Watergate scandal

Today marks fifty years since President Richard Nixon resigned from office during the fallout from the Watergate scandal. Operatives allegedly linked to the Commander-In-Chief broke into the Democratic Party headquarters at the Watergate Hotel next to the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. A Congressional committee investigation led by North Carolina U.S. Senator Sam Ervin, punctuated by testimony by former House counsel John Dean, grabbed the headlines. But, two Alabama lawmakers reportedly helped seal Nixon’s fate.

Campaign finance laws and ethics forms for political campaigns and office holders were enacted throughout the entire country in the 1970s, mostly in…