the events that followed became known as the Saturday night massacre the country tonight is in the midst of what may be the most serious constitutional crisis in its history the president has fired the special Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox because of the president's action the Attorney General has resigned Elliot Richardson has quit saying he cannot carry out mr. Nixon's instructions Richardson's deputy William Ruckelshaus has been acquired ruptals House refused in a moment of constitutional drama to obey a presidential order to fire the special Watergate prosecutor and half an hour after the special Watergate prosecutor had been fired agents of the FBI acting at the direction of the White House sealed off the offices of the special prosecutor the Offices of the Attorney General and the offices of the Deputy Attorney General six FBI all of this adds up to a totally unprecedented situation a grave and profound crisis in which the president has set himself against his own Attorney General and the Department of Justice nothing like this has ever happened before 50,000 telegrams poured in on Capitol Hill today so many Western Union was swamped most of them demanded impeaching mr. Nixon he's come from republicanism businessman and people most of whom begin their statement by saying I've supported the president I've never believed in impeachment but he's now gone too far and we're going to have to we want the Congress to take strong action my three district officers in the one Republican area my phone calls were a hundred to one in favor of pursuing the path of impeachment which was rather shocking to me I was terribly surprised which says something about that that very weird thing that happens when you're in the middle of a cocoon of a crisis within a protected environment and you have a great desire for things to happen as you want them to happen on Tuesday Nixon learned that 21 resolutions calling for his impeachment had been introduced on Capitol Hill [Music] stunned by the ferocity of the public reaction Nixon retreated he appointed a new special prosecutor Leon Jaworski and agreed to release the nine subpoenaed tapes