Spiro Theodore Agnew

Agnew, Spiro Theodore (1918–96), U.S. vice president under Richard Nixon (1969–73). Agnew was elected Republican governor of Maryland (1966) and gained a reputation as a moderate liberal, though he later took a conservative stand toward civil rights demonstrations and urban unrest. He resigned from the vice presidency in 1973 following revelations of political corruption in his Maryland administration and pleaded no contest to a charge that he had failed to report income from payoffs by Maryland business people, for which he was fined $10,000. A Maryland court later fined him $248,000 for taking bribes while in office.

See also: Nixon, Richard Milhous.