Green grew up in the Kensington neighborhood's 33rd Ward with his brothers and sisters Mary, Anne, Michael, Dennis and Patrick. His father, William J. Green Jr., the dean of U.S. congressmen from Philadelphia at his death, was among the most powerful Democratic members of the U.S. House. This upbringing gave Green and his siblings extraordinary access to top Democratic Party leaders. The Harry Truman Presidential Library website, for instance, contains a picture of the Green family meeting with Harry Truman in the White House. And the records of the administration of President John F. Kennedy frequently mention the senior Green as well.
At the age of 25, Green was elected as a Democrat in a special election on April 28, 1964, to the Eighty-eighth Congress to fill the vacancy caused by the death of his father. He was reelected to six successive Congresses and served until January 3, 1977.
Upon his election to Congress, Green and his wife Pat moved to Frankford. As a congressman in Lyndon B. Johnson's "Great Society" era, Green assumed leadership on issues such as meat inspection, rat control, and tax reform and led the charge in Congress to eliminate the oil depletion allowance. He voted for the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the Fair Housing Act of 1968, the Immigration Reform Act of 1965, and the Medicare Act of 1965, other pieces of President Johnson's sweeping program of domestic reform, and was one of the original cosponsors of the Equal Rights Amendment. He had a 100 percent rating from the AFL-CIO, the NAACP, and the Americans for Democratic Action for his fourteen years in Congress.
Green served from December 1967, through December 1969, in his father's old post as Democratic city chairman but resigned after the Democratic City Committee refused to adopt his reform plan following a Republican sweep led by District Attorney and future U.S. SenatorArlen Specter.
He was an unsuccessful candidate for the Democratic nomination for mayor of Philadelphia in 1971, losing to former Police Commissioner Frank Rizzo's "law and order" candidacy. In the 1972 congressional redistricting, Green's opponents tried to gerrymander him out of his seat, placing him in the same district as Congressman James Byrne, in office since 1952. The newly merged district had voted heavily for Rizzo in the mayoral election and had been represented mainly by Byrne, for whom Rizzo campaigned actively. The grassroots organization Green put together for his mayoral campaign, however, enabled him to defeat Byrne decisively. He was then easily re-elected in the overwhelmingly Democratic year of 1974.
In 1976, U.S. Senator Hugh Scott, the Senate Republican leader, announced his retirement after being tarred in a campaign finance scandal and facing pressure from fellow Republicans Arlen Specter and John Heinz, who each coveted his seat. Green did not seek re-election to the House, and instead sought Scott's Senate seat.
Backed by Governor Milton Shapp, Green won the Democratic nomination for the seat, defeating State SenatorJeanette Reibman of Northampton County. Green's fundraising skills, however, proved to be no match for the millions available to Heinz from his personal fortune after he defeated Arlen Specter in the Republican Senate primary. Heinz blasted Green for voting against defense budgets Green considered too expensive, implying that Green was weak on U.S. defense. Political cartoons of the time show Heinz pouring money from a giant ketchup bottle over Green's head. Even so, and with Carter at the top of the Democratic ticket, Heinz barely reversed the Democratic tide and defeated Green, 52–48 percent.
After losing to Heinz, Green was admitted to the Pennsylvania bar, and he joined the now-defunct Philadelphia law firm Wolf, Block, Schorr & Solis-Cohen, known for its lobbying and government relations practice. He moved out of his district to the Germantown section of Philadelphia and into the home of his mother-in-law, Margaret Sharpless Kirk, with his wife and children. They later moved to Chestnut Hill.
As mayor
He declined to run in the 1978 gubernatorial election but won the Democratic nomination for Mayor of Philadelphia in 1979, defeating runner-up Charles Bowser, former deputy mayor. Other candidates for the nomination, former City Controller William Klenk and former Commerce Director Al Gaudiosi, withdrew near the end of the primary.
As mayor, Green was often forced by circumstances to make difficult and unpopular choices. He was required to balance a city budget still at a record high $285 million deficit inherited from Mayor Rizzo, the largest ever inherited by an incoming Philadelphia mayor. The resulting disputes with municipal labor unions, open battles with City Council, quiet disputes with campaign contributors, and an adversarial relationship with the mass media sapped his morale. "Reporters are the type of people who tore the wings off flies when they were young," he complained at the time. His efforts to balance the budget were successful, however, and for the first time in years new businesses were choosing to relocate to Philadelphia, which won a national marketing award during the Green administration. In a city divided by race, Green appointed the first African American managing director, future Mayor Wilson Goode, aggressively supported Joseph Coleman as the first African American president of City Council, and appointed the first African American superintendent of the Philadelphia public schools, Constance Clayton. Another member of his cabinet was the city's first female city solicitor. The Green administration is also remembered for having brought young talent into the City government: Chaka Fattah received his first government job in Green's Commerce Department, one headed by Dick Doran; Ed Deseve, Green's finance director, went on to head the U.S. Office of Management and the Budget in the administration of President Bill Clinton; Bill Marrazo, a Green commissioner of the Philadelphia Water Department, is now president of WHYY, Philadelphia's principal public television station.
Green decided not to seek re-election during the Democratic primary and concentrated on his family when his wife Patricia became pregnant. Pat Green was 40 and Green feared for her health and the health of his unborn child if she faced the stress of a political campaign during the pregnancy. After his youngest child, Maura Elizabeth Green, was born healthy near the end of his term, Green joked, "I am the winner" of the 1983 mayoral contest.
Material in Mayor Green's city archives files include correspondence, reports, and other materials relating to the various city departments, boards, commissions, and other city offices. Information is also available on the General Business Tax, the Mayor's Tax Committee, the Mayor's Scholarship Program of 1979–1980, cable TV, Century IV celebration, CETA, the bicentennial of the U.S. Constitution, Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission, energy, the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers Strike of 1981, the Educational Nomination Panel of 1981–1982, Mayor's and Cabinet members' schedules for 1980–1982, Conversation Hall renovations that were started by Green, council legislation, Freedom Festival, among many other topics.[2]
Post-mayoral career
After his term as Mayor expired, Green practiced law, opened two restaurants in the emerging Manayunk section of Philadelphia, and passed up opportunities to run for the U.S. Senate in 1986 and 1991. He established himself as a Washington, D.C., lobbyist and purchased a home in suburban Virginia.
In the late 1980s, the 1990s, and the 2000s, Green pursued a successful career as vice president of government relations for MacAndrews & Forbes, a large holding company that includes Revlon.
In 2003, Green retired from MacAndrews & Forbes and returned with his wife to Philadelphia, where he has since kept a low political profile. Some of his associates while he was mayor have dominated Republican mayoral politics in the decades since he has left office, but none has won election in an overwhelmingly Democratic city.
Arlen Specter was an American lawyer, author and politician who served as a United States Senator from Pennsylvania from 1981 to 2011. Specter was a Democrat from 1951 to 1965, then a Republican from 1965 until 2009, when he switched back to the Democratic Party. First elected in 1980, he was the longest-serving senator from Pennsylvania, having represented the state for 30 years.
Joseph Merrill Hoeffel III is an American author and politician. A Democrat, Hoeffel was a member of the United States House of Representatives from 1999 to 2005, representing Pennsylvania's 13th congressional district. He also served multiple terms on the Montgomery County Board of Commissioners, and from 1977–84, was a member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives. A native of Philadelphia, he is a graduate of Boston University and Temple University School of Law.
Joseph Sill Clark Jr. was an American writer, lawyer and politician. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the 90th Mayor of Philadelphia from 1952 to 1956 and as a United States Senator from Pennsylvania from 1957 to 1969. Clark was the only Unitarian Universalist elected to a major office in Pennsylvania in the modern era.
The 1986 United States Senate elections were elections for the United States Senate. Held on November 4, in the middle of Ronald Reagan's second presidential term, the 34 seats of Class 3 were contested in regular elections. The Republicans had to defend an unusually large number of freshman Senate incumbents who had been elected on President Ronald Reagan's coattails in 1980. Democrats won a net of eight seats, defeating seven freshman incumbents, picking up two Republican-held open seats, and regaining control of the Senate for the first time since January 1981. This remains the most recent midterm election cycle in which the sitting president's party suffered net losses while still flipping a Senate seat.
The 1980 United States Senate elections were held on November 4, coinciding with Ronald Reagan's victory in the presidential election. The 34 Senate seats of Class 3 were contested in regular elections. Reagan's large margin of victory over incumbent Jimmy Carter gave a huge boost to Republican Senate candidates, allowing them to flip 12 Democratic seats and win control of the chamber for the first time since the end of the 83rd Congress in January 1955.
The 1976 United States Senate elections was an election for the United States Senate. Held on November 2, the 33 seats of Class 1 were contested in regular elections. They coincided with Democrat Jimmy Carter's presidential election and the United States Bicentennial celebration. Although almost half of the seats decided in this election changed parties, Carter's narrow victory did not provide coattails for the Democratic Party. Each party flipped seven Senate seats, although, one of the seats flipped by Democrats was previously held by a Conservative.
Edward Maurice Mezvinsky is an American politician and lawyer from Iowa. He is a former U.S. Representative and felon. A Democrat, he represented Iowa's 1st congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives for two terms (1973–77).
Francis Silvestri Rizzo, commonly known as Frank Rizzo Jr., is an American politician. He is the son of former Philadelphia Mayor Frank Rizzo and served as a Republican and briefly as an Independent member of the Philadelphia City Council for a combined sixteen years.
Joseph Ambrose Sestak Jr. is an American politician and retired U.S. Navy officer. He represented Pennsylvania's 7th congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2007 to 2011 and was the Democratic nominee for the United States Senate in 2010. A three-star vice admiral, he was the highest-ranking military official ever elected to the United States Congress at the time of his election. He was a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in the 2020 election, launching his campaign on June 23, 2019 and ending it on December 1, 2019, subsequently endorsing Amy Klobuchar.
The 2010 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania took place on November 2, 2010, during the 2010 midterm elections. Incumbent Republican-turned-Democrat U.S. Senator Arlen Specter ran for reelection to a sixth term, but lost in the Democratic primary to Joe Sestak. Republican nominee Pat Toomey then won the seat.
The 2004 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania was held on November 2, 2004. Incumbent Republican U.S. Senator Arlen Specter won re-election to a fifth term. As of 2022, this is the last time a Republican statewide candidate won Montgomery and Delaware Counties and won more than 25% of the vote in Philadelphia.
Electoral history of Arlen Specter, former United States Senator from Pennsylvania (1981–2011), Chairman of the Senate Committees on Intelligence (1995–1997), Veterans' Affairs and Judiciary (2005–2007), as well as a candidate for the 1996 Republican presidential nomination.
The 1998 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania was held November 3, 1998. Incumbent Republican U.S. Senator Arlen Specter won re-election to a fourth term.
The 1978 Pennsylvania gubernatorial election was held on November 7, 1978. Incumbent Governor Milton Shapp was constitutionally ineligible to run for a third consecutive term in office. Republican Dick Thornburgh defeated Democrat Pete Flaherty in the general election.
The 1992 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania was held on November 3, 1992. Incumbent Republican U.S. Senator Arlen Specter narrowly won re-election to a third term, garnering just forty-nine percent of the vote in what was described by The Philadelphia Inquirer as a "massive turnout for Bill Clinton."
The 1986 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania was held on November 4, 1986. Incumbent Republican U.S. Senator Arlen Specter won re-election to a second term.
The 1980 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania was held on November 4, 1980. Incumbent Republican U.S. Senator Richard Schweiker decided to retire, instead of seeking a third term.
The Democratic Party primary for the 2010 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania took place on May 18, 2010, when Congressman Joe Sestak defeated incumbent Arlen Specter, which led to the end of Specter's five-term Senatorial career. Just before the start of the primary campaign, after serving in the Senate as a Republican for 29 years, Specter had switched to the Democratic Party in anticipation of a difficult primary challenge by Pat Toomey; Toomey ultimately defeated Sestak in the general election. Political observers and journalists described the race between Specter and Sestak as one of the bitterest and most-watched of all the 2010 primary elections.
The 1976 United States Senate election in Pennsylvania was held on November 2, 1976. Incumbent Republican U.S. Senator and Minority Leader Hugh Scott decided to retire. Republican John Heinz won the open seat.
The 1967 Philadelphia mayoral election saw the reelection of James Tate, who narrowly defeated Republican challenger Arlen Specter in the general election. Specter would later be elected to the U.S. Senate in 1980, where he served until 2011.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
