III.

Early Political Career

A.

United States Congressman

In 1946 Nixon was persuaded by California Republicans to be their candidate to challenge the popular Democratic Congressman Jerry Voorhis for his seat in the United States House of Representatives. Nixon’s campaign was an example of the vigorous and aggressive style characteristic of his political career. He accused Voorhis of being “soft” on Communism. In 1946, when the Cold War rivalry between the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was just beginning, the charge that Voorhis did not sufficiently oppose Communism was damaging. The two men confronted each other in a series of debates, and Voorhis was forced into a defensive position. Nixon won the election by a vote of 65,586 to 49,994.

As a new member of the Congress of the United States, Nixon gained valuable experience in international affairs while serving on a special committee that helped establish the European Recovery Program. Under this program, also known as the Marshall Plan, the United States helped pay for a cooperative, long-term rebuilding program in Europe following the war. Nixon also served on the House Education and Labor Committee, where he helped draft the Taft-Hartley Act on labor-management relations. The act outlawed union shops (workplaces where everyone had to join the union); prohibited such union tactics as secondary boycotts; forbade unions to contribute to political campaigns; established loyalty oaths for union leaders; and allowed court orders to halt strikes that could affect national health or safety (see National Labor Relations Act).

As a member of the Un-American Activities Committee, Nixon personally pressed the investigation of Alger Hiss, a high State Department official. Hiss had been accused of being a Communist by writer and editor Whittaker Chambers, who testified before the committee in 1948. Chambers said that he himself had been a Communist in the 1920s and 1930s and a courier in transmitting secret information to Soviet agents. Chambers charged that Hiss was also a Communist, and that he had turned classified documents over to Chambers to be sent to the USSR. Hiss denied the charges, but Chambers produced microfilm copies of documents that were later identified as classified papers belonging to the Departments of State, Navy, and War, some apparently annotated by Hiss in his own handwriting. The Department of Justice conducted its own investigation, and Hiss was indicted for perjury, or lying under oath. The jury failed to reach a verdict, but Hiss was convicted after a second trial in January 1950 (see Hiss Case). During the investigation Nixon gained a national reputation as a dedicated enemy of Communism and in 1948, he was reelected to Congress after winning both the Republican and Democratic nominations.

B.

United States Senator

In 1950 the Republicans chose Nixon as their candidate for the U.S. Senate from California. His opponent was the liberal Congresswoman Helen Gahagan Douglas. In another bitterly fought campaign, Nixon linked her voting record with that of the American-Labor-Party congressman from New York, Vito Marcantonio, who was widely regarded as pro-Communist. Nixon won the election by 680,000 votes.

In 1952 Nixon was selected to be the running mate of General Dwight D. Eisenhower, who had won the Republican presidential nomination. Shortly after Nixon’s vice-presidential nomination, however, it was reported that a fund had been collected to meet his expenses as a senator. His critics implied that he was supported by “favor-seeking millionaires.” No evidence was produced that Nixon had misused the fund or given special favors to contributors, but many of Eisenhower’s advisers wanted Nixon to resign his candidacy. In response Nixon made an impassioned reply on national television in a speech known as the “Checkers” speech because it contained a sentimental reference to Nixon’s dog, Checkers. The speech included a full disclosure of his personal finances, and Eisenhower then kept him as his running mate. In the campaign that followed, Nixon once again attacked the Democrats and their presidential candidate, Illinois Governor Adlai E. Stevenson, as soft on Communism. The Eisenhower-Nixon ticket won a resounding victory. In 1956, Eisenhower and Nixon were reelected, after Nixon survived an attempt by some Republicans to replace him.

C.

Vice President

Much of Nixon’s time as vice president was spent in representing the president before Congress and on trips abroad as a goodwill ambassador. On these tours Nixon was occasionally the target of anti-U.S. feelings. During a tour of South America in May 1958, for example, the cars carrying Nixon and his escort were assaulted by stone-throwing Venezuelans near the Caracas airport.

Nixon’s most dramatic confrontation abroad took place when he visited the USSR in July 1959 to open a U.S. exhibition in Moscow. Nixon escorted Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev through a model U.S. kitchen. In front of the television cameras, Khrushchev then found himself in a debate with Nixon over the relative merits of the United States and Communist systems. Parts of what became known as the “kitchen debate” were later broadcast on television in both the USSR and the United States. On the final day of his visit, Nixon made an unprecedented address on Soviet television.

D.

Election of 1960

As President Eisenhower neared the end of his second term, his vice president emerged as his logical successor, and the president endorsed Nixon in March. Nixon received an impressive vote in party primaries, and at the Republican National Convention, held in Chicago in July, he received all but ten of the delegates’ votes on the first ballot. Nixon chose as his running mate the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Henry Cabot Lodge of Massachusetts. An unusual feature of the campaign was a series of four televised face-to-face discussions between Nixon and his Democratic opponent, Senator John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts. Kennedy was widely regarded as the winner of the debates, which helped him win the election.

Even with the debates, the popular vote in November was extremely close. Both candidates received more than 34 million votes, and Kennedy beat Nixon by only 112,803. Because of the way the popular vote was distributed, however, the vote in the electoral college was 303 for Kennedy to 220 for Nixon.