Ford, Gerald Rudolph, Jr.

Ford, Gerald Rudolph, Jr.
▪ 2007
Leslie Lynch King, Jr.   38th president (1974–77) of the United States (b. July 14, 1913, Omaha, Neb.—d. Dec. 26, 2006, Rancho Mirage, Calif.), as 40th vice president, succeeded to the presidency upon the resignation of Pres. Richard M. Nixon under the process decreed by the 25th Amendment to the Constitution.

      While Ford was still an infant, his parents were divorced, and his mother moved to Grand Rapids, Mich., where she married Gerald R. Ford, Sr., who adopted the boy and gave him his name. After attending the University of Michigan, where he was a star football player, Ford worked as an assistant coach while he earned a law degree (1941) from Yale University. He joined the navy during World War II and served in the South Pacific, attaining the rank of lieutenant commander and nearly losing his life in 1944 during a fierce typhoon that killed hundreds. In 1948, the year he won his first elective office, as Republican representative from Michigan, he married Elizabeth Anne Bloomer Warren (Betty Ford), with whom he had four children.

      Ford served in Congress for 25 years. Well-liked and ideologically flexible, he won the role of House minority leader in 1965 and held this position until 1973. During his time in Congress, he developed a reputation for honesty and openness. When Nixon's vice president, Spiro T. Agnew, was forced to resign from office in disgrace, the president nominated the only Republican whom the Democratic leadership of Congress would approve, the affable Jerry Ford. In 1974, when it became clear that Nixon would face criminal charges for his role in the Watergate Scandal and three articles of impeachment had been passed by the House Judiciary Committee, Nixon resigned, effective August 9. On that day Ford took the oath of office as president, stating, “Our long national nightmare is over.”

      Ford retained the foreign and domestic policy staffs of the Nixon administration, including Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. One of Ford's early acts as president was the announcement of a conditional amnesty program for those who had evaded the draft or deserted during the Vietnam War. The most attention-getting act of his years in office—and the move that for many destroyed his credibility—followed in the next month. On Sept. 8, 1974, declaring that in the end “it is not the ultimate fate of Richard Nixon that most concerns me” but rather “the immediate future of this great country,” Ford pardoned Nixon “for all offenses against the United States” that he had committed “or may have committed” while in office. On October 17, Ford voluntarily appeared before a subcommittee of the House of Representatives to explain his reasoning—the first time a sitting president had formally testified before a committee of Congress. In another startling move, Ford annoyed members of his own party by naming Nelson A. Rockefeller, both a party liberal and a representative of the so-called “Eastern establishment,” as his vice president. Ford's administration attempted to cope with the high rate of inflation, which he inherited from the Nixon years, by slowing down the economy. The result was a very severe recession in 1974–75, which lowered inflation but at the cost of an unemployment rate that rose to nearly 9%. Despite his WIN (Whip Inflation Now) program, he could do little to stop the country's economic problems. Ford's relations with the Democrat-controlled Congress were perhaps typified by his more than 50 vetoes of legislation by the end of 1976; more than 40 were sustained. Legislative gridlock set in. During the final days of the Vietnam War, in March 1975, Ford ordered an airlift of some 237,000 anticommunist Vietnamese refugees from Da Nang, most of whom were taken to the United States. Two months later, after Cambodia seized the American cargo ship Mayaguez, Ford declared the event an “act of piracy” and sent the Marines to seize the ship. They succeeded, but the rescue operation to save the 39-member crew resulted in the loss of 41 American lives and the wounding of 50 other Americans.

      Twice in September 1975, Ford was the target of assassination attempts. In the first instance, Secret Service agents intervened before shots were fired; in the second, a former U.S. Marine knocked the arm of the would-be assassin as she fired at Ford, and the shot missed. In October he initially refused to consider loans to the city of New York, then on the brink of fiscal collapse, and thereby prompted the newspaper headline “Ford to City: Drop Dead.” As the larger implications became clear, he retreated from his earlier position. In a close contest at the Republican convention in August 1976, Ford won his party's nomination, despite a serious challenge by Ronald Reagan, the former governor of California. That fall Ford became the first incumbent president to agree to public debates with a challenger—Jimmy Carter, the Democratic nominee. Ford ran substantially behind from the beginning of the campaign, owing in large part to negative fallout from the Nixon pardon but also to the general public's perception of his skills. As journalist John Osborne summarized the situation, Ford was seen as a “loser, a bumbler, a misfit president who for some reason or other…was prone to slip on airplane ramps, bump his head on helicopter entrances, entangle himself in the leashes of his family dogs, and fall from skis in front of television cameras that showed him asprawl in snow.” Ford was defeated in the November 1976 election by a popular vote of 40.8 million to 39.1 million and an electoral vote of 297 to 240. Ford held Ronald Reagan responsible for dissipating Republican support for his 1976 campaign. When Reagan offered him the vice presidential bid in the 1980 elections, he refused. After leaving the White House, Ford happily retired from public life, golfed and skied at his leisure, and ultimately joined the boards of directors of numerous corporations.

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Universalium. 2010.

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  • Ford,Gerald Rudolph — Ford, Gerald Rudolph. Born 1913. The 38th President of the United States (1974 1977), who was appointed Vice President on the resignation of Spiro Agnew (1973) and became President after Richard Nixon s resignation over the Watergate scandal. As… …   Universalium

  • Gerald Rudolph Ford — Gerald Ford (1974) Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr. (* 14. Juli 1913 in Omaha, Nebraska; † 26. Dezember 2006 in Rancho Mirage, Kalifornien, eigentlich Leslie Lynch King, Jr., nach einer Adoption umbenannt) war der 38. Präsident (1974–1977) der USA. Er… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Gerald Rudolph Ford — Gerald Ford Pour les articles homonymes, voir Gerald Ford (homonymie). Gerald Ford …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Gerald Rudolph Ford Jr — Gerald Ford Pour les articles homonymes, voir Gerald Ford (homonymie). Gerald Ford …   Wikipédia en Français

  • Ford, Gerald R. — in full Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr. orig. Leslie Lynch King, Jr. born July 14, 1913, Omaha, Neb., U.S. 38th president of the U.S. (1974–77). While he was still an infant, his parents were divorced; his mother later married Gerald R. Ford, Sr., who… …   Universalium

  • Gerald Rudolph Ford — noun 38th President of the United States; appointed vice president and succeeded Nixon when Nixon resigned (1913 ) • Syn: ↑Ford, ↑Gerald Ford, ↑Gerald R. Ford, ↑President Ford • Instance Hypernyms: ↑President of the United States, ↑United States …   Useful english dictionary

  • Ford, Gerald R. — completo Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr. orig. Leslie Lynch King, Jr. (n. 14 jul. 1913, Omaha, Neb., EE.UU.). Trigésimo octavo presidente de EE.UU. (1974–77). Sus padres se divorciaron cuando era muy niño; después su madre se casó con Gerald R. Ford, Sr …   Enciclopedia Universal

  • Gerald R. Ford — Gerald Ford (1974) Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr. (* 14. Juli 1913 in Omaha, Nebraska; † 26. Dezember 2006 in Rancho Mirage, Kalifornien, eigentlich Leslie Lynch King, Jr., nach einer Adoption umbenannt) war der 38. Präsident (1974–1977) der USA. Er… …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • Gerald Ford — (1974) Unterschrift von Gerald Ford Ge …   Deutsch Wikipedia

  • FORD (G. R.) — FORD GERALD RUDOLPH (1913 ) C’est par accident que Gerald R. Ford est devenu le trente huitième président des États Unis: rien ne laissait en effet prévoir que, triomphalement réélu en novembre 1972, Richard Nixon serait contraint à la démission …   Encyclopédie Universelle

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