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Show 4 FACT BOOK-1972 Court's desegregation decisions. Despite a unanimous 1971 Court opinion that busing, in spite of its possible awkwardness and incon venience, might be necessary as an integration tool, Nixon used nationwide television to ask that Congress clamp a moratorium on federal court ordered busing. He also toyed publicly with the idea of an anti-busing constitutional amendment in the event the Con gress turned down his proposal. Regardless of an American's views on busing, he could take no comfort in a President who interfered with the legal responsibilities of the highest court in the land, espe cially one headed by his own appointee, Chief Justice Burger. Nixon's machinations could only damage the credibility of the Court still further. 9 President Nixon's unprincipled and confused handling of the My Lai trial of Lieutenant William Calley was a dishonor to the at a time when its public standing is weaker than ever massacre military before. At a televised news conference on December 8,1969, President Nixon ignored ongoing investigations and upcoming trials by simply announcing that "What appears was certainly a massacre, under no circumstances was it justified." But the President went on to sensi " record of generosity, of decency, bly state that the military's must not be allowed to be smeared and slurred because of this kind of incident. That is why I am going to do everything that I pos • ... sibly can to see that guilty, are punished.v-" . . . those who are charged, if they are found On March 31,1971, Lieutenant Calley was sentenced to life im for the murder of 22 Vietnamese civilians. The punish ment and verdict were handed down by a six-man military court in • prisonment Fort Benning, Georgia. On April 1, 1971, President Nixon changed his mind about the punishment deserved by those guilty of the massacre; he ordered • that Lieutenant Calley be released from the stockade and placed loosely under house arrest. He also announced that he would review the case as Commander-in-Chief after the appeals process had been exhausted. According to John D. Ehrlichman, one of his principal advisors, the President felt compelled to intervene in a case which had captured the interest of the American people as it has. 0" " ... • 0 Captain Aubrey M, Daniel III, the Army's prosecutor, protested the President's action in eral Senators. a letter sent to the White House and to sev Daniel wrote that the "0 greatest tragedy of all 0 0 |
