Canuck letter
The Canuck letter was a forged letter to the editor of the
The letter was a successful attempt at
On October 10, 1972, FBI investigators revealed that the Canuck letter was part of a dirty tricks campaign against Democrats orchestrated by the Committee for the Re-Election of the President (CRP, later derisively nicknamed CREEP).[5]
The letter's immediate effect was to compel the candidate to give a speech in front of the newspaper's offices, subsequently known as "the crying speech".[6] The letter's indirect effect was to contribute to the implosion of Muskie's candidacy.
The crying speech
On the morning of February 26, two Saturdays before the March 7 primary, Muskie delivered a speech in front of the offices of the Union Leader, calling its publisher,
Denunciation
Whether true or false, fear of Muskie's alleged unstable emotional condition led some New Hampshire Democrats to defect to George McGovern. Muskie's winning margin, 46% to McGovern's 37%, was smaller than his campaign had predicted. The bounce and second-place finish led the McGovern campaign to boast of its momentum. By the time of the Florida primary, with McGovern clearing other left-leaning candidates from the field, Muskie's campaign was dead.
Washington Post staff writer Marilyn Berger reported that Nixon White House staffer Ken Clawson had bragged to her about authoring the letter. Clawson denied Berger's account. In October 1972, FBI investigators asserted that the Canuck Letter was part of the dirty tricks campaign against Democrats orchestrated by the Committee for the Re-Election of the President.[8] Loeb, the publisher of the Manchester Union Leader, maintained that the letter was not a fabrication, but later admitted to having some doubt, however, after receiving another letter claiming that someone had been paid $1,000 to write the Canuck Letter. The purported author, Paul Morrison of Deerfield Beach, Florida, was never found.
The authorship of the letter is covered at length in the 1974 book All the President's Men by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein and its 1976 film adaptation.
References
- ISBN 0-671-89441-2.
- ^ Bernstein, Carl; Woodward, Bob (October 10, 1972). "FBI Finds Nixon Aides Sabotaged Democrats". The Washington Post. Retrieved May 14, 2014.
- ISBN 978-981-4435-31-4.
- ISBN 0-671-89441-2.
- ISBN 9781101443675.
- ^ The Crying Speech
- ^ Wilson, David B. (March 8, 1987). "Muskie's 'Tears' How The Press' Perception Can Change History". The Philadelphia Inquirer.
- ^ Woodward, Bob; Bernstein, Carl (October 10, 1972). "FBI Finds Nixon Aides Sabotaged Democrats". Washington Post. Retrieved September 27, 2009.
Further reading
- David Broder, "The Story That Still Nags at Me -- Edmund S. Muskie," Washington Monthly. February 1987.
- "Nixon's Nightmare: Fighting to be Believed," Time. May 14, 1973.
- Theodore H. White, The Making of the President 1972.