| • Science | • People | • Locations | • Timeline |
Muskie was born in Rumford, Maine, the son of Catholic Polish immigrants. He graduated from Bates College in 1936, and Cornell University Law School in 1939 before serving in the United States Navy during World War IIWorld War II was the most extensive and costly armed conflict in the history of the world, involving the great majority of the world's nations, being fought simultaneously in several major theatres, and costing tens of millions of lives. The war was fough.
After the war he was instrumental in building up the Democratic Partylogo depicts a stylized donkey in red, white, and blue. The Democratic Party is one of the two major United States political parties. The Party is currently the minority in both the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives, as w in Maine. Maine had traditionally been a Republican state, notable for being one of the two states that Alf LandonAlfred Mossman "Alf" Landon ( September 9, 1887 October 12, 1987) was an American Republican politician from Kansas, notable nationally for his 1936 nomination as the Republican opponent of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Born in West Middlesex, Pennsylvania, carried against Franklin Roosevelt in 1936.
He served in the Maine House of Representatives before being elected GovernorA governor is an official who heads the government of a colony, state or other sub-national state unit. Most countries in the world have some sort of official known as a governor, though in some countries, the heads of the states, provinces and regions ma in 1954. He was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1958Events January January 1 Treaty of Rome founding the EU is implemented January 4 Sputnik 1 falls to Earth from its orbit (launched on October 4 1957) January 8 14 year old Bobby Fischer wins the United States Chess Championship January 18 Armed Lumbee Nat, defeating incumbent Republican Fred Payne and won reelection in 1964, 1970, and 1976, serving until his resignation on May 7, 1980 to become Secretary of State. He served in this capacity from 1980 to 1981 during the Jimmy Carter administration, following the resignation of Cyrus Vance.
Memorial to Edmund Muskie in his birthplace, Rumford, Maine
He was the Democratic Party's nominee for Vice-President in 1968. Before the 1972 election he was viewed as the frontrunner, a moderate establishment candidate, for the Democratic Presidential nomination. But the grassroots Iowa caucuses made the early runnings more liberal and anti-war than Muskie's perceived positions, and Muskie's perhaps surprising political inexperience - having built up the Democratic Party in his home state, he had never been in a primary battle before, and his performance was criticized - began to show. Muskie lost momentum, and after winning the New Hampshire primary by only a small margin, saw his lead fall to South Dakota Senator George McGovern. McGovern would go on to win the nomination before losing the election in a landslide to Richard Nixon.