Gerald Ford and the Challenges of the 1970s


Book Description

"In the author's reassessment of this underrated president, Ford emerges as a skilled executive, an effective diplomat, and a leader with a clear vision for America's future. Working to heal a divided nation, Ford unified the GOP and laid the groundwork for the Republican resurgence in subsequent decades."--BOOK JACKET.




A Companion to Gerald R. Ford and Jimmy Carter


Book Description

With 30 historiographical essays by established and rising scholars, this Companion is a comprehensive picture of the presidencies and legacies of Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. Examines important national and international events during the 1970s, as well as presidential initiatives, crises, and legislation Discusses the biography of each man before entering the White House, his legacy and work after leaving office, and the lives of Betty Ford, Rosalynn Carter, and their families Covers key themes and issues, including Watergate and the pardon of Richard Nixon, the Vietnam War, neoconservatism and the rise of the New Right, and the Iran hostage crisis Incorporates presidential, diplomatic, military, economic, social, and cultural history Uses the most recent research and newly released documents from the two Presidential Libraries and the State Department




Taking Aim at the President


Book Description

Winner of the 2009 San Francisco Book Festival Award (Wild Card category) "I'm not sorry I tried...if successful, the assassination...just might have triggered the kind of chaos that could have started the upheaval of change." --Sara Jane Moore in 1976 Journalist Geri Spieler met would-be assassin Sara Jane Moore while she was in prison; Taking Aim at the President is based on over two decades of interviews as well as independant research. Spieler follows Moore's actions from her childhood in a small West Virginia town to her release from prison in December 2007. Moore's life was never conventional, and along the way she entered and dropped out of the military, was married five times, and was both a political radical and an FBI informant. Focusing on the complex psychology and motivations of a quintessentially desperate housewife and the only woman to ever fire a bullet at an American president, Spieler delivers a nuanced portrait of an elusive person and a fascinating glimpse back at a turbulent period in American history.




Choose Economic Freedom


Book Description

What are the keys to good economic policy? George P. Shultz and John B. Taylor draw from their several decades of experience at the forefront of national economic policy making to show how market fundamentals beat politically popular government interventions—be they from Democrats or Republicans—as a recipe for success. Choose Economic Freedom reconstructs debates from the 1960s and 1970s about the use of wage and price controls as tools of policy, showing how brilliant economists can hold diametrically opposed views about the wisdom of using government intervention to spur the economy. Speeches and documents from the era include a recently unearthed memo from Arthur Burns, Federal Reserve chair, in 1971, in which he argues in favor of controls. Under Burns's guidance and in the face of stubborn inflation, Nixon introduced wage and price guidelines and freezes. But over the long run, these became a drag on the economy and ultimately failed. It wasn't until the Reagan administration that these controls were reversed, resulting in a vibrant economy. The words of iconic economist Milton Friedman—whose "free to choose" ethos inspired the free-market revolution of the Reagan era—along with lessons Shultz and Taylor learned from the front lines, demonstrate that tried-and-true economic policy works.




The Ford Presidency


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Gerald R. Ford


Book Description

In the aftermath of the Watergate scandal, then Vice President Gerald Ford became the first person to succeed a president who had resigned from office. Although Ford’s presidency lasted only three years, he worked diligently to heal a country from war, inflation, and controversy. Ford began a career serving his country in World War II, eventually becoming a lieutenant commander in the Navy. In 1948 he was elected to the United States Congress, where he served with distinction for the next 25 years. During the Watergate investigations in 1973, the vice president resigned and Ford stepped into that office. When President Richard Nixon resigned a short time later, Ford became the first president that was not officially elected by the country. Ford is largely credited with restoring the country’s faith in office after a tumultuous decade.




895 Days that Changed the World


Book Description

When asked why he pardoned Nixon, Ford simply replied "it was the right thing to do."




The presidency of Gerald Ford


Book Description

Seminar paper from the year 2006 in the subject Politics - Region: USA, grade: 2, University of Wyoming (Political Science), language: English, abstract: Gerald Ford came to the Presidency very surprisingly. Before and after Richard Nixon’s resignation following the Watergate affair, he did not have a lot of time to create his own policies or structure his own administration within the White House. Three transition groups were working on the structural preparation for the Presidency, one of them started secretly several months before Ford had to take over the office - just in case. But they were all facing the problem that they did not have the amount of time normally given to a future President between the election and the inauguration to develop a plan for the advisory structure. Ford and his Vice-presidential staff jumped into a running government which was created for the personal needs and around the work style of a President Nixon. They could not fire the whole Nixon staff at the same time without the risk of leading the country into an incapability of action until a new staff system had been built up. And they could not keep all the Nixon people who were loyal to the former President and were probably not able to work the way the new President wanted them to. Ford and his advisers decided to go a middle way which will be analyzed later. This paper will focus on how the advisory structure Ford chose, or was forced to choose, influenced him in his decision making process. The main source will be the biography of John Robert Greene, The Presidency of Gerald R. Ford. The thesis will be that Ford’s way to make a decision, as he was used to from his congressional career, did not match with the structure the Presidency forced him to use and led him too often to ineffective decisions.




American Energy Policy in the 1970s


Book Description

With Middle East blow-ups, pipeline politics, wind farm controversies, solar industry scandals, and disputes over fracking, it's natural to think that the energy policy debate is at its most intense ever. But it's easy to forget that energy issues dominated the nation's politics in the 1970s as well. Wars were fought, political careers made and unmade, and fortunes gambled and lost, all because of the vagaries of energy production and consumption, which held the American public and its politicians in thrall. This historical investigation focuses exclusively on American energy policy in the 1970s. Revisiting the last time energy issues came to the forefront of national political discourse, the essays collected here provide new insight into the energy crisis of that decade—insights with clear implications for our present dilemmas. Among a new generation of energy historians, the authors address questions of political leadership, foreign policy, supply, and demand. Chapters examine the politics of energy policymaking; efforts by American policymakers to increase supply and reduce demand; and the challenge of crafting American foreign policy as the Middle East emerges as the world’s leading oil-producing region. American Energy Policy in the 1970s reminds us of a wide range of policy successes and failures and offers an in-depth look at the complicated workings of such issues as café standards, alternative energy supplies, nuclear power, conservation, the strategic petroleum reserve, and the Carter Doctrine. This book restores historical clarity and context to the complex and politically freighted discussion of energy in America. It should inform and enlighten the discussion going forward.




Jimmy Carter's Economy


Book Description

The massive inflation and oil crisis of the 1970s damaged Jimmy Carter's presidency. In Jimmy Carter's Economy, Carl Biven traces how the Carter administration developed and implemented economic policy amid multiple crises and explores how a combination of factors beyond the administration's control came to dictate a new paradigm of Democratic Party politics. Jimmy Carter inherited a deeply troubled economy. Inflation had been on the rise since the Johnson years, and the oil crisis Carter faced was the second oil price shock of the decade. In addition, a decline in worker productivity and a rise in competition from Germany and Japan compounded the nation's economic problems. The resulting anti-inflation policy that was forced on Carter included controlling public spending, limiting the expansion of the welfare state, and postponing popular tax cuts. Moreover, according to Biven, Carter argued that the ambitious policies of the Great Society were no longer possible in an age of limits and that the Democratic Party must by economic necessity become more centrist.