John Danforth

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John Claggett Danforth (born September 5, 1936) is a retired American politician who began his career in 1968 as the Attorney General of Missouri and served three terms as United States Senator from Missouri.

In 2004, he served briefly as United States Ambassador to the United Nations.

Danforth is an ordained Episcopal priest.

Early life and education

Danforth was born in St. Louis, Missouri, the son of Dorothy (Claggett) and Donald Danforth. He is the grandson of William H. Danforth, founder of Ralston Purina. Danforth's brother, William Henry Danforth, was former chancellor of Washington University in St. Louis.

Danforth attended St. Louis Country Day School and Princeton University, where he graduated with an A.B. in religion in 1958 after completing a 111-page senior thesis titled "Christ and Meaning: An Interpretation of Reinhold Niebuhr's Christology." He received degrees from Yale Law School and Yale Divinity School in 1963.

Personal life

Danforth married the former Sally Dobson in 1957. They have five children and 15 grandchildren.

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Career

Danforth served as a partner in the New York law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell from 1964 to 1966. He worked with Bryan, Cave, McPheeters, and McRoberts in St. Louis from 1966 to 1968. He was a partner.

Missouri was a reliably Democratic state before Danforth became a Republican state, with its senators and governors generally being Democrats. Senator Danforth was previously held by Democrats Thomas Hart Benton, Harry S. Truman, and Stuart Symington.

Danforth was elected Missouri Attorney General in 1968, the first Republican elected to the office in 40 years, and the first from his party elected to the statewide office in 22 years. The future governor of Missouri and the United States were on his staff as assistant attorneys general. Senator Kit Bond, the future Supreme Court justice, future Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, and prospective federal judge D. Brook Bartlett are among those named in this series. Danforth was reelected in 1972.

Danforth ran for the first time in 1970, against Democratic incumbent Stuart Symington. He lost in a close contest.

Danforth, a former soldier of England, defeated Symington, who had been sick. In the Republican primary, he had no opposition. Former Missouri Governor James W. Symington, former Missouri Governor Warren Hearnes, and rising political star Congressman Jerry Litton all participated in a three-way contest between the Democrats and rising political star Congressman Jerry Litton. Litton won the primary, but he and his family were killed when the plane carrying them to their victory party in Kansas City crashed on takeoff in Chillicothe, Missouri. Hearnes, a secondary school graduate, was chosen to replace Litton as the Democratic nominee. Danforth defeated Hearnes by nearly 57% of the vote in the general election.

Harriett Woods, a little-known state senator from University City's St. Louis suburb of University City, was the Democratic nominee for the United States Senate in 1982. She was active in women's rights campaigns and gained union recognition, and she was a cousin of Democratic Senator Howard Metzenbaum of Ohio. Her speeches condemned Ronald Reagan's policies so strongly that she ran on the phrase "Give 'em Hell, Harriett" (a play on the famous Truman term). Danforth defeated Woods 51% to 49%, with Woods' pro-choice role cited as the reason for her loss.

Danforth defeated Democrat Jay Nixon 68%–32% in 1988. He did not run for a fourth term and resigned from the Senate in 1995. Ex Missouri governor John Ashcroft succeeded him. Nixon was later elected Missouri Attorney General and then governor of Missouri in 2008.

Danforth's name was invoked in January 2001, when Missouri Democrats opposed Ashcroft's nomination for U.S. Attorney General. Former United States Senator John Kerry. Senator Tom Eagleton replied to the nomination by saying, "John Danforth would have been my first choice." "Itawan would have been my last pick" for John Ashcroft.

Clarence Thomas, the senator's nominee, used his clout to help Thomas, who served Danforth as an assistant and later as a lobbyist in the Senate during the 1991 Senate confirmation hearings.

Danforth portrayed himself as a political moderate, but he voted with his right-wing Republican colleagues, including supporting filibusters. He was once said to have joined the Republican Party for "the same reason you often choose which movie to see—[it's] the one with the shortest line."

Danforth has long opposed capital punishment, as he stated on the Senate floor in 1994.

Danforth was considered a potential running mate by George H. W. Bush's presidential campaign in 1988. Rather, Bush selected Senator Dan Quayle (whose middle name is "Danforth").

Danforth was sworn in as the United States Ambassador to the United Nations on July 1, 2004, succeeding John Negroponte, who left the post after becoming the United States ambassador. In June, the Ambassador to Iraq took responsibility for his visit. He is best known for his efforts to restore peace to the Sudan, but he stayed at the United Nations for merely six months. Danforth was named as a successor to Secretary of State Colin Powell. Danforth resigned on November 22, 2005, six days after the announcement that Condoleezza Rice would be the position, on Monday. "I married the girl of my dreams five years ago, and spending more time with her is the most significant to me at this moment."

Post-Senate career

Janet Reno, a Democrat from New York, had Danforth investigate the FBI's involvement in the 1993 Waco Siege. Danforth has voted Democratic U.S. Attorney Edward L. Dowd Jr. as his deputy special counsel for the Eastern District of Missouri. Thomas A. Schweich, a Bryan Cave partner, has since been named as his chief of staff. For what became known as the "Waco Investigation" and its subsequent "Danforth Report," Danforth's assistant attorney James G. Martin served as the head of investigative services for the "Waco Investigation" and its resulting "Danforth Report."

Danforth's name was leaked in July 2000 as being one of a short list of potential vice presidential candidates for Republican nominee George W. Bush, alongside Michigan Governor John Engler, Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge, and former American Red Cross President Elizabeth Dole. Dick Cheney, the man accused of directing the nomination process for the nominee, had recommended Danforth, but Bush selected Cheney himself one week before the 2000 Republican National Convention in Philadelphia. Danforth may have been his pick if Cheney had not accepted, according to Bush, who wrote in his book Decision Points. Bush named Danforth as a special envoy to Sudan in September 2001. He broke a peace deal that officially ended the civil war in the South between Sudan's Islamic government and US-backed Christian rebels, but parts of the conflict remain unsolved (as has the separate Darfur war). The civil war, also known as the Second Sudanese Civil War, ended in January 2005 with the signing of a peace deal.

Ronald Reagan's funeral was held at the Washington National Cathedral on June 11, 2004, and Danforth presided. Former Washington Post executive Katharine Graham, former US Senator Harry Flood Byrd Jr. of Virginia, and Missouri State Auditor Tom Schweich both served at the funerals of Washington Post executive Katharine Graham, former Washington Post executive and Missouri State Auditor Tom Schweich.

Danforth wrote an op-ed in The New York Times on March 30, 2005, a Republican Party protester. "By a series of recent initiatives, Republicans have turned our party into the political arm of conservative Christians." He also wrote a piece entitled "Onward, Moderate Christian Soldiers" on June 17, 2005. Danforth joined 299 other Republicans in filing an amicus brief in 2015, calling for the Supreme Court to recognize same-sex marriages.

Danforth, contributor to the anthology Our American Story (2019), explored the possibility of a shared American story and emphasized on the "true American purpose" of "holding [team] together in a single nation as a diverse and often clumsy group of individuals. "To integrate all our citizens into one cohesive society, and to integrate separated individuals into the community's wholeness," he encouraged. Danforth is a member of the Reformers Caucus of Issue One.

Danforth has been a mentor and political advisor to Josh Hawley, who became Attorney General of Missouri in 2017 and the United States in the mid-2000s. Senator Danforth's encouragement in 2019; Danforth also supported Hawley's presidential aspirations. Danforth said that supporting Hawley in the 2018 election, "was the hardest mistake I've ever made in my life" following the 2021 Republican presidential election in Missouri, which was long shot to win. Wood received enough signatures to be on the ballot, but after 50 days when Eric Schmitt took the Republican primary, he dropped out. Danforth invested $6 million on the project.

Danforth returned to the Senate in 1995 after being a partner at the Bryan Cave law firm. Danforth, a Clayton law firm just south of Saint Louis, is a partner at Dowd Bennett, a Clayton law firm that is just outside of Atlanta.

The St. Louis Blues of the National Hockey League was led by Danforth's son-in-law and Summitt Distributing CEO Tom Stillman, in which Danforth is a minority investor, sold majority interest in the National Hockey League in May 2012. In June 2019, the company acquired complete control of the company. On the St. Louis Walk of Fame, Danforth has a celebrity. He is an honorary board member of Wings of Hope, a non-profit group.

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