Jerry Brown

Jerry Brown (born April 7, 1938, San Francisco, California, U.S.) is an American Democratic politician who served as governor of California (1975–83; 2011–19), mayor of Oakland, California (1999–2007), and California’s attorney general (2007–11).

Brown was one of the four children of Edmund G. Brown, who served as governor of California from 1959 to 1967. The younger Brown attended both public and parochial schools as a child, and in 1956, after spending a year at the University of Santa Clara, he transferred to the Jesuit seminary Sacred Heart Novitiate. In 1958 he took the vows of a clergyman. However, he left the seminary in 1960 to enroll at the University of California at Berkeley, where he majored in classics (B.A., 1961). He spent time abroad before receiving a law degree from Yale University in 1964, then clerked for California Supreme Court Justice Mathew Tobriner. By the late 1960s Brown was living in Los Angeles and working for the law firm Tuttle & Taylor. He was elected to the Los Angeles Community College Board of Trustees in 1969, and the following year he was elected secretary of state for California. During his four-year tenure, he drafted and championed the California Fair Political Practices Act (passed in 1974).

In 1974 Brown was elected governor of California, succeeding Ronald Reagan. His decision to live in an inexpensive apartment rather than the governor’s mansion cemented his reputation as an unconventional politician. As governor, Brown focused on fiscal austerity, criminal deterrence, and environmental issues, including alternative energy technologies and preservation of the state’s coastal land. In 1976 he embarked on his first unsuccessful presidential campaign. Also that year Brown was given the nickname “Governor Moonbeam” by Chicago journalist Mike Royko, in reference to the politician’s idealistic streak; the sobriquet would prove to be near-unshakable throughout Brown’s career. He was elected to a second term as governor in 1979. He again ran for president the following year but failed to win the Democratic nomination.

At the close of his second term in 1982, Brown retired as governor to pursue a Senate seat. When he lost to a Republican candidate, his political future became unclear. He took a long sabbatical, traveling to Mexico, Japan, and India, where he worked with Mother Teresa. In 1989, a year after his return to the United States, he was elected chairman of California’s Democratic Party. He resigned in 1991 and sought the Democratic presidential nomination the following year, losing to Bill Clinton.

From the mid-1990s Brown lived in a warehouse building in Oakland, out of which he operated the political organization We the People, which sponsored programs and initiatives aimed at education and sustainable food production, including a daily radio program hosted by Brown. It was also the base for Brown’s successful 1998 mayoral campaign. He served two terms as mayor of Oakland and was considered instrumental in the turnaround of the city, pushing through numerous development deals and spurring the growth of a local arts scene. In 2006 Brown was elected attorney general of California.

In March 2010 he announced his candidacy for governor of California, to succeed incumbent Arnold Schwarzenegger. Brown easily won the primary, and he defeated Republican Meg Whitman in the general election that November. After he took office in 2011, Brown undertook various measures that erased the state’s budget deficit; perhaps most notably, he oversaw the passage of a tax increase in 2012. He also continued to advance environmental protections. In 2014 he easily won reelection, and in his fourth term Brown focused on two long-standing—and troubled—initiatives seen as his legacy projects: constructing a high-speed train line and reengineering the state’s water system. In 2017–18 he was also noted for his opposition to U.S. Pres. Donald Trump, especially on policies concerning immigration and climate change. Because of term limits, Brown, who was California’s longest-serving governor, did not seek reelection in 2018, and the following year he left office. He was succeeded by Gavin Newsom.