White Knight: The Rise of Spiro Agnew

New York: Random House, 1972. First edition. First Edition [stated]/. Hardcover. Very good in fair dust jacket. DJ has wear, soiling, chips, and a large tear at back. Pencil erasure residue on fep.. xii, [2], 465, p. Index. From Wikipedia: "Spiro Theodore Agnew (November 9, 1918 September 17, 1996) was an American politician who served as the 39th Vice President of the United States from 1969 to 1973, serving under President Richard Nixon. Born in Baltimore, Maryland, Agnew was a graduate of Johns Hopkins University and University of Baltimore School of Law. He was drafted into the United States Army in 1941, serving as an officer during World War II, and was recalled for service during the Korean War in 1950. He worked as an aide for U.S. Representative James Devereux before he was appointed to the Baltimore County Board of Zoning Appeals in 1957. He lost election for the Baltimore City Circuit Court in 1960, but was later elected Baltimore County Executive in 1962. In 1966 Agnew was elected the 55th Governor of Maryland, defeating Democratic opponent George P. Mahoney. He was the first Greek American to hold the position, serving from 1967 to 1969. At the 1968 Republican National Convention, Agnew was nominated for Vice President; he ran alongside the party's presidential nominee, former Vice President Richard Nixon. They defeated incumbent Vice President Hubert Humphrey and Senator Edmund Muskie, in the 1968 presidential election. In 1972 Nixon and Agnew were reelected for a second term, defeating Senator George McGovern and Ambassador Sargent Shriver. During his fifth year as Vice President, late in the summer of 1973, Agnew was investigated by the United States Attorney's office for the District of Maryland, on charges of extortion, tax fraud, bribery, and conspiracy. In October, he was charged with having accepted bribes totaling more than $100, 000 while holding office as Baltimore County Executive, Governor of Maryland, and Vice President of the United States. On October 10, 1973, Agnew was allowed to plead no contest to a single charge that he had failed to report $29, 500 of income received in 1967, with the condition that he resign the office of Vice President. Nixon replaced him by appointing then House Minority Leader Gerald Ford to the office of Vice President. Agnew was the second Vice President in United States history to resign, the other being John C. Calhoun, and the only one to do so because of criminal charges. Nearly ten years after leaving office, in January 1983, Agnew paid the state of Maryland nearly $270, 000 as a result of a civil suit that stemmed from the bribery allegations. Critics have cited him as being one of the worst Vice Presidents in American history. His pugnacious attacks on the Nixon administration's opponents, however notably the news media and anti-war demonstrators won him many admirers in the conservative wing of the Republican Party." From Wikipedia: "Jules Joseph Witcover (born July 16, 1927) is an American journalist, author, and columnist. Witcover is a veteran newspaperman of 50 years' standing, having written for The Baltimore Sun, the now-defunct Washington Star, the Los Angeles Times, and The Washington Post. Together with Jack Germond, Witcover co-wrote "Politics Today, " a five-day-a-week syndicated column, for over 24 years. Witcover was born in Union City, New Jersey. He lives in Washington, DC with his wife, author and H.L. Mencken scholar Marion Elizabeth Rodgers. His most recent works are Very Strange Bedfellows: The Short and Unhappy Marriage of Nixon & Agnew, Public Affairs (2007). and Joe Biden: A Life of Trial and Redemption. In March 2008, his history of campaign finance reform, "The Longest Campaign, " appeared on the Center for Public Integrity's The Buying of the President 2008 website. Witcover assumed the mantle of Theodore H. White, producing the definitive chronicle of the 1976 presidential campaign, Marathon, and then following with books on every contest from 1980 through 1992 (these four co-authored with Jack W. Germond). In the 1990s and 2000s, he became increasingly preoccupied with the mechanics of national campaigns--authoring works on the Vice Presidency,