Jerry Brown Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description
Edmund Gerald Brown Jr. (born April 7, 1938), best known as Jerry Brown, is a Democratic politician. He served as the 34th Governor of California, was thrice a candidate for President of the United States, and is currently the mayor of Oakland, California.
Brown was born in San Francisco, California, the son of former Democratic governor Pat Brown. He graduated from the University of California, Berkeley in 1961.
Brown is a Democrat. In 1975 he was elected Governor of California succeeding Republican Ronald Reagan and served two terms until 1983. Jerry Brown's father, Pat Brown, had been Governor prior to losing the 1966 election to Reagan.
Staunchly opposed to the Vietnam War, Brown had a broad base of support from California's young left-wing radicals who dominated the political scene at the time. Upon election he refused to live in the grand governor's mansion, and instead rented a modest apartment. Instead of riding as a passenger in the traditional chauffeured limousine, Brown drove himself to work in a compact sedan from the State Vehicle Pool.
In 1978 he was dubbed "Governor Moonbeam" by his critics from his proposal for the State of California to purchase its own satellite that would be launched into orbit to provide emergency communications for the state (a similar program of leasing satellites was later adopted by the state). The nickname quickly became associated with his quirky politics, which were considered eccentric and even radical by some in California and the rest of the nation. He was even the subject of California Über Alles; by punk band the Dead Kennedys, a bizarre fantasy about Brown being an evil Zen fascist. Many of the concepts suggested by Governor Brown that were considered quirky at the time would now be considered forward looking.
While serving as governor, he twice ran for the Democratic nomination for President, in 1976 and 1980. In his first two campaigns, he was considered a youthful firebrand and was not embraced by many in his own party, especially while challenging incumbent Jimmy Carter for the nomination in 1980. His political views took something of a back seat to the ongoing media frenzy surrounding his reported relationship with singer Linda Ronstadt. His outspoken criticism of Carter in 1980 was regarded by some in his party as helping lead to Carter's landslide defeat by Ronald Reagan.
In 1982, Brown declined to run for re-election as California governor and instead ran for the U.S. Senate. He was defeated by Republican Pete Wilson. Republican George Deukmejian won the governorship in 1982, succeeding Brown, and was reelected in 1986. After his Senate defeat in 1982, many considered Brown's political career to be over. During the 1980s, Brown travelled to Japan to study Buddhism, studying with Christian/Zen teacher Hugo Enomiya-Lassalle, among others.
In 1991, when he announced his intention to run for president in 1992 and to challenge George H. W. Bush in his re-election bid, many in the media and his own party dismissed his campaign as an ego-trip with little chance of gaining significant support. Brown made the adoption of a flat tax the centerpiece of his campaign, an issue that became associated with the campaign of Steve Forbes four years later in 1996. To the surprise of many, Brown was able to tap a populist streak in the Democratic Party, which had suffered a string of defeats in presidential elections. In his campaign, he specifically shunned large donors and promoted his decision to seek contributions from individuals in the sum of 100 dollars or less. He was quick to recognize the possible use of alternative media, often at the expense of mockery of his tactics. Appearing on cable television interviews, he would display a toll-free telephone number for donations, a tactic that was effective but considered gauche by the standards of the day. To the astonishment and even embarrassment of many in the media and his party, he won primaries in thirteen states and stayed a viable candidate well past Super Tuesday. He was the last remaining challenger, along with Paul Tsongas, to the eventual nominee Bill Clinton. Brown gave grudging support to the Clinton campaign, which kept him at arm's length, and his popularity did not translate into a lasting position of power within the national party.
Brown also for several years hosted a talk and call-in radio show on the local Pacifica group station, KPFA. The radio show and Brown's politcal action group were called We the People. In discussions he strongly critiqued both the Democratic and Republican parties - with many positions similar to those of Ralph Nader, both appearing to draw upon the works of Noam Chomsky. He terminated this show to run for for the nonpartisan office of Mayor of Oakland (all municipal and county offices in California are by law nonpartisan).
In June, 1998, he was elected mayor of the city of Oakland, and took office in January, 1999. An early action was to get the approval of the electorate to convert Oakland's weak mayor political structure (the mayor as chairman of the board of supervisors and official greeter) to a strong mayor structure (the mayor as chief excecutive over the nonpolitical city manager and thus the various city departments and not a board member). This strong mayor structure in many ways is similar to that of the nearby city of San Francisco. Brown was reelected in 2002. During his first term there was considerable controversy with San Francisco's mayor Willie Brown over the alignment of a replacement span for the eastern portion of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. This became known as the Mayors Brown controversy.
In 2003, Brown and fellow Democratic Mayor Jim Hahn of Los Angeles praised Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger for his decisive actions regarding the suppression of the reinstitution of portions the vehicle license fee (also known as the car tax) and some restoration of state funding for city governments, implying that Gray Davis (who had been Governor Brown's Chief of Staff in the 1970s) had acted poorly in this regard.
In early 2004, Brown expressed his interest to be a candidate for the Democratic nomination for attorney general of California in the 2006 election.
| Preceded by: Ronald Reagan | Governors of California | Succeeded by: George Deukmejian |
| H.P. Sullivan | California Secretary of State | March Fong Eu |
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