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Bill Clinton, born in 1946, 42nd president of the United States (1993-2001), who was one of the most popular American presidents of the 20th century and the second president to be impeached (see Impeachment). Clinton was the first president born after World War II (1939-1945) and the third youngest person to become president, after Theodore Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. He was also the first Democrat in 12 years to hold the presidency and the first Democrat since Franklin D. Roosevelt to be elected to two terms.

A moderate Democrat and longtime governor of Arkansas, Clinton promised to change not only the direction the country had taken under the two previous Republican presidents but also the policies of his own Democratic Party. However, Clinton’s presidency was marked by unusually bitter strife with Republicans in Congress. In his second term, Clinton became the second president to be impeached by the U.S. House of Representatives, after admitting to an improper relationship with a White House intern. The Senate, however, defeated the impeachment articles and did not remove him from office.

During Clinton’s presidency, the country enjoyed the longest period of economic growth in its history. A graceful speaker, Clinton had a remarkable ability to connect with people, which enabled him to bounce back from defeats, scandals, and even impeachment. He left office with the highest voter approval rating of all modern presidents.

II Early Life

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A Childhood

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Bill Clinton was born on August 19, 1946, in Hope, Arkansas. His given name was William Jefferson Blythe IV. He never knew his father, William Jefferson Blythe III, a traveling salesman who died in a car accident several months before Bill was born. After Bill became president, he and his mother learned that his father had been married at least three other times and that Bill had a half brother and half sister whom he had never met. Bill took the name William Jefferson Clinton after his mother remarried.

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As a small child, Bill lived with his mother, Virginia Cassidy Blythe, and her parents in Hope, Arkansas. When Bill, or Billy, as he was known, was one year old, his mother went to New Orleans, Louisiana, to study to be a nurse-anesthetist, and for the next two years he was reared mainly by his maternal grandparents.

When Bill was four years old, his mother married Roger Clinton, later the owner of a car dealership in Hope. Two years later, the family moved to Hot Springs, Arkansas. Life at home for Bill and his mother was not always easy. Roger was an alcoholic and a gambler, often losing the family’s money, including Virginia’s earnings as a nurse-anesthetist. He cursed and sometimes beat his wife and verbally abused Bill and Bill’s younger brother, Roger, Jr., who was born in 1956. Bill was especially close to his mother and sometimes stood up to his stepfather to protect her. As a college student, Bill reconciled with his stepfather, who died of cancer in 1967.

B Schooling

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Clinton attended a Roman Catholic school for two years in Hot Springs before attending public schools. He was a popular student and maintained top grades. He held several student offices, played the tenor saxophone, and was a member of the all-state band. In 1963, after his junior year in high school, Clinton was elected as one of two delegates from Arkansas to Boys Nation, a government study program for young people sponsored by the American Legion, a veterans organization. There he debated in favor of civil rights legislation and met President John F. Kennedy at a ceremony in the White House Rose Garden.

C College

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Clinton graduated from high school in 1964 and enrolled at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., where he majored in international affairs. He was elected president of his class during his freshman and sophomore years. As a junior and senior he earned money for school expenses by working as an intern for the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, which was chaired by Senator J. William Fulbright, an Arkansas Democrat. Clinton greatly admired Fulbright, who was a leading critic of United States involvement in the Vietnam War (1959-1975). Clinton was also deeply moved by African Americans’ fight for equality in the 1960s. In April 1968, a few weeks before Clinton graduated, the assassination of civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., set off rioting in several American cities, including Washington, D.C. Clinton volunteered to work with the Red Cross and took clothing and food to people whose homes had been burned in the riots.

During his senior year, Clinton won a Rhodes Scholarship to the University of Oxford in England, and he spent two years in Oxford’s graduate program after graduating from Georgetown. In 1970 Clinton enrolled at Yale University Law School, where he studied for a law degree. He paid his way with a scholarship and by working two or three jobs at the same time. At Yale he met fellow law student Hillary Diane Rodham, who was from the Chicago area (see Hillary Rodham Clinton). They began dating, and in 1972 Clinton and Rodham worked in Texas for the presidential campaign of Democrat George S. McGovern. Clinton worked as a campaign coordinator for McGovern in Texas and Arkansas, and Rodham helped organize a voter-registration drive for the Democratic National Committee.