Edmund Sixtus "Ed" Muskie (March 28, 1914 – March 26, 1996) was an American politician from Rumford, Maine. He served as Governor of Maine from 1955 to 1959, as a member of the United States Senate from 1959 to 1980, and as Secretary of State under Jimmy Carter from 1980 to 1981. Muskie was the Democratic nominee for Vice President in the 1968 presidential election, and was a candidate for the Democratic nomination for President in 1972.

Muskie held the highest office (Secretary of State) held by a Polish American in U.S. history, and also is the only Polish American ever nominated by a major party for Vice President.

Muskie was born in Rumford, Maine. His father, Stephen Marciszewski (mar-chih-SHEF-ski) immigrated to the United States in 1903 and changed his name to Muskie. His mother Josephine (née Czarnecki) was born in Buffalo, New York, to Polish immigrants. His parents, Roman Catholics, had seven children, of whom six survived.

Muskie attended Bates College in Lewiston, Maine, where he majored in history and government. While at Bates, Muskie was a successful member of the debating team, participated in several sports, and was elected to student government. He also worked during the school year as a waiter, and during the summers at a hotel in Kennebunk, Maine, to supplement the scholarship that allowed him to attend the college. He graduated from Bates in 1936, and from Cornell Law School in 1939.

William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton (born William Jefferson Blythe III; August 19, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation. Clinton has been described as a New Democrat. Many of his policies have been attributed to a centrist Third Way philosophy of governance.

Born and raised in Arkansas, Clinton became both a student leader and a skilled musician. He is an alumnus of Georgetown University where he was Phi Beta Kappa and earned a Rhodes Scholarship to attend the University of Oxford. He is married to Hillary Rodham Clinton, who has served as the United States Secretary of State since 2009 and was a Senator from New York from 2001 to 2009. Both Clintons received law degrees from Yale Law School, where they met and began dating. As Governor of Arkansas, Clinton overhauled the state's education system, and served as Chair of the National Governors Association.