The presidency of Richard Nixon began on January 20, 1969 at noon Eastern Standard Time, when Richard Nixon was inaugurated as President of the United States, and ended on August 9, 1974, when, in the face of almost certain impeachment and removal from office, he resigned the presidency (the first U.S. president ever to do so). He was succeeded by Vice President Gerald Ford (who had become vice president only nine months earlier, following Spiro Agnew's resignation from office). A Republican, Nixon took office after the 1968 presidential election, in which he defeated Hubert Humphrey, the then–incumbent Vice President. Four years later, in 1972, Nixon won reelection in a landslide victory over George McGovern. Overall, he won 60.7% of the popular vote, and 520 of 538 electoral votes.
Nixon, the 37th United States president, succeeded Lyndon B. Johnson, who had launched the Great Society, a set of domestic programs financed and run by the federal government. In contrast, Nixon advocated a "New Federalism" domestic program model, one in which certain powers would devolve back to the states. The creation of the EPA, passage of the Endangered Species Act, and the integration of Southern public schools happened during his presidency. The end of the military draft, and the Apollo program, which successfully landed Americans on the Moon, did as well.