Warren Christopher, 1925–2011

Warren Christopher was not known as a joker, but colleagues treasured the moments when the secretary of state’s sober façade cracked. One day in 1994, Christopher flew into Miami from multilateral talks in Europe. Greeting him, a junior American diplomat cheerfully assured him that he’d be thrilled with the day’s agenda. Wearily rubbing his eyes, Christopher said with a groan, “That’s what they told me in Budapest.”

An “early and traumatic experience” may have shaped Christopher’s “ever-cautious character,” said the London Guardian. Born in 1925 in Scranton, N.D., Christopher was 11 when his father suffered a stroke after the bank he owned collapsed.

Migrating with his family to Los Angeles, Christopher won a scholarship to the University of Southern California, said The Boston Globe. After a stint in the Navy, he attended Stanford University Law School, and upon graduation in 1949 served for a year as clerk to liberal Supreme Court Justice William Douglas.

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Christopher’s next stop was the Los Angeles law firm of O’Melveny & Myers, where he would remain for the rest of his life, apart from his stints in Washington, said the Los Angeles Times. He got his first taste of international diplomacy in 1977 as an assistant secretary of state. In 1980, President Jimmy Carter chose him to negotiate for the release of the Americans taken hostage during the 1979 Iranian revolution. He succeeded, but the crisis had fatally weakened the Carter presidency. The hostages were released the same day Ronald Reagan was sworn in as Carter’s successor.

Christopher’s career reached its pinnacle when he served as Bill Clinton’s secretary of state from 1993 to 1997, said The New York Times. Although often overshadowed by his colleague Richard Holbrooke, Christopher played a vital role in negotiating an end to the civil war in Bosnia. His final turn in the spotlight came while representing Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore during the disputed Florida recount following the 2000 election. When Gore’s opponent, George W. Bush, emerged victorious, some Democratic activists faulted Christopher for being too gentlemanly in the fight. Gore did not. Following his friend’s death, he called Christopher “one of the great statesmen of our era.”