John Connally and fellow Texan president. In May 1973, Connally joined the Republican Party. When Vice President Spiro Agnew resigned five months later because of scandal, Connally was one of Nixon's potential choices to fill the vacancy. Nixon tapped Gerald Ford, the House Minority Leader from Grand Rapids, Michigan, because he believed that the moderate Ford could be easily confirmed by both houses of Congress, as required by the 25th Amendment to the United States Constitution. A Connally nomination presumably could have been blocked by liberal Democratic opposition. The weakened Nixon did not want a fight for the vice-presidential selection. Connally's party
Spiro Agnew of the Korean War. He resigned from Schreibers in 1952, and resumed his legal practice, specializing in labor law. In 1955, Lester Barrett was appointed a judge in Towson, the county seat of Baltimore County. Agnew moved his office there; at the same time he moved his family from Lutherville to Loch Raven, also in Baltimore County. There, he led a typical suburban lifestyle, as president of the local school's PTA, joining the Kiwanis and participating in a range of social and community activities. Historian William Manchester sums up the Agnew of those days: "His favorite musician was Lawrence Welk.