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John Warner Biography & Facts

John William Warner III (February 18, 1927 – May 25, 2021) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the United States Secretary of the Navy from 1972 to 1974 and as a five-term Republican U.S. Senator from Virginia from 1979 to 2009. He served as Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee from 1999 to 2001, and again from 2003 to 2007. Warner also served as the Chairman of the Senate Rules Committee from 1995 to 1999. Warner was a veteran of the Second World War and Korean War, and was one of five World War II veterans serving in the Senate at the time of his retirement. He did not seek reelection in 2008. After leaving the Senate, he worked for the law firm of Hogan Lovells, where he had previously been employed before joining the United States Department of Defense as the Under Secretary of the Navy during the presidency of Richard Nixon in 1969. Warner's 2002 re-election is the most recent election in which a Republican won a U.S. Senate seat in Virginia. Early life and education John William Warner III was born on February 18, 1927, in Washington, D.C., to Martha Budd and Dr. John Warner Jr., an obstetrician-gynecologist in Washington. He grew up in the District, where he attended the elite St. Albans School before graduating from Woodrow Wilson High School in February 1945. Warner enlisted in the United States Navy during World War II in January 1945, shortly before his 18th birthday. He served until the following year, leaving as a petty officer third class. He went to college at Washington and Lee University, where he was a member of Beta Theta Pi, graduating in 1949; he then entered the University of Virginia Law School. Warner joined the U.S. Marine Corps in October 1950, after the outbreak of the Korean War, and served in Korea as a ground aircraft maintenance officer with the 1st Marine Aircraft Wing. His service number was 050488. He continued in the Marine Corps Reserves after the war, eventually reaching the rank of captain. He then resumed his studies, taking courses at the George Washington University before receiving his law degree from UVA in 1953. That year, he became a law clerk to Chief Judge E. Barrett Prettyman of the United States Court of Appeals. In 1956, he became an assistant prosecutor in the office of the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia. In 1960, he entered private law practice and joined Hogan & Hartson (now Hogan Lovells). In the 1960 United States presidential election, he served as an aide to Vice President Richard Nixon's campaign team. Secretary of the Navy After giving substantial funds and time to Nixon's successful presidential campaign in 1968, Warner was appointed Under Secretary of the Navy in the Nixon Administration in February 1969. On May 4, 1972, he succeeded John H. Chafee as Secretary of the Navy. Thereafter Warner was appointed by President Gerald Ford as delegate to the Law of the Sea talks, and he negotiated the U.S.-Soviet Incidents at Sea agreement which became a cause célèbre of pro-Détente doves in U.S.-Soviet relations. He was subsequently appointed by Gerald Ford to the post of Director of the American Revolution Bicentennial Administration. U.S. Senator Following Ford's defeat, Warner began to consider political office for himself. He entered politics in the 1978 Virginia election for U.S. Senate. Despite the publicity of being Elizabeth Taylor's husband and the large amounts of money Warner used in his campaign for the nomination, he finished second at the state Republican Party (GOP) convention to the far more conservative politician Richard D. Obenshain. Much of this loss was due to his perceived liberal political stances, especially his soft approach to U.S.-Soviet relations. In contrast, Obenshain was a noted anti-Soviet, a hardline anti-communist, and an opponent of other liberal policies including the Great Society and much of the Civil Rights Movement. However, when Obenshain died two months later in a plane crash, Warner was chosen to replace him and narrowly won the general election over Democrat Andrew P. Miller, a former Attorney General of Virginia. He was in the Senate until January 3, 2009. Despite his less conservative policy stances, Warner managed to be the second longest-serving senator in Virginia's history, behind only Harry F. Byrd Sr. and by far the longest-serving Republican Senator from the state. On August 31, 2007, Warner announced that he would not seek re-election in 2008. His committee memberships included the Environment and Public Works Committee, the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. As the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, he protected and increased the flow of billions of dollars into the Virginia economy each year via the state's military installations and shipbuilding firms which served his reelection efforts in every cycle. Warner was quite moderate, especially in comparison to most Republican Senators from the South. He was among the minority of Republicans to support some gun control laws. He voted for the Brady Bill and, in 1999, was one of only five Republicans to vote to close the so-called gun show loophole. While Warner voted against the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban, he co-sponsored efforts by Sen. Dianne Feinstein to reauthorize the ban in 2004 and 2005. Warner supported the Roe v. Wade decision establishing abortion rights and supported embryonic stem cell research, although he received high ratings from anti-abortion groups because he voted in favor of many abortion restrictions. On June 15, 2004, Warner was among the minority of his party to vote to expand hate crime laws to include sexual orientation as a protected category. He supported a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, but he raised concerns about the most recent Federal Marriage Amendment as being too restrictive, as it would have potentially banned civil unions as well. In 1987, Warner was one of the six Republicans who voted to reject the nomination of Robert Bork by President Ronald Reagan and the only Southern Republican to do so. Warner was re-elected easily in 1984 and 1990, and faced his first real challenge for re-election in 1996 from political newcomer Democrat Mark Warner (no relation), a millionaire who vastly outspent the incumbent and produced an unusually close election. John Warner prevailed with 52% of the vote. According to George Stephanopoulos, a former close aide to President Bill Clinton, Warner was among top choices to replace Les Aspin as the Secretary of Defense in the Clinton administration; Clinton ultimately selected William Perry. In the 1996 United States Presidential election, Warner served as a Senate teller (along with Democrat Wendell H. Ford) of electoral votes. Warner was among ten GOP Senators who voted against the charge of perjury during Clinton's impeachment (the others were Richard Shelby of Alabama, Ted Stevens.... Discover the John Warner popular books. Find the top 100 most popular John Warner books.