Correction: The print version of this column incorrectly identified Gov. George Wallace as the governor of Georgia; he was the governor of Alabama. The article has been updated.

If you were alive during Watergate 1972-1974, you might remember that Vice-President Spiro Agnew resigned. And like me, you might not remember why. I recently read Rachel Maddow and Michael Yarvitz’s “Bagman: The Wild crimes, Audacious Cover-up & Spectacular Downfall of a Brazen Crook in the White House”. Now I know why.

I’m not a big fan of Maddow. She comes across as arrogant. She’s also extremely liberal. But she’s a great writer with a solid research background, and she gives irrefutable facts that tell the story of Agnew’s rise and fall. Those facts relate directly to what is occurring today in the prosecutions of the former president.

Let’s start with Agnew’s background. Nixon picked Agnew, governor of Maryland, to be his running mate for the same reason that Senator John McCain selected Alaska Governor Sarah Palin in 2008: they both needed someone to be their attack dog. Both presidential candidates surprised the nation by picking relatively unknown governors.

“The crowds who came out to his rallies reveled in Agnew’s unapologetic take-the-paint-off-the-walls partisanship. His increasingly confrontational taunts became a constant presence on the network newscasts,” Maddow wrote. “What news executive could pass on scenes like this?”

Agnew had been selected by Nixon to counter Alabama Gov. George Wallace, an open and unapologetic racist. Agnew became even more racist. Agnew also went after the press, accusing the three major news networks of censorship. He portrayed Nixon and himself as victims of the media. The approach worked marvelously in two presidential races, 1968 and 1972.

Spiro Agnew was a relative newcomer to politics. He had served as a Maryland County commissioner before he was elected governor. During his time in elected office, he took bribes from contractors for government contracts, skimming off a percentage of the take, usually between 3 to 5%. Each time, the bribe was hand-delivered to his office in cash in a white envelope. That practice continued when Agnew became vice president.

“Agnew’s is a story of a scandal so brazen that, had it not occurred at the same time as Watergate, would likely be remembered as the most astonishing and sordid chapter visited upon a White House in modern times. Heck in any times,” Maddow wrote.

Three federal prosecutors stationed in Baltimore got wind of rampant corruption in Maryland, totally separate from the Watergate scandal playing out in D.C. They “followed the money”. That trail led to Vice-President Agnew.

These prosecutors gathered reams of evidence by getting corrupt contractors to waive their 5th Amendment rights in order to be given immunity from prosecution.

Like today, taking on a high-level official in the White House in 1972-74 brought tremendous risks and dangers. It was not something that was done lightly. Evidence had to be solid and unbreakable.

Republican Elliot Richardson was Nixon’s Attorney General. He had enough on his hands with the Watergate investigation without another scandal being added to the burden. Richardson, a man of integrity, knew that Agnew would have to be removed from office before Nixon.

Eventually, Agnew was notified that he was under investigation by the Department of Justice for taking bribes. Agnew’s favored tactic was to attack the prosecutors for lying and playing politics, portraying himself as the victim.

When that approach didn’t stop the investigation, he asked Nixon for help. Both men obstructed justice by deciding to use a U.S. Senator to pressure the boss of the prosecutors. Agnew wanted the prosecutors fired and the investigation shut down. All of this information came from the Oval Office tapes that Nixon recorded. Those tapes eventually forced Nixon to resign in August of 1974, but the truth about the obstruction of justice had to wait forty years.

It also came to light in those tapes that George H.W. Bush had put pressure on the U.S. senator who was the brother of the boss of the Baltimore prosecutors. Later, in 1980, Bush acted to delay the release of the U.S. embassy staff held by the Iranians until after Reagan was safely elected. Bush became Reagan’s vice-president, and then president after Reagan’s term ended in 1988.

What we are seeing now with the three current indictments of Donald Trump harkens back to the time of Nixon and Agnew. Agnew resigned from the vice-presidency to avoid going to prison. Now you know the origins of our current political mess. A few Republicans like AG Richardson acted with integrity then, as only a few have done during and after the Jan. 6 insurrection.

The rot is old and deep in the Republican Party.

“Oh, what a tangled web we weave…. When first we practice to deceive” – Sir Walter Scott