Eagleburger To Speak at James Madison Day Program March 15, 2002
News
Lawrence S. Eagleburger, the 62nd U.S. secretary of state, will speak Friday, March 15, at a program honoring James Madison, the fifth U.S. secretary of state.
Eagleburger, secretary of state under President George H.W. Bush, will be the main speaker at James Madison University's annual James Madison Day program. Madison, the fourth U.S. president and "Father of the Constitution," served as secretary of state under his close friend and fellow Virginian, President Thomas Jefferson.
The James Madison Day program begins at 9:30 a.m. in JMU's Wilson Hall Auditorium. The program is open to the public at no charge, but tickets are required. Ticket information is available by calling (540)568-3193. The program also will be telecast live from Grafton-Stovall Theatre.
James Madison Day is part of a weeklong celebration as JMU honors the life of the university's namesake. On March 14, contrasting views will be presented on the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that gives citizens the right to bear arms. Other events during the week include a March 13 debate between JMU and Mary Washington College student debaters.
Eagleburger, who was the May Commencement speaker at JMU in 1995, held major positions in the administrations of Presidents Nixon, Carter and Bush.
Eagleburger first worked in the embassies of Honduras and Yugoslavia in the late 1950s. In the mid-1960s, he was named a special assistant to presidential advisor Dean Acheson and later a special assistant to Undersecretary of State Nicholas Katzenbach.
In 1969, he became executive assistant to Dr. Henry Kissinger and later worked as chief of the political section of the U.S. Mission to NATO and as an assistant Secretary of Defense. In June 1977, President Jimmy Carter appointed Eagleburger ambassador to Yugoslavia where he served for three and a half years.
He was appointed undersecretary of state of political affairs in 1982, the third highest position in the department. Eagleburger retired from the State Department in 1984, but returned in 1989 to serve as secretary of state under President Bush.
In 1991, President Bush presented Eagleburger the President's Citizen's Medal, and he received an honorary knighthood in 1994 from Queen Elizabeth II.
Eagleburger now lives in Charlottesville and is a frequent contributor to network and cable television news shows.
Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin was originally scheduled to speak at James Madison Day, but JMU withdrew its invitation after Goodwin acknowledged she had quoted other writers without sufficient attribution in her book about the Kennedys.
Goodwin announced last month that she was taking an indefinite leave from PBS's "NewsHour with Jim Lehrer." The University of Delaware also withdrew its invitation to Goodwin to speak at its commencement ceremony.
