The Chinese government denied all accusations. Activities until 2008 campaign In 2002, Clinton warned that pre-emptive military action against Iraq would have unwelcome consequences, and later claimed to have opposed the Iraq War from the start though some dispute this. Also in the 1980s, The Clintons' personal and business affairs included transactions that became the basis of the investigation, which later dogged his presidential administration. Less than a month after taking office, he signed the , which required large employers to allow employees to take unpaid leave for pregnancy or a serious medical condition. If you are going to do things like that, take it away from the office and off work hours. This resulted in an urban battle that killed 18 American soldiers, wounded 73 others, and one was taken prisoner. The Clintons in a Christmas portrait, 1993 During the campaign, questions of regarding state business and the politically powerful , at which Hillary Rodham Clinton was a partner, arose. Archived from on June 16, 2006. This action had bipartisan support, and was popular with the public. In a series of tweets, then-President-Elect criticized his ability to get people out to vote. Batts was confirmed by the Senate in a in 1994. Clinton was the first president in history to appoint more women and minority judges than white male judges to the federal courts.
Prior to the presidency, he was the from 1979 to 1981, and again from 1983 to 1992, and the from 1977 to 1979. Clinton was born and raised in and attended, and. He met at Yale and married her in 1975. After graduating, Clinton returned to Arkansas and won election as theserving from 1977 to 1979. As Governor of Arkansas, he overhauled the state's education system and served as chairman of the. Bill clinton on today show was elected president indefeating incumbent Republican opponent. At age 46, he became the and the first from the generation. Clinton presided over the longest period of peacetime economic expansion in American history and signed into law thebut failed to pass his plan for. In thethe of the for the first time in 40 years. InClinton became the first Democrat since to be elected to a second full term. He passed and theas well as financial deregulation measures, including the and the. In 1998, Clinton was by the for and following allegations that he committed perjury and obstructed justice to conceal an he had witha 22-year old White House intern. Clinton was acquitted by the in 1999 and completed his term in office. He is only the second U. During the last three years of Clinton's presidency, the reported a budget surplus, the first such surplus since 1969. In foreign policy, Clinton ordered U. Clinton left office with the highest end-of-office of any U. Since leaving office, he has been involved in public speaking and humanitarian work. He has remained active in politics by campaigning for Democratic candidates, including the presidential campaigns of his wife and. In 2004, Clinton published his autobiography. In 2009, he was named the United Nations to and after thehe teamed with to form the. In addition, he secured the release ofvisiting the capital and negotiating their release with. He is the son ofa traveling salesman who had died in an automobile accident three months before his birth, and later Virginia Kelley. His parents had married on September 4, 1943, but this union later proved to be bigamous, as Blythe was still married to his third wife. Virginia traveled to to study nursing soon after Bill was born, leaving him in Bill clinton on today show with her parents Eldridge and Edith Cassidy, who owned and ran a small grocery store. At a time when the southern United States wasClinton's grandparents sold goods on to people of all races. In 1950, Bill's mother returned from nursing school and marriedwho co-owned an in with his brother and. The family moved to Hot Springs in 1950. Although he immediately assumed use of his stepfather's surname, it was not until Clinton turned 15 that he formally adopted the surname Clinton as a gesture toward his stepfather. Clinton said that he remembered his stepfather as a gambler and an alcoholic who regularly abused his mother and half-brother,to the point where he intervened multiple times with the threat of violence to protect them. In Hot Springs, Clinton attended St. John's Catholic Elementary School, Ramble Elementary School, andwhere he was an active student leader, avid reader, and musician. Clinton was in the chorus and played thewinning first chair in the state band's saxophone section. He briefly considered dedicating his life to music, but as he noted in his autobiography : Sometime in my sixteenth year, I decided I wanted to be in public life as an elected official. I loved music and thought I could be very good, but I knew I would never be or. I was interested in medicine and thought I could be a fine doctor, bill clinton on today show I knew I would never be. But I knew I could be great in public service. Clinton began an interest in law at Hot Springs High, when he took up the challenge to argue the defense of the ancient in a mock trial in his Latin class. Clinton has identified two influential moments in his life, both occurring in 1963, that contributed to his decision to become a public figure. One was his visit as a senator to the to meet President. College and law school years Georgetown University Clinton ran for president of the while attending the School of Foreign Service at. With the aid of scholarships, Clinton attended the at in Washington, D. In 1964 and 1965, Clinton won elections for. From 1964 to 1967, he was an intern and then a clerk in the office of Arkansas Senator. While in college, he became a brother of co-ed service fraternity and was elected to. Clinton was also a member of thea youth group affiliated with Freemasonry, but he never became a. He is a member of honorary band fraternity. Oxford Upon graduating from Georgetown in 1968, Clinton won a towhere he initially read for a in but transferred to a in politics and, ultimately, a in politics. Clinton did not expect the second year because of the draft and he switched programs; this type of activity was common among other Rhodes Scholars from his cohort. He had received an offer to study at, but he left early to return to the United States and did not receive a degree from Oxford. During his time at Oxford, Clinton befriended fellow American Rhodes Scholar Frank Aller. In 1969, Aller received a letter that mandated deployment to the. Aller's 1971 suicide had an influential impact on Clinton. I knew nothing about it, and when Bill clinton on today show began to describe the napalming of civilians I began to cry. Bill said that feeling bad wasn't good enough. He also developed an interest inwhich he played at Oxford. Vietnam War opposition and draft controversy During theClinton received educational draft deferments while he was in England in 1968 and 1969. While at Oxford, he participated in and organized a event in October 1969. He was planning to attend law school in the U. Clinton registered for the draft and received a high number 311meaning that those whose birthdays had been drawn as numbers 1 to 310 would have to be before him, making it unlikely that he would be drafted. In fact, the highest number drafted was 195. He issued a statement during the 1992 presidential campaign: I was informed by the draft board that it was of interest to Senator Fulbright's office that Bill Clinton, a Rhodes Scholar, should be admitted to the program. During the 1992 campaign, it was revealed that Clinton's uncle had attempted to secure him a position in thewhich would have prevented him from being deployed to Vietnam. This effort was unsuccessful and Clinton said in 1992 that he had been unaware of it until then. Although legal, Clinton's actions with respect to the draft and deciding whether to serve in the military were criticized bill clinton on today show his first presidential campaign by conservatives and some Vietnam veterans, some of whom charged that he had used Fulbright's influence to avoid military service. Law school After Oxford, Clinton attended and earned a J. In 1971, he met fellow law student in the ; she was a class year ahead of him. They began dating and were soon inseparable. After only about a month, Clinton postponed his summer plans to be a coordinator for the for the in order to move in with her in California. The couple continued in New Haven when they returned to law school. Clinton eventually to take a job leading McGovern's effort there. He spent considerable time inat the campaign's local headquarters on Lemmon Avenue, where he had an office. Clinton worked with future two-termfutureand then unknown television director and future filmmaker. Bill married Hillary on October 11, 1975, and their only child,was born on February 27, 1980. Early political career Further information:, and After graduating from Yale Law School, Clinton returned to Arkansas and became a law professor at the. In 1974, he ran for the. Running in a conservative district against incumbent RepublicanClinton's campaign was bolstered by the anti-Republican and anti-incumbent mood resulting from the. Hammerschmidt, who had received 77 percent of the vote in 1972, defeated Clinton by only a 52 percent to 48 percent margin. In 1976, Clinton ran for. With only minor opposition in the primary and no opposition at all in the general election, Clinton was elected. Newly elected Bill Clinton meets with President in 1978, fifteen years before assuming the nation's highest office. In 1978, Clinton entered the Arkansas gubernatorial primary. At just 31 years old, he was one of the youngest gubernatorial candidates in the state's history. Clinton was elected in 1978, having defeated the Republican candidatea farmer from. Clinton was only 32 years old when he took office, the youngest governor in the country at the time and the second youngest governor in bill clinton on today show history of Arkansas. He worked on educational reform and directed the maintenance of Arkansas's roads, with wife Hillary leading a succ
