Up for auction "Maine Governor" Joseph E. Brennan Hand Signed TLS.
Es-8169E
Joseph Edward Brennan (born November 2,
1934) is an American Democratic Party lawyer
and politician from Maine. He served as the 70th Governor of Maine from 1979 to 1987. He is a former
commissioner on the Federal Maritime Commission.
Born in 1934 in Portland, Maine, Brennan
lived on Kellogg Street on Munjoy Hill. Brennan attended Cheverus High School, Boston College and the University of Maine School of
Law, and became Cumberland County District
Attorney before winning election to the Maine House of Representatives (1965–1971)
and the Maine Senate (1973–1975). When first
elected to the Maine House he did not own a car and hitchhiked up from
Portland. His first statewide candidacy was for Governor in
1974; he lost the Democratic nomination to George J. Mitchell, whom he would later appoint to the U.S. Senate. Appointed
State Attorney General in
1975, Brennan ran for governor again in 1978, winning the primary and general
elections. Brennan was reelected in 1982, serving as governor from 1979 to
1987. In 1986 he ran for the U.S. House in
Maine's First Congressional District and won with 53% of the vote. When he was
District Attorney his Munjoy Hill was shot up with bullets landing by his
infant daughter, this led Brennan to support the ban on assault style weapons
in America. After
two terms in the House, Brennan ran for governor again in 1990, losing to Republican John McKernan. He ran
again in 1994, losing to Independent Angus King, but placing second, ahead of Republican Susan Collins. He would face Collins in another statewide
election in 1996, running for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Bill Cohen, a race which Collins won. In 1999, President Bill Clinton nominated Brennan to serve as a commissioner
on the Federal Maritime Commission,
a small independent agency that regulates shipping between the U.S. and foreign
countries. He was renominated (by President Bush) and confirmed for a second term at the FMC in 2004.