Richard Milhous Nixon was born on January 9th, 1913, in Yorba Linda, California. He was born into a large and predominantly poor family who lived on the edge of poverty. Dick had four brothers in which he loved very much. Tragedy struck at an early age for Dick when younger brother Arthur died of unpublished causes (Lindop, 10). From then on Nixon prided on making a success out of himself, to try to make up for the loss of his brother. Frank Nixon, the father of Dick, dropped out of school in sixth grade because he was poverty stricken and he needed to support himself (Lindop, 11). Dick knew that to make a success out of himself, it would take a lot of hard work, so he took his fathers advice on going to school. In his junior year at high school, Dick decided that he wanted to study law and become a politician. After high school he went on to attend Whittier College, which was nearby his high school. Dick earned outstanding grades in college earning the number two ra!
             nking in his class (Lindop, 12). After Whittier, he went on to attend Duke University Law School where he received scholarships that paid his full tuition. He graduated Duke in 1937 earning the third ranking of his class of twenty-five (Lindop, 12). He was elected president of the Duke Bar Association earning admission to the Order of the Coif, an honorary legal fraternity (Robinson, 2000). Shortly after returning home, Dick passed the California bar examination and became a lawyer.
             After school and joining the war, Nixon decided to give politics a shot as a Republican. In 1946, Nixon got his feet wet in the political arena when he won the Republican nomination in his Whittier district gaining a seat in the House of Representatives (Lindop, 14). Nixon's opponent in the race was Democratic Jerry Voorhis, who had attained the office for five terms (Lindop, 14). This is the point in which Nixon's began to build himself a reputation. Nixon did whateve...