PRESIDENT Nixon's former vice-president, Mr Spiro Agnew, has died, aged 77, almost 23 years after he was forced to resign in disgrace over a tax evasion charge and suspicion of kickbacks and bribery.
He later denied any wrongdoing but never forgave Nixon for abandoning him and using him as a "scapegoat", he claimed, to try to save his own skin as the Watergate pressures increased. Ten months later, Nixon himself resigned in disgrace.
As vice president, the tall, handsome Mr Agnew vigorously defended Nixon's Vietnam policy and became an outspoken critic of the liberal media. He was seen as the articulate voice of "the silent majority" and some see him as a precursor of the conservative wave which brought Ronald Reagan to power in 1980.
As Governor of Maryland, Mr Agnew was a surprise choice as President Nixon's running mate in 1968 as he was not well known nationally. But he had attracted notice when he publicly rebuked black leaders for not doing more to prevent rioting in Baltimore following the assassination of the Rev Martin Luther King. Mr Agnew later said he was chosen by Nixon as "the least offensive to all Republicans".
As criticism of President Nixon grew over Vietnam and Watergate, Spiro Agnew riposted with his colourful attacks on the media. He branded critics as "nattering nabobs of negativism" and "hopeless, hysterical hypochondriacs of history".
Anti war demonstrators were denounced by Mr Agnew as "ideological eunuchs". He proposed that those misleading American youth should be "separated from society. . . with no more regret than we should feel over discarding rotten apples from a barrel".
In his earlier days, Mr Agnew had been a Democrat and then a liberal Republican who supported Nelson Rockefeller's presidential bid.
He was born in Baltimore, the son of a Greek immigrant restaurant owner, who changed his name from Anagnostopoulos, and an American mother. His law studies were interrupted by the second World War in which Mr Agnew served as a company commander in Europe and won a Bronze Star decoration.
As a lawyer in Baltimore, Mr Agnew became involved in local politics and is credited with introducing a ban on discrimination in public places on grounds of race or colour. But his closeness to property developers led to the later charges which caused his downfall.
After resigning from the vice presidency, Mr Agnew virtually disappeared from view. He went to live in California where he wrote a novel and a 1980 political memoir called Go Quietly. . . Or Else. He quietly resumed practice as a lawyer and helped negotiate business deals for European investors.