University Archives

Becoming the president of the United States is an honor that is held to the highest regard, so, when that trust between the executive branch and the people of the United States is broken, that presidency is held into question. This established trust can be broken in a multitude of ways; treason, failure to uphold promises made during elections, or poor public policy decisions. A new trust-breaking event swept the United States in the January of 1998 where then President Bill Clinton became one of the, then, most ostracized presidents in U.S. history after his “improper sexual relationship with a young White House intern” named Monica Lewinsky. This paper completed an analysis of the article from Molly W. Sonner and Clyde Wilcox titled “Forgiving and Forgetting: Public Support for Bill Clinton during the Lewinsky Scandal”. It had also went into depth of the major issues, the public response, the government response and action to the scandal whilst also giving a personal opinion about the controversy myself. The article referenced throughout the research paper started off by going into depth of how the affair between 42nd U.S. President Bill Clinton and White House intern Monica Lewinsky caused a rift between the American people and the executive branch. This went further to the bi-cameral chambers, House of Representatives and the Senate, where the potentiality of impeachment was on the table.  Highlighted later on in the article, Clinton’s approval rating would only falter during the first week of the scandal and near the end, his approval rates would be the highest it ever would be for a multitude of reasons such as the strength of the economy, personality, political opponents, and whether or not this was even an issue for the American people to care about.