41 Facts About Pat Brown

Edmund Gerald "Pat" Brown was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 32nd governor of California from 1959 to 1967.

Pat Brown's first elected office was as district attorney for San Francisco, and he was later elected attorney general of California in 1950, before becoming the state's governor after the 1958 election.

Pat Brown lost the 1966 California gubernatorial election for a third term to future president Ronald Reagan; his legacy has since earned him regard as the builder of modern California.

Pat Brown was born in 1905 in San Francisco, California, one of four children of Ida and Edmund Joseph Pat Brown.

Pat Brown's father came from an Irish Catholic family, with his grandfather Joseph immigrating from County Tipperary, Ireland.

Pat Brown was a debate champion as a member of the Lowell Forensic Society at San Francisco's Lowell High School, where he held twelve offices of student government; he graduated from Lowell in 1923.

Pat Brown studied law at night, while working part-time for attorney Milton Schmitt, receiving an LL.

Pat Brown ran as a Republican Party candidate for the State Assembly in 1928, but lost badly; he moved to the Democratic Party in 1934, as the Great Depression had made him lose confidence in the pro-business Republican Party.

Pat Brown quickly became a New Dealer, and an active party participant.

Pat Brown was reelected to the office in 1947, and after seven years in office, received the support of Republican Governor Earl Warren.

Pat Brown emulated the course followed by Warren when the Governor himself was the Alameda County district attorney.

In 1946, as the Democratic nominee, Brown lost the race for attorney general of California to Los Angeles County District Attorney Frederick N Howser.

Pat Brown was known for his cheerful personality, and his championing of building an infrastructure to meet the needs of the rapidly growing state.

Pat Brown was the boom-boom governor for a boom-boom time: championing highways, universities and, most consequential, a sprawling water network to feed the explosion of agriculture and development in the dry reaches of central and Southern California.

Pat Brown's team worked hard in preparation for the governor's inauguration.

Pat Brown wanted to expand state services but first had to end the deficit and obtain enough revenue for his plans.

Governor Pat Brown was a staunch supporter of the plan, energetically opposing critics and seeking solutions.

Pat Brown reduced his introductory bond issuance from $11 billion to $1.75 billion, beginning a television campaign to appeal to residents.

Governor Pat Brown insisted on the Burns-Porter Act which sent the bond issue to a referendum; the 1960 vote saw Butte County as the sole Northern California county not voting against the measure.

The first year of Pat Brown's administration saw the abolition of the cross-filing system that had enabled candidates to file with multiple political parties at once while running for office.

Governor Pat Brown insisted on Unruh's reforms that abolished various government agencies and consolidated others.

In February 1961, Pat Brown proposed a massive reorganization plan for the state government, which included the creation of several so-called "super-agencies" to greatly reduce the number of direct reports to the governor.

In September 1961, Pat Brown appointed the secretaries of the first four superagencies.

Pat Brown signed the California Master Plan for Higher Education in 1960.

Governor Pat Brown sought free higher education for California students, which the Master Plan provided.

Pat Brown presided over the implementation of the California Master Plan for Higher Education, fair employment legislation, a state economic development commission, and a consumers' council.

Pat Brown sponsored some 40 major proposals, gaining passage of 35.

Pat Brown later admitted that he denied clemency in one capital case principally since the legislator who represented the district in which the murder occurred held a swing vote on farmworker legislation supported by Brown, and had told Brown that his district "would go up in smoke" if the governor commuted the man's sentence.

In contrast, Governor Pat Brown approved 36 executions, including the highly controversial cases of Caryl Chessman in 1960 and Elizabeth Duncan in 1962; she was the last female put to death before a national moratorium was instituted.

Pat Brown's Republican successor, Ronald Reagan, was a firm supporter of capital punishment and oversaw, in 1967, the last execution in California prior to the US Supreme Court ruling that it was unconstitutional in Furman v Georgia.

Pat Brown's sagging popularity was evidenced by a tough battle in the Democratic primary, normally not a concern for an incumbent.

The California Republican Party seized upon Pat Brown's increasing unpopularity by nominating a well-known and charismatic political outsider, actor and union leader Ronald Reagan.

At first, Pat Brown ran a low-key campaign, stating that running the state was his biggest priority, but later began campaigning on the record of his eight years as governor.

Pat Brown lost the 1966 election to Ronald Reagan in his second consecutive race against a future Republican President.

Pat Brown was a relatively popular Democrat in what was, at the time, a Republican-leaning state.

Today, Governor Pat Brown is widely credited with the creation of modern California.

Pat Brown's wife, Bernice Layne, was a fellow student at Lowell High School, but it was not until the completion of his law degree, and her teaching credential, that they began a courtship.

Pat Brown died from a heart attack at his home in the Beverly Canyon section of Los Angeles on February 16,1996, at the age of 90.

Pat Brown is interred at Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma.

However, along with over a dozen other candidates, aside from George Wallace, Brown was a stalking horse for incumbent Lyndon B Johnson, whose nomination was assured.

Pat Brown briefly sought the vice presidential nomination at the 1956 Democratic National Convention, winning one vote.