Everything about George P Shultz totally explained
George Pratt Shultz (born
December 13,
1920) served as the
United States Secretary of Labor from 1969 to 1970, as the
U.S. Secretary of the Treasury from 1972 to 1974, and as the
U.S. Secretary of State from 1982 to 1989. Originally an
economist, he's also served as a
university professor and a business executive.
Early life, education
George Shultz was born in
New York City, the son of Birl Earl Shultz and Margaret Lennox Pratt, the daughter of Rev. Edward Pratt of Shoshone, Idaho, and not the grand-daughter of
Charles Pratt of
Standard Oil, as has been widely mythologized. In 1938, Shultz graduated from the
Loomis Chaffee School in
Windsor, Connecticut, after which he received an
B.A. degree in
economics from
Princeton University in 1942. That same year he joined the
U.S. Marine Corps and served until 1945, attaining the rank of
Captain. In 1949, Shultz earned a Ph.D. from the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His degree was in
industrial economics.
Family
While serving with the Navy in
Hawaii, he met his future wife, nurse lieutenant Helena Maria "Obie" O'Brien (1915-1995). They had five children. In 1997, after the death of Helena, he married
Charlotte Mailliard Swig, a prominent
San Francisco socialite. Their marriage was called the "Bay Area Wedding of the Year" and they remain a power couple in San Francisco.
University professor
He taught in both the
MIT Department of Economics and the
MIT Sloan School of Management from 1948 to 1957, with a leave of absence in 1955 to serve on President
Dwight Eisenhower's Council of Economic Advisers as a senior staff economist. In 1957, Shultz joined the
University of Chicago Graduate School of Business as professor of industrial relations. Later, he was named dean in 1962.
Joins Nixon's cabinet
Shultz served as President
Richard Nixon's secretary of labor from 1969 to 1970, after which he was director of the
Office of Management and Budget. He then became
United States Secretary of the Treasury from May 1972 to May 1974. It was during this period that Shultz, along with
Paul Volcker and
Arthur Burns, supported the decision of the Nixon administration to end the
gold standard and the
Bretton Woods system.
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Business executive
In 1974, he left government service to become president and director of
Bechtel Group, a large
engineering and services company.
Secretary of State for Reagan
On
July 16,
1982, he was appointed by President
Ronald Reagan to serve as the sixtieth U.S. secretary of state, replacing
Alexander Haig, who had resigned. Considered by some to be a
dove on foreign policy within the
Reagan administration, Shultz frequently clashed with the more hawkish members of the administration. In particular, he was well known for outspoken opposition to the "arms for hostages" scandal that would eventually become the
Iran Contra situation. In a 1983 testimony before the
U.S. Congress, he said that the
Sandinista government in
Nicaragua was "a cancer in our own land mass", that must be "cut out". He was also opposed to any negotiation with the government of
Daniel Ortega: "Negotiations are a euphemism for capitulation if the shadow of power isn't cast across the bargaining table." -- for example, negotiations are not effective unless backed by the option to use power. During the
First Intifada (see
Arab-Israeli conflict), Shultz "proposed ... an international convention in April 1988 ... on an interim autonomy agreement for the
West Bank and
Gaza Strip, to be implemented as of October for a three-year period" (Oded, 135). However, this never materialized.
Comedians best know Shultz for State Department spokeswoman Phyllis Oakley's response to a question about the Princeton tiger tattooed on Shultz's posterior: "I'm not in a position to know."
Spy Magazine featured Shultz and the Cowardly Lion from the Wizard of Oz in "Separated at Birth."
Later life
George Shultz left office on
January 20,
1989, but continues to be a strategist for the
Republican Party. He was an advisor for the
George W. Bush 2000 Campaign, and senior member of the so-called "Vulcans," a group of policy mentors for Bush which also included among its members
Dick Cheney,
Paul Wolfowitz and
Condoleezza Rice. One of his most senior advisors and confidants is former ambassador Charles Hill, who holds dual positions at the
Hoover Institution and
Yale University. Shultz has been called the father of the
Bush Doctrine, because of his advocacy of
preventive war.
(External Link) He generally defends the
neoconservatism of the Bush administration.
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After leaving public office in 1989, Shultz surprised many of his fellow conservatives by becoming the first prominent Republican to call for the legalization of
recreational drugs. He went on to add his signature to an advertisement, published in
The New York Times on
June 8,
1998, entitled "We believe the global war on drugs is now causing more harm than drug abuse itself."
He also has spoken against the
Cuban embargo, going as far as calling the US policy towards
Cuba "
insane", arguing that
free trade would help bring down the
Fidel Castro, regime and that the embargo only helps justify the continued repression in the island.
In August 2003, Shultz was named co-chair (along with
Warren Buffett) of California's Economic Recovery Council, an advisory group to the campaign of
California gubernatorial candidate
Arnold Schwarzenegger.
On
January 5,
2006, he participated in a meeting at the
White House of former Secretaries of Defense and State, to discuss United States foreign policy with Bush administration officials.
Shultz is the chairman of the
JP Morgan Chase bank's International Advisory Council and an honorary director of the
Institute for International Economics. He is a member of the
Hoover Institution at
Stanford University, the
Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP) Board of Advisors, the New Atlantic Initiative, the prestigious Mandalay Camp at the
Bohemian Grove, the
Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, and the
Committee on the Present Danger. He is honorary chairman of The Israel Democracy Institute (www.idi.org.il). He formerly served on the board of directors for the
Bechtel Corporation, Accretive Health, and
Charles Schwab Corporation. Shultz was a member of the board of directors of
Gilead Sciences from January 1996 to December 2005. He is currently a co-chairman of the
North American Forum.
Honors and prizes
Further Information
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