Downsizing: Bill Clinton’s First Term

Abstract

In the fall of 1970, the young William Jefferson Clinton was supposed to be studying law at Yale. Instead he indulged his first love—politics—campaigning for the Democratic Party’s candidate for a Senate seat in Connecticut, Joseph D. Duffey. The incumbent, Thomas Dodd, had lost the party’s support over misuse of campaign funds. Duffey ran against the Vietnam War and won through the primaries. His Senate bid drew together big hitters from the arts and rising stars in the party. Paul Newman, Arthur Miller, and Barbara Tuchman worked alongside the young Howard Dean and Vice Campaign Chair John Kerry. Bill Clinton proved his worth in the poor Irish and Italian neighborhoods of New Haven. Duffey marveled at his ability to talk to anyone. The campaign was dirty. Hostile banners read “A vote for Duffey is a vote for Khrushchev.”² Duffey fought hard but lost. He blamed his defeat on neglect of the political middle ground where “somewhere between affluence and grinding poverty stand the majority of American families.” The message stayed with Clinton. He built his career on aiming for the center ground.³

Gosh, I miss the Cold War.

—Bill Clinton, 15 October 1993¹