WASHINGTON — The presidential pardon of Richard Nixon's Watergate misdeeds defined Gerald Ford's singular presidency.

That's not exactly what Ford had hoped. He saw Nixon's pardon on Sept. 8, 1974 as the first step toward being elected to the presidency on the merits of his own work. And there was no way Ford could focus on the nation's business as long as Nixon's legal fate remained unresolved.

"I had to get the monkey off my back," Ford wrote in his 1979 memoir, "A Time to Heal."

In fact, pardoning Nixon on Sept. 8, 1974 did nothing to seal Ford's place in history as, he hoped, a popularly elected president. Instead, the pardon had the effect of denying Ford his goal and delivering his opponent, Democrat Jimmy Carter, the White House in the 1976 election.

Even as he pondered the question that summer of 1974, Ford saw the downside no matter what he did.

If he sided with the 56 percent of Americans who wanted Nixon denied a pardon and tried in court, the legal drama would overshadow Ford's administration and possibly his election campaign.

Nixon, after all, had not been indicted but stood accused of serious crimes that would take time — perhaps years — to sort out. A grand jury had voted 19-0 to name him an unindicted co-conspirator in the coverup of White House involvement in the 1972 break-in at Democratic headquarters in the Watergate office building.

On the other hand, granting a pardon could touch off an uproar that would sink Ford's election hopes.

"I'm aware of that," Ford recalled in his 1979 memoir, "A Time to Heal," snapping at a cautious aide. "It could easily cost me the next election if I run again. But damn it, I don't need the polls to tell me whether I'm right or wrong."

Ford sought wisdom from the nation's founders and court decisions.The Supreme Court ruled in 1915 case that a pardon "carries an imputation of guilt, acceptance and a confession of it."

"So I had the legal authority to move ahead," Ford wrote.

Nixon, of all people, held up the process when he balked at Ford's request for a public statement of contrition.

"President Nixon is not issuing any statement whatsoever regarding Watergate, whether Jerry Ford pardons him or not," declared Nixon's spokesman, Ron Zeigler, Ford wrote.

The defiant style and the condescending use of Ford's name tempted Ford's aides to get up and leave a meeting with Nixon's representatives. Instead, Zeigler drafted three versions of the statement, the first "disastrous," Ford wrote.