George Stanley McGovern, (born July 19, 1922) is a former United States Representative, Senator, and Democratic presidential nominee. McGovern lost the 1972 presidential election in a landslide to incumbent Richard Nixon.

McGovern, a World War II combat veteran, was most noted for his opposition to the Vietnam War. He is currently serving as the United Nations global ambassador on hunger.

McGovern was born in Avon in South Dakota and lived in nearby Mitchell, having moved there at the age of six. The son of a minister, he graduated from Dakota Wesleyan University in Mitchell.

McGovern married Eleanor Stegeberg of Woonsocket on October 31, 1943. The two had met during a high school debate in which Eleanor and her sister Ila defeated McGovern and his partner.

As the war approached, McGovern recalled later, he felt insecure about his own courage. A gym teacher once called him a "physical coward" for failing to vault a gymnastics horse. To prove himself, McGovern, who was afraid of heights, took flying lessons and got a pilot's license through the U.S. Government's Civilian Pilot Training Program. "Frankly, I was scared to death on that first solo flight," McGovern remembered. "But when I walked away from it, I had an enormous feeling of satisfaction that I had taken the thing off the ground and landed it without tearing the wings off."http://www.airportjournals.com/Display.cfm?varID=0605004

He volunteered for the United States Army Air Forces during World War II and served as a B-24 Liberator bomber pilot in the Fifteenth Air Force, flying 35 missions over enemy territory from bases in North Africa and later Italy, often against heavy anti-aircraft artillery. McGovern was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for saving his crew by crash landing his damaged bomber on a small Mediterranean island. McGovern's wartime service is at the center of Stephen E Ambrose's book The Wild Blue http://www.pbs.org/newshour/conversation/july-dec01/wildblue_8-16.html, which the author dedicated to McGovern's wife Eleanor.

On return from the war, McGovern earned a divinity degree from Garrett Theological Seminaryin Evanston near Chicago, and briefly tried his hand as a Methodist minister. Dissatisfied, he earned a Ph.D in history from Northwestern University in Evanston and became a professor at his alma mater, Dakota Wesleyan University.

Although he was raised by two Republican parents, he chose not to join any party until the 1948 presidential election, when he registered as an Independent and joined the newly-formed Progressive Party. During the campaign, he attended the party's first national convention as a delegate and volunteered for the eventually unsuccessful campaign of its presidential nominee, former Vice President Henry A. Wallace.

Four years later, in 1952, he heard a radio broadcast of Governor Adlai Stevenson's speech accepting the presidential nomination of the Democratic Party. He immediately went into town and registered as a Democrat, then volunteered for Stevenson's campaign the following day. Although Stevenson lost that election, McGovern remained active in Democratic politics. By 1953, he had been named Executive Director of the South Dakota Democratic Party and, in 1956, he ran for and won a seat in the House of Representatives, winning reelection in 1958 against a strong challenge from South Dakota's two-term Governor Joe Foss.

After two terms in the House, he unsuccessfully ran for the Senate in 1960, losing to Republican incumbent Karl Mundt 52%-48%. The election loss made him available for appointment as the first director of President John F. Kennedy's Food for Peace program. In 1962, he stood for election to South Dakota's other Senate seat and won, serving his first of three Senate terms.

Although he voted in favor of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, McGovern later became a strong critic of defense spending, and was an early and vocal opponent of U.S. military involvement in Vietnam, often criticizing the policies of fellow Democrat, President Lyndon Johnson.

McGovern was outspoken in his criticism of the Senate's "war hawks". During Senate floor debate in September 1970, he assailed his colleagues for not supporting an amendment that he had cosponsored with Senator Mark Hatfield (R-Oregon) calling for a complete withdrawal of troops from Vietnam:

"Every Senator in this chamber is partly responsible for sending 50,000 young Americans to an early grave... This chamber reeks of blood... it does not take any courage at all for a Congressman or a Senator or a President to wrap himself in the flag and say we are staying in Viet Nam, because it is not our blood that is being shed." He blamed his colleagues for having contributed to "that human wreckage all across our land — young men without legs or arms or genitals or faces — or hopes." http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,902748,00.html

In a retort to the powerful Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman, John Stennis, McGovern declared, "I'm tired of old men dreaming up wars for young men to fight. If he wants to use American ground troops in Cambodia, let him lead the charge himself." http://www.thecrimson.com/printerfriendly.aspx?ref=355047

At the 1968 Democratic National Convention, McGovern stood as the anti-war flagbearer for some of the supporters of Senator Robert F. Kennedy, who had been assassinated two months earlier while running for the nomination. Despite strong anti-war sentiment, McGovern lost the Presidential nomination to establishment candidate Vice President Hubert Humphrey, coming in behind anti-war candidate Minnesota Senator Eugene McCarthy who had been in the race for the longest time, but had alienated many of the Kennedy supporters in the months leading up to Kennedy's assassination, and failed to win them over afterward.

During the convention, a motion was passed to establish a commission to reform the Democratic Party nomination process (White pp. 17–20). In 1969, McGovern was named chairman of the Commission on Party Structure and Delegate Selection; due to the influence of former McCarthy and Kennedy supporters on the staff, the commission significantly reduced the role of party officials and insiders in the nomination process, increased the role of caucuses and primaries, and mandated quotas for proportional black, women, and youth delegate representation (White pp. 24–33).

These changes eventually facilitated McGovern's successful own nomination at the 1972 Convention. The fundamental principle of the McGovern Commission—that the Democratic primaries should determine the winner of the Democratic nomination—lasted throughout every subsequent nomination contest.

Arousing suspicions of Republican "dirty tricks," frontrunner Edmund Muskie did worse than expected in the New Hampshire primary and McGovern came in a close second. While Muskie's campaign funding and support dried up, McGovern picked up valuable momentum in the following months. Despite losing several primaries, including losing the Florida primary to George Wallace, McGovern secured enough delegates to the 1972 Democratic National Convention to win the party's nomination. McGovern's campaign manager, Gary Hart, became a presidential contender himself 12 years later.

In the 1972 election, McGovern ran on a platform that advocated withdrawal from the Vietnam War in exchange for the return of American prisoners of war [White p. 122] and amnesty for draft evaders who had left the country [White p. 360], an anti-war platform that was presaged, in 1970, by McGovern's sponsorship of the McGovern-Hatfield amendment, seeking to end U.S. participation in the war by Congressional action. However, during a meeting with Democratic Governors conference, Nevada Governor Mike O'Callaghan asked McGovern what he would do if the North Vietnamese refused to release American POW's after a withdrawal. McGovern responded, "Under such circumstances, we'd have to take action," although he did not say what action. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,877739-4,00.html

McGovern's platform also included an across-the-board, 37% reduction in defense spending over three years [White p. 123]; and a "demogrant" program giving $1,000 to every citizen in America [White p. 125] that was later changed to creating a $6,500 guaranteed minimum income for Americans, and was later dropped from the platform [White p. 190]. In addition, McGovern supported ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment. An infamous incident took place late in the campaign. McGovern was giving a speech and a Nixon admirer kept heckling him. McGovern called the young man over and said "Listen you son of a bitch, why don't you kiss my ass!" Mississippi Senator James Eastland later asked the Senator if that was what he had said. When McGovern said yes, Eastand replied that was the best thing he had ever said in the whole campaign.

Main article: Thomas Eagleton

Just over two weeks after his nomination, it was revealed that McGovern's running mate, Thomas Eagleton, had received electroshock therapy for depression during the 1960s. Though many people still supported Eagleton's candidacy, an increasing number of influential politicians and columnists questioned his ability to handle the office of Vice-President. The resulting negative attention prompted McGovern to accept Eagleton's offer to withdraw from the ticket, replacing him with JFK in-law Sargent Shriver. This occurred after McGovern had stated publicly he was still "...behind Eagleton 1000 percent"; reneging on that statement a few days later made McGovern look indecisive. The Eagleton controversy also put the McGovern campaign off message and was speculated at the time to perhaps be a harbinger of what would become McGovern's subsequent landslide loss.

The McGovern Commission changes to the convention rules marginalized the influence of establishment Democratic figures (some of whom had lost the nomination to McGovern). Many refused to support him, with some switching their support to the incumbent President Richard Nixon through a campaign effort called "Democrats for Nixon". In addition, McGovern was repeatedly attacked by associates of Nixon, who used an array of "dirty tricks" and illegal tactics during the campaign, including the infamous Watergate break-in, which eventually led to Nixon's resignation in 1974. http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/story/0,13918,1165126,00.html http://www.villagevoice.com/news/0529,ridgeway,66005,6.html

In the general election, the McGovern/Shriver ticket suffered a 60%-38% defeat to Nixon — at the time, the second biggest landslide in American history, with Electoral College totals of 520 to 17. McGovern's two electoral vote victories came in Massachusetts and the District of Columbia; McGovern failed to win his home state of South Dakota, a state that had delivered for the Democrat in only three of the previous 18 presidential elections in the twentieth centuryhttp://www.uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/index.html. In his telegram to Nixon conceding defeat, McGovern wrote, "I hope that in the next four years you will lead us to a time of peace abroad and justice at home. You have my full support in such efforts."http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,712179,00.html

On April 25, 1972, George McGovern won the Massachusetts primary and journalist Bob Novak phoned Democratic politicians around the country, who agreed with his assessment that blue-collar workers voting for McGovern did not understand what he really stood for. On April 27, 1972 Novak reported in a column that an unnamed democratic senator had said of McGovern: "The people don’t know McGovern is for amnesty, abortion and legalization of pot. Once middle America - Catholic middle America, in particular - finds this out, he’s dead." The label stuck and McGovern became known as the candidate of "amnesty, abortion and acid."http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19694666/page/7/http://www.columbiatribune.com/2007/Aug/20070819Feat004.asp

Novak was accused of manufacturing the quote and to rebut the criticism, Novak took the senator to lunch after the campaign and asked whether he could identify him as the source but the senator said he would not allow his identity to be revealed. http://www.kansascity.com/news/columnists/steve_kraske/story/209499.html "Oh, he had to run for re-election. The McGovernites would kill him if they knew he had said that," says Novak. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19694666/page/7/

On July 15, 2007, Novak disclosed on Meet the Press that the unnamed senator was Thomas Eagleton. Political analyst Bob Shrum says that Eagleton would never have been selected as McGovern's running mate if it had been known at the time that Eagleton was the source of the quote, Eagleton's electro-shock treatments would never have become an issue in the 1972 presidential campaign, and McGovern would have remained politically viable carrying perhaps eight to ten states against Richard Nixon in 1972.http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19694666/page/7/

After this loss, McGovern returned to South Dakota, where he was re-elected to the Senate in 1974. During the Iran hostage crisis he was in agreement with conservative Republicans in authorizing military action to free the hostages. In 1980, he was defeated for re-election by U.S. Rep. James Abdnor amidst that year's Republican sweep, which became known as the "Reagan Revolution." In 1984, he sought his party's presidential nomination once again. Although he finished in third place in the Iowa caucus amidst a crowded field, his campaign eventually floundered and he withdrew soon after the New Hampshire primary.

The McGoverns had five children: Ann, Terry, Susan, Mary McGovern-McKinnon, and Steven. In 1994, his daughter Teresa died of hypothermia while intoxicated. McGovern revealed his daughter had battled her alcohol addiction for years. He founded a non-profit organization in her name to help others suffering from alcoholism.

McGovern's wife, Eleanor, died January 25, 2007, at their home in Mitchell, South Dakota. http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0701/02/lkl.01.html

In 1981–1982, McGovern replaced historian Stephen Ambrose as a professor at the University of New Orleans.

McGovern hosted a 1984 Saturday Night Live episode and played a dull caricature of himself in a 1990 Newhart episode.

McGovern considered a second run for the White House in 1992 according to a New York Times article published on January 25, 1991.

From 1998 to 2001, he served as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations (UN) Food and Agriculture Agencies, based in Rome, Italy (he was succeeded in this post by long-time Democratic Rep. Tony Hall). In 2001, he was appointed UN Global Ambassador on World Hunger by the World Food Programme. http://www.wfp.org/english/?ModuleID=137&Key=401

He endorsed Democrat Wesley Clark's unsuccessful candidacy for the Democratic Party nomination for the 2004 presidential election on January 18, 2004 (24 days before Clark's withdrawal from the race). McGovern continues to lecture and make public appearances. He previously owned a used book store in his summer home of Stevensville in Montana's Bitterroot Valley.

On June 2, 2005, McGovern stated "the U.S. media needs a modern-day "Deep Throat" within the administration of President George W. Bush to reveal how America was "misled on Iraq." He is a member of the Middle East Policy Council.

On July 28, 2005, McGovern appeared on Idaho Public Television's "Dialogue" program http://www.idahoptv.org/dialogue/showtemplate.cfm?ShowNo=1030 and discussed a variety of subjects including parallels between the Iraq war and Vietnam, and Vice-President Dick Cheney's assertions that Iraq was involved in the 9/11 events. On September 4, 2005, he appeared at the Houston Astrodome in support of the survivors of Hurricane Katrina.

On March 22, 2006 McGovern spoke at the University of Virginia, Miller Center of Public Affairs on the topic of world hunger. Fighting World Hunger, a 60 minute lecture, is available in streaming video and audio formats through the University Channel. During the lecture he discussed the history of U.S. hunger initiatives along with his own role in establishing programs such as Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) and the National School Lunch Program. He also expressed his views on the Iraq war and alcoholism as a social ill.

In 2006, the film One Bright Shining Moment — The Forgotten Summer of George McGovern http://firstrunfeatures.com/onebrightdvd.html was released in the United States. Directed by Stephen Vittoria and narrated by Amy Goodman, the documentary chronicles the life and times of George McGovern, focusing on his 1972 bid for the presidency. The film features McGovern, Gloria Steinem, Gore Vidal, Warren Beatty, Howard Zinn and Dick Gregory.

On October 3, 2006, a book written by McGovern and foreign policy analyst William R. Polk titled Out of Iraq: A Practical Plan for Withdrawal Now was released by Simon & Schuster. In the book McGovern and Polk argue for an immediate withdrawal of U.S. military forces from Iraq.

On October 5–October 7, 2006, the George and Eleanor McGovern Library and Center for Leadership and Public Service was dedicated at Dakota Wesleyan University in Mitchell, South Dakota. Among the dedication's dignitaries were former President Bill Clinton and Allen Neuharth.

On the January 2, 2007 episode of CNN's Larry King Live, McGovern announced publicly for the first time that he voted for Gerald Ford in the 1976 presidential election, even though Ford was a Republican. McGovern said he felt more comfortable with Ford than with Carter, whom he did not know well. But, McGovern voted for Carter in 1980, when Carter lost his bid for re-election.

On July 10, 2007, "An Evening with George McGovern" was held at Dakota Wesleyan University in Mitchell, South Dakota to celebrate McGovern's upcoming 85th birthday. The event was anchored by veteran NBC correspondent Sander Vanocur. When asked by Vanocur about his feelings about the term "McGovernism" to describe a particular liberal philosophy, McGovern quipped, "“Well, I’m one politician that’s in the dictionary, even though it’s as a swear word.”http://www.dwu.edu/press/2007/jul11.htm

As well, a celebration of McGovern's 85 years was held on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., attended by such notables as former Senator and Republican Presidential Nominee Bob Dole and former Senator Gary Hart, campaign manager for McGovern's 1972 presidential campaign. In remarks prepared for the event, Bill Clinton, who worked on the McGovern campaign in 1972, referred to the 300+ attendees at the celebration as "McGovern's heirs."http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/18/AR2007071801965_pf.htmlIn October of 2007 he disappointed many of his fellow peace activists by endorsing the hawkish Hillary Clinton for the 2008 Democratic Nomination

George McGovern affected major changes in Democratic party rules that continue to this day, such as the requirements of diversity of the delegates to the party's nominating convention. He remains a symbol of the political left during the turbulent 1960s and early 1970s when the country was torn by U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War and the corruption and abuse of power of the Nixon administration. McGovern recognized the mixed results of his 1972 candidacy, saying, "I opened the doors of the Democratic Party and 20 million people walked out." McGovern's campaign also represented the last time a mostly grass roots candidacy was able to wrest control of either party's presidential nomination against the perceived will of a party's leadership. McGovern has also become more forceful in recent years in drawing historical parallels between the Nixon and Bush administrations and the Vietnam and Iraq wars.

Despite his reputation as a dovish liberal, McGovern has publicly stated he is not a pacifist. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,906071,00.html

McGovern's legacy also includes a commitment to combating hunger both in the US and across the globe. In addition to numerous domestic programs, together with Republican Sen. Bob Dole he created an international school lunch program through The George McGovern-Robert Dole International Food for Education and Child Nutrition Program, which helps fight child hunger and poverty by providing nutritious meals to children in schools in developing countries. McGovern currently serves on the board of Friends of the World Food Program. http://www.friendsofwfp.org

* George McGovern on Idaho Public Television's "Dialogue" (2005) * McGovern Campaign Commercials from 1972 and 1984 * Trailer for the film "One Bright Shining Moment" * 2006 McGovern lecture on fighting world hunger * "Should the U.S. Get Out of Iraq?" October 18 2006 The Brian Lehrer Show * George McGovern advocating a position of a six-month withdrawal from Iraq on NPR, [[October 1] 2006]

*Ambrose, Stephen, The Wild Blue : The Men and Boys Who Flew the B-24s Over Germany 1944–45, Simon & Schuster, 2001. ISBN 0-7432-0339-9. *Clinton, Bill, My Life, Vintage, 2005. ISBN 1-4000-3003-X. *Hart, Gary, Right from the Start: A Chronicle of the McGovern Campaign, Quadrangle, 1973. ISBN 0-8129-0372-2. *Marano, Richard Michael, Vote Your Conscience: The Last Campaign of George McGovern, Praeger Publishers, 2003. ISBN 0-275-97189-9. *McGovern, George S., The Essential America: Our Founders and the Liberal Tradition, Simon & Schuster, 2004. ISBN 0-7432-6927-6. *McGovern, George S., Grassroots: The Autobiography of George McGovern, Random House, 1977. ISBN 0-394-41941-3. *McGovern, George S., Terry: My Daughter's Life-And-Death Struggle With Alcoholism, Plume Books, 1997. ISBN 0-452-27823-6. *McGovern, George S., The Third Freedom: Ending Hunger in Our Time, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2002. ISBN 0-7425-2125-7. *McGovern, George S., A Time of War! A Time of Peace, Vintage Books, 1968. ISBN 0-394-70481-9. *Thompson, Hunter S., Fear and Loathing: On The Campaign Trail '72, Warner Books, 1973. ISBN 0-446-31364-5. *Watson, Robert P. (ed.), George McGovern: A Political Life, A Political Legacy, South Dakota State Historical Society Press, 2004. *White, Theodore H., The Making of the President 1972, Antheneum Publishers, 1973. ISBN 0-689-10553-3. *"What Might Have Been", article from The Washington Post by Thomas Leahy, February 20 2005. *"Come Home, America: Liberals need another George McGovern—and perhaps conservatives do too.", article from The American Conservative by Bill Kauffman, January 30 2006. *"The Way Out of War" A blueprint for leaving Iraq now November 8, 2006 *McGovern, George S., "An Impartial Interrogation of George W. Bush" January 12, 2007

*Dakota Wesleyan University *McGovern Library *McGovern talks about his book, Social Security and the Golden Age *George McGovern: Cheney is wrong about me, wrong about war — Op-Ed, Los Angeles Times, April 24, 2007 *McGovern 72 Site *McGovern Tribute Site