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Elizabeth Dole |
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Elizabeth Dole
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| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office January 7, 2003 Serving with Richard Burr |
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| Preceded by | Jesse Helms |
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| In office January 25, 1989 – November 23, 1990 |
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| President | George H.W. Bush |
| Preceded by | Ann Dore McLaughlin |
| Succeeded by | Lynn Morley Martin |
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| In office February 7, 1983 – September 30, 1987 |
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| President | Ronald Reagan |
| Preceded by | Andrew L. Lewis, Jr. |
| Succeeded by | James H. Burnley IV |
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| Born | July 29, 1936 Salisbury, North Carolina |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse | Bob Dole |
| Alma mater | Duke University Harvard Graduate School of Education Harvard Law School |
| Religion | Methodist |
Mary Elizabeth Hanford "Liddy" Dole (born July 29, 1936) is an American politician who served in both the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush presidential administrations, and currently serves as a United States senator from North Carolina. She was elected to the Senate in 2002 and is the first female senator for North Carolina. She is running for re-election in the United States Senate election in North Carolina, 2008.
She is a member of the Republican Party and former chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. She is married to former U.S. Senate Majority Leader and 1996 Republican presidential nominee Sen. Bob Dole.
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Dole was born Mary Elizabeth Hanford in Salisbury, North Carolina, to Mary Ella Cathey (1901-2004) and John Van Hanford (1893-1978).[1] She attended Duke University, graduating in 1958, and followed that with post-graduate work at Oxford University in 1959. She earned a master's degree in education from Harvard University in 1960 and a J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1965. She is an alumna of the Phi Beta Kappa honor society and was recognized for being their leading orchid grower several times.
Dole first met her future husband, Senator Bob Dole in the spring of 1972 at a meeting arranged by her boss and mentor, Virginia Knauer.[2] The couple dated, and she became his second wife on December 6, 1975. They have no children, though she is stepmother to Bob's adult daughter Robin from his first marriage of 24 years that ended in divorce in 1972.
Dole, who had campaigned for the Kennedy-Johnson presidential ticket in 1960, worked in the White House in the latter years of the administration of Lyndon Johnson.
When many Democrats left the White House following Richard Nixon's replacement of Johnson, Dole did not. From 1969 to 1973, Elizabeth Dole served as Deputy Assistant to President Nixon for Consumer Affairs. In 1973, Nixon appointed her to a seven-year term on the Federal Trade Commission. In 1975, she became a Republican. She took a leave from her post as a Federal Trade Commissioner for several months in 1976 to campaign for her husband for Vice President of the United States. She later resigned from the FTC in 1979 to campaign for her husband's 1980 presidential run.
She served as United States Secretary of Transportation from 1983 to 1987 under Ronald Reagan, the first woman appointed to that position. In this role, she was the first woman to have served as the head of a branch of the United States Military, the United States Coast Guard being under the Department of Transportation at the time.
During her tenure the implementation of the "third eye" brake light on passenger cars was made mandatory. She worked with MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving) to pass laws withholding federal highway funding from any state that had a drinking age below twenty-one. The state government of South Dakota opposed the drinking age law and sued Dole in the case South Dakota v. Dole, but the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Dole. She oversaw the privatization of the national freight railroad, CONRAIL. She initiated random drug testing within the Department of Transportation.
Dole served as United States Secretary of Labor from 1989 to 1990 under George H. W. Bush; she is the first woman to serve in two different Cabinet positions in the administrations of two Presidents.
In 1991 Dole became the president of the American Red Cross. She served until 1999 when she resigned, leaving little doubt she intended to pursue the Presidency of the United States. She agreed to take this job without pay.
Elizabeth Dole ran for the Republican nomination in the US presidential election of 2000, but pulled out of the race in October 1999 before any of the primaries, largely due to inadequate fundraising. Dole placed third – behind George W. Bush and Steve Forbes – in a large field in the Iowa Straw Poll (the first, non-binding, test of electability for the Republican Party nomination). The Iowa Straw Poll differed from the national polls where Mrs. Dole was second only to Bush and Senator John McCain was in third.
In July 2000, shortly before the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia, Bush campaign sources said Mrs. Dole was on the short list to be named the vice-presidential nominee, along with Michigan Governor John Engler, New York Governor George Pataki, Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge, author and political figure Lynne Cheney, and former Missouri Senator John Danforth [3]. Many pundits believed that Dole was the frontrunner for the Vice Presidential nomination. Bush then surprised most pundits by selecting former U.S. Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney, who was actually in charge of leading Bush's search for a vice presidential nominee.
In late December 2001, Dole shifted her official residency from the Doles' Watergate condominium to her mother's home in Salisbury, North Carolina to seek election to the U.S. Senate.[4][5] The seat was made available by the retirement of Jesse Helms (R). Despite having not lived regularly in the state since 1959, she easily won the Republican primary. She defeated her Democratic opponent Erskine Bowles, a former chief of staff to former President Bill Clinton.
Her election to the Senate marked the second time a spouse of a former Senator was elected to the Senate from a different state from that of her spouse (the first was Kansas Senator Nancy Landon Kassebaum, who married former Tennessee Senator Howard Baker – though Kassebaum and Baker were married after both had finished their service in the Senate).
In November 2004, following Republican gains in the United States Senate, Dole narrowly edged out Senator Norm Coleman of Minnesota for the post of chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. She is first woman to become chair of the NRSC. During her election cycle as chairperson, her Democratic Party counterpart, Senator Chuck Schumer raised significantly more money, and also had more success in recruiting candidates. In the November election, Dole's party lost six U.S. Senate seats to the Democrats, thus losing control of the U.S. Senate. Dole was replaced as NRSC chair by Senator John Ensign of Nevada following the 2006 midterms.
Dole is running for reelection in 2008. Democratic congressman Brad Miller had expressed an interest in challenging her, but had decided against it.[6] On May 6, 2008, State Senator Kay R. Hagan won the Democratic primary election and became Dole's general election opponent.
Dole is a member of the following U.S. Senate committees:
In early 2007, a number of North Carolina- and nationally-focused political blogs raised questions regarding Elizabeth Dole's status as a North Carolina resident, similar to those raised regarding Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, which are as yet, unresolved. The Senator's campaign maintains that Elizabeth Dole’s official voter registration is in her hometown, while her place of current residency is Washington D.C., like most elected officials.
According to North Carolina election law, in order to maintain residency while living outside the state, voters registered in the state must intend to return to the state, to reside, as soon as reasonably feasible.[7][8] According to critics, Elizabeth Dole fails to meet the minimum requirements for North Carolina eligibility due to the fact that the Doles have maintained a shared residence in the Watergate complex since their marriage in 1975, which was listed as her official residence on her Rowan County voter registration information until sometime in 2007[9][10]; Senator Dole does not appear to spend a significant amount of time in North Carolina, when the Senate is in recess,[11], making it unlikely that she would return to the state, were her bid for reelection to fail, thus disqualifying her as a North Carolina resident.
Elizabeth Dole has authored three books:
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Images and media |
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| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Andrew L. Lewis, Jr. |
United States Secretary of Transportation 1983 – 1987 Served Under: Ronald Reagan |
Succeeded by James H. Burnley IV |
| Preceded by Ann Dore McLaughlin |
United States Secretary of Labor 1989 – 1990 Served Under: George H.W. Bush |
Succeeded by Lynn Morley Martin |
| United States Senate | ||
| Preceded by Jesse Helms |
United States Senator (Class 2) from North Carolina 2003 – present Served alongside: John Edwards, Richard Burr |
Incumbent |
| Party political offices | ||
| Preceded by George Allen |
Chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee 2005 – 2007 |
Succeeded by John Ensign |
| Non-profit organization positions | ||
| Preceded by Richard Schubert |
President of the American Red Cross 1991 – 1999 |
Succeeded by Bernadine Healy |
| Order of precedence in the United States of America | ||
| Preceded by John E. Sununu R-New Hampshire |
United States Senators by seniority 73d |
Succeeded by Lamar Alexander R-Tennessee |
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