Data from a recently recovered Iowa Poll from 1974 show that half of Iowans disapproved of then-President Nixon’s job performance just one month before he resigned from office following the Watergate scandal. These results come from Iowa Poll #213, which interviewed a random sample of 601 Iowans in July of 1974. The resulting data has been restored as part of IPOL’s work to recover lost data from past Iowa polls.

Respondents were asked whether they “approve or disapprove of the way Nixon is handling his job as President?” 39.9% expressed approval while 50.0% disapproved, with 10.1% indicating they had no opinion. Nixon’s disapproval nearly matched that of Congress, though his approval was almost 7 percentages points greater. 

These overall similarities mask substantial partisan differences, though. Nixon, a Republican, maintained strong support among Iowans who identified as Republicans, with 63.4% approving of his job performance and 25.8% disapproving. In contrast, 49.6% of Republicans disapproved of the job performance of Congress, which was majority Democratic, and 35.6% approved. The responses for Congress showed a ten-point swing among Iowa Democrats in the survey, with 37.2% approving and 43.3% disapproving. Approval for Nixon among Democrats had a much lager swing of nearly forty percentage points, with 24.8% approving and 67.8% disapproving---nearly the exact opposite of Republicans. Independents had fairly similar ratings for both, with 33% approving of Nixon and Congress and 54.8% and 48.7% disapproving of each, respectively. 

Iowa Poll #213, conducted by the Des Moines Register, was administered to a random sample of Iowans in July 1974. In addition to the questions about Presidential and Congressional approval, the survey asked respondents their opinions on a wide variety of topics, including the economy, inflation, tax policy, and Watergate. Understanding Iowans’ past opinions on these topics can help us understand how perspectives have changed and what ideas have remained popular. IPOL has also been working with UI Libraries and the Des Moines Register to restore data from dozens of Iowa Polls from the 1960s to early 1980s. More information about the project can be found here. We are working to release a full report on our findings as we analyze additional questions.