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Howard Henry Baker Jr. (November 15, 1925 –June 26, 2014) was an American politician, diplomat, and photographer who served as the United States Senator for Tennessee from 1967 to 1985. Baker was the first Republican to be elected to the Senate in Tennessee since the Reconstruction era. During his tenure he rose to the rank of Senate Majority Leader.

Known as the "Great Conciliator," Baker was a master at brokering comprises, enacting legislation, and maintaining civility. A moderate conservative, he was widely respected by both his Republican and Democratic colleagues.

As the leading Republican on the Senate Watergate Committee, Baker famously asked "What did the President know and when did he know it?"

Baker was a contender for the vice presidency in 1968, 1973 and 1976. Had he been selected in 1968 or 1973 in lieu of Spiro Agnew and Gerald Ford, he would have become president upon the resignation of Richard Nixon. Baker sought the Republican presidential nomination in 1980 but dropped out after the first set of primaries. Baker was planning to run for president again in 1988, but instead decided to serve as White House Chief of Staff as part of an effort to reorganize the Reagan administration following the Iran-Contra scandal. He later served as the United States Ambassador to Japan from 2001 to 2005.

Early life
Howard Henry Baker Jr. was born on November 15, 1925 in Huntsville, Tennessee. He was the oldest child of lawyer Howard Baker Sr. and homemaker Dora (née Ladd) Baker. The Bakers had been prominent citizens of East Tennessee for generations. Like most East Tennesseans, they traditionally supported the Republican Party.

Baker received his early education in Scott County. Described as quiet and studious, he was an avid reader, especially of National Geographic and Southern history. He imagined a future career for himself as an engineer or pilot.

The young Baker frequently met his father's legal colleagues, some of whom went on to have notable political careers, such as Ray Jenkins, Estes Kefauver, and John Sherman Cooper. Cooper was also a distant cousin.

Baker's mother died when he was eight due to complications from a gall bladder surgery. He noted later in life that he only had a vague recollection of her. Her death caused Baker to have a lifelong distaste of organ music, which he associated with her funeral. As their father was frequently away on business, Baker was expected to raise his younger sister Mary with the help of their grandmother, Lillie Ladd. Ladd was the first female sheriff in Tennessee and became Baker's main maternal figure. In 1936, Baker Sr. remarried to Irene Bailey, a widow who drafted legal titles for the Great Smoky Mountains Park Commission. Baker Jr. initially resented his stepmother but those feelings quickly subsided.

Baker's first political experience occurred when he accompanied his father on a tour of Tennessee during the 1936 United States presidential election. Baker Sr. campaigned extensively on behalf of Republican candidate Alf Landon. Landon lost in a landslide nationwide, and did especially poorly in heavily Democratic Tennessee. Despite this, Baker Sr. was recognized for his work and chosen as the Republican nominee for governor in 1938 and for senator in 1940. Statewide races were unwinnable for any Republican at the time but they were the highest position the Tennessee Republican Party could bestow when the traditionally Republican 1st and 2nd congressional districts were held by incumbents. A witness described Baker Sr.'s campaigns as an attempt to acquaint "voters with Republicanism and the name Baker in much the same way medieval villagers worked on a magnificent cathedral that would never be completed in their own lifetime."

Baker took up photography as a hobby no later than 1937. It would remain a lifelong passion for him. Shortly after buying his first camera, Baker earned money by photographing cadavers prior to funerals.

With Scott County's education system being underfunded, Baker's father and stepmother decided to send him to The McCallie School, a military prep school in Chattanooga. While there he became the photography editor of the student newspaper and yearbook. He graduated from the school in 1943.

Motivated by patriotic duty, Baker delayed his plans to pursue a degree in engineering to enlist in the Second World War. He was enrolled in the V-12 Navy College Training Program, which required him to study electrical engineering at the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, before being transferred to Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana for military training. Baker reached the rank of lieutenant and served in the Naval Reserve. During the war he commanded a PT boat and was responsible for decommissioning other PT boats. Baker was discharged from the navy in 1946 and joined the American Legion shortly after.

Immediately after the war Baker began working as a coal mining engineer. He soon decided to register at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville to continue his education in engineering. However, when the time came to register, he stood in line all day without getting to the registrar's office and left out of frustration. On the way back home Baker passed the University of Tennessee College of Law. The College of Law had no registration line, and so he decided to enroll there instead. While attending law school Baker was a member of the Scarabbean Senior Society and the Pi Kappa Phi fraternity. He was elected student president in 1948, and graduated in 1949.

Legal career
After being admitted to the bar, Baker returned to Huntsville to become the junior partner of his father's law firm. Baker became very involved in Scott County society, joining the Scott County Bar Association, Scott County Chamber of Commerce, and the Oneida Kiwanis Club.

Prior to the 1950 midterm elections, Baker Sr. decided to challenge Republican incumbent John Jennings Jr. for his seat in the 2nd congressional district. Baker served as his father's campaign manager in the divisive but successful primary challenge, as well as in the general election, where Baker Sr. defeated Democratic opponent Frank Wilson in an unusually narrow race for the heavily Republican 2nd district.

The Bakers accompanied their father to Washington D.C. in 1951. While Howard helped set up his father's office, Mary was chosen as the Tennessee Cherry Blossom Princess for the National Cherry Blossom Festival. While there she befriended the Illinois Cherry Blossom Princess Joy Dirksen, daughter of Senator Everett Dirksen. Baker was introduced to Joy Dirksen by Mary, either at the festival or a few months later at the wedding of Louise Reece, daughter of Representative B. Carroll Reece. Baker and Dirksen had an altercation at the wedding after she dared Mary to smoke a cigarette. Baker called her a "very corruptive influence" and pushed her into a rose bush. A few days later Baker phoned to apologize and also offered to apologize in person. At the Dirksen home "he became enthralled with her charm, the grace of her acceptance of his apology, and her mischievous wit" and proposed marriage twenty-five minutes after arriving, which Dirksen accepted. They married at the First Presbyterian Church of Pekin, Illinois on December 22, 1951. On their honeymoon they went to Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands before returning to Huntsville where Baker continued to practice law. Their first child, Darek Dirksen Baker, was born in 1953. Their second child, Cynthia "Cissy" Baker, was born in 1956.

As he continued to practice law Baker gained a reputation as a particularly talented criminal defense attorney. He was nicknamed "Old Two to Ten" for the relatively light sentences his clients received for serious crimes. The firm was successful enough that a second office was opened in Knoxville. The Bakers began to live in Knoxville during the school year and return to Huntsville in the summer. Baker also became increasingly immersed in the Scott County business community, serving as a founding board member of the Highland Telephone Cooperative, Huntsville Utility District, and Scott County Hospital. He was also on the boards of the Scott County Airport Authority, Tibbals Flooring, Stearns Coal and Lumber, Colonial Gas, and Brimstone Railroad. As well as being a board member, Stearns Coal and Lumber was also Baker's biggest client. He represented them in court against their employees' union, the United Mine Workers of America. Baker also became co-owner of the First National Bank of Oneida after buying it out with his best friend and business partner Bill Swain (owner of Swain Lumber Mills), and a third investor, Dr. Milford Thomas.

As the children of two prominent Republicans, the Bakers were frequently given tickets to White House dinners by couples who could not attend. They were present at dinners so often — seemingly uninvited — that President Dwight Eisenhower inquired into their identity.

Baker made occasional campaign appearances on behalf of his father and father-in-law. He was arguing a case before the Federal Power Commission on January 7,1964 when he was informed by Everett Dirksen that his father had died of a heart attack that morning. Baker declined an offer to be given his father's House seat, instead suggesting his stepmother take the position. Irene Baker accepted, finishing her late husband's term before retiring from politics.

Political ambitions
Baker had hesitated from entering politics while his father was still in office, but had long considered the possibility of becoming a senator. Tennessee's shift from a solidly Democratic state to a Republican-leaning swing state in presidential elections encouraged Baker to think it was finally possible for a Republican to win statewide office.

Senator Estes Kefauver died suddenly in office in 1963, and so a by-election was required to replace him. The by-election was scheduled to take place at the same time as the regular election for Tennessee's other Senate seat, as well as the 1964 presidential election. Memphis businessman Dan Kuykendall was selected to run in the regular election against incumbent Democrat Albert Gore, but no strong Republican candidate had emerged for the by-election. Baker was encouraged by several leading Republicans to run, including his friend and fellow attorney John B. Waters Jr. Baker agreed to run on the condition that Waters serve as his campaign manager.

During the campaign Baker's main proposal was a tax revenue sharing plan where the federal government would transfer money to state and municipal governments. Baker also supported positions he knew were widely popular in Tennessee, such as the continued state ownership of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), maintaining Social Security, and continuing social spending in the Appalachia region. Baker opposed policies which he characterized as "galloping federalism." In practice this meant he was against the creation of Medicare and the passage of the Civil Rights Act. Baker believed that the Civil Rights Act's guarantee of equal access to public accommodations and prohibition of discrimination by employers violated a constitutional right to freedom of association.

Baker was an enthusiastic supporter of Republican presidential candidate Barry Goldwater. This support was damaging for Baker, as Goldwater was widely perceived as an extremist. Unlike Baker, Goldwater supported privatizing the TVA, making Social Security voluntary, and ending social spending in Appalachia. These positions caused many Tennesseans to scorn Goldwater. Baker and Goldwater's mutual opposition to the Civil Rights Act also caused Tennessee's traditionally Republican black population to abandon the party in droves. Despite this, Baker continued to vigorously campaign against his opponent, Representative Ross Bass. Baker lost the election, but with the best result of any Tennessee Republican in a Senate election up to that point. Kuykendall lost a similarly close race against Gore. It was widely believed that Baker and Kuykendall had only lost because of their toxic association with Goldwater.

Following the 1964 election, Baker maintained a light schedule and declined offers to become the party's state chairman in anticipation of a rematch with Bass in the 1966 Senate election. Baker was discouraged by his family, which caused some hesitation, but he ultimately decided to run. His only opponent in the Republican primary was Vanderbilt law professor Kenneth L. Roberts. Roberts had supported Baker in the last election, and had entered the race after assuming that Baker's hesitation was a sign he would not be running. Because of their past working relationship and very similar beliefs, Baker and Roberts came to a gentleman's agreement to not attack each other during the campaign. In the primary, Baker continued to champion his tax revenue sharing plan. He also proposed the creation of an Economic Opportunity Corporation (EOC) which would pay for job training, grant loans to businesses, and build housing. The EOC would be supplemented by tax credits for students and businesses who hired the chronically unemployed. During the primary Baker also announced his support for a constitutional amendment to reinstate voluntary prayer in public schools. Despite expectations of a close race, Baker enjoyed the near-unanimous support of the Republican establishment and easily won the primary.

In the Democratic primary Bass had been defeated by former governor Frank G. Clement. The Tennessee Democratic Party had become increasingly plagued by factionalism, with different groups within the party being loyal to Bass, Clement, and former governor Buford Ellington. Because of the factionalism, Clement found it very difficult to mobilize the Democratic base in the general election. The Tennessee Labor Council and the AFL-CIO both refused to endorse him, and the Tennessee Voters' Council (TVC), the state's premier black organization, only did so after seven hours of debate. Clement was slow to try and win back his base under the assumption that winning the Democratic primary was still tantamount to winning the election in Tennessee. In contrast, Baker made a concerted effort to appeal to Democratic voters; in a speech to the TVC, Baker declared his support for equality of the races and non-discriminatory housing practices, although he conceded he opposed the Fair Housing Act as it was written. He also hired black staff members and opened campaign offices in black neighbourhoods. To young voters without the same generational loyalty to the Democratic Party as their parents and grandparents, Baker sought to portray Clement's faction as "complacent guardians of the status quo." On fiscal issues Baker ran on the same policies as he had in the past.

Baker won the election with a clear nine point margin and with a nearly 100,000 vote lead. Besides winning traditionally Republican East Tennessee, he also became the first Republican to win West Tennessee since Reconstruction. Baker also did notably well in urban areas, winning every city except for Nashville. His outreach to the Democratic base paid off; he won approximately 65% of union members and 17.5% of black voters. Because of Baker's issue-oriented campaigning and Clement's failure to find any moral foibles to attack Baker on, it was later described as "one of the cleanest elections ever."

Senate career
Baker did not make much of an initial impression in the Senate. He was described as a "junior-grade Everett Dirksen" and was negatively compared to more prominent freshman Republicans such as Edward Brooke of Massachusetts and Charles Percy of Illinois.

In his first session Baker spoke in favor of his tax revenue sharing plan and submitted it as a bill. Congress' Democratic leadership refused to hold hearings on the plan and so no progress was made.

Baker's first assignment was to the Government Operations and Public Works Committee. The ranking Republican on the committee was John Sherman Cooper, Baker's distant relation who had since become Senator for Kentucky. The two developed a close working relationship. Baker later described Sherman as being his biggest political influence with the exception of his father.

After being appointed to the Air and Water Pollution Subcommittee, Baker called upon Congress to introduce restrictions on pollutants. Due to his background in engineering, Baker had a firmer grasp on industrial development and environmental science than many more senior members of the committee. The committee's short-tempered chairman, Edmund Muskie, quickly became reliant on Baker's expertise. He also gradually became reliant on Baker's ability to broker compromises on difficult issues within environmental bills.

Baker's first term in the Senate included a series of votes that earned him the accolades of civil rights groups. Collaborating with Senator Ted Kennedy, Baker co-sponsored a bill to reapportion congressional districts to be equally distributed across the population. Disproportionate districts had been used to disenfranchise black voters, and had been used by both parties for their own benefit in different regions of the United States; historically, disproportionate districts were to the benefit of the Democrats in the South, and to the Republicans in the Midwest. Baker convinced Senate Republicans to vote in favor of the bill by showing them data projecting that nationwide equally proportioned districts would grant a net gain in Republicans seats in Congress. Baker also voted in favor of Thurgood Marshall's Supreme Court confirmation, and voted for the Fair Housing Act despite his past reservations. After the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., Baker was the first Southerner to eulogize him on the Senate floor.

Baker was a favorite son candidate in the 1968 presidential election and the leader of the Tennessee delegation to that year's Republican National Convention. Baker unsuccessfully challenged the state party's decision to send a lily-white delegation to the convention; of the fifty-six delegates, only one token black delegate was included. The three major candidates at the convention were liberal Governor Nelson Rockefeller, moderate former Vice President Richard Nixon, and conservative Governor Ronald Reagan. Rockefeller courted Baker for his support, but he politely declined, citing Rockefeller's complete lack of support in Tennessee. Baker was inclined toward Nixon from the start, and firmly endorsed him after he promised to implement Baker's revenue sharing plan if elected. After Nixon was nominated there was a boomlet on the convention floor to have Baker selected as his running mate. Baker did nothing to encourage the Nixon/Baker movement but confirmed he would accept the vice presidential nomination if it was offered to him. Although he was considered by Nixon as an option, Baker did not make it on to his shortlist. In the end, Governor Spiro Agnew of Maryland was selected. The Nixon/Agnew ticket went on to win the election.

Senate leadership bids
Baker was considered a Nixon loyalist early in his presidency. Baker fully supported Nixon's foreign policy regarding nuclear strategy and the Vietnam War. He also reintroduced his revenue sharing bill with Nixon's support, and supported bills introduced by Dirksen, including a constitutional amendment to allow voluntary prayer in public schools and a law to ban the sale of mail-order pornography to minors.

In September of 1969, Dirksen died in office of heart failure due to complications from a lung cancer operation. Dirksen laid in state at the Capitol rotunda, where Baker gave the principle eulogy.

Following Dirksen's death, Baker was encouraged by Senator Bob Packwood, who informally led a caucus of freshman senators who wanted someone relatively young as the next leader of the Senate Republicans. Packwood's caucus included Henry Bellmon, Marlow Cook, Bob Dole, Edward Gurney, and Ted Stevens.

After considering Robert Griffin and James Pearson, Packwood's caucus settled on Baker as the best candidate. Other candidates for the leadership were the moderate Hugh Scott, and conservatives Gordon Allott and Roman Hruska. Scott had a strong start with a series of endorsements from liberal and moderate Republicans in the Senate. Allott had intended to rely on fellow senators from the Western United States to support his bid but found he had alienated many of them during past water rights disputes. Lacking a base of support, Allott withdrew from the contest. Similarly, Hruska decided that he did not have a path to the leadership without the support of the freshman senators, and so he withdrew from the race and endorsed Baker. This left the contest as a one-on-one competition between Scott and Baker. Ideology was not the most important factor in the race; both liberals and conservatives back Scott and Baker. Rather, it was seen as a competition between experienced but procedural leadership against inexperienced but dynamic leadership.

Baker was re-elected in 1972 and again in 1978 and served from January 3, 1967, to January 3, 1985. In 1969, he was already a candidate for the Minority Leadership position that opened up with the death of his father-in-law, Everett Dirksen, but Baker was defeated 24–19 by Hugh Scott. At the beginning of the next Congress, in 1971, Baker ran again, losing again to Scott, 24–20.

When Scott retired, Baker was elected as leader of the Senate Republicans in 1977 by his Republican colleagues, defeating Robert Griffin, 19–18. Baker led the Senate GOP for the last eight years of his tenure, serving two terms as Senate Minority Leader from 1977 to 1981, and two terms as Senate Majority Leader from 1981 to 1985, a role he transitioned to after the Republicans gained the majority in the Senate in the 1980 elections.

Baker did not seek further re-election and concluded his Senate career in 1985. He was succeeded by Democratic Representative and future Vice President Al Gore.

Nixon administration
President Richard Nixon asked Baker in 1971 to fill one of the two empty seats on the US Supreme Court. When Baker took too long to decide whether he wanted the appointment, Nixon changed his mind and nominated William Rehnquist instead.

Watergate investigation
In 1973 and 1974, Baker was the influential ranking minority member of the Senate Watergate Committee, chaired by Senator Sam Ervin, which investigated the Watergate scandal. Baker famously asked aloud, "What did the President know and when did he know it?" The question is sometimes attributed to being given to him by his counsel and former campaign manager, future US Senator Fred Thompson.

John Dean, former White House counsel to Nixon, revealed to Senate Watergate chief counsel Samuel Dash that Baker had "secret dealings" with the White House during the congressional investigation. Although Baker, as a US senator, would be a juror in any future impeachment trial, Baker was recorded, on February 22, 1973, promising Nixon, "I'm your friend. I'm going to see that your interests are protected."

Watergate reporter Bob Woodward wrote that then "both the majority Democrats and minority Republicans agreed to share all information." Ultimately, one such document shared by Nixon lawyer Fred Buzhardt inadvertently suggested the presence of Nixon's secret taping system.

Presidential campaign
Baker was frequently mentioned by insiders as a possible nominee for Vice President of the United States on a ticket headed by incumbent President Gerald Ford in 1976. According to many sources, Baker was a frontrunner until he disclosed that his wife, Joy, was a recovered alcoholic. Ford, whose own wife, Betty, was an alcoholic (albeit undisclosed at the time), chose Kansas Senator Bob Dole.

Baker ran for U.S. president in 1980, dropping out of the race for the Republican nomination after losing the Iowa caucuses to George H. W. Bush and the New Hampshire primary to Ronald Reagan even though a Gallup poll had him in second place in the presidential race at 18%, behind Reagan at 41% as late as November 1979. Baker's support of the 1978 Panama Canal Treaties was overwhelmingly unpopular, especially among Republicans, and it was a factor in Reagan's choosing Bush instead as his running mate. Ted Stevens served as Acting Minority Leader during Baker's primary campaign.



Reagan administration
In 1984, Baker received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

In October 1983, Baker voted in favor of the bill establishing Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a federal holiday.

As a testament to Baker's skill as a negotiator and an honest and amiable broker, Reagan tapped him to serve as Chief of Staff during part of Reagan's second term (1987–1988). Many saw that as a move by Reagan to mend relations with the Senate, which had deteriorated somewhat under the previous chief of staff, Donald Regan. In accepting the appointment, Baker chose to skip another bid for the White House in 1988.

Later life
In 2003, the Howard H. Baker, Jr. Center for Public Policy was set up at the University of Tennessee to honor him. Vice President Dick Cheney gave a speech at the 2005 ground-breaking ceremony for the center's new building. Upon the building's completion in 2008, US Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor assisted in the facility's dedication.

In 2007, Baker joined fellow former Senate Majority Leaders Bob Dole, Tom Daschle, and George Mitchell to found the Bipartisan Policy Center, a non-profit think tank that works to develop policies suitable for bipartisan support. He was an advisory board member for the Partnership for a Secure America, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to recreating the bipartisan center in American national security and foreign policy. From 2005 to 2011, Baker was a member of the board of directors of the International Foundation for Electoral Systems, a nonprofit that provides international election support.

From 2005 to his death, Baker served as senior counsel to the law firm of his father and his grandfather, Baker, Donelson, Bearman, Caldwell & Berkowitz.

Baker was an accomplished lifelong photographer. His photographs have often been exhibited and were published in National Geographic, Life, and in the books Howard Baker's Washington (1982), Big South Fork Country (1993), and Scott's Gulf: The Bridgestone/Firestone Centennial Wilderness (2000). In 1993, he received the International Award of the American Society of Photographers, and in 1994, he was elected into the Hall of Fame of the Photo Marketing Association.



Death
On June 26, 2014, Baker died at the age of 88 from complications of a stroke that he had suffered a week earlier. He was in his native Huntsville, Tennessee, with his wife, Nancy, by his side.

Honors

 * He received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement in 1973.
 * He received the US Senator John Heinz Award for Greatest Public Service by an Elected or Appointed Official in 1981, given out annually by the Jefferson Awards
 * He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1984.
 * The rotunda at the University of Tennessee College of Law was renamed for Baker.
 * While he was delivering a commencement speech during his grandson's graduation at East Tennessee State University, Johnson City, Tennessee, on May 5, 2007, Baker was awarded an honorary doctorate degree.
 * He received the Order of the Paulownia Flowers, 2008 (Japan)

Personal life
Besides having a lifelong interest in photography, Baker was also a tennis enthusiast and amateur pilot.

Baker, a Presbyterian, was married twice. His first wife, Joy Dirksen, with whom he had two daughters, was the daughter of former Senate Minority Leader Everett M. Dirksen. After she died of cancer in 1993, Baker married U.S. Senator Nancy Landon Kassebaum, daughter of Kansas Governor Alfred M. Landon, in 1996.