Brief Summary
The Set-Up
Many Supreme Court cases are examinations of lower court decisions that the justices feel are important enough to review. U.S. v. Nixon is one of 'em.
It was argued at the height of the Watergate scandal, after a grand jury of the District Court of D.C. decided that seven people were nastily involved in a bunch of illegal White House operations. They were accused of all sorts of offenses including conspiracy to defraud the U.S. and obstruction of justice.
As part of his evidence-gathering, the special prosecutor in the case (Nixon fired the first one) sought a subpoena from the District Court requesting that Nixon hand over copies of certain tape-recorded convos with some of the men who'd been indicted. Nixon had secretly taped every conversation he had in the Oval Office.
It seemed like a good idea at the time.
Citing executive privilege and the belief that it was none of the court's beeswax, Nixon tried to quash the subpoena. Jaworski petitioned the District Court for judgment. They ruled that it was indeed their beeswax and that Nixon did not have an absolute right to confidentiality of all his communications.
In other words, fork over the tapes.
Nixon appealed, and both parties asked the Supremes to consider the case.
Enter: U.S. v. Nixon.
The Text
U.S. v. Nixon is the written Opinion of the Court, penned by Chief Justice Warren Burger. It's a summary of what happened in the District Court, followed by the Supreme Court's reasoning that led them to affirm the lower court's ruling.
Yeah, opinions aren't always fun.
Anyway, it addresses a bunch of issues, like whether the judicial branch could intervene in an executive branch battle; whether the special prosecutor obeyed all the rules in seeking the subpoena; and whether Nixon's claim to absolute executive privilege (confidentiality) of his conversations was a legit reason to withhold the taped evidence.
Even though the District Court put their decision on hold pending an appeal, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case. They knew this was a super-important matter that had to be decided ASAP. They also recognized that this was a tricky case, involving a criminal prosecution with a sitting president who likely had tons of evidence about the crimes and might have been a co-conspirator himself. They tried hard to balance a respect for the office of the president with the defendants' rights to due process, which necessitated the special prosecutor's access to the tapes he requested.
In the end, they decided that, absent some serious military or national security issues, the president's need for confidentiality was less important than disclosure of the information necessary for the prosecutor to do his job. The Supreme Court affirmed the lower court's ruling that denied the motion to quash.
Nixon was ordered to turn over his tapes to investigators.
P.S. Knowing that the contents of those tapes would be the final nail in his coffin, Nixon resigned a couple weeks after the ruling.
TL;DR
Nixon: "Uh, I'm the president. I do what I want, and no you can't have my tapes thankyouverymuch."
Supreme Court: "Nope."