Bruce Babbitt

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Bruce Edward Babbitt (born June 27, 1938) is an American prosecutor and politician from Arizona's state.

Babbitt, a member of the Democratic Party, served as Arizona's 16th governor from 1978 to 1987 and as the United States Secretary of the Interior from 1993 to 2001. After graduating from Harvard Law School, he gained the election as Arizona Attorney General.

After the death of his predecessor, Wesley Bolin, he became Governor of Arizona.

Babbitt won the election in 1978 and 1982.

He helped found the Democratic Leadership Council and ran for the 1988 Democratic presidential nomination, but he dropped out of the race after the first round of primaries. Babbit served as the head of the League of Conservation Voters during his presidential campaign.

During Bill Clinton's presidency, he served as the Secretary of the Interior for the duration of his term.

Since vacancies existed in 1993 and 1994, Clinton was also considering nominating Babbitt to the Supreme Court.

Babbitt became an advocate with Latham & Watkins after leaving the public service in 2001.

Personal life

Babbitt was born in a prominent Roman Catholic Flagstaff, Arizona family, and the son of Frances B. (Perry) and Paul James Babbitt Sr. His family owned a department store in Flagstaff, a ranch in northern Arizona, and Indian trading posts. He graduated from the University of Notre Dame, attended Newcastle University in the United Kingdom on a Marshall Scholarship, and then received his J.D. Harvard Law School conferred a bachelor's degree.

Harriet Coons (formerly Hattie) married him in 1968. She has worked in Arizona and Washington, D.C., and as the United States Ambassador to the Organization of American States from 1993 to 1997, and as Deputy Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development from 1997 to 2001 during the Clinton Administration.

Babbitt worked with publisher Jonathan Marshall to draft legislation that became Arizona's "open meeting law."

Post-political life

After leaving the Department of Interior, Babbitt took up as chief counsel of Latham & Watkins, a multinational law firm. Babbitt offended many environmentalists by taking on two clients who want to build large developments along the coast of Latham & Watkins. Babbitt defended both schemes, one on Hearst Corporation property in central California and the other on the Ahmanson Ranch north of Los Angeles.

Babbitt has piqued the attention of several environmentalist and Native American organizations for his portrayal of the Arizona Snowbowl ski resort and its attempts to expand the resort and use waste water to produce artificial snow.

He is a trustee of the World Wildlife Fund Secretariat Trustees in the United States, and he was a member of the Council on Foreign Relations from 2012 to 2012. Since 2009, he has been on the Board of Directors for the Amazon Conservation Association, whose aim is to protect the Amazon's biological diversity. Babbitt is also a member of Issue One's ReFormers Caucuses.

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Political career

Babbitt defeated Republican incumbent N. Warner Lee to become Attorney General of Arizona in the state election of November 1974.

When Bolin died in office on March 4, 1978, he succeeded Wesley Bolin as governor. Arizona does not have a lieutenant governor; if elected by re-election, the Arizona Secretary of State stands first in line in case the governor vacates his or her position. However, Rose Mofford, the then secretary of state, had been appointed to her position and therefore was not eligible to serve as governor, according to the Arizona state constitution. Babbitt, as attorney general, was next in line of succession and had to complete the term for which Ral Héctor Castro had first been elected in 1974. Babbitt was elected for a full four-year term in 1978 and again in 1982. In 1986, he did not run for a third term.

Babbitt was instrumental in negotiations between the Christ Miracle Healing Church and Center's founders and the Cochise County sheriff and their leaders over the freeing of church members whose church members were exempt from facing criminal charges. The cathedral, which had been indicted in bomb making, was expected to play a central role in the Miracle Valley shooting later this year. Babbitt sent the Arizona National Guard to assist the Phelps Dodge mining company in Morenci, Arizona, in 1983.

Many in Arizona expected Babbitt to oppose Representative John McCain for the position following his resignation from the Senate in 1986. Babbitt initially announced in 1985 that he would forego the Senate race in order to focus on a White House bid in 1988.

Babbitt is the only Arizona governor to have served two four-year terms with nine years of service. George W.P. : W.C. Hunt is Arizona's longest-serving governor, however, with 14 years of total service and four terms.

President Jimmy Carter had nominated Babbitt to serve as a commissioner on the President's Commission on the Accident on Three Mile Island in 1979, a six-month investigation into the 1979 disaster at a commercial nuclear power plant in Middletown, Pennsylvania. Babbitt appeared at the 1980 Democratic National Convention, which nominated incumbent Jimmy Carter as the Democratic nominee for president.

Babbitt, a founding member of the Democratic Leadership Council and the chair of the Democratic Governors Association in 1985, ran for President of the United States in 1988. Among his plans was a national sales tax to eliminate the then-record spending deficits that have built up during the previous administrations. He received positive media attention (called a "boomlet" in USA Today), but after finishing out of the top tier of contenders in the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary, he dropped out of the contest. Babbitt joked that the press "wouldn't have Bruce Babbitt to puff up anymore" in an intentionally referring to Richard Nixon (who said after losing the California governorship in the 1962 race that the press "will not have [me] to kick around anymore") in his last campaign press conference. Babbitt dropped this line from the prepared text of his resignation speech, according to the Washington Post.

Babbitt served as the Secretary of the Interior during Bill Clinton's Presidency, leading the League of Conservation Voters from 1993-192001. According to John D. Leshy:...

Babbitt worked to protect scenic and historic areas of America's federal public lands. The National Landscape Conservation System, a series of 15 US National Monuments and 14 National Conservation Areas that will be managed by the Bureau of Land Management in a way that will keep them "healthy, open, and wild" in 2000.

Low fees charged ranchers who grazed cattle on public lands were a major problem. The "animal unit month" (AUM) fee was only $1.35, much less than the 1983 market value. The argument was that the federal government was subsidizing ranchers, with a handful of major companies owning millions of acres of grazing land. Babbitt tried to mobilize environmentalists and raise taxes, but senators from Western states blocked his plans.

President Clinton had serious discussions with Babbitt in 1993 to replace retiring US Supreme Court Justice Byron White. Clinton nominated Ruth Bader Ginsburg instead due to his lead on environmental issues. When Harry Blackmun announced his resignation in 1994, Clinton considered Babbitt for the high court for the second time. Babbitt was voted again, this time in favor of Stephen Breyer, who had a large vote in the US Senate, largely because he was close to Sen. Ted Kennedy.

A federal grand jury probe into whether he had lied to Congress about having denied an Indian casino license in Wisconsin in exchange for political contributions in 1998. Wampumgate has sparked controversies. In the special prosecutor's final report on the probe the following year, Babbitt was not guilty of wrongdoing.

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