Mike Gravel
Maurice Robert "Mike" Gravel (IPA: /g??'v?l/) (born May 13, 1930), is a former Democratic United States Senator from Alaska for two terms, from 1969 to 1981. He is primarily known for his efforts in ending the draft following the Vietnam War and for having put into the public record the Pentagon Papers in 1971. He is currently a candidate for the 2008 Democratic nomination for President of the United States. Early life Gravel was born in Springfield, Massachusetts to French-Canadian immigrant parents, Marie Bourassa and Alphonse Gravel.[1] There, he was raised and educated (in parochial schools) as a Roman Catholic. Gravel enlisted in the United States Army in 1951 and served in the Counter Intelligence Corps until 1954. He attended Columbia University's School of General Studies, where he studied economics. Gravel was married to the former Rita Martin from 1958 until around 1980.[2] Gravel moved to Alaska with the specific intent of running for the U.S. Senate. He drove up the Alaska Highway and had several jobs before he was able to get into politics, including real estate sales, brakeman for the Alaska Railroad, and a successful property developer on the Kenai Peninsula.[3] State legislator Gravel served in the Alaska House of Representatives from 1962 to 1966. During the last two years of his term, he served as the Speaker of the House. He left that body to run for Alaska's seat in the U.S. House of Representatives, losing to incumbent Ralph Rivers. Between 1963 and 1966 Gravel initiated electronic voting in Alaska.[citation needed] In 1968 he ran against incumbent Democratic Senator Ernest Gruening, a popular former governor, for his party's nomination to the U.S. Senate, unexpectedly beating him in the primary and going on to win the general election. Senator Gravel served on the Environment and Public Works Committee throughout his Senate career. He also served on the Finance and Interior Committees and he chaired the Energy, Water Resources, and Environmental Pollution subcommittees.[4] Nuclear issues In the late 1960s and early 1970s the Pentagon was in the process of performing calibration tests for a nuclear warhead that, upon investigation, was revealed to be obsolete. The Cannikin tests involved the detonation of nuclear bombs under the seabed of the North Pacific at Amchitka Island, Alaska. Gravel opposed the tests in Congress and organized worldwide environmental opposition to their continuation. The program was halted after the second test. Nuclear power was considered an environmentally clean alternative for the commercial generation of electricity and was part of a popular national policy for the peaceful use of atomic energy in the 1950s and 1960s. Gravel publicly opposed this policy in 1970. He used his office to organize citizen opposition to the policy and to persuade Ralph Nader's organization to join the opposition. Vietnam War and foreign policy See also: Gravel v. United States In 1971 Gravel played a key role in the release of the Pentagon Papers -- a large collection of secret government documents pertaining to the Vietnam War -- which were made public by former Defense Department analyst Daniel Ellsberg. Gravel inserted 4,100 pages of the Papers into the Congressional Record of his Senate Subcommittee on Buildings and Grounds. These pages were later issued by the Beacon Press as the "Senator Gravel Edition" -- the most complete edition of the Pentagon Papers to be published. The "Gravel Edition" was edited and annotated by Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn, and included an additional volume of analytical articles on the origins and progress of the war, also edited by Chomsky and Zinn. Also in 1971, Gravel embarked on a one-man filibuster against legislation renewing the military draft. Using various parliamentary maneuvers, Gravel was able to block the bill for five months before President Richard Nixon and Senate Republicans agreed to allow the draft to expire in 1973. Six months before United States Secretary of State Henry Kissinger's secret mission to the People's Republic of China in July 1971, Gravel introduced legislation to recognize and normalize relations with the PRC. Alaskan issues In 1973, Gravel introduced an amendment to empower the Congress to make the policy decision about the construction of the Alaska Pipeline. The amendment passed the Senate by a single vote. The pipeline has been responsible for 20% of the U.S. oil supply. Gravel opposed the Alaskan fishing industry in advocating American participation in the formation of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). For two years he opposed legislation that permitted the U.S. to unilaterally take control of the 200-mile waters bordering its land mass. The legislation was passed, and the United States has signed but never ratified the UNCLOS. He helped secure a private grant to facilitate the first Inuit Circumpolar Conference in 1977, attended by Inuit representatives from Alaska, Canada, and Greenland. These conferences now also include representatives from Russia. In the early 1970s Gravel supported a demonstration project that established links between Alaskan villages and the National Institute of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, for medical diagnostic communications. Gravel authored and secured the passage into law of the General Stock Ownership Corporation (GSOC), Subchapter U of the Tax Code, as a prerequisite to a failed 1980 Alaskan ballot initiative that would have paid dividends to Alaskan citizens for Pipeline-related revenue. Run for Vice President Gravel actively campaigned for the office of Vice President of the United States during the 1972 presidential election. At the 1972 Democratic National Convention, he was nominated by Bettye Fahrenkamp, the national committeewoman of Alaska. The senator then addressed the convention and won 226 delegate votes, coming in third behind Senator Thomas Eagleton of Missouri, who was convention Presidential nominee George McGovern's choice, and Frances "Sissy" Farenthold of Texas, in chaotic balloting after many delegates were unsatisfied by McGovern's choice.[5] Loss of Senate seat In 1980 Gravel was challenged for the Democratic Party's nomination by State Representative Clark Gruening, the grandson of the man Gravel had defeated in a primary 12 years earlier. Gruening won the nomination and went on to lose in the general election to Republican Frank Murkowski. Career after leaving the Senate Gravel took the 1980 defeat hard, recalling years later: "I had lost my career. I lost my marriage. I was in the doldrums for ten years after my defeat."[6] In the years since, Gravel has been a real estate developer in Anchorage and Kenai, Alaska,[7] consultant, and founder and head of The Democracy Foundation, which promotes direct democracy.[8] Gravel led an effort to get a United States Constitutional amendment to allow voter-initiated federal legislation similar to state ballot initiatives. He argued that Americans are able to legislate responsibly, and that the Act and Amendment in the National Initiative would allow American citizens to become "law makers". Gravel and his second wife, Whitney Stewart Gravel, live in Arlington County, Virginia. They have two grown children, Martin Gravel and Lynne Gravel Mosier, and four grandchildren.[9] Barnes Review controversy In June 2003 Gravel gave a speech on direct democracy at a conference hosted by the American Free Press. The event was cosponsored by the Barnes Review, a journal that endorses Holocaust denial.[10] Gravel has said repeatedly that he does not share such a view, stating "You better believe I know that six million Jews were killed. I've been to the Holocaust Museum. I've seen the footage of General Eisenhower touring one of the camps. They're [referring to the Barnes Review, and publisher Willis Carto] nutty as loons if they don't think it happened". The newspaper had intended to interview Gravel about the National Initiative. Senator Gravel recounts the background to the event: "He [Carto] liked the idea of the National Initiative. I figured it was an opportunity to discuss it. Whether it is the far right, far left, whatever, I'll make my pitch to them. They gave me a free subscription to American Free Press. They still send it to me today. I flip through it sometimes. It has some extreme views, and a lot of the ads in it are even more extreme and make me want to upchuck. Anyways, sometime later, Carto contacted me to speak at that Barnes Review Conference. I had never heard of the Barnes Review, didn't know anything about it or what they stood for. I was just coming to give a presentation about the National Initiative. I was there maybe 30 minutes. I could tell from the people in the room (mainly some very old men) that they were pretty extreme. I gave my speech, answered some questions and left. I never saw the agenda for the day or listened to any of the other presentations."[11] Writings During his first term in the Senate, Gravel wrote a book titled Citizen Power, in which he advocated the implementation of numerous populist ideas: * a guaranteed annual income (dubbed the "Citizen's Wage"), * public financing of elections, * progressive tax with no deductions or exemptions, * steps against the military-industrial complex (which he calls the "Warfare State"), * a national law to do away with voter registration and other barriers to voting, * abolition of the death penalty, * universal health care, school vouchers, * a drastic reduction in government secrecy, and an end to America's imperialistic foreign policy. The book also contained the complete text of the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, and the complete platform adopted by the Populist Party during the 1892 presidential election. Political positions Main article: Political positions of Mike Gravel Mike Gravel has announced positions on issues relevant to the upcoming Presidential election and matters of general political controversy in the American context including healthcare, veterans affairs, drug policy, immigration, taxation, energy policy, stem cell research, abortion, foreign relations, LGBT civil rights, education, impeachment, campaign finance reform, constitutional reform, trade policy, and gun control. Some of his political leanings and convictions may also be learned from the content of his 1972-published manifesto, Citizen Power. Presidential bid in 2008 On April 17 2006, Gravel became a declared candidate for the Democratic nomination for President of the United States in the 2008 election, announcing his run in a speech to the National Press Club. Short on campaign cash, he took public transportation to get to his announcement.[12] Gravel's campaign is based primarily on his ardent support for direct democracy (the National Initiative), but also emphasizes his support for a national sales tax and abolition of the IRS, immediate withdrawal from the war in Iraq, a single payer national health care system, and term limits during his campaign. Although Gravel's campaign has been little-noticed by the national media, he has campaigned almost full time in New Hampshire, the first primary state, since his announcement. He addressed the Democratic National Committee's Winter Convention in early February 2007 and was one of the participants in the Democratic Presidential Candidates forum in Carson City, Nevada later the same month. Through February 2007, opinion polls of contenders for the Democratic nomination have all shown Gravel with a 1% or less support level. At the end of March 2007, his campaign had less than $500 in cash on hand against debts of nearly $90,000.[13] On April 26 2007 he took part in the first Democratic presidential debate at South Carolina State University in Orangeburg, South Carolina. During the debate he suggested a Democratic bill criminalizing the war in Iraq. He also advocated positions such as opposing preemptive nuclear war. He stated that the Iraq War had the effect of creating more terrorists and that the "war was lost the day that George Bush invaded Iraq on a fraudulent basis". Overall, Gravel gained considerable publicity by shaking up the normally staid multiple-candidate format. However, it did not improve his performance in the polls; a May 2007 CNN poll showed him with less than 0.5 percent support among Democrats.[14] In early March, Gravel was not invited to the New Hampshire Presidential Debate. It was a joint effort from CNN, Hearst owned WMUR-TV and the Union Leader.[15] After the South Carolina Presidential Debate and heavy lobbying from supporters, CNN reversed its decision. In a recent television appearance Mike Gravel discussed numerous positions and suggestions. He suggested a program of "Kelso economics". Responding to a caller on a CSPAN program asking about marijuana and the drug war, Gravel stated "That one is real simple, I would legalize marijuana. You should be able to buy that at a liquor store."
