United States v. Nixon (1974)
The Supreme Court ruled 8-0 that President Nixon had to turn over his secretly recorded Oval Office tapes to special prosecutor Leon Jaworski. The Court rejected Nixon's blanket executive-privilege claim in the Watergate criminal investigation.
Nixon released the tapes within weeks. They contained the 'smoking gun' conversation showing he ordered a cover-up. He resigned 16 days after the ruling.
The decision set the precedent that executive privilege is not absolute and must yield to legitimate criminal-process needs. It did not address whether such recordings can later be made public through FOIA.
Nixon settled when a president must surrender recordings to investigators. Biden's case asks the next question: whether the investigator's tapes can later be released to political opponents through FOIA.
