Mickey Edwards
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Mickey Edwards is a retired Republican congressman who served Oklahoma's 5th congressional district from 1977 to 1993.
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[edit] Education and early career
Edwards was born July 12, 1937 in Cleveland, Ohio. He earned a B.A. in Journalism from the University of Oklahoma in 1958, a J.D. from Oklahoma City University School of Law in 1969, and was admitted to the Oklahoma bar in 1970. Edwards served as a newspaper reporter and editor from 1958 to 1963, engaged in advertising and public relations from 1963 to 1968 and was a magazine editor from 1968 to 1973. From 1973 to 1974 he served as a legislative assistant for the Republican Steering Committee in Washington, D.C. and was an instructor in law and journalism at Oklahoma City University in 1976.
[edit] Political career
During Edwards’ sixteen years in Congress, he served variously on the House Budget and Appropriations committees and was the ranking member of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Foreign Operations. He was also a member of the House Republican leadership, serving as the chairman of the House Republican Policy Committee, the party's fourth-ranking leadership position. In Edwards first run in 1974, he was defeated by incumbent conservative Democratic Congressman John Jarman, who switched parties to the Republican party shortly before retiring. The next time around in 1976, Edwards beat GOP establishment candidate G.T. Blankenship, a local banker and oilman who was a former state attorney general and former Republican leader in the state House of Representatives, in the Republican primary, and defeated Democrat Tom Dunlap in the general election.
Edwards was one of three founding trustees of the Heritage Foundation and national chairman of the American Conservative Union. Along with former White House Counsel Lloyd Cutler, he has served as co-chairman of Citizens for Independent Courts, a national organization devoted to preserving judicial independence, and co-chairman with another former White House Counsel, Abner Mikva, of Citizens for the Constitution, a national organization concerned with limiting the use of constitutional amendments as a substitute for the normal legislative process. Edwards has also served as co-chairman of a Brookings Institution/Council on Foreign Relations Task Force on Resources for International Affairs as well as the Brookings Working Group on Campaign Finance Reform and for five years as chairman of the annual Conservative Political Action Conference. He has served on the board of directors of the Constitution Project and was the director of the congressional policy task forces advising Ronald Reagan's 1980 presidential campaign.
[edit] Academic career
After leaving Congress, Edwards taught at Harvard Kennedy School of Government and Harvard Law School for 11 years, where he was the first John Quincy Adams Lecturer in Legislative Politics. He taught courses on Congress, political leadership, issue advocacy, election strategies, conservative political theory, and the constitutional separation of powers. In 1997, he was selected by students as the outstanding teacher in the Kennedy School. He has also served as a visiting professor at Georgetown University.
As of 2006, Edwards is a Lecturer of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and a member of the Princeton Project on National Security. He is also a Vice President of the Aspen Institute and Director of the Aspen Institute-Rodel Fellowships in Public Leadership.
[edit] Author and commentator
Edwards has been a regular political commentator on NPR's All Things Considered. His newspaper columns have appeared in the Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times, for which he has been a regular weekly columnist, and frequently in such other publications as the New York Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, San Francisco Examiner, Miami Herald and Wall Street Journal. A well-known public speaker, he has spoken on many college campuses, including West Point, University of Notre Dame, Duke University, Grinnell College, New York University, MIT, Georgetown University, American University, Boston College, University of Southern California, the University of Iowa, and many others.
Edwards has also authored numerous books and articles: "The Modern Conservative Movement" (2006), "Is Congress Gaining the Upper Hand? – Or is the Power of the President Dominant – A Century Foundation Essay," (2003), "Foreign Assistance and Foreign Policy (The Heritage Lectures)" (1987), "Behind Enemy Lines: A Rebel in Congress Proposes a Bold New Politics for the 1980s" (1983), "Hazardous to Your Health: A New Look at the Health Care Crisis in America" (1972) and co-authored "Winning the Influence Game: What Every Business Leader Should Know About Government" (2001) and "Financing America’s Leadership: Protecting American Interests and Promoting American Values" (1997). His latest book "Reclaiming Conservatism" was issued in February, 2008, by Oxford University Press.
[edit] Personal
Edwards was born in Cleveland, Cuyahoga County, Ohio, July 12, 1937, and spent most of his early years in the Capitol Hill section of Oklahoma City where his father, Eddie Edwards, managed a shoe store. He has one sister, Sheila Braithwaite, who lives in Sacramento, California.
Edwards is married to Elizabeth A. Sherman, Ph.D., a well-known Democratic political operative from Massachusetts. Sherman directed the Center for Women in Politics and Public Policy at the University of Massachusetts, Boston and served as a research fellow from 2001 to 2004 at the Center for Public Leadership and as a teaching fellow in 1994 for the Institute of Politics, both at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. She is currently an adjunct professor in the Graduate School of Public Policy and Public Administration at George Washington University. She is, as well, the Executive Director of Presidential Classroom in Alexandria, Virginia. Together Edwards and Sherman have appeared on numerous political talk shows taking opposing sides of many current political issues.
Edwards has three children and four grandchildren.
| Preceded by John Jarman |
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Oklahoma's 5th congressional district 1977–1993 |
Succeeded by Ernest Istook |
