Definition

Warren refers to: A network of underground interconnecting rabbit burrows, a place where rabbits breed and live. An overcrowded place or building.

Geographical names

Warrens, Saint Michael, Barbados

Warren, Manitoba, Canada

Warren, Ontario, Canada

Warren Park, Mashonaland East, Zimbabwe

Australia

Warren (biogeographic region)

Warren, New South Wales

Warren National Park, Western Australia

United Kingdom

Warren, Dorset

Warren, Pembrokeshire

Warren, South Yorkshire

Warren, Cheshire

Warren Corner, Hampshire

Warren Heath, Suffolk

Warren Row, Berkshire

Warren's Green, Hertfordshire

Warren Street, Kent, a hamlet

The Warren, Bracknell Forest, a suburb of Bracknell in Berkshire

The Warren (Yeading), stadium in Hayes, Hillingdon, Greater London

The Warren Hayes, Bromley, a former mansion now sports club used by the Metropolitian Police

Dawlish Warren, Devon

Hawkley Warren, a woodland near Petersfield

The Warren, Kent, part of the East Cliff and Warren Country Park

United States

Warren County

Warren Township (disambiguation)

; Populated places

Warren, Arizona

Warren, Arkansas

Warren (near Fellows), California

Warren (near Mojave), California

Warren, Colorado

Warren, Connecticut

Warren, Georgia

Warren, Idaho

Warren, Illinois

Warren, Indiana

Warren Park, Indiana

Warren, Maine

Warren, Maryland

Warren, Massachusetts

* Warren (CDP), Massachusetts

Warren, Michigan

Warren, Minnesota

Warren, Montana

Warren, New Hampshire

Warren, New York

Warren, Ohio

Warren, Oklahoma

Warren, Oregon

Warren, Pennsylvania

Warren South, Pennsylvania

Warren, Rhode Island

Warren, Tennessee

Warren City, Texas

Warren, Fannin County, Texas

Warren, Tyler County, Texas

Warren, Utah

Warren, Vermont

Warren's Gore, Vermont

Warren, Virginia

Warren, Washington

Warren, St. Croix County, Wisconsin

Warren, Waushara County, Wisconsin

Warrens, Wisconsin

F. E. Warren Air Force Base, Wyoming

; Parks

Warren Dunes State Park, Berrien County, Michigan

Warren Woods State Park, Berrien County, Michigan

Business

Warren House Inn, Dartmoor, United Kingdom

Warren Publishing, comic book publisher

Warrens Bakery, a United Kingdom bakery chain

Warren Theatres, a United States movie theatre chain

Education

High schools

Earl Warren High School, San Antonio, Texas

Warren Central High School (Indiana)

Warren Central High School (Kentucky)

Warren Central High School (Mississippi)

Warren East High School, Bowling Green, Kentucky

Warren High School (Downey, California)

Warren High School (Vincent, Ohio)

Warren High School (Warren, Arkansas)

Warren High School (Warren, Michigan)

Warren High School (Warren, Texas)

Warren Hills Regional School District, Warren County, New Jersey

Warren Township High School, Lake County, Illinois

Warren Woods Tower High School, Warren, Michigan

Colleges

Warren County Community College, New Jersey

Warren Wilson College, Swannanoa, North Carolina

Fiction

Harley Warren, an occultist from the H.P. Lovecraft horror tale "The Statement of Randolph Carter"

Melinda Warren, matriarch in the television show ''Charmed''

Warren (Malazan Book of the Fallen), a kind of magic in the ''Malazan Book of the Fallen'' series of fantasy novels by Steven Erikson

Warren (Porridge)

Warren (Suikoden)

Warren (Sword of Truth)

Warren Mears, a character from ''Buffy the Vampire Slayer''

Professor Miles Warren, a.k.a. the Jackal (Marvel Comics)

Warren Worthington III, a.k.a. X-Men member ''Archangel'', comic book character

''Mrs. Warren's Profession'', novel and stageplay

Warren Jensen, Mary's mentally disabled brother in There's Something About Mary

Warren T. Rat, a character from the film An American Tail

Transportation

Warren and Saline River Railroad in Warren, Arkansas

Warren County Canal, Ohio

Warren railway station, near Liverpool, UK (disused)

Warren Street tube station, London, UK

Warren/Woodlands Airport, Manitoba, Canada

Miscellaneous

USS ''Warren'', several ships of the Continental Navy and United States Navy

Warren abstract machine, a Prolog (software) engine

Warren Commission, which investigated the assassination of John F. Kennedy

Warren Cup, a Roman antiquity

Warren's Gate, an archaeological site

Warren's Skipper, a type of butterfly

Warren Wagon Train Raid, historic incident in Texas

Warren (free) ("Free warren"), a type of hunting franchise under the Anglo-Norman ''Forest law''

Warren (domestic), a rabbitry or fixed establishment of cuniculture

Warren v. District of Columbia, a U.S. Court of Appeals case that declared that police have no legal responsibility to protect individuals

Category:Place name disambiguation pages

ca:Warren de:Warren fr:Warren io:Gareno it:Warren he:וורן nl:Warren ja:ワーレン no:Warren (andre betydninger) pl:Warren pt:Warren ru:Уоррен (значения) simple:Warren sk:Warren fi:Warren sv:Warren vo:Warren

Name	Gerald Ford
Alt	President Gerald Ford, arms folded, in front of a United States Flag and the Presidential seal.
Office	38th President of the United States
Vicepresident	Nelson Rockefeller
Term start	August 9, 1974
Term end	January 20, 1977
Predecessor	Richard Nixon
Successor	Jimmy Carter
Office2	40th Vice President of the United States
President2	Richard Nixon
Term start2	December 6, 1973
Term end2	August 9, 1974
Predecessor2	Spiro Agnew
Successor2	Nelson Rockefeller
Office3	16th United States Minority Leader of the House of Representatives
Deputy3	Leslie Arends
Term start3	January 3, 1965
Term end3	December 6, 1973
Predecessor3	Charles Halleck
Successor3	John Rhodes
State4	Michigan
District4	5th
Term start4	January 3, 1949
Term end4	December 6, 1973
Predecessor4	Bartel Jonkman
Successor4	Richard Vander Veen
Birth date	July 14, 1913
Birth name	Leslie Lynch King, Jr.
Birth place	Omaha, Nebraska, U.S.
Death date	December 26, 2006
Death place	Rancho Mirage, California, U.S.
Party	Republican Party
Spouse	Betty Bloomer (1948–2006)
Children	MichaelJohnStevenSusan
Alma mater	University of MichiganYale Law School
Profession	Lawyer
Religion	Episcopal
Signature	Gerald Ford Signature.svg
Signature alt	Gerald R. Ford
Branch	United States Navy
Rank	Lieutenant Commander
Serviceyears	1942–1946
Battles	World War II
Awards	Asiatic-Pacific Campaign MedalAmerican Campaign MedalWorld War II Victory Medal }}

Gerald Rudolph "Jerry" Ford, Jr. (born Leslie Lynch King, Jr.; July 14, 1913 – December 26, 2006) was the 38th President of the United States, serving from 1974 to 1977, and the 40th Vice President of the United States serving from 1973 to 1974. As the first person appointed to the vice-presidency under the terms of the 25th Amendment (after Spiro Agnew had resigned), when he became President upon Richard Nixon's resignation on August 9, 1974, he became the only President of the United States who was never elected President nor Vice-President. Before ascending to the vice-presidency, Ford served nearly 25 years as the Representative from Michigan's 5th congressional district, eight of them as the Republican Minority Leader.

As President, Ford signed the Helsinki Accords, marking a move toward détente in the Cold War. With the conquest of South Vietnam by North Vietnam nine months into his presidency, U.S. involvement in Vietnam essentially ended. Domestically, Ford presided over arguably the worst economy since the Great Depression, with growing inflation and a recession during his tenure. One of his more controversial acts was to grant a presidential pardon to President Richard Nixon for his role in the Watergate scandal. During Ford's incumbency, foreign policy was characterized in procedural terms by the increased role Congress began to play, and by the corresponding curb on the powers of the President. In 1976, Ford narrowly defeated Ronald Reagan for the Republican nomination, but lost the presidential election to Democrat Jimmy Carter.

Following his years as president, Ford remained active in the Republican Party. After experiencing health problems and being admitted to the hospital four times in 2006, Ford died in his home on December 26, 2006. He lived longer than any other U.S. president, dying at 93 years and 165 days.

Early life

Childhood

Ford was born Leslie Lynch King, Jr., on July 14, 1913, at 3202 Woolworth Avenue in Omaha, Nebraska, where his parents lived with his paternal grandparents. His mother was Dorothy Ayer Gardner, and his father was Leslie Lynch King, Sr., a wool trader and son of prominent banker Charles Henry King and Martha King. Dorothy separated from King just sixteen days after her son's birth. She took her son with her to the Oak Park, Illinois home of her sister Tannisse and brother-in-law, Clarence Haskins James. From there, she moved to the home of her parents, Levi Addison Gardner and Adele Augusta Ayer in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Dorothy and King divorced in December 1913; she gained full custody of her son. Ford's paternal grandfather Charles Henry King paid child support until shortly before his death in 1930.

Ford later said his biological father had a history of hitting his mother. James M. Cannon, a member of the Ford administration, wrote in a Ford biography that the Kings' separation and divorce were sparked when, a few days after Ford's birth, Leslie King threatened Dorothy with a butcher knife and threatened to kill her, Ford, and Ford's nursemaid. Ford later told confidantes that his father had first hit his mother on their honeymoon for smiling at another man.

After two and a half years with her parents, on February 1, 1916, Dorothy married Gerald Rudolff Ford, a salesman in a family-owned paint and varnish company. They then called her son ''Gerald Rudolff Ford, Jr.'' The future president was never formally adopted, however, and he did not legally change his name until December 3, 1935; he also used a more conventional spelling of his middle name. He was raised in Grand Rapids with his three half brothers by his mother's second marriage: Thomas Gardner Ford (1918–1995), Richard Addison Ford (born 1924), and James Francis Ford (1927–2001).

Ford also had three half-siblings from his father's second marriage: Marjorie King (1921–1993), Leslie Henry King (1923–1976), and Patricia Jane King (born 1925). They never saw one another as children and he did not know them at all. Ford was not aware of his biological father until he was 17, when his parents told him about the circumstances of his birth. That year his father Leslie King, whom Ford described as a "carefree, well-to-do man who didn't really give a damn about the hopes and dreams of his firstborn son", approached Ford while he was waiting tables in a Grand Rapids restaurant. The two "maintained a sporadic contact" until Leslie King, Sr.'s death.

Ford maintained his distance emotionally, saying, "My stepfather was a magnificent person and my mother equally wonderful. So I couldn't have written a better prescription for a superb family upbringing."

Scouting and athletics

Ford was involved in The Boy Scouts of America, and earned that program's highest rank, Eagle Scout. In later years, Ford received the Distinguished Eagle Scout Award in May 1970 and Silver Buffalo Award from the Boy Scouts of America. He is the only U.S. president who was an Eagle Scout. Scouting was so important to Ford that his family asked that Scouts participate in his funeral. About 400 Eagle Scouts were part of the funeral procession, where they formed an honor guard as the casket went by in front of the museum. A few selected scouts served as ushers inside the National Cathedral.

Ford attended Grand Rapids South High School and was a star athlete and captain of his football team. In 1930, he was selected to the All-City team of the Grand Rapids City League. He also attracted the attention of college recruiters.

Attending the University of Michigan as an undergraduate, Ford played center and linebacker for the school's football team and helped the Wolverines to undefeated seasons and national titles in 1932 and 1933. The team suffered a steep decline in his 1934 senior year, however, winning only one game. Ford was the team's star nonetheless, and after a game during which Michigan held heavily favored Minnesota (the eventual national champion) to a scoreless tie in the first half, assistant coach Bennie Oosterbaan later said, "When I walked into the dressing room at half time, I had tears in my eyes I was so proud of them. Ford and [Cedric] Sweet played their hearts out. They were everywhere on defense." Ford later recalled, "During 25 years in the rough-and-tumble world of politics, I often thought of the experiences before, during, and after that game in 1934. Remembering them has helped me many times to face a tough situation, take action, and make every effort possible despite adverse odds." His teammates later voted Ford their most valuable player, with one assistant coach noting, "They felt Jerry was one guy who would stay and fight in a losing cause."

During the same season, in a game against the University of Chicago, Ford "became the only future U.S. president to tackle a future Heisman Trophy winner when he brought down running back Jay Berwanger, who would win the first Heisman the following year." In 1934, Ford was selected for the Eastern Team on the Shriner's East West Crippled Children game at San Francisco (a benefit for crippled children), played on January 1, 1935. As part of the 1935 Collegiate All-Star football team, Ford played against the Chicago Bears in an exhibition game at Soldier Field. By virtue of Ford's later career as President of the United States, the University of Michigan retired Ford's No.48 jersey in 1994.

Ford remained interested in football and his school throughout life, occasionally attending games. Ford also visited with players and coaches during practices, at one point asking to join the players in the huddle. Ford often had the Naval band play the University of Michigan fight song, ''The Victors'', before state events instead of ''Hail to the Chief''. He also selected the song to be played during his funeral procession at the U.S. Capitol. On his death in December 2006, the University of Michigan Marching Band played the fight song for him one final time, for his last ride from the Gerald R. Ford Airport in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Ford was also an avid golfer. In 1977, he shot a hole in one during a Pro-am held in conjunction with the Danny Thomas Memphis Classic at Colonial Country Club in Memphis, Tennessee. He received the 1985 Old Tom Morris Award from the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America, GCSAA's highest honor.

Education

At Michigan, Ford became a member of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity (Omicron chapter) and washed dishes at his fraternity house to earn money for college expenses. Following his graduation in 1935 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics, he turned down contract offers from the Detroit Lions and Green Bay Packers of the National Football League to take a coaching position at Yale and apply to its law school. Ford continued to contribute to football and boxing, accepting an assistant coaching job for both at Yale in September 1935.

Ford hoped to attend Yale's law school beginning in 1935 while serving as boxing coach and assistant varsity football coach. Yale officials at first denied his admission to the law school, because of his full-time coaching responsibilities. He spent the summer of 1937 as a student at the University of Michigan Law School and was eventually admitted in spring 1938 to Yale Law School. Ford earned his LL.B. degree in 1941 (later amended to Juris Doctor), graduating in the top 25 percent of his class. His introduction to politics came in the summer of 1940 when he worked in Wendell Willkie's presidential campaign. While attending Yale Law School, he joined a group of students led by R. Douglas Stuart, Jr., and signed a petition to enforce the 1939 Neutrality Act. The petition was circulated nationally and was the inspiration for the America First Committee, a group determined to keep the U.S. out of World War II.

Ford graduated from law school in 1941, and was admitted to the Michigan bar shortly thereafter. In May 1941, he opened a Grand Rapids law practice with a friend, Philip Buchen, who would later serve as Ford's White House counsel. But overseas developments caused a change in plans, and Ford responded to the attack on Pearl Harbor by enlisting in the Navy.

Naval service in World War II

Ford received a commission as ensign in the U.S. Naval Reserve on April 13, 1942. On April 20, he reported for active duty to the V-5 instructor school at Annapolis, Maryland. After one month of training, he went to Navy Preflight School in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where he was one of 83 instructors and taught elementary navigation skills, ordnance, gunnery, first aid and military drill. In addition, he coached in all nine sports that were offered, but mostly in swimming, boxing and football. During the one year he was at the Preflight School, he was promoted to Lieutenant Junior Grade on June 2, 1942, and to Lieutenant in March 1943.

Applying for sea duty, Ford was sent in May 1943 to the pre-commissioning detachment for the new aircraft carrier , at New York Shipbuilding Corporation, Camden, New Jersey. From the ship's commissioning on June 17, 1943, until the end of December 1944, Ford served as the assistant navigator, Athletic Officer, and antiaircraft battery officer on board the ''Monterey''. While he was on board, the carrier participated in many actions in the Pacific Theater with the Third and Fifth Fleets in late 1943 and 1944. In 1943, the carrier helped secure Makin Island in the Gilberts, and participated in carrier strikes against Kavieng, New Ireland in 1943. During the spring of 1944, the ''Monterey'' supported landings at Kwajalein and Eniwetok and participated in carrier strikes in the Marianas, Western Carolines, and northern New Guinea, as well as in the Battle of the Philippine Sea. After overhaul, from September to November 1944, aircraft from the ''Monterey'' launched strikes against Wake Island, participated in strikes in the Philippines and Ryukyus, and supported the landings at Leyte and Mindoro.

Although the ship was not damaged by Japanese forces, the ''Monterey'' was one of several ships damaged by the typhoon that hit Admiral William Halsey's Third Fleet on December 18–19, 1944. The Third Fleet lost three destroyers and over 800 men during the typhoon. The ''Monterey'' was damaged by a fire, which was started by several of the ship's aircraft tearing loose from their cables and colliding on the hangar deck. During the storm, Ford narrowly avoided becoming a casualty himself. As he was going to his battle station on the bridge of the ship in the early morning of December 18, the ship rolled twenty-five degrees, which caused Ford to lose his footing and slide toward the edge of the deck. The two-inch steel ridge around the edge of the carrier slowed him enough so he could roll, and he twisted into the catwalk below the deck. As he later stated, "I was lucky; I could have easily gone overboard."

Because of the extent of the fires, Admiral Halsey ordered Captain Ingersoll to abandon ship. Instead Captain Ingersoll ordered Ford to lead a fire brigade below. After five hours he and his team had put out the fire.

After the fire the ''Monterey'' was declared unfit for service, and the crippled carrier reached Ulithi on December 21 before continuing across the Pacific to Bremerton, Washington where it underwent repairs. On December 24, 1944, at Ulithi, Ford was detached from the ship and sent to the Navy Pre-Flight School at Saint Mary's College of California, where he was assigned to the Athletic Department until April 1945. One of his duties was to coach football. From the end of April 1945 to January 1946, he was on the staff of the Naval Reserve Training Command, Naval Air Station, Glenview, Illinois as the Staff Physical and Military Training Officer. On October 3, 1945, he was promoted to Lieutenant Commander. In January 1946, he was sent to the Separation Center, Great Lakes to be processed out. He was released from active duty under honorable conditions on February 23, 1946. On June 28, 1946, the Secretary of the Navy accepted Ford's resignation from the Naval Reserve.

For his naval service, Gerald Ford earned the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal with nine engagement stars for operations in the Gilbert Islands, Bismarck Archipelago, Marshall Islands, Asiatic and Pacific carrier raids, Hollandia, Marianas, Western Carolines, Western New Guinea, and the Leyte Operation. He also received the Philippine Liberation Medal with two bronze stars for Leyte and Mindoro, as well as the American Campaign and World War II Victory Medals.

Ford was a member of several civic organizations, including the American Legion, AMVETS, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, Sons of the Revolution, and Veterans of Foreign Wars.

Gerald R. Ford was initiated into Freemasonry on September 30, 1949. He later said in 1975, "When I took my obligation as a master mason—incidentally, with my three younger brothers—I recalled the value my own father attached to that order. But I had no idea that I would ever be added to the company of the Father of our Country and 12 other members of the order who also served as Presidents of the United States."

Marriage and children

On October 15, 1948, at Grace Episcopal Church in Grand Rapids, Ford married Elizabeth Bloomer Warren (1918–2011), a department store fashion consultant. Warren had been a John Robert Powers fashion model and a dancer in the auxiliary troupe of the Martha Graham Dance Company. She had previously been married to and divorced from William G. Warren.

At the time of his engagement, Ford was campaigning for what would be his first of thirteen terms as a member of the United States House of Representatives. The wedding was delayed until shortly before the elections because, as ''The New York Times'' reported in a 1974 profile of Betty Ford, "Jerry was running for Congress and wasn't sure how voters might feel about his marrying a divorced ex-dancer."

The couple had four children:

Michael Gerald, born in 1950

John Gardner, known as Jack, born in 1952

Steven Meigs, born in 1956

Susan Elizabeth, born in 1957

House of Representatives

After returning to Grand Rapids, Ford became active in local Republican politics, and supporters urged him to take on Bartel J. Jonkman, the incumbent Republican congressman. Military service had changed his view of the world; "I came back a converted internationalist", Ford wrote, "and of course our congressman at that time was an avowed, dedicated isolationist. And I thought he ought to be replaced. Nobody thought I could win. I ended up winning two to one." During his first campaign in 1948, Ford visited voters at their doorsteps and as they left the factories where they worked. Ford also visited local farms where, in one instance, a wager resulted in Ford spending two weeks milking cows following his election victory. Ford was known to his colleagues in the House as a "Congressman's Congressman".

Ford was a member of the House of Representatives for twenty-five years, holding the Grand Rapids congressional district seat from 1949 to 1973. It was a tenure largely notable for its modesty. As an editorial in ''The New York Times'' described him, Ford "saw himself as a negotiator and a reconciler, and the record shows it: he did not write a single piece of major legislation in his entire career". Appointed to the House Appropriations Committee two years after being elected, he was a prominent member of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee. Ford described his philosophy as "a moderate in domestic affairs, an internationalist in foreign affairs, and a conservative in fiscal policy".

In the early 1950s, Ford declined offers to run for both the Senate and the Michigan governorship. Rather, his ambition was to become Speaker of the House.

Warren Commission

In November 1963, President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed Ford to the Warren Commission, a special task force set up to investigate the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Ford was assigned to prepare a biography of Lee Harvey Oswald, the accused assassin. The Commission's work continues to be debated in the public arena.

In the preface to his book, ''A Presidential Legacy and The Warren Commission'', Ford said the CIA destroyed or kept from investigators critical secrets connected to the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy. He said the commission's probe put "certain classified and potentially damaging operations in danger of being exposed". The CIA's reaction, he added, "was to hide or destroy some information, which can easily be misinterpreted as collusion in JFK's assassination".

According to a 1963 FBI memo released in 2008, Ford secretly provided the FBI with information about two of his fellow commission members, both of whom were doubtful about the FBI's conclusions about the assassination. The FBI position was that President Kennedy was shot by a single gunman firing from the Texas Book Depository. Another 1963 memo released in 1978 stated that Representative Ford volunteered to advise the FBI regarding the content of the commission's deliberations if his involvement with the bureau was kept confidential, a condition which the bureau approved. Ford was an outspoken proponent of the single-assassin theory. According to the same reports, Ford had strong ties to the FBI and J. Edgar Hoover.

House Minority Leader

In 1964, Democratic President Lyndon Johnson led a landslide victory for his party, securing another term as president and taking 36 seats from Republicans in the House of Representatives. Following the election, members of the Republican caucus looked to select a new Minority Leader. Three members approached Ford to see if he would be willing to serve; after consulting with his family, he agreed. After a closely contested election, Ford was chosen to replace Charles Halleck of Indiana as Minority Leader.

The Republicans had 140 seats in the House compared with the 295 seats held by the Democrats. Consequently, the Johnson Administration proposed and passed a series of programs termed by President Johnson as the "Great Society". During the first session of the Eighty-ninth Congress alone, the Johnson Administration submitted eighty-seven bills to Congress, and Johnson signed eighty-four, or 96%, arguably the most successful legislative agenda in U.S. Congressional history.

Criticism over the Johnson Administration's handling of the Vietnam War began to grow in 1966, with Ford and Congressional Republicans expressing concern that the United States was not doing what was necessary to win the war. Public sentiment also began to move against Johnson, and the 1966 midterm elections saw a 47-seat swing in favor of the Republicans. This was not enough to give Republicans a majority in the House, but the victory did give Ford the opportunity to prevent the passage of further Great Society programs.

Ford's private criticism of the Vietnam War became public following a speech from the floor of the House, in which he questioned whether the White House had a clear plan to bring the war to a successful conclusion. The speech angered President Johnson, who accused Ford of playing "too much football without a helmet".

As Minority Leader in the House, Ford appeared in a popular series of televised press conferences with famed Illinois Senator Everett Dirksen, in which they proposed Republican alternatives to Johnson's policies. Many in the press jokingly called this "The Ev and Jerry Show". Johnson said at the time, "Jerry Ford is so dumb he can't fart and chew gum at the same time." The press, used to sanitizing LBJ's salty language, reported this as "Gerald Ford can't walk and chew gum at the same time."

Ford's role shifted under President Nixon to being an advocate for the White House agenda. Congress passed several of Nixon's proposals, including the National Environmental Policy Act and the Tax Reform Act of 1969. Another high-profile victory for the Republican minority was the State and Local Fiscal Assistance act. Passed in 1972, the act established a Revenue Sharing program for state and local governments. Ford's leadership was instrumental in shepherding revenue sharing through Congress, and resulted in a bipartisan coalition that supported the bill with 223 votes in favor (compared with 185 against).

During the eight years (1965–1973) he served as Minority Leader, Ford won many friends in the House because of his fair leadership and inoffensive personality. An office building in the U.S. Capitol Complex, House Annex 2, was renamed for Gerald Ford as the Ford House Office Building.

Vice Presidency, 1973–74

On October 10, 1973, Vice President Agnew resigned and then pleaded no contest to criminal charges of tax evasion and money laundering, part of a negotiated resolution to a scheme in which he accepted $29,500 in bribes while governor of Maryland. According to ''The New York Times'', "Nixon sought advice from senior Congressional leaders about a replacement. The advice was unanimous. 'We gave Nixon no choice but Ford,' House Speaker Carl Albert recalled later".

Ford was nominated to take Agnew's position on October 12, the first time the vice-presidential vacancy provision of the 25th Amendment had been implemented. The United States Senate voted 92 to 3 to confirm Ford on November 27. Only three Senators, all Democrats, voted against Ford's confirmation: Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin, Thomas Eagleton of Missouri and William Hathaway of Maine. On December 6, the House confirmed Ford by a vote of 387 to 35. One hour after the confirmation vote in the House, Ford took the oath of office as Vice President of the United States. Ford's brief tenure as Vice-President was little noted by the media as reporters were preoccupied by the continuing revelations about crimes committed during the 1972 presidential election and allegations of cover-ups within the White House.

Following Ford's appointment, the Watergate investigation continued until Chief of Staff Alexander Haig contacted Ford on August 1, 1974, and told him that "smoking gun" evidence had been found. The evidence left little doubt that President Nixon had been a part of the Watergate cover-up. At the time, Ford and his wife, Betty, were living in suburban Virginia, waiting for their expected move into the newly-designated vice president's residence in Washington, D.C. However, "Al Haig [asked] to come over and see me," Ford later related, "to tell me that there would be a new tape released on a Monday, and he said the evidence in there was devastating and there would probably be either an impeachment or a resignation. And he said, 'I'm just warning you that you've got to be prepared, that things might change dramatically and you could become President.' And I said, 'Betty, I don't think we're ever going to live in the vice president's house.

Presidency, 1974–77

Accession

When Nixon resigned on August 9, 1974, Ford assumed the presidency, making him the only person to assume the vice-presidency and the presidency without having been voted into either office. Immediately after taking the oath of office in the East Room of the White House, he spoke to the assembled audience in a speech broadcast live to the nation. Ford noted the peculiarity of his position: "I am acutely aware that you have not elected me as your president by your ballots, and so I ask you to confirm me as your president with your prayers." He went on to state:

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He also stated: }}

A portion of the speech would later be memorialized with a plaque at the entrance to his presidential museum.

On August 20, Ford nominated former New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller to fill the vice presidency he had vacated. Rockefeller's top competitor had been George H. W. Bush. Rockefeller underwent extended hearings before Congress, which caused embarrassment when it was revealed he made large gifts to senior aides, such as Henry Kissinger. Although conservative Republicans were not pleased that Rockefeller was picked, most of them voted for his confirmation, and his nomination passed both the House and Senate. Some, including Barry Goldwater, voted against him.

Pardon of Nixon

On September 8, 1974, Ford issued Proclamation 4311, which gave Nixon a full and unconditional pardon for any crimes he may have committed against the United States while President. In a televised broadcast to the nation, Ford explained that he felt the pardon was in the best interests of the country, and that the Nixon family's situation "is a tragedy in which we all have played a part. It could go on and on and on, or someone must write the end to it. I have concluded that only I can do that, and if I can, I must." When he announced the Nixon pardon, Ford also introduced a conditional amnesty program for Vietnam War draft dodgers who had fled to countries such as Canada. Unconditional amnesty, however, did not come about until the Jimmy Carter Presidency.

The Nixon pardon was highly controversial. Critics derided the move and claimed, a "corrupt bargain" had been struck between the men. They claimed Ford's pardon was granted in exchange for Nixon's resignation that elevated Ford to the Presidency. According to Bob Woodward, Nixon Chief of Staff Alexander Haig proposed a pardon deal to Ford. He later decided to pardon Nixon for other reasons, primarily the friendship he and Nixon shared. Regardless, historians believe the controversy was one of the major reasons Ford lost the election in 1976, an observation with which Ford agreed. In an editorial at the time, ''The New York Times'' stated that the Nixon pardon was "a profoundly unwise, divisive and unjust act" that in a stroke had destroyed the new president's "credibility as a man of judgment, candor and competence".

Ford's first press secretary and close friend Jerald Franklin terHorst resigned his post in protest after President Nixon's full pardon. Ford also voluntarily appeared before Congress on October 17, 1974 to give sworn testimony—the only time a sitting president has done so—about the pardon.

After Ford left the White House in 1977, intimates said that the former President privately justified his pardon of Nixon by carrying in his wallet a portion of the text of ''Burdick v. United States'', a 1915 U.S. Supreme Court decision which stated that a pardon indicated a presumption of guilt, and that acceptance of a pardon was tantamount to a confession of that guilt. In 2001, the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation awarded the John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award to Ford for his pardon of Nixon. In presenting the award to Ford, Senator Ted Kennedy said that he had initially been opposed to the pardon of Nixon, but later stated that history had proved Ford to have made the correct decision.

Administration and cabinet

Upon assuming office, Ford inherited Nixon's cabinet. During Ford's brief administration, only Secretary of State Kissinger and Secretary of the Treasury William E. Simon remained. Ford appointed William Coleman as Secretary of Transportation, the second African American to serve in a presidential cabinet (after Robert Clifton Weaver) and the first appointed in a Republican administration.

{| cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="float:right; margin:10px; background:#fafafa; border:1px solid #aaa; font-size:85%; border-spacing:4px; float:right;" |- ! style="background:#dcdcdc;" colspan="3"|The Ford Cabinet |- |align="left"|OFFICE||align="left"|NAME||align="left"|TERM |- !colspan="3"| ---- |- |align="left"|President||align="left" |Gerald Ford||align="left"|1974–1977 |- |align="left"|Vice President||align="left"|Nelson Rockefeller||align="left"|1974–1977 |- !colspan="3"| ---- |- |align="left"|State||align="left"|Henry Kissinger||align="left"|1974–1977 |- |align="left"|Treasury||align="left"|William E. Simon||align="left"|1974–1977 |- |align="left"|Defense||align="left"|James R. Schlesinger||align="left"|1974–1975 |- |align="left"| ||align="left"|Donald Rumsfeld||align="left"|1975–1977 |- |align="left"|Justice||align="left"|William B. Saxbe||align="left"|1974–1975 |- |align="left"| ||align="left"|Edward Levi||align="left"|1975–1977 |- |align="left"|Interior||align="left"|Rogers Morton||align="left"|1974–1975 |- |align="left"| ||align="left"|Stanley K. Hathaway||align="left"|1975 |- |align="left"| ||align="left"|Thomas S. Kleppe||align="left"|1975–1977 |- |align="left"|Agriculture||align="left"|Earl Butz||align="left"|1974–1976 |- |align="left"| ||align="left"|John Albert Knebel||align="left"|1976–1977 |- |align="left"|Commerce||align="left"|Frederick B. Dent||align="left"|1974–1975 |- |align="left"| ||align="left"|Rogers Morton||align="left"|1975 |- |align="left"| ||align="left"|Elliot Richardson||align="left"|1975–1977 |- |align="left"|Labor||align="left"|Peter J. Brennan||align="left"|1974–1975 |- |align="left"| ||align="left"|John Thomas Dunlop||align="left"|1975–1976 |- |align="left"| ||align="left"|William Usery, Jr.||align="left"|1976–1977 |- |align="left"|HEW||align="left"|Caspar Weinberger||align="left"|1974–1975 |- |align="left"| ||align="left"|F. David Mathews||align="left"|1975–1977 |- |align="left"|HUD||align="left"|James Thomas Lynn||align="left"|1974–1975 |- |align="left"| ||align="left"|Carla Anderson Hills||align="left"|1975–1977 |- |align="left"|Transportation||align="left"|Claude Brinegar||align="left"|1974–1975 |- |align="left"| ||align="left"|William Thaddeus Coleman, Jr.||align="left"|1975–1977 |}

Other cabinet-level posts:

White House Chief of Staff

*Alexander Haig (1974)

*Donald Rumsfeld (1974–1975)

*Dick Cheney (1975–1977)

Director of the Office of Management and Budget

*Roy Ash (1974–1975)

*James T. Lynn (1975–1977)

United States Trade Representative

*William D. Eberle (1974–1975)

*Frederick B. Dent (1975–1977)

Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency

*Russell E. Train (1974–1977)

United States Ambassador to the United Nations

*John A. Scali (1974–1975)

*Daniel Patrick Moynihan (1975–1976)

*William Scranton (1976–1977)

Other important posts:

United States National Security Advisor

*Henry Kissinger (1974–1975)

*Brent Scowcroft (1975–1977)

Director of Central Intelligence

*William E. Colby (1974–1976)

*George H. W. Bush (1976–1977)

Ford selected George H.W. Bush as Chief of the US Liaison Office to the People's Republic of China in 1974, and then Director of the Central Intelligence Agency in late 1975.

Ford's transition chairman and first Chief of Staff was former congressman and ambassador Donald Rumsfeld. In 1975, Rumsfeld was named by Ford as the youngest-ever Secretary of Defense. Ford chose a young Wyoming politician, Richard Cheney, to replace Rumsfeld as his new Chief of Staff and later campaign manager for Ford's 1976 presidential campaign. Ford's dramatic reorganization of his Cabinet in the fall of 1975 has been referred to by political commentators as the "Halloween Massacre".

Midterm elections

The 1974 Congressional midterm elections took place fewer than three months after Ford assumed office and in the wake of the Watergate scandal. The Democratic Party turned voter dissatisfaction into large gains in the House elections, taking 49 seats from the Republican Party, and increasing their majority to 291 of the 435 seats. This was one more than the number needed (290) for a two-thirds majority, necessary to override a Presidential veto (or to propose a constitutional amendment). Perhaps due in part to this fact, the 94th Congress overrode the highest percentage of vetoes since Andrew Johnson was President of the United States (1865–1869). Even Ford's old, reliably Republican seat was taken by Democrat Richard Vander Veen, defeating Republican Robert VanderLaan. In the Senate elections, the Democratic majority became 61 in the 100-seat body.

Domestic policy

The economy was a great concern during the Ford administration. One of the first acts the new president took to deal with the economy was to create the Economic Policy Board by Executive Order on September 30, 1974. In response to rising inflation, Ford went before the American public in October 1974 and asked them to "Whip Inflation Now". As part of this program, he urged people to wear "WIN" buttons. At the time, inflation was believed to be the primary threat to the economy, more so than growing unemployment. They felt as though controlling inflation would work to fix unemployment. To rein in inflation, it was necessary to control the public's spending. To try to mesh service and sacrifice, "WIN" called for Americans to reduce their spending and consumption. On October 4, 1974, Ford gave a speech in front of a joint session of Congress and as a part of this speech kicked off the "WIN" campaign. Over the next nine days 101,240 Americans mailed in "WIN" pledges. In hindsight, this was viewed as simply a public relations gimmick without offering any means of solving the underlying problems. The main point of that speech was to introduce to Congress a one-year, five-percent income tax increase on corporations and wealthy individuals. This plan would also take $4.4 billion out of the budget bringing federal spending below $300 billion. At the time, inflation was approximately seven percent.

Ford was confronted with a potential swine flu pandemic. In the early 1970s, an influenza strain H1N1 shifted from a form of flu that affected primarily pigs and crossed over to humans. On February 5, 1976, an army recruit at Fort Dix mysteriously died and four fellow soldiers were hospitalized; health officials announced that "swine flu" was the cause. Soon after, public health officials in the Ford administration urged that every person in the United States be vaccinated. Although the vaccination program was plagued by delays and public relations problems, some 25% of the population was vaccinated by the time the program was canceled in December of that year. The vaccine was blamed for twenty-five deaths; more people died from the shots than from the swine flu.

Ford was an outspoken supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment, issuing Presidential Proclamation 4383.

As president, Ford's position on abortion was that he supported "a federal constitutional amendment that would permit each one of the 50 States to make the choice". This had also been his position as House Minority Leader in response to the 1973 Supreme Court case of ''Roe v. Wade'', which he opposed. Ford came under criticism for a ''60 Minutes'' interview his wife Betty gave in 1975, in which she stated that ''Roe v. Wade'' was a "great, great decision". During his later life, Ford would identify as pro-choice.

Budget

The federal budget ran a deficit every year Ford was President. Despite his reservations about how the program ultimately would be funded in an era of tight public budgeting, Ford signed the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975, which established special education throughout the United States. Ford expressed "strong support for full educational opportunities for our handicapped children" according to the official White House press release for the bill signing.

The economic focus began to change as the country sank into a mild recession. The focus of the Ford administration became fixing the increase in unemployment, which hit 7.2 percent in December 1974. In January 1975, Ford proposed a 1 year tax reduction of $16 billion to stimulate economic growth, along with spending cuts to avoid inflation. Ford was criticized greatly for quickly switching from advocating a tax increase to a tax reduction. In Congress, the proposed amount of the tax reduction increased to $22.8 billion in tax cuts and lacked spending cuts. In March 1975, Congress passed, and Ford signed into law, these income tax rebates as part of the Tax Reduction Act of 1975. This resulted in a federal deficit of around $53 billion for the 1975 fiscal year and $73.7 billion for 1976.

When New York City faced bankruptcy in 1975, Mayor Abraham Beame was unsuccessful in obtaining Ford's support for a federal bailout. The incident prompted the New York ''Daily News''' famous headline "Ford to City: Drop Dead", referring to a speech in which "Ford declared flatly ... that he would veto any bill calling for 'a federal bail-out of New York City. The following month, November 1975, Ford changed his stance and asked Congress to approve federal loans to New York City.

Foreign policy

Ford continued the détente policy with both the Soviet Union and China, easing the tensions of the Cold War. Still in place from the Nixon Administration was the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT). The thawing relationship brought about by Nixon's visit to China was reinforced by Ford's December 1975 visit to the communist country. In 1975, the Administration entered into the Helsinki Accords with the Soviet Union, creating the framework of the Helsinki Watch, an independent non-governmental organization created to monitor compliance that later evolved into Human Rights Watch.

Ford attended the inaugural meeting of the Group of Seven (G7) industrialized nations (initially the G5) in 1975 and secured membership for Canada. Ford supported international solutions to issues. "We live in an interdependent world and, therefore, must work together to resolve common economic problems," he said in a 1974 speech.

Middle East

In the Middle East and eastern Mediterranean, two ongoing international disputes developed into crises. The Cyprus dispute turned into a crisis with the Turkish invasion of Cyprus, causing extreme strain within the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) alliance. In mid-August, the government withdrew Greece from the NATO military structure; in mid-September 1974, the Senate and House of Representatives overwhelmingly voted to halt military aid to Turkey. Ford, concerned with both the effect of this on Turkish-American relations and the deterioration of security on NATO's eastern front, vetoed the bill. A second bill was passed by the house, and vetoed, although a compromise was accepted to continue aid until the end of the year. As Ford expected, Turkish relations were considerably disrupted until 1978.

In the continuing Arab-Israeli conflict, although the initial cease fire had been implemented to end active conflict in the Yom Kippur War, Kissinger's continuing shuttle diplomacy was showing little progress. Ford considered it "stalling" and wrote, "Their [Israeli] tactics frustrated the Egyptians and made me mad as hell." During Kissinger's shuttle to Israel in early March 1975, a last minute reversal to consider further withdrawal, prompted a cable from Ford to Prime Minister Yitzak Rabin, which included:

On March 24, Ford received congressional leaders of both parties and informed them of the reassessment of the administration policies in the Middle East. "Reassessment", in practical terms, meant to cancel or suspend further aid to Israel. For six months between March and September 1975, the United States refused to conclude any new arms agreements with Israel. Rabin notes it was "an innocent-sounding term that heralded one of the worst periods in American-Israeli relations". As could be expected, the announced reassessments upset the American Jewish community and Israel's well-wishers in Congress. On May 21, Ford "experienced a real shock", seventy-six senators wrote him a letter urging him to be "responsive" to Israel's request for $2.59 billion in military and economic aid. Ford felt truly annoyed and thought the chance for peace was jeopardized. It was, since the September 1974 ban on arms to Turkey, the second major congressional intrusion upon the President's [foreign policy] prerogatives. The following summer months were described by Ford as an American-Israeli "war of nerves" or "test of wills", and after much bargaining, the Sinai Interim Agreement (Sinai II), was formally signed on September 1 and aid resumed.

Vietnam

One of Ford's greatest challenges was dealing with the continued Vietnam War. American offensive operations against North Vietnam had ended with the Paris Peace Accords, signed on January 27, 1973. The accords declared a cease fire across both North and South Vietnam, and required the release of American prisoners of war. The agreement guaranteed the territorial integrity of Vietnam and, like the Geneva Conference of 1954, called for national elections in the North and South. The Paris Peace Accords stipulated a sixty-day period for the total withdrawal of U.S. forces.

The accords had been negotiated by United States National Security Advisor Kissinger and North Vietnamese politburo member Le Duc Tho. South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu was not involved in the final negotiations, and publicly criticized the proposed agreement. However, anti-war pressures within the United States forced Nixon and Kissinger to pressure Thieu to sign the agreement and enable the withdrawal of American forces. In multiple letters to the South Vietnamese president, Nixon had promised that the United States would defend his government, should the North Vietnamese violate the accords.

In December 1974, months after Ford took office, North Vietnamese forces invaded the province of Phuoc Long. General Trần Văn Trà sought to gauge any South Vietnamese or American response to the invasion, as well as to solve logistical issues before proceeding with the invasion.

As North Vietnamese forces advanced, Ford requested aid for South Vietnam in a $522 million aid package. The funds had been promised by the Nixon administration, but Congress voted against the proposal by a wide margin. Senator Jacob Javits offered "...large sums for evacuation, but not one nickel for military aid". President Thieu resigned on April 21, 1975, publicly blaming the lack of support from the United States for the fall of his country. Two days later, on April 23, Ford gave a speech at Tulane University. In that speech, he announced that the Vietnam War was over "...as far as America is concerned". The announcement was met with thunderous applause. 1,373 U.S. citizens and 5,595 Vietnamese and third country nationals were evacuated from the South Vietnamese capital of Saigon during Operation Frequent Wind. Military and Air America helicopters took evacuees to U.S. Navy ships off-shore during an approximately 24-hour period on April 29 to 30, 1975, immediately preceding the fall of Saigon. During the operation, so many South Vietnamese helicopters landed on the vessels taking the evacuees that some were pushed overboard to make room for more people. Other helicopters, having nowhere to land, were deliberately crash landed into the sea, close to the ships, their pilots bailing out at the last moment to be picked up by rescue boats.

Many of the Vietnamese evacuees were allowed to enter the United States under the Indochina Migration and Refugee Assistance Act. The 1975 Act appropriated $455 million toward the costs of assisting the settlement of Indochinese refugees. In all, 130,000 Vietnamese refugees came to the United States in 1975. Thousands more escaped in the years that followed.

Mayaguez and Panmunjom

North Vietnam's victory over the South led to a considerable shift in the political winds in Asia, and Ford administration officials worried about a consequent loss of U.S. influence there. The administration proved it was willing to respond forcefully to challenges to its interests in the region on two occasions, once when Khmer Rouge forces seized an American ship in international waters and again when American military officers were killed in the demilitarized zone (DMZ) between North and South Korea.

The first crisis was the Mayaguez Incident. In May 1975, shortly after the fall of Saigon and the Khmer Rouge conquest of Cambodia, Cambodians seized the American merchant ship ''Mayaguez'' in international waters. Ford dispatched Marines to rescue the crew, but the Marines landed on the wrong island and met unexpectedly stiff resistance just as, unknown to the U.S., the ''Mayaguez'' sailors were being released. In the operation, two military transport helicopters carrying the Marines for the assault operation were shot down, and 41 U.S. servicemen were killed and 50 wounded while approximately 60 Khmer Rouge soldiers were killed. Despite the American losses, the operation was seen as a success in the United States and Ford enjoyed an 11-point boost in his approval ratings in the aftermath. The Americans killed during the operation became the last to have their names inscribed on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall in Washington, D.C.

Some historians have argued that the Ford administration felt the need to respond forcefully to the incident because it was construed as a Soviet plot. But recent work by Andrew Gawthorpe, based on an analysis of the administration's internal discussions, shows that Ford's national security team understood that the seizure of the vessel was a local, and perhaps even accidental, provocation by an immature Khmer government. Nevertheless, they felt the need to respond forcefully to discourage further provocations by other Communist countries in Asia.

The second crisis, known as the axe murder incident, occurred at Panmunjom, a village which stands in the DMZ between the two Koreas. At the time, this was the only part of the DMZ where forces from the North and the South came into contact with each other. Encouraged by U.S. difficulties in Vietnam, North Korea had been waging a campaign of diplomatic pressure and minor military harassment to try and convince the U.S. to withdraw from South Korea. Then, in August 1976, North Korean forces killed two U.S. officers and injured South Korean guards who were engaged in trimming a tree in Panmunjom's Joint Security Area. The attack coincided with a meeting of the Conference of Non-Aligned Nations in Colombo, Sri Lanka, at which Kim Jong-il, the son of North Korean leader Kim Il-sung, presented the incident as an example of American aggression, helping secure the passage of a motion calling for a U.S. withdrawal from the South.

At administration meetings, Kissinger voiced the concern that the North would see the U.S. as "the paper tigers of Saigon" if they did not respond, and Ford agreed with that assessment. After mulling various options the Ford administration decided that it was necessary to respond with a major show of force. A large number of ground forces went to cut down the tree, while at the same time the air force was deployed, which included B-52 bomber flights over Panmunjom. The North Korean government backed down and allowed the tree-cutting to go ahead, and later issued an unprecedented official apology.

Assassination attempts

Ford faced two assassination attempts during his presidency, occurring within three weeks of each other: while in Sacramento, California, on September 5, 1975, Lynette Fromme, a follower of Charles Manson, pointed a Colt .45-caliber handgun at Ford. As Fromme pulled the trigger, Larry Buendorf, a Secret Service agent, grabbed the gun and managed to insert the webbing of his thumb under the hammer, preventing the gun from firing. It was later found that, although the semi-automatic pistol had four cartridges in the magazine, the weapon had not been chambered, making it impossible for the gun to fire. Fromme was taken into custody; she was later convicted of attempted assassination of the President and was sentenced to life in prison; she was paroled on August 14, 2009.

In reaction to this attempt, the Secret Service began keeping Ford at a more secure distance from anonymous crowds, a strategy that may have saved his life seventeen days later: as he left the St. Francis Hotel in downtown San Francisco, Sara Jane Moore, standing in a crowd of onlookers across the street, pointed her .38-caliber revolver at him. Just before she fired, former Marine Oliver Sipple grabbed at the gun and deflected her shot; the bullet struck a wall about six inches above and to the right of Ford's head, then ricocheted and hit a taxi driver, who was slightly wounded. Moore was later sentenced to life in prison. She was paroled on December 31, 2007, having served 32 years.

Judicial appointments

In 1975, Ford appointed John Paul Stevens as Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States to replace retiring Justice William O. Douglas. Stevens had been a judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, appointed by President Nixon. During his tenure as House Republican leader, Ford had led efforts to have Douglas impeached. After being confirmed, Stevens eventually disappointed some conservatives by siding with the Court's liberal wing regarding the outcome of many key issues. Nevertheless, President Ford paid tribute to Stevens. "He has served his nation well," Ford said of Stevens, "with dignity, intellect and without partisan political concerns."

In addition to the Stevens appointment, Ford appointed 11 judges to the United States Courts of Appeals, and 50 judges to the United States district courts.

1976 presidential election

Ford reluctantly agreed to run for office in 1976, but first he had to counter a challenge for the Republican party nomination. Then-former Governor of California Ronald Reagan and the party's conservative wing faulted Ford for failing to do more in South Vietnam, for signing the Helsinki Accords and for negotiating to cede the Panama Canal (negotiations for the canal continued under President Carter, who eventually signed the Torrijos-Carter Treaties). Reagan launched his campaign in autumn of 1975 and won several primaries before withdrawing from the race at the Republican Convention in Kansas City, Missouri. The conservative insurgency convinced Ford to drop the more liberal Vice President Nelson Rockefeller in favor of Kansas Senator Bob Dole.

In addition to the pardon dispute and lingering anti-Republican sentiment, Ford had to counter a plethora of negative media imagery. Chevy Chase often did pratfalls on ''Saturday Night Live'', imitating Ford, who had been seen stumbling on two occasions during his term. As Chase commented, "He even mentioned in his own autobiography it had an effect over a period of time that affected the election to some degree."

President Ford's 1976 election campaign had the advantage that he was an incumbent president during several anniversary events held during the period leading up to the United States Bicentennial. The Washington, D.C. fireworks display on the Fourth of July was presided over by the President and televised nationally. On July 7, 1976, the President and First Lady served as hosts at a White House state dinner for Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip of the United Kingdom, which was televised on the Public Broadcasting Service network. The 200th anniversary of the Battles of Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts gave Ford the opportunity to deliver a speech to 110,000 in Concord acknowledging the need for a strong national defense tempered with a plea for "reconciliation, not recrimination" and "reconstruction, not rancor" between the United States and those who would pose "threats to peace". Speaking in New Hampshire on the previous day, Ford condemned the growing trend toward big government bureaucracy and argued for a return to "basic American virtues".

Democratic nominee and former Georgia governor Jimmy Carter campaigned as an outsider and reformer, gaining support from voters dismayed by the Watergate scandal and Nixon pardon. After the Democratic National Convention, he held a huge 33-point lead over Ford in the polls. However, as the campaign continued, the race tightened, and, by election day, the polls showed the race as too close to call. There were three main events in the fall campaign. Most importantly, Carter repeated a promise of a "blanket pardon" for Christian and other religious refugees, and also all Vietnam War draft dodgers (Ford had only issued a conditional amnesty) in response to a question on the subject posed by a reporter during the presidential debates, an act which froze Ford's poll numbers in Ohio, Wisconsin, Hawaii, and Mississippi. (Ford had needed only to shift 11,000 votes in two of those four states in order to win.) Americans viewed the pardon as an essential moral act and as the true end to a bitterly hated war. It was the first act signed by Carter, on January 20, 1977. Earlier, ''Playboy'' magazine had published a controversial interview with Carter; in the interview Carter admitted to having "lusted in my heart" for women other than his wife, which cut into his support among women and evangelical Christians. Also, on September 24, Ford performed well in what was the first televised presidential debate since 1960. Polls taken after the debate showed that most viewers felt that Ford was the winner. Carter was also hurt by Ford's charges that he lacked the necessary experience to be an effective national leader, and that Carter was vague on many issues.

Presidential debates were reintroduced for the first time since the 1960 election. While Ford was seen as the winner of the first debate, during the second debate he blundered when he stated, "There is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe and there never will be under a Ford Administration." Ford also said that he did not "believe that the Poles consider themselves dominated by the Soviet Union". In an interview years later, Ford said he had intended to imply that the Soviets would never crush the ''spirits'' of eastern Europeans seeking independence. However, the phrasing was so awkward that questioner Max Frankel was visibly incredulous at the response. As a result of this blunder, and Carter's promise of a full presidential pardon for political refugees from the Vietnam era during the presidential debates, Ford's surge stalled and Carter was able to maintain a slight lead in the polls.

In the end, Carter won the election, receiving 50.1% of the popular vote and 297 electoral votes compared with 48.0% and 240 electoral votes for Ford. The election was close enough that had fewer than 25,000 votes shifted in Ohio and Wisconsin – both of which neighbored his home state – Ford would have won the electoral vote with 276 votes to 261 for Carter. Though he lost, in the three months between the Republican National Convention and the election Ford managed to close what was once a 34-point Carter lead to a 2-point margin.

Had Ford won the election, the provisions of the 22nd amendment would have disqualified him from running in 1980, because he had served more than two years of Nixon's remaining term.

Post-presidential years, 1977–2006

Activity

The Nixon pardon controversy eventually subsided. Ford's successor, Jimmy Carter, opened his 1977 inaugural address by praising the outgoing President, saying, "For myself and for our Nation, I want to thank my predecessor for all he has done to heal our land."

Ford remained relatively active in the years after his presidency and continued to make appearances at events of historical and ceremonial significance to the nation, such as presidential inaugurals and memorial services. In January 1977, he became the president of Eisenhower Fellowships in Philadelphia then served as its chairman of the board of trustees from 1980 to 1986. Later in the year, he reluctantly agreed to be interviewed by James M. Naughton, a ''New York Times'' journalist who was given the assignment to write the former President's advance obituary, an article that would be updated prior to its eventual publication. In 1979, Ford published his autobiography, ''A Time to Heal'' (Harper/Reader's Digest, 454 pages). A review in ''Foreign Affairs'' described it as, "Serene, unruffled, unpretentious, like the author. This is the shortest and most honest of recent presidential memoirs, but there are no surprises, no deep probings of motives or events. No more here than meets the eye."

During the term of office of his successor, Jimmy Carter, Ford received monthly briefs by President Carter's senior staff on international and domestic issues, and was always invited to lunch at the White House whenever he was in Washington, D.C. Their close friendship developed after Carter had left office, with the catalyst being their trip together to the funeral of Anwar el-Sadat in 1981. Until Ford's death, Carter and his wife, Rosalynn, visited the Fords' home frequently. Ford and Carter served as honorary co-chairs of the National Commission on Federal Election Reform in 2001 and of the Continuity of Government Commission in 2002.

Like Presidents Carter, George H.W. Bush, and Clinton, Ford was an honorary co-chair of the Council for Excellence in Government, a group dedicated to excellence in government performance, which provides leadership training to top federal employees.

Ford considered a run for the Republican nomination in 1980, foregoing numerous opportunities to serve on corporate boards to keep his options open for a grudge match with Carter. Ford attacked Carter's conduct of the SALT II negotiations and foreign policy in the Middle East and Africa. Many have argued that Ford also wanted to exorcise his image as an "Accidental President" and to win a term in his own right. Ford also believed the more conservative Ronald Reagan would be unable to defeat Carter and would hand the incumbent a second term. Ford was encouraged by his former Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger as well as Jim Rhodes of Ohio and Bill Clements of Texas to make the race. On March 15, 1980, Ford announced that he would forgo a run for the Republican nomination, vowing to support the eventual nominee.

After securing the Republican nomination in 1980, Ronald Reagan considered his former rival Ford as a potential vice-presidential running mate, but negotiations between the Reagan and Ford camps at the Republican National Convention were unsuccessful. Ford conditioned his acceptance on Reagan's agreement to an unprecedented "co-presidency", giving Ford the power to control key executive branch appointments (such as Kissinger as Secretary of State and Alan Greenspan as Treasury Secretary). After rejecting these terms, Reagan offered the vice-presidential nomination instead to George H.W. Bush. Ford did appear in a campaign commercial for the Reagan-Bush ticket, in which he declared that the country would be "better served by a Reagan presidency rather than a continuation of the weak and politically expedient policies of Jimmy Carter".

After his presidency, Ford joined the American Enterprise Institute as a distinguished fellow. He founded the annual AEI World Forum in 1982. Ford was awarded an honorary doctorate at Central Connecticut State University on March 23, 1988.

In 1977, he established the Gerald R. Ford Institute of Public Policy at Albion College in Albion, Michigan, to give undergraduates training in public policy. In April 1981, he opened the Gerald R. Ford Library in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on the north campus of his alma mater, the University of Michigan, followed in September by the Gerald R. Ford Museum in Grand Rapids. In 1999, Ford was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Bill Clinton. In 2001, he was presented with the John F. Kennedy Profiles in Courage Award for his decision to pardon Richard Nixon to stop the agony America was experiencing over Watergate. In retirement Ford also devoted much time to his love of golf, often playing both privately and in public events with comedian Bob Hope, a longtime friend.

In October 2001, Ford broke with conservative members of the Republican party by stating that gay and lesbian couples "ought to be treated equally. Period." He became the highest ranking Republican to embrace full equality for gays and lesbians, stating his belief that there should be a federal amendment outlawing anti-gay job discrimination and expressing his hope that the Republican Party would reach out to gay and lesbian voters. He also was a member of the Republican Unity Coalition, which ''The New York Times'' described as "a group of prominent Republicans, including former President Gerald R. Ford, dedicated to making sexual orientation a non-issue in the Republican Party".

On November 22, 2004, New York Republican Governor George Pataki named Ford and the other living former Presidents (Carter, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton) as honorary members of the board rebuilding the World Trade Center.

In a pre-recorded embargoed interview with Bob Woodward of ''The Washington Post'' in July 2004, Ford stated that he disagreed "very strongly" with the Bush administration's choice of Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction as justification for its decision to invade Iraq, calling it a "big mistake" unrelated to the national security of the United States and indicating that he would not have gone to war had he been President. The details of the interview were not released until after Ford's death, as he requested.

Health problems

As Ford approached his 90th year, he began to experience health problems associated with old age. He suffered two minor strokes at the 2000 Republican National Convention, but made a quick recovery after being admitted to Hahnemann University Hospital. In January 2006, he spent 11 days at the Eisenhower Medical Center near his residence at Rancho Mirage, California, for treatment of pneumonia. On April 23, President George W. Bush visited Ford at his home in Rancho Mirage for a little over an hour. This was Ford's last public appearance and produced the last known public photos, video footage and voice recording. While vacationing in Vail, Colorado, he was hospitalized for two days in July 2006 for shortness of breath. On August 15 Ford was admitted to St. Mary's Hospital of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, for testing and evaluation. On August 21, it was reported that he had been fitted with a pacemaker. On August 25, he underwent an angioplasty procedure at the Mayo Clinic, according to a statement from an assistant to Ford. On August 28, Ford was released from the hospital and returned with his wife Betty to their California home. On October 13, he was scheduled to attend the dedication of a building of his namesake, the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan, but due to poor health and on the advice of his doctors he did not attend. The previous day, Ford entered the Eisenhower Medical Center for undisclosed tests; he was released on October 16. By November 2006, he was confined to a bed in his study. In reality, President Ford had end-stage coronary artery disease and severe aortic stenosis and insufficiency, caused by calcific alteration of one of his heart valves.

Death

Ford died on December 26, 2006, at his home in Rancho Mirage, California, of arteriosclerotic cerebrovascular disease and diffuse arteriosclerosis. His age at the time of his death was 93 years and 165 days, making Ford the longest-lived U.S. President. On December 30, 2006, Ford became the 11th U.S. President to lie in state. The burial was preceded by a state funeral and memorial services held at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., on January 2, 2007. After the service, Ford was interred at his Presidential Museum in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Ford died on the 34th anniversary of President Harry Truman's death, thus becoming the second U.S. President to die on Boxing Day. He was the last surviving member of the Warren Commission. His wife, Betty Ford, died peacefully on July 8, 2011. Like her husband, Betty also died at age 93. They are the longest lived Presidential couple.

Longevity

Ford was the longest-lived U.S. President, his lifespan being 45 days longer than Ronald Reagan's. He was the third-longest-lived Vice President, falling short only of John Nance Garner, 98, and Levi P. Morton, 96. Ford had the third-longest post-presidency (29 years and 11 months) after Herbert Hoover (31 years and 7 months) and Jimmy Carter (30 years 7 months and counting)

On November 12, 2006, upon surpassing Ronald Reagan's lifespan, Ford released his last public statement: }}

Public image

Ford was the only president never elected to be either president or vice-president. The choice of Ford to fulfill Agnew's vacated role as vice president was based on his reputation for openness and honesty. "In all the years I sat in the House, I never knew Mr Ford to make a dishonest statement nor a statement part-true and part-false. He never attempted to shade a statement, and I never heard him utter an unkind word," said Martha Griffiths.

The trust the American people had in him was severely and rapidly tarnished by his pardon of Nixon. Nonetheless, many grant in hindsight that he had respectably discharged with considerable dignity a great responsibility that he had not sought. His subsequent loss to Carter in 1976 has come to be seen as an honorable sacrifice he made for the nation.

In spite of his athletic record and remarkable career accomplishments, Ford acquired a reputation as a clumsy, likable and simple-minded Everyman. An incident in 1975 when he tripped while exiting the presidential jet in Austria, was famously and repetitively parodied by Chevy Chase, cementing Ford's image as a klutz. Pieces of Ford's common Everyman image have also been attributed to Ford's inevitable comparison to Nixon, as well as his perceived Midwestern stodginess and self-deprecation. Ridicule often extended to supposed intellectual limitations, with Lyndon Johnson once joking, "He's a nice fellow but he spent too much time playing football without a helmet."

Named after Gerald Ford

Gerald R. Ford Freeway (Nebraska)

Gerald R. Ford Freeway (Michigan)

Gerald Ford Memorial Highway, I-70 in Eagle County, Colorado

Gerald R. Ford International Airport in Grand Rapids, Michigan

Gerald R. Ford Library in Ann Arbor, Michigan

Gerald R. Ford Museum in Grand Rapids, Michigan

Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy, University of Michigan

Gerald R. Ford Amphitheater in Vail, Colorado, in Ford Park, also named after him

Gerald R. Ford Institute of Public Policy, Albion College

USS ''Gerald R. Ford'' (CVN-78)

Gerald R. Ford Elementary School, Indian Wells, California

Gerald Ford Boys and Girls Club, La Quinta, California

Gerald Ford Drive, Coachella Valley, California (Cathedral City, Rancho Mirage, Palm Desert)

Gerald R. Ford Council, Boy Scouts of America The council where he was awarded the rank of Eagle Scout. (Includes the following Michigan counties: Allegan, Barry, Ionia, Kent, Lake, Mason, Mecosta, Montcalm, Muskegon, Newaygo, Oceana and Ottawa). Council Headquarters is located in Walker, Michigan.

See also

US Presidents on US postage stamps

References

Bibliography

Primary sources

, by speechwriter , by chief of staff by Secretary of State

Secondary sources

full-scale biography full-scale biography Conley, Richard S. "Presidential Influence and Minority Party Liaison on Veto Overrides: New Evidence from the Ford Presidency". ''American Politics Research'' 2002 30(1): 34–65. Fulltext: in Swetswise , the major scholarly study

Hersey, John Richard. The President: A Minute-By-Minute Account of a Week in the Life of Gerald Ford. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 1975.

Hult, Karen M. and Walcott, Charles E. ''Empowering the White House: Governance under Nixon, Ford, and Carter''. University Press of Kansas, 2004.

Jespersen, T. Christopher. "Kissinger, Ford, and Congress: the Very Bitter End in Vietnam". ''Pacific Historical Review'' 2002 71(3): 439–473. Fulltext: in University of California; Swetswise; Jstor and Ebsco Jespersen, T. Christopher. "The Bitter End and the Lost Chance in Vietnam: Congress, the Ford Administration, and the Battle over Vietnam, 1975–76". ''Diplomatic History'' 2000 24(2): 265–293. Fulltext: in Swetswise, Ingenta, Ebsco Maynard, Christopher A. "Manufacturing Voter Confidence: a Video Analysis of the American 1976 Presidential and Vice-presidential Debates". ''Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television'' 1997 17(4): 523–562. Fulltext: in Ingenta

External links

Published works

.

First State of the Union Address.

Second State of the Union Address.

Third State of the Union Address.

Libraries and museums

Gerald R. Ford Foundation.

Ford Library and Museum.

National Archives materials.

Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies in President Ford's hometown.

Gerald Ford: A Resource Guide from the Library of Congress.

Biographies

Extensive essay on Gerald Ford and shorter essays on each member of his cabinet and First Lady from the Miller Center of Public Affairs

White House biography

Multimedia and other

Audio recordings of Ford's speeches

April 23, 2006, Gerald Ford's visit with George W. Bush, the last known public photos, video footage and voice recording taken of Ford alive

Portrait of Gerald Ford by Margaret Holland Sargent

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birth name	Larry Claxton Flynt, Jr.
birth date	November 01, 1942
birth place	Lakeville, Magoffin County, Kentucky,USA
occupation	Publisher
years active	1965–1978
spouse	Mary Flynt (1961-1965; divorced)Peggy Flynt (1966-1969; divorced)Kathy Flynt (1970-1975; divorced)Althea Leasure (1976–1987; widower)Elizabeth Berrios (1998–present) }}

Larry Claxton Flynt, Jr. (born November 1, 1942) is an American publisher and the president of Larry Flynt Publications (LFP). In 2003, ''Arena'' magazine listed him as the number one on the "50 Powerful People in Porn" list.

LFP mainly produces sexually graphic videos and magazines, most notably ''Hustler''. Flynt has fought several prominent legal battles involving the First Amendment, and has unsuccessfully run for public office. He is paralyzed from the waist down due to injuries sustained in a 1978 assassination attempt.

Biography

Early life

Flynt was born in Lakeville, Magoffin County, Kentucky, the first of three children to 23-year-old Larry Claxton Flynt, Sr. (August 16, 1919 – July 1, 2005), a sharecropper and a World War II veteran, and 17-year-old Edith Arnett (August 13, 1925 – March 29, 1982), a homemaker. He had two younger siblings; sister Judy (1947–1951) and brother Jimmy Ray (born June 20, 1948). His father served in the United States Army in the European Theatre of World War II. Due to his father's absence, Larry was raised solely by his mother and maternal grandmother for the first three years of his life. Flynt was raised in poverty, and claimed Magoffin County was the poorest county in the nation during the Great Depression. In 1951, Flynt's sister, Judy, died due to leukemia at age four. The death provoked his parents' divorce one year later, and Larry was raised by his mother in Hamlet, Indiana, and his brother, Jimmy, was raised by his maternal grandmother in Magoffin County. Two years later, Larry returned to live in Magoffin County with his father, because he disliked his mother's new boyfriend.

Flynt attended Salyersville High School (now Magoffin County High School) in the ninth grade, however ran away from home and, despite being only 15 years old, joined the United States Army using a counterfeit birth certificate. It was around this time that he developed his passion for the game of poker. Since the United States was at peace, the Army decided to honorably discharge Flynt. He returned to his mother in Indiana, and found employment at the Inland Manufacturing Company, an affiliate of General Motors, however there was a union-led slowdown and he was released after only three months. He then returned to his father in Kentucky. For a brief period, he became a bootlegger but stopped when he learned that county deputies were searching for him. After living on his savings for two months, he enlisted in the United States Navy in July 1960. He became a radar operator on the USS ''Enterprise''. He was the operator on duty when the ship was assigned to recover John Glenn's space capsule. He was honorably discharged in July 1964.

First enterprises

In early 1965, Flynt took $1,800 from his savings and bought his mother's Dayton, Ohio bar, the Keewee. He refitted it and was soon making $1,000 a week; he used the profits to buy two other bars. He worked as many as 20 hours a day, taking amphetamines to stay awake. He frequently had to break up fistfights between drunken customers.

Flynt decided to open a new, higher-class bar, which would also be the first in the area to feature naked hostesses who danced; he named it the Hustler Club. From 1968 onward, with the help of his brother Jimmy and later his girlfriend Althea Leasure, he opened Hustler Clubs in Akron, Cleveland, Columbus, Cincinnati, and Toledo. Soon each club grossed between $260,000 and $520,000 a year (2010 dollars). He also acquired the Dayton franchise of a small newspaper called ''Bachelor's Beat,'' which he published for two years before selling it. At the same time, he closed a money-losing vending-machine business.

''Hustler'' magazine

In March 1972, Flynt created the ''Hustler Newsletter,'' a four-page, black-and-white publication about his clubs. This item became so popular with his customers that by May 1972 he expanded the ''Hustler Newsletter'' to 16 pages, then to 32 pages in August 1973. As a result of the 1973 oil crisis, the American economy went into recession. Revenues of Hustler Clubs declined, and Flynt had to either refinance his debts or declare bankruptcy. He decided to turn the ''Hustler Newsletter'' into a sexually explicit magazine with national distribution. He paid the start-up costs of the new magazine by deferring payment of sales taxes his clubs owed on their activities.

In July 1974, the first issue of ''Hustler'' was published. Although the first few issues went largely unnoticed, within a year the magazine became highly lucrative and Flynt was able to pay his tax debts. In November 1974, Hustler showed the first "pink-shots," or photos of open vulvas. Flynt had to fight to publish each issue, as many people, including some at his distribution company, found the magazine too explicit and threatened to remove it from the market. Shortly thereafter, Flynt was approached by a paparazzo who had taken nude pictures of former First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis while she was sunbathing on vacation in 1971. He purchased them for $18,000 and published them in the August 1975 issue. That issue attracted widespread attention, and 1 million copies were sold within a few days. Now a millionaire, Flynt bought a $375,000 mansion.

Shooting

On March 6, 1978, during a legal battle (see below) related to obscenity in Gwinnett County, Georgia, Flynt and his local lawyer, Gene Reeves, Jr., were shot by a sniper in an ambush near the county courthouse in Lawrenceville. The shooting left Flynt partially paralyzed, with permanent spinal cord damage, and in need of a wheelchair. White supremacist serial killer Joseph Paul Franklin confessed to the shootings many years later, claiming he was outraged by an interracial photo shoot in ''Hustler''. Franklin, who is currently on death row for an unrelated murder conviction, has never been brought to trial for the attempted killing. Flynt has made statements indicating he believes Franklin's story, and some police officials also concur. Flynt's injuries caused him excruciating, constant pain, and he was addicted to painkillers until multiple surgeries deadened the affected nerves. He also suffered a stroke caused by one of several overdoses of his analgesic medications; he recovered but has had pronunciation difficulties since.

Personal life

Flynt has been married five times. He married his fourth wife, Althea, in 1976 and they remained married until her death in 1987. He married his current wife, Elizabeth Berrios, in 1998. He has four daughters and a son.

He was an evangelical Christian for one year, converted in 1977 by evangelist Ruth Carter Stapleton, the sister of President Jimmy Carter. He stated that he became "born again" and that he had a vision from God while flying with Stapleton in his jet. He continued to publish his magazine, however, vowing to "hustle for God." He has since declared himself an atheist.

Flynt disowned his eldest daughter, Tonya Flynt-Vega, after she became a Christian anti-pornography activist. In her 1998 book ''Hustled'', she claims that Flynt sexually abused her as a child, often calling her names. Flynt has denied the charges, claiming to have passed a polygraph test and to be in possession of a tape recording of his daughter admitting she made up the accusations for money.

In 1994 Flynt bought a Gulfstream II private jet, which was used in the movie ''The People vs. Larry Flynt.'' In 2005 he replaced it with a Gulfstream IV. He currently resides in the Hollywood Hills.

Flynt has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

Flynt's enterprises

By 1970, he ran eight strip clubs throughout Ohio in Cincinnati, Toledo, Akron and Cleveland.

In July 1974, Flynt first published ''Hustler'' as a step forward from the ''Hustler Newsletter'', which was advertising for his businesses. The magazine struggled for the first year, partly because many distributors and wholesalers refused to handle it as its nude photos became increasingly graphic. It targeted working-class men and grew from a shaky start to a peak circulation of around 3 million (current circulation is below 500,000). In November 1974, it showed the first "pink-shots," photos of open vulvas. The publication of nude paparazzi pictures of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in August 1975 was a major coup. Hustler has often featured more explicit photographs than comparable magazines and has contained depictions of women that some find demeaning, such as a naked woman in a meat grinder or presented as a dog on a leash — though Flynt later said that the meat grinder image was a criticism of the pornography industry itself.

Flynt created his privately held company ''Larry Flynt Publications'' (LFP) in 1976. LFP published several other magazines. It also included a distribution business, something that may have angered the Mafia, which traditionally organized the distribution of porn. LFP did not expand beyond pornography until 1986, but later its output included more mainstream work. LFP sold the distribution business, as well as several mainstream magazines, beginning in 1996. LFP started to produce pornographic movies in 1998, through the Hustler Video film studio, which bought VCA Pictures in 2003.

On June 22, 2000, Flynt opened the Hustler Casino, a card room located in the Los Angeles suburb of Gardena. After it opened, many observers in the gaming industry speculated that, because of his past legal troubles, Flynt might not be able to get a license to operate a card room. However, the California Gambling Control Commission has confirmed that Flynt is the sole proprietor and gaming licensee of the Hustler Casino.

Other ventures either wholly owned by or licensed by Flynt or LFP, Inc. include the Hustler Clubs and the Hustler Hollywood Store. LFP also publishes ''Barely Legal,'' a pornographic magazine featuring young women who have recently turned 18, the minimum age for a pornographic or erotic model.

In 2001, Larry Flynt stated his net worth as $400 million.

Legal battles

Flynt has been embroiled in many legal battles regarding the regulation of pornography and free speech within the United States, especially attacking the ''Miller v. California'' (1973) obscenity exception to the First Amendment. He was first prosecuted on obscenity and organized crime charges in Cincinnati in 1976 by Simon Leis, who headed a local anti-pornography committee. He was sentenced to seven to 25 years and served six days; the sentence was overturned on a technicality. One argument resulting from this case was reviewed by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1981.

Outraged by a derogatory cartoon published in ''Hustler'' in 1976, Kathy Keeton, then girlfriend of ''Penthouse'' publisher Bob Guccione, filed a libel suit against Flynt in Ohio. Her lawsuit was dismissed because she had missed the deadline under the statute of limitations. She then filed a new lawsuit in New Hampshire, where Hustler's sales were very small. The question of whether she could sue there reached the U.S. Supreme Court in 1983, with Flynt losing the case. This case is occasionally reviewed today in first-year law school Civil Procedure courses, due to its implications regarding personal jurisdiction over a defendant.

During the proceedings in ''Keeton v. Hustler Magazine'', Flynt reportedly shouted "Fuck this court!" and called the justices "nothing but eight assholes and a token cunt" (referring to Justice Sandra Day O'Connor). Chief Justice Warren E. Burger had him arrested for contempt of court, but the charge was later dismissed.

Also in 1983, he leaked an FBI surveillance tape to the media regarding John DeLorean. In the videos, when arresting DeLorean, the FBI is shown asking him whether he would rather defend himself or have "his daughter's head smashed in." During the subsequent trial, Flynt wore an American flag as a diaper and was jailed for six months for desecration of the flag.

In 1988, Flynt won an important Supreme Court decision, ''Hustler Magazine v. Falwell'', after being sued by Reverend Jerry Falwell in 1983 over an offensive ad parody in ''Hustler'' that suggested that Falwell's first sexual encounter was with his mother in an out-house. Falwell sued Flynt, citing emotional distress caused by the ad. The decision clarified that public figures cannot recover damages for "intentional infliction of emotional distress" based on parodies. After Falwell's death, Flynt stated that despite their differences, he and Falwell had become friends over the years, adding that, "I always appreciated his sincerity even though I knew what he was selling and he knew what I was selling."

As a result of a sting operation in April 1998, Flynt was charged with a number of obscenity-related offenses concerning the sale of sex videos to a youth in a Cincinnati adult store he owned. In a plea agreement in 1999 LFP, Inc. (Flynt's corporate holdings group) pleaded guilty to two counts of pandering obscenity and agreed to stop selling adult videos in Cincinnati.

In June 2003, prosecutors in Hamilton County, Ohio, attempted to revive criminal charges of pandering obscene material against Flynt and his brother Jimmy, charging that they had violated the 1999 agreement. Flynt claimed that he no longer had an interest in the Hustler Shops and that prosecutors had no basis for the lawsuit.

In January 2009, Flynt filed suit against two nephews, Jimmy Flynt II and Dustin Flynt, for the use of his family name in producing pornography. He regarded their pornography to be inferior. He prevailed on the main trademark infringement issue, but lost on invasion of privacy claims.

Politics

Flynt is a Democrat though he once attempted a Presidential run as a Republican. He is a staunch critic of the Warren Commission and offered $1 million for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the assassin of John F. Kennedy. He once tried to link the attempt on his own life to the Kennedy assassination. In 2003, Flynt was a candidate in the recall election of California Governor Gray Davis, calling himself a "smut peddler who cares". He finished 7th in a field of 135 candidates.

Flynt has repeatedly weighed in on public debates by trying to expose conservative or Republican politicians with sexual scandals. He did so during the impeachment proceedings against President Clinton in 1998, offering $1 million for evidence and publishing the results in ''The Flynt Report''. These publications led to the resignation of incoming House Speaker Bob Livingston. In 2007, Flynt repeated his $1 million offer and also wrote the foreword to Joseph Minton Amann and Tom Breuer's ''The Brotherhood of Disappearing Pants: A Field Guide to Conservative Sex Scandals'', which contained some cases published by Flynt. In 2003, he also purchased nude photographs of Private Jessica Lynch, who was captured by Iraqi forces, rescued from an Iraqi hospital by US troops and celebrated as a hero by the media. Flynt stated he would never show any of the photographs, calling Lynch a "good kid" who became "a pawn for the government".

Flynt has supported activist groups opposed to the war in Iraq in 2004 and 2005, and is also a strong supporter of gay rights and gay marriage.

Works about Flynt

In 1996, Flynt published his autobiography, ''An Unseemly Man: My Life as a Pornographer, Pundit, and Social Outcast'' (ISBN 978-0787111786).

A film, ''The People vs. Larry Flynt'' (1996), was based on his life which features Woody Harrelson as the the title role. Flynt himself made a cameo appearance as an Ohio judge and also a jury member in the court scene of the Jerry Falwell case. The film was directed by Miloš Forman and co-produced by Oliver Stone.

Laura Kipnis analysis of ''Hustler'' magazine in "(Male) Desire and (Female) Disgust: Reading ''Hustler''" was reprinted in Kipnis's ''Bound and Gagged: Pornography and the Politics of Fantasy in America'' (Duke, 1999).

A documentary, available on DVD, ''Larry Flynt: The Right to Be Left Alone'', directed by Joan Brooker-Marks was released in 2008.

''One Nation Under Sex'' which documents the colorful sex lives of America's most powerful leaders, was co-written by Larry Flynt and Columbia University history professor David Eisenbach and published in 2011. (ISBN 978-0230105034).

References

Bibliography

Flynt, Larry and Ross, Kenneth ''An Unseemly Man: My Life As A Pornographer, Pundit And Social Outcast'' (1996) ISBN 0-7871-1143-0

External links

Official Hustler website

Official Hustler Magazine website

Official website

HustlerWorld.com – Official Hustler News website

“Larry Flynt: The Right to be Left Alone”

Category:1942 births Category:Living people Category:People from Magoffin County, Kentucky Category:Adult magazine publishers (people) Category:American atheists Category:American businesspeople Category:American pornographers Category:American shooting survivors Category:Attempted assassination survivors Category:California Democrats Category:Free speech activists Category:Larry Flynt Publications Category:American magazine founders Category:People with bipolar disorder Category:People with paraplegia Category:Stroke survivors Category:United States Army soldiers Category:United States Navy personnel Category:United States presidential candidates, 1984 Category:Obscenity controversies bg:Лари Флинт ca:Larry Flynt da:Larry Flynt de:Larry Flynt es:Larry Flynt fr:Larry Flynt gl:Larry Flynt ko:래리 플린트 it:Larry Flynt he:לארי פלינט ka:ლარი ფლინტი lt:Laris Flintas nl:Larry Flynt ja:ラリー・フリント no:Larry Flynt pl:Larry Flynt pt:Larry Flynt ro:Larry Flynt ru:Флинт, Ларри sk:Larry Flynt sl:Larry Flynt sr:Лари Флинт fi:Larry Flynt sv:Larry Flynt th:แลร์รี ฟลินต์ tr:Larry Flynt uk:Ларрі Флінт

name	Relson Gracie
other names	Campeão [Champion]
birth date	March 28, 1953
birth place	Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
residence	Aiea, Hawaii, U.S.
style	Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu
teacher	Helio Gracie
rank	''8th degree red belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu''
url	http://relsongracie.com/
updated	}}

Relson "Campeao" Gracie is a retired professional Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu fighter and martial arts personality. He is a member of the legendary Gracie family.Relson currently lives in Hawaii where he still teaches Gracie Jiu-Jitsu at his academy in Honolulu. There are many Relson Gracie affiliated academies and associations throughout the U.S. which keep him traveling regularly.

Relson is the second oldest son of Helio Gracie, who along with Carlos Gracie, is credited for innovating the Kodokan Judo taught by Mitsuyo “Count Koma” Maeda into what is now known as Gracie or "Brazilian" Jiu Jitsu. Relson began learning the art of Gracie Jiu-Jitsu at the age of two, began competing at the age of ten, and earned his black belt when he was 18. He went 22 years undefeated as the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu National Champion.

Although Relson's techniques are deeply rooted in Gracie Jiu-Jitsu, Relson also emphasizes "street effective" techniques. Relson's Jiu-Jitsu has evolved to help defend yourself in a survival situations where there are no rules.

Relson is one of the few people to hold an 8th degree red/black belt in the art of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, which he received from his father, Helio.

Relson as has also taught self defense to the U.S. Military, Secret Service, D.E.A., F.B.I., and local law enforcement agencies across the United States.

Biography

Beginnings

Relson was born in 1953, a year after the Gracies opened Academia Gracie in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. In 1962, Helio Gracie (Relson's father) held the world’s first Gracie Jiu-Jitsu tournament in Rio de Janeiro, where Relson competed at the age of 10. Relson was Brazilian National Champion in both his own weight class and the open division for an unprecedented 22 years. His record and success in Gracie Jiu-Jitsu earned him the name "Campeao," Portuguese for Champion.

In 1975, at the age of 22, Relson was approached by Rio's Secretary of Sport Jose Morais and Manaus Senator Artur Vigilio, a Reyson Gracie Black Belt, who proposed Relson open his own academy. Because of this encouragement, Relson opened his first Jiu Jitsu academny, Ilha Clube Jardim Guanabara (ICJG). During this time Relson taught at both ICJG and Academia Gracie Humaita.

Growth Of Gracie Jiu-Jitsu

In the middle to late 1970s Gracie Jiu-Jitsu continued to grow in popularity, and in 1978, Academia Gracie relocated to Flamengo, an area in Rio de Janerio, Brazil. In 1982 Relson and his younger brother Rickson began competing and winning black belt divisions of Jiu Jitsu tournaments in their respective weight classes (83 kg and 77 kg, respectively) and "open weight" divisions as well, often sharing 1st and 2nd place. "Open weight" are divisions in tournaments where any weight can compete.

During this time Relson and other family members defended the Gracie name and reputation "in the streets" of Brazil. Even in true "no holds barred" matches, where it was often a matter of survival, Relson and the Gracie family maintained its dominance and proved that Gracie Jiu-Jitsu is an effective martial art.

The Gracie family also experienced success in Vale Tudo fights and competitions. On April 25, 1980, "the torch" was officially passed to Rickson Gracie when he defeated Casemiro "Rei Zulu" Nascimento Martins by rear naked choke. Rei Zulu suffered a similar fate at the hands of Rickson again in January 1984 during their second encounter. Relson trained Rickson for both events in anticipation of fighting Zulu himself, but Relson later acquiesced to Helio's wishes for Rickson to make his debut as the Gracie family champion.

Move to the United States

In 1985, Relson moved from Rio de Janeiro to Monterey, California at the request of Pedro Sauer’s older brother, Carlos. In Monterey Relson taught at the Eseline Therapy Institute for a year and a half. In June 1988 he moved to Honolulu and continued to teach.

In the pre-UFC years, Gracie Jiu-Jitsu was relatively unknown outside of Brazil. Relson taught out of his garage in the evenings after a hard day's work in the construction industry. However, the effectiveness and benefits of Jiu-Jitsu soon spread throughout the island of Oahu, and in the same year he expanded his classes to athletic facilities at the University of Hawaii at Manoa because of growing demand until 1996, while continuing to teach out of his garage.

Relson organized the first tournament outside of Brazil in Honolulu in 1992.

Involvement with MMA

In 1993, The Ultimate Fighting Championship held its first event, UFC 1, which would launch the career of Royce Gracie.

Prior to UFC 1, Royce was just "Rorion and Relson's little brother." Relson helped Royce train for the event. Relson's style was—and still is—ideally suited to a "limited rules" type of fighting. Royce won three of the first four UFC events.

However, with the advent of the Unified Rules of Mixed Martial Arts (and UFC's rule change for UFC 5), many of Relson's lethal techniques are no longer legal in MMA.

Tournament competition in the 1990s and beyond

In 1997 Relson Gracie brought a team from Hawaii to the second World Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Championships and became the first team outside of Brazil to "close out" (or win) a division. Two of Relson’s students, Kendall Goo and Kelly Matsukawa, took first and second place in the Adult Blue Belt Pessidissimo division.

In 2000 the Relson Gracie Team joined forces with Gracie Humaita and placed in every division at the Pan American Jiu-Jitsu Championships in Florida: 1st in the Female and Master/Seniors divisions, 2nd in the Juvenile, and 3rd in the Adult.

After the changes to rules common to most Jiu Jitsu tournaments, Relson felt tournaments started to steer Gracie Jiu-Jitsu away from the principles that his father had created it for. Relson decided to place less emphasis on pushing his team to compete and refocused on the true essence of Gracie Jiu-Jitsu.

Relson is also affiliated with some tournaments: the Relson Gracie National Jiu-Jitsu Tournament has been held annually in Columbus, Ohio since 1997. Due to the success of his inaugural National tournament, Arnold Schwarzenegger approached Relson to start the Arnold-Gracie World Submission Championships in 2000, also held to be held in Columbus. Between 2005 and 2008, participation has increased from 1200 to 1800 competitors.

Black Belts under Relson

There have been very few black belts ever given by Relson across his career. His reputation is for being very hard on promotions, often taking 10-15+ years to attain black belt level. Here are all of the known black belts and their promotion dates, where known: Name - School/Affiliation - City, State - Date of promotion to Black Belt

Steve Maxwell - MaxwellSC - Philadelphia, PA - 2001?

Scott Devine - Coastal Combatives Inc - Savannah, Georgia - 3rd 3/2003 Andre Derizans - Relson Gracie Academy - Honolulu, HI, 3rd, 3/2003 Jeff Hudson - Relson Gracie Academy, North Columbus Chapter - Columbus, OH - 3/2003 Phil Migliarese (4th Degree) - Balance Studios - Philadelphia, PA - 3rd, 3/2003

Sam Mahi - O2 Martial Arts Academy - Aiea, HI - 2nd, 4/14/04

Robin Gieseler - Relson Gracie Academy, North Columbus Chapter - Columbus, OH - 2006 (started 94) Kofi Debrah - 02 Martial Arts Academy - Aiea, HI - 9/28/05 Rick Migliarese (3rd Degree) - Balance Studios - Philadelphia, PA - 1st, 2005 Ronn Shiraki - Relson Gracie Academy - Honolulu, HI - 2nd degree, 6/5/06 Kimo Kreis - Relson Gracie Academy - Denver, CO - 2nd degree, 6/5/06 Phil Cardella - Relson Gracie Academy Austin - Austin, TX - 6/5/06 Mike Onzuka - 02 Martial Arts Academy - Aiea, HI - 4/4/07 Garth Spendiff - Coastal Combatives Inc - Savannah, Georgia - 8/25/07 Nathan Zigler - Gracie Arizona - Phoenix, AZ - ?

Vince Panzano - Relson Gracie Academy, North Columbus Chapter - Columbus, OH - ?

Lionel Perez - North Florida Brazilian Jiu Jitsu - Jacksonville, FL - ? Toney Waldecker - In-Base Jiu Jitsu - Fairfax, VA - 4/18/08 Richard Giberson - Relson Gracie Academy Austin - Austin, TX - 10/8/08? Shawn Chitwood - Team Chitwood - Columbus, OH - 11/14/08

David Wilson - Relson Gracie Academy, North Columbus Chapter - Columbus, OH - 7/24/08

Steve Hordinski - Relson Gracie JIu Jitsu Academy - Littleton, CO - 1/17/09

Michael Casey - Gracie Jiu Jitsu Tuckahoe - Tuckahoe, NY - 1/24/09

Chris Onzuka - 02 Martial Arts Academy - Aiea, HI - 2/11/09

Shane Agena - 02 Martial Arts Academy - Aiea, HI - 2/11/09

Reyn Morimoto - O2 Martial Arts Academy - Aiea, HI - 2/18/09

Todd Tanaka - Relson Gracie/Team HK Jiu Jitsu - Honolulu, HI - 7/22/09

Tony Zara - Relson Gracie Academy, North Columbus Chapter - Columbus, OH - 2/19/11

Matt Rigney - Relson Gracie Academy, North Columbus Chapter - Columbus, OH - 2/19/11

Mark Kurano - Relson Gracie/Gracie Waikiki - Honolulu, HI - 6/22/11 Jeff Furuta - Relson Gracie/Gracie Uptown - Honolulu, HI - 6/22/11 Kaleo Auwae - Relson Gracie/Gracie Papakolea - Honolulu, HI - 6/22/11 Rhalan Gracie - Relson Gracie - Honolulu, HI - 6/22/11 Kaleo Hosaka - Relson Gracie - Honolulu, HI - 6/22/11 Gye Nitta - Relson Gracie - Honolulu, HI - 6/22/11

Dan Wallen - Relson Gracie - Fightworks- Sterling, Va-7/13/11

Jim Hannan - Relson Gracie - Relson Gracie DC - Fairfax county, Va -7/13/11

Tom Feister - Relson Gracie Academy, North Columbus Chapter - Columbus, OH - 7/29/11

Personal

Relson has four children: Karina, Kailani, Rishna and Rhalan.

References

External links

Academia Gracie

Relson Gracie Official Website

Relson Gracie from gracieacademy.com

Relson Gracie Jiu-Jitsu (Austin Association)

http://www.graciedenver.com/

http://www.denverjiujitsu.com/

Category:Brazilian practitioners of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Category:1953 births Category:Living people Category:People from Rio de Janeiro (city) Category:Brazilian people of Scottish descent