Alexander Butterfield reveals the existence of the "Nixon tapes" to the special Senate committee investigating the Watergate break-in.
The Nixon White House tapes are audio recordings of conversations between U.S. President Richard Nixon and Nixon administration officials, Nixon family members, and White House staff, produced between 1971 and 1973.In February 1971, a sound-activated taping system was installed in the Oval Office, including in Nixon's Wilson desk, using Sony TC-800B open-reel tape recorders to capture audio transmitted by telephone taps and concealed microphones. The system was expanded to include other rooms within the White House and Camp David. The system was turned off on July 18, 1973, two days after it became public knowledge as a result of the U.S. Senate Watergate Committee hearings. Nixon was not the first president to record his White House conversations; President Franklin D. Roosevelt recorded Oval Office press conferences for a short period in 1940.The tapes' existence came to light during the Watergate scandal of 1973 and 1974, when the system was mentioned during the televised testimony of White House aide Alexander Butterfield before the U.S. Senate Watergate Committee. Nixon's refusal of a congressional subpoena to release the tapes was the basis for an article of impeachment against Nixon, and led to his subsequent resignation on August 9, 1974.On August 19, 2013, the Nixon Library and the National Archives and Records Administration released the final 340 hours of the tapes that cover the period from April 9 through July 12, 1973.
Alexander Porter Butterfield (born April 6, 1926) is a retired United States Air Force officer, public servant, and businessman. He served as the deputy assistant to President Richard Nixon from 1969 to 1973. He revealed the White House taping system's existence on July 13, 1973, during the Watergate investigation, but had no other involvement in the scandal. From 1973 to 1975, he served as administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration.