Former U.S. President Gerald Ford Dies At 93
Posted December 27, 2006 12:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Former U.S. President Gerald Ford, the man who replaced Richard Nixon in office following the Watergate scandal, has died at the age of 93.
The country’s 38th president died at his desert home in California Tuesday evening.
“His life was filled with love of God, his family and his country,” his wife, Betty, said in a statement.
The Republican, who took office in 1974, has the distinction of being the only president not elected to either the office or the vice presidency. He was appointed to the latter position after Spiro Agnew left the job amid a scandal in 1973.
The cause of death wasn’t released, but Ford had had several medical problems over the past year including pneumonia in January and an angioplasty and pacemaker implant in the summer.
“The American people will always admire Gerald Ford’s devotion to duty, his personal character and the honourable conduct of his administration,” President George W. Bush said in a statement Tuesday night.
Ford was Nixon’s choice for successor, and he took office shortly after Watergate forced Nixon to resign.
“My fellow Americans,” Ford said at the time, “our long national nightmare is over. Our Constitution works. Our great republic is a government of laws and not of men. Here the people rule.”
“I am acutely aware that you have not elected me as your president by your ballots. So I ask you to confirm me with your prayers.”
And though Americans were receptive to Ford’s openness, they weren’t pleased when he granted Nixon a pardon a month after taking office. It’s believed the decision to absolve the former president, though praised in later years, cost Ford the election in 1976. He lost to Democrat Jimmy Carter.
Among the notable events taking place over Ford’s presidency – the end of the Vietnam War in April of 1975.
“Today, America can regain the sense of pride that existed before Vietnam. But it cannot be achieved by refighting a war that is finished as far as America is concerned.” Ford added that it was time to “look forward to an agenda for the future, to unify, to bind up the nation’s wounds.”
He survived two attempts on his life within weeks of each other in 1975. A 26-year-old follower of Charles Manson, Lynette (Squeaky) Fromme was arrested after aiming a gun at the president in California. Then, just over two weeks later, a 45-year-old political activist named Sara Jane Moore fired a gun at Ford in San Francisco and was arrested. Ford wasn’t hurt in either case, and both women are now serving life sentences in federal prison.
Ford was challenged within the party from Ronald Reagan in 1976 – and though Reagan would go on to lead the nation in 1980 the two would eventually work together.
“Ronnie and I always considered him a dear friend and close political ally,” Nancy Reagan said in a statement Tuesday.
Born Leslie King in 1913 in Omaha, Nebraska, Ford took on his stepfather’s name after his parents divorced and his mother remarried Gerald R. Ford Sr.
He was first introduced to politics at Yale when he worked on Republican Wendell Willkie’s 1940 campaign for president. After serving with the Navy in World War II, he practiced law in Grand Rapids and became increasingly involved in Republican politics.
While living in Michigan Ford learned a lot about Canada and though he didn’t visit the country during his presidency he was close with former prime minister Pierre Trudeau. He invited Trudeau to a G7 meeting in Puerto Rico in 1976, even though Canada had been excluded from the Group of Seven industrialized countries. Canada later became a full member of the G8.
Ford was also the last surviving member of the Warren Commission, which investigated the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963. The Commission concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald was the lone gunman.
Ford leaves behind his wife, Betty, three sons, Michael, John and Steven, and a daughter, Susan.
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