Richard Nixon was elected.
Richard Milhous Nixon ( January 9 , 1913 -- April 22 , 1994 ) was an American politician who served as the 37th President of the United States from 1969 until 1974 , when he became the only U.S. president to resign from office . Nixon was elected to the House of Representatives in 1946 and to the Senate in 1950 . In 1968 , he ran for the presidency again and was elected by defeating incumbent Vice President Hubert Humphrey . He was reelected in one of the largest electoral landslides in U.S. history in 1972 , when he defeated George McGovern .