A biography of William Ruckelshaus, a Washington resident who famously resigned from the U.S. Justice Department instead of carrying out a 1973 order by then President Richard Nixon, will be published on Thursday as part of the Legacy Washington’s “Who are we?” project.
The profile of Ruckelshaus will be available Thursday on the 43rd anniversary of the “Saturday Night Massacre.”
It marked a pivotal day in the Watergate investigation when Ruckelshaus, serving as the deputy attorney general, and attorney general Elliot Richardson both resigned instead of following an order to fire independent special prosecutor Archibald Cox, according to a press release from the Washington State Secretary of State office.
Ruckelshaus is a longtime resident of Washington state and devotes much of his time now to restoring Puget Sound and salmon recovery.
He is the chairman of the William D. Ruckelshaus Center, and a 2015 recipient of the Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor.
The profile documents Ruckelshaus’ younger years in Indiana and the influence it had on him as he ascended through the Nixon administration, first serving as the leader of the Environmental Protection Agency and temporarily running the FBI before Nixon made him deputy attorney general.
The biography can be found here: https://www.sos.wa.gov/legacy/who-are-we/stories/bill-ruckelshaus/.
