Alan Cranston

At 86 years old, Alan Cranston has this physical status:

Alan MacGregor Cranston (June 19, 1914 – December 31, 2000) was an American politician and journalist who served as a Senator from California from 1969 to 1993 and as President of the World Federalist Association from 1949 to 1952. Since graduating from Stanford University, Cranston, who was born in Palo Alto, California, worked as a journalist.

Cranston, the California state controller, gained the Senate seat in 1968 after being elected.

In 1977, he became the Senate Democratic Whip and served in that position until 1991.

Cranston ran for president in 1984, insisting on a nuclear freeze in the intervening stages of the Cold War.

He was disqualified after the first round of primaries. Cranston was recalled by the Senate Ethics Committee in 1991 for his role in the savings and loan crisis as a member of the Keating Five.

He refused to run for a fifth term after being diagnosed with prostate cancer.

He served as president of the Global Security Institute and pushed for the global ban on nuclear weapons following his resignation from Congress.

Early life and education

Cranston, the son of Carol (née Dixon) and William MacGregor Cranston, was born in Palo Alto, California. He attended Pomona College for a year and spent a summer at the National Autonomous University of Mexico before graduating from Stanford University in 1936 with a degree in English.

Personal life

Cranston's family was wealthy, with real estate investments. He married and divorced twice. Geneva McMath, his first wife, was the mother of his sons, Robin, who died in a car crash young, and Kim, who survived him. Norma Weintraub was married by Cranston later in life.

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Early career

Before World War II, Cranston served as a reporter for the International News Service for two years. When an abridged English-language translation of Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf was published, Cranston sanitized to exclude certain elements of Hitler's anti-semitism and militancy, a new translation (with annotations) that he believed represented the book's contents more accurately. Hitler's publisher sued him in Connecticut in 1939 for copyright misappropriation; a judge ordered in Hitler's favour and the book's publication had been suspended; by then, half a million copies had been sold, educating a large audience about the threat faced by Hitler.

Cranston served as an editor and writer for the magazine Common Ground before enlisting in the Armed forces in 1944 and later in the Office of War Information. After completing Infantry basic instruction, he enlisted in the army as a private, but Army Talk magazine's editor was instead appointed. While on active service, he wrote his second book, The Killing of the Peace, a recap of the failed attempt to join the League of Nations immediately following World War I. When he was discharged at the end of the war in 1945, Cranston wrote a book named Sergeant.

Cranston, a worldwide government supporter, attended the 1945 conference that culminated in the Dublin Declaration and served as President of the World Federalist Association in 1948. He successfully persuaded the California legislature to pass the 1949 World Federalist California Resolution, urging Congress to amend the Constitution to allow for participation of the United States in a federal world government. Cranston also in the 1940s, he began his long-agoals against nuclear weapons.

Cranston co-founded the California Democratic Council (CDC), serving as chairman in 1952. Since that time, the CDC has functioned as an unofficial alliance of local Democratic clubs that coordinate electoral advocacy and activism throughout California. Cranston's CDC support in his attempts for State Controller in 1958 and his subsequent attempts for the U.S. Senate were largely funded.

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