Jerry Brown
Edmund Gerald Brown, Jr. (born April 7, 1938), best known as Jerry Brown, is a Californian politician. He served as the 34th Governor of California 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 was a Democrat who served as governor from 1975 - 1983. He was staunchly opposed to the Vietnam War, and he had a broad base of support from California's young left-wing radicals who dominated the political scene at the time. His radical youth politics earned him the nickname "Governor Moonbeam" from his critics. He was even the subject of California Ueber Alles by punk band the Dead Kennedys, a bizzare fantasy about Brown being an evil Zen fascist.
He ran for the Democratic nomination for President in 1976, 1980, and most successfully in 1992, winning primaries in thirteen states against Paul Tsongas and the eventual nominee Bill Clinton.
Brown ran for the U.S. Senate and was defeated by Republican Pete Wilson in 1982. Republican George Deukmejian won the governorship in 1982, succeeding Brown, and was reelected in 1986. Wilson became governor in 1990 and was reelected in 1994.
In June, 1998, he was elected mayor of the city of Oakland, and took office in January, 1999. Brown was reelected in 2002.
In 2003, Brown and fellow Democratic Mayor Jim Hahn of Los Angeles praised Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger for his decisive actions regarding the vehicle license fee (also known as the car tax) and state funding for city governments, implying that Gray Davis had acted poorly in this regard.
Brown dated pop singer Linda Ronstadt in the late 1970's.
| Preceded by: Ronald Reagan | Governors of California | Succeeded by: George Deukmejian |