts, he won the Noble Peace Prize, the first American to do so. Among presidents, Woodrow Wilson and Jimmy Carter have also won it, and among vice presidents, Charles Dawes did.

August 19, 1976:Ford Nominated, Barely

Besides having the distinction as the only appointed president, Gerald Ford almost had the dubious distinction of being the only sitting 20th-century president to be denied nomination for another term by his own party. The 1976 Republican Convention turned out to be the last one (as yet) to be undecided beforehand by primary elections -- the old-fashioned way, as it were. Ford came to the convention with just enough delegates for the nomination, but his hold on them wasn't iron-clad, and Ronald Reagan was all too keen to pry some of them away from the president.

Reagan and his men couldn't quite overcome the lure of incumbency, however. Ford won the nomination 1187 to 1070 ("Watergate martyr" Elliot L. Richardson got one vote). Had Ford lost, he would have been the first sitting president to lose a nomination contest since President Arthur lost to James G. Blaine in 1884. Other sitting presidents who wanted the nomination but couldn't have it include John Tyler, Millard Fillmore, Franklin Pierce and Andrew Johnson. In the 20th century, some presidents quit in the face of the possibility of such a defeat -- Harry Truman in 1952 and Lyndon Johnson in 1968.

August 9, 1974:Ford Becomes President

Thirty-three years ago, Gerald R. Ford succeeded Richard Nixon as president. Probably none of the architects of the 25th Amendment to the Constitution, which paved the way for Ford's rise to the presidency, imagined that it would have been applied quite so soon. The amendment had only been ratified by the requisite 38 states in early 1967. Ford was appointed vice president under its provisions (Section 2) in late 1973.

Ford was also the first vice president to succeed to the presidency after the amendment was ratified. In Section 1, the amendment formalized the precedent established by John Tyler in 1841: "In case of the removal of the President from office or of his death or resignation, the Vice President shall become President."

On the occasion of the first anniversary of his accession to fall after Ford's death, one writer, Quin Hillyer of The American Spectator, offers the opinion that Ford's swearing-in speech is an underrated gem of American oratory: "...on Aug. 9, 1974, Gerald Ford took office with one of the finest, and still most underrated, speeches in modern American history," he wrote on Aug. 8, 2007. "Amidst all the vitriol of Watergate, Ford's speech reminded Americans of the great things that unite us...

"After just a couple of basic introductory sentences, Ford quickly began achieving real eloquence with these words: 'I am acutely aware that you have not elected me as your President by your ballots, and so I ask you to confirm me as your President with your prayers.'

"He then turned his lack of national election into a strength: 'If you have not chosen me by secret ballot, neither have I gained office by any secret promises. I have not campaigned either for the Presidency or the Vice Presidency. I have not subscribed to any partisan platform. I am indebted to no man, and only to one woman -- my dear wife -- as I begin this very difficult job.'

"He followed with some concise and effective encomiums to peace and to candor in government, citing (without overly showy emphasis) Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln as he did so. Then came the most famous line of the speech, followed by four more sentences of appropriate grace:

"'My fellow Americans, our long national nightmare is over. Our Constitution works; our great Republic is a government of laws and not of men. Here the people rule. But there is a higher Power, by whatever name we honor Him, who ordains not only righteousness but love, not only justice but mercy. As we bind up the internal wounds of Watergate, more painful and more poisonous than those of foreign wars, let us restore the golden rule to our political process, and let brotherly love purge our hearts of suspicion and of hate...'"

The entire essay is here. The text of Ford's speech is on line many places, including here.

July 14, 1913:Leslie Lynch King Jr.'s Birthday

Dead president aficionados know that Gerald R. Ford was not born with that name, and in fact that wasn't his legal name until he was a young man, in 1935. But he did grow up using it. Ford was his stepfather's name; King his biological father's, whom Ford had no contact with growing up -- the better for him, as it turned out. The future president was the product of an unfortunate marriage between Leslie Lynch King Sr. and Dorothy Gardner.

Former Ford administration official James Cannon wrote the following about the circumstances of President Ford's birth in an essay of the president's character: "Dorothy Gardner Ford was a strong and resourceful woman whose own character was tested at the age of twenty. She grew up in a warm, loving family in a small town in northern Illinois where her father prospered as a businessman and served as town mayor.

"In college Dorothy met the brother of her roommate, and fell in love with him. Leslie King was the blond, blue-eyed, charming son of a wealthy Omaha banker who also owned a stage-coach line and a wool business.

"On their honeymoon she discovered that she had made a tragic mistake. Her new husband struck her, not once but repeatedly. When they reached Omaha, where they were to live with his family, she found out that King was not only brutal, but a liar and a drunk. His outward charm concealed a vicious temper...

"She decided to leave King, but discovered she was pregnant. With the encouragement of King's mother and father, she decided to have the baby in Omaha, and did.

"On July 14, 1913, the thirty-eighth President of the United States was born in the mansion of his paternal grandfather, and named Leslie King Jr. Unaccountably, a few days later, King came into his wife's room with a butcher knife and threatened to kill mother, child and nurse. Police were called to restrain him...

"Divorce was rare in 1913, but an Omaha court found King guilty of extreme cruelty, granted custody of the child to the mother, and ordered King to pay alimony and child support. King refused to pay anything...

"By good fortune, in her son's first year, Dorothy Gardner King met a man whose character matched and complemented her own. He was a tall, dark-haired, and amiable bachelor named Gerald R. Ford. By trade, Ford was a paint salesman; in the community he was respected as honest and hardworking, kind and considerate, a man of integrity and character--everything Dorothy's first husband was not.

"The next year she married Jerry Ford and her two-year-old son grew up as Jerry Ford Jr., believing his stepfather was his true father. By Jerry Ford Sr., Dorothy had three more sons, and the Fords provided a strong combination of love and discipline. Ford house rule number one was: 'Tell the truth, work hard, and come to dinner on time.' "

April 17, 1976: Gerald Ford Appears on Late-Night TV

The April 17, 1976, episode of Saturday Night Live had a lot to offer its audience, including Dan Aykroyd pitching the Bass-O-Matic '76, the Patti Smith Group performing, a sketch in which Catherine the Great's press secretary announces that the empress has died in a riding accident, Emily Litella and more. The show also included President Gerald R. Ford making three cameo appearances on film, including one in which he says the signature opener, "Live from New York, it's Saturday Night!"

Ford's press secretary, Ron Nessen, was host that night, a fact that's remarkable in its own right. How that came to pass was spoofed during the show, with Chevy Chase playing Ford and Nessen playing himself:

Nessen: ...that's why I want to host this show, to demonstrate that this administration has a sense of humor. You may remember in 1968, Nixon said, "Sock it to me" on Laugh-In, and it may have made the difference in the election.

Ford: He won, didn't he, Ron?

Nessen: Yes, he did, sir.

Ford: [chuckles to himself] By golly, he was funny then, and he's funny now. He's a funny man, Ron.

Nessen: Yes, sir.

Ford: That's why I gave him a break, Ron. [to stuffed dog on floor] Stop that infernal noise, Liberty! [to Ron] Well, by all means do the show.

Nessen: Thank you, sir. Now, the producer suggested you might like to do something on the show yourself.

Ford: Well, I can take a joke just so far... [stands up and walks behind desk] ...but I won't have this high office ridiculed. I won't have me stumbling around... [walks into window] ...making a fool of myself... [walks into flag and fumbles with it, trying to keep it from falling] ...for some late night comedy show... [picks up football helmet and puts it on] ...I don't need to prove that I can fall down like Chevy Chase or be an athlete. Everyone knows I'm an athlete... [accidentally kicks wastepaper basket and chases it, soon giving up and returning to his desk] ...I'll never forget those wonderful days... [picks up tennis racket, throws it in the air to try and catch it, but misses. Walks over to "Liberty," cups his hand near the dog's tail] ...Gimme the ball, Liberty!... [takes off helmet, tries to drop-kick it but misses. Returns to desk and sits down]

February 10, 1967:Ratification of the 25th Amendment

The 25th Amendment to the US Constitution, ratified 40 years ago today by the requisite three-quarters of the states, has some mileage on it. Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford both used it to appoint vice presidents, and both George H.W. Bush and Dick Cheney have been, briefly, acting presidents under its provisions.

The amendment is long and detailed for a constitutional text, but part of it deals with a tricky question: what to do if a president is critically wounded for a long time like Garfield, or critically ill for months on end like Wilson, or just a loony (a term not used in the amendment). For most of the history of the Republic, muddling through was the approach to presidential incapacity, but in the nuclear age, and especially after John Kennedy was murdered, that didn't seem like such a good idea. Books and movies have made considerable hay about the potential for presidential succession shenanigans under the 25th amendment, often involving a scheming vice president or other official in the line of succession, but in practice those invoking the amendment have been exceeding circumspect.

The amendment also clarified the vice presidency. Originally the Constitution did not, in fact, specify that the vice president becomes president upon a vacancy in the top office. A case could be made for an acting presidency, based on the language of the document. John Tyler did not interpret it that way, however, and the precedent stuck for Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, Arthur, Teddy Roosevelt, Coolidge, Truman and Lyndon Johnson. The 25th amendment explicitly says that the vice president will become president, formalizing the precedent.

There was also the issue of a vacant vice presidency. In between the time that Washington took office and the ratification of the 25th amendment, the vice presidency was vacant for a total of more than 37 years, either because a vice president had become president, or a veep had died in office. The amendment was designed to cut down on the vacancy periods in the number-two spot, and so far it has. In the last 40 years, the office has been vacant only about six months. Had it not been in force in 1974, Speaker Carl Albert of Oklahoma would have become acting president.

Sen. Birch Bayh of Indiana (pictured) is considered the architect of the 25th amendment, though generally speaking the 1960s was one of those periods in which the nation was receptive to changing the Constitution -- as it had been during Reconstruction and during the progressive age of the 1910s. Bayh was chairman of the Senate subcommittee on Constitutional Amendments, and also succeeded in getting the 26th amendment rolling, thereby lowering the voting age to 18. He had less luck with two other constitutional projects, the Equal Rights Amendment and the abolition of the Electoral College.