Hillary Clinton is an American politician and lawyer who served as the 67th Secretary of State of the United States from 2009 until 2013. In the 2016 presidential election, she was the Democratic Party’s nominee for President of the United States, but she lost to Republican opponent Donald Trump. She was the First Lady of the United States from 1993 to 2001, when her husband, former US President Bill Clinton, was in office. She was born in Chicago and has been driven and ambitious since she was a child. She graduated from Yale Law School and went on to have a successful legal career before entering politics. She began her political career while serving as First Lady, and was sworn in as a United States senator in January 2001. She was comfortably re-elected to a second term as a popular senator. She quickly aspired higher, and from 2009 to 2013, she served as Secretary of State in the Obama Administration. After Obama’s first term, she stepped down. She publicly launched her candidacy for President of the United States in the 2016 election in 2015, and she was formally nominated at the Democratic National Convention in 2016. On November 8, 2016, Hillary was defeated by Republican Donald Trump in a highly publicized election.
Childhood and Adolescence
Hugh Rodham and Dorothy Howell gave birth to Hillary Rodham Clinton on October 26, 1947, in Chicago, Illinois. Her parents had two younger brothers, Hugh and Tony, and she is the eldest of their three children.
She was a National Merit Finalist when she graduated from Maine South High School in 1965. Her parents both wanted her to be able to pursue a job without being constrained by gender stereotypes.
In 1965, she enrolled at Wellesley College to study political science. She was involved in student politics throughout her college years and was chosen president of the Wellesley Young Republicans.
Throughout the 1960s, her political position shifted a number of times. She was regarded as a conservative thinker with a liberal heart. She was elected President of the Wellesley College Government Association in 1968 and served in that position with zeal.
She earned a BA in political science with departmental honors from the college in 1969 and worked at a variety of odd jobs before enrolling at Yale Law School.
She was chosen to serve with Senator Walter Mondale’s migrant labor sub-committee in 1970. Following that, she interned at the law firm of Treuhaft, Walker, and Burnstein in Oakland, California, where she worked on child custody and other issues.
In 1973, she graduated from Yale Law School with a Juris Doctor degree. She then began a one-year postgraduate degree at Yale Child Study Center on the study of children and medicine. She worked as a staff attorney for Children’s Defense Fund while pursuing her postgraduate studies.
Early Legal Experience
During the Watergate affair, she was appointed to the impeachment inquiry staff in Washington, D.C., where she advised the House Committee on the Judiciary. President Richard Nixon resigned as a result of the committee’s work.
She began teaching criminal law at the University of Arkansas in 1974. After her husband, Bill Clinton, was appointed as Arkansas Attorney General, she moved to the state capital of Arkansas two years later.
She joined the Rose Law Firm in 1977, focusing on patent infringement and intellectual property law. She even did pro bono work in the field of child advocacy. She co-founded the Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families the same year.
President Jimmy Carter appointed her to the board of directors of Legal Service Corporation in 1978 because of her outstanding political ability. She held the chair until 1980, during which time she increased the Corporation’s funding by more than threefold, from $90 million to $300 million. She was also the first female to hold the role.
She became the First Lady of Arkansas in 1979, when Bill Clinton was appointed Governor of Arkansas, a position she maintained for twelve years, from 1979 to 1981 and 1983 to 1992. She was named chair of the Rural Health Advisory Committee and given the duty of delivering medical care to the poorest parts of the country.
She took over the Arkansas Educational Standards Committee in 1983. During her time in office, she sought to raise educational standards and mandate teacher assessment. She also established curriculum and classroom size standards for the state.
She was the chairwoman of the New World Foundation for six years, from 1982 to 1988. She was a member of the American Bar Association’s Commission on Women in the Profession’s board of directors from 1987 to 1991, opposing gender bias. She was also a member of the TCBY and Wal-Mart boards of directors. She accompanied her husband in successfully campaigning for a place in the Presidential elections as a democratic candidate as First Lady in 1992. She played an important role in the election and was instrumental in Bill Clinton’s triumph. She became the First Lady of the United States in 1993, after Bill Clinton was elected President of the United States. She was the first First Lady to have a postgraduate degree and the first to have a West Wing office in addition to the East Wing First Lady’s office.
She had an active role in public policy and was frequently referred to as the ‘co-president,’ as most people assumed. She chose about eleven persons for the highest roles and a dozen more for lower positions.
In 1993, she was named to lead the Task Force on National Health Reform as First Lady. Clinton’s health-care proposal, sometimes known as the Clinton health-care plan, attempted to force employers to give health-care coverage to their employees. However, the proposal was abandoned in 1994 due to a lack of support.
The failure of Clinton’s health-care plan had the opposite effect, causing the Democrats’ popularity to plummet and the Republicans to gain ground in both House and Senate elections. Her policy function was degraded as a result of this.
In 1997, she created the Youngsters’s Health Insurance Program, which provided state funding to help children obtain health insurance. She also advocated for immunization, a mandatory mammogram for females to check for breast cancer, and funding for prostate cancer and childhood asthma research.
She began the process of enacting several laws, including the Adoption and Safe Families Act and the Foster Care Independence Act. She established the Department of Justice’s Office on Violence Against Women and hosted multiple seminars.
She traveled to 79 nations as First Lady, including India and Pakistan, to improve bilateral relations with the United States. During the trip, she was struck by the plight of women, which inspired her to pursue a career in diplomacy.
She was involved in the Whitewater real estate project with Bill Clinton, which resulted in congressional hearings and an independent counsel investigation. As if this wasn’t bad enough, her husband’s adultery difficulties further jeopardized the safeguarding attempt.
Career in Politics
She ran for the US Senate seat from New York and was sworn in on January 3, 2001, after winning by a large margin. She became the first wife of a president to run for and be elected to a national position, as well as the first woman to be elected to the United States Senate from New York. In November 2006, she was handily re-elected. During her tenure, she was a staunch supporter of military involvement in Afghanistan, redesigning the state’s security after the 9/11 attacks, and collecting monies to aid New York’s recovery efforts.
She originally hinted at her intention to run for president in 2008 in 2007, becoming the first woman to be nominated by a major political party. Despite losing the presidential election to Barack Obama, she was named Secretary of State.
She continued to advocate for women’s and human rights while serving as Secretary of State. She also spoke out in favor of US military intervention in Libya and was at the vanguard of the US response to the Arab Spring. She was one of the State Department’s most traveled secretaries. On February 1, 2013, she resigned from her position.
The Presidential Election of 2016
Clinton formally declared her campaign for the presidency in the 2016 election in April 2015. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, a democratic socialist, ran a strong campaign against her, but she won and was formally nominated at the 2016 Democratic National Convention in July 2016.
She had a big lead in national surveys over Republican businessman Donald Trump for most of 2016, despite being pitted against him for the presidency.
She supported the US Export-Import Bank and centered her economic theory on inclusive capitalism during her campaigns. She also asked for a constitutional change in the United States to overturn the Citizens United judgment from 2010.
She believed in same-gender marriage and equal pay for equal work. In her campaigns, she concentrated on family issues and was a major supporter of universal preschool and the Affordable Care Act.
With all of the controversies surrounding Hillary Clinton’s presidential opponent, Donald Trump, it appeared for a time that she may win the election. But it was not to be, and on November 8, 2016, she was defeated by Trump in the presidential election.
Achievements & Awards
For her great efforts as a legislator and in the field of law, she has received various prizes and medals. She was also a force to be reckoned with in every role she embarked on. She has also received numerous honorary degrees from universities all over the world.
Personal History and Legacy
On October 11, 1975, she married longtime boyfriend Bill Clinton in a Methodist ceremony. Chelsea is the couple’s daughter.
Estimated Net Worth
Hillary Clinton’s net worth is estimated to be $120 million.
Top 10 Hillary Clinton Facts You Didn’t Know
Hillary Clinton used to be a Republican, which may surprise you. She served on Republican presidential contender Barry Goldwater’s campaign during the 1964 elections. In 1968, she switched sides and campaigned for Eugene McCarthy, the Democratic presidential nominee. Both of them, by the way, lost.
Hillary Clinton’s first love was not politics. She aspired to be an astronaut and even wrote to NASA to pursue her ambition. NASA, on the other hand, responded that women were not welcome.
Hillary Clinton has a number of “firsts” to her name, in addition to being the former First Lady. She is the first First Lady with a postgraduate degree who has also been elected to a national office. She is also the first First Lady to be fingerprinted by the FBI after being subpoenaed.
Hillary Clinton has won a Grammy Award. Her audio version of her book ‘It Takes A Village’ got her the prize for Best Spoken Word Album in 1997.
Hillary Clinton is the Secretary of State who has traveled the most. She traveled to 112 nations during her four-year reign and spent about a quarter of her time in the air.
During the Watergate incident in 1974, she was a member of the presidential impeachment inquiry staff. Later that year, President Nixon resigned as a result of the scandal.
Hillary Clinton holds the distinction of having served as both a senator and First Lady for a total of 20 days. From January 1, 2001, through January 20, 2001, she held both of these jobs. Bill Clinton then left the White House on January 20, 2001.
Hillary Clinton can consume a lot of alcohol. When both of them were senators, she once out-drank John McCain during a trip to Estonia in 2004. Clinton won the game of vodka shots by a four-to-one margin over McCain.
When Bill Clinton was Governor of Arkansas, Hillary Clinton out-earned him numerous times. She was working as a lawyer for a private firm at the time.
This one may frighten you! Hillary Clinton had a propensity of conversing with the dead. Hillary Clinton met with former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and Indian icon Mahatma Gandhi while in the White House, according to famous journalist Bob Woodward’s book “The Choice.” Jean Houston, co-director of the Foundation for Mind Research, moderated these discussions.