In 1994, Bill Frist became the first practicing physician elected to the United States Senate since 1928. A Republican, Senator Frist serves on the Labor and Human Resources Committee; Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee; Budget Committee; and Small Business Committee.
A nationally acclaimed heart surgeon, Senator Frist started the Vanderbilt Transplant Center at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center in 1986. He pioneered innovative diagnostic techniques and performed the first pediatric heart transplant and first lung transplant in Tennessee. He is the author of more than 100 articles and abstracts on medical research and policy and of a book, Transplant, that examines the social and ethical issues of transplantation. He successfully organized a statewide grassroots campaign to return the organ donation card to the Tennessee driver's license and received the Distinguished Service Award from the Tennessee Medical Association for his efforts. He also has chaired the Tennessee Task Force on Medicaid. Senator Frist received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University and graduated with honors from Harvard Medical School.
Mrs. O'Leary was sworn in as Secretary of Energy in January 1993. Before her appointment, she had been promoted to president of Northern States Power Company's Gas Utility. She previously had served as NSP executive vice president. She also had been a member of the company's Executive Management Committee. Earlier, Mrs. O'Leary had been vice president and general counsel for O'Leary Associates, an international energy, economics, and strategic planning firm located in Washington, D.C. She also had served as a Presidential appointee in the Energy Department under President Carter and the Federal Energy Administration under President Ford. Mrs. O'Leary also was an assistant attorney general for the State of New Jersey; assistant prosecutor, Essex County, N.J.; and general counsel of the U.S. Community Services Administration.
A native of Newport News, Va., Secretary O'Leary received a B.A. degree from Fisk University and a Juris Doctorate degree from Rutgers University. She holds Bar Association memberships in both New Jersey and the District of Columbia. Secretary O'Leary is a trustee of the William Mitchell College of Law and the St Paul, Minn., Chamber of Commerce; a member of the Hubert H. Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs Advisory Committee, the Executive Leadership Council, and the Committee of 200; and is on the boards of the Greater Minneapolis Red Cross, the University of Minnesota Foundation, the Minneapolis Foundation, and the Northwest Area Foundation.
Don Sundquist was elected Tennessee 's 47th Governor in 1994, after serving for 12 years as the state's Seventh District Congressman. His introduction to politics came in 1964, when he served as Bedford County chairman for Howard Baker's U.S. Senate campaign. He became active in Young Republicans, eventually serving as chairman for the Young Republican National Federation. He was elected to the Seventh District seat in 1982 and was re-elected five times.
Governor Sundquist served two years in the U.S. Navy after his graduation from college. He then joined Jostens, a firm that manufactures college rings, where he rose to plant manager and eventually to a key corporate post at company headquarters. He later struck out on his own, becoming president and partner of Graphic Sales of America, a Memphis printing and advertising firm. A few years later, Governor Sundquist was among the founders of the Bank of Germantown. He then joined two former staff members to open a Memphis-style barbecue restaurant in Arlington, Va. The "Red, Hot & Blue" concept was successful and today has franchises in more than a dozen cities.
Seeking public office for the first time, Fred Thompson was elected U.S. Senator from Tennessee in 1994. A native of Lawrenceburg, Senator Thompson graduated from Memphis State University and received a law degree from Vanderbilt University.
He practiced general law until 1969, when he was named Assistant U.S. Attorney for Middle Tennessee. While in this post, he also served as Middle Tennessee campaign manager for the U.S. Senate campaign of Howard Baker. After that election, he was asked by Senator Baker to serve as minority counsel on the Senate Watergate Committee. He later returned to private practice and wrote a book about his Watergate experiences, At That Point in Time. In 1977, Senator Thompson took on the case of Marie Ragghianti, who had been fired from her job as Chairman of the Parole Board by Tennessee Governor Ray Blanton for questioning his early-release decision for prison inmates. He and Mrs. Ragghianti helped to expose a clemency-for-cash scandal that eventually brought down the Blanton administration. The case was the subject of a book and a film in which the senator was asked to play himself. He went on to portray authority figures in many television productions and in 17 films, including In the Line of Fire, Cape Fear, and Hunt for Red October. He also continued to practice law and maintained offices in Nashville and Washington. Congress called on him to serve as Special Counsel to the U.S. Senate Intelligence and Foreign Relations committees, and he is listed in Naifeh and Smith's book, The Best Lawyers in America.