James Andrew “Jim” Courter is a United States Republican Party politician, lawyer and businessman.
His career in public service included representing New Jersey as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for 12 years, from 1979 until 1991. He was nominated as the Republican Party’s nominee for Governor of New Jersey in 1989, but lost and decided not to run for reelection to congress in 1990. From 1991 to 1994, Courter held the cabinet-level position of chairman of the Base Closure and Realignment Commission, having been appointed by both President George Herbert Walker Bush and President Bill Clinton; the Commission oversaw the restructuring of the United States’ domestic military base infrastructure.
Jim Courter was chairman of the Committee for the Common Defense at the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution, which was in 1995 responsible for writing a letter in support of the Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit bomber that seven former Secretaries of Defense (representing every Democratic and Republican Administration since Richard Nixon) signed.
He is Chairman of the Lexington Institute, a think tank dedicated to resolving issues of foreign policy, national security, and international trade. He is also CEO and Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors of the IDT Corporation, based in Newark, New Jersey. Courter also serves as a member of the Board of Directors for the company’s subsidiaries IDT Telecom, IDT Media, and IDT Winstar.
Courter currently serves as Chairman of the Board of Advisors for the Graduate School of Management at Rutgers University, he is a member of the Board of Trustees for Berkeley College, and is a member of the Drew University Board of Visitors. Courter is on the Board of Trustees of the Newark Museum, is a member of the New Jersey Network Foundation Board of Trustees, and was named an adjunct professor at the New Jersey Institute of Technology. Courter also serves on the Board of Trustees of the Liberty Science Center, the Board of Trustees of the Newark Alliance, and is a member of the Board of Trustees for the New Jersey Performing Arts Center. He was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Centenary College of New Jersey.
After working briefly as a Wall Street lawyer, Cribb served as Assistant to the President for Domestic Affairs in the Reagan Administration, serving as President Reagan’s top advisor on domestic matters. Earlier in the administration he held the position of Counselor to the Attorney General.
He was President of the Intercollegiate Studies Institute from 1989-2011, and served on its board until May 2012. During his tenure, ISI expanded its educational programs. He also served as vice chairman of the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board from 1989 to 1992. He was also president of the Collegiate Network, an association of alternative college newspapers; president of the Council for National Policy, a conservative umbrella organization; member of the Board of Advisors for the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education; is counselor to the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy, a conservative legal organization. Cribb also serves on the Board of Advisors of the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal, an educational organization that continues the intellectual legacy of noted conservative icon Russell Kirk, and on the Board of Visitors of Ralston College, a start-up liberal arts college in Savannah. He also served as President of the Philadelphia Society.
Cribb has been published in National Review, The American Spectator, The Intercollegiate Review, Modern Age, and Human Events.
Harry Darby served as a United States Senator from Kansas for one year (1949 – 1950). Harry served in the United States Army during World War I and rose to the rank of Captain. Harry was a successful businessman in the insurance, railroad and banking industry.
He served on the Kansas State Highway Commission for four years (1933 – 1937).
Henry Hague Davis was a Canadian lawyer and Puisne Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada.
Born in Brockville, Ontario, the son of William Henry Davis and Eliza Dowsley, he received a Bachelor of Arts in 1907, a Master of Arts in 1909 and a Bachelor of Laws in 1911 all from the University of Toronto. He was called to the Ontario Bar in 1911 and then proceeded to practice law with the firm of Kilmer, McAndrew & Irving in Toronto. In 1933, he was appointed to the Ontario Court of Appeal.
In early 1935, he was appointed to the Supreme Court. For reasons unknown, it had taken the federal government over a year to appoint Davis to replace Justice Smith, who had retired in late 1933.
Davis had been actively involved in the Canadian Bar Association while in practice, and maintained that involvement while on the Bench. He was President of the Ontario Bar Association when appointed to the Court, and finished his term in that office. He then served as national President of the Canadian Bar Association while on the Supreme Court.
Justice Davis served until his death in 1944.
George Decamp was appointed the Chairman of the Federal Reserve and Chairman of the Board of the Board of Directors for the Cleveland Bank in 1926.
Dennis DeConcini worked as a lawyer for the Arizona governor’s staff (1965-1967) and founded the law firm of DeConcini, McDonald, Yetwin & Lacy where he is still a partner with offices in Tucson, Phoenix and Washington, D.C. He was then elected a U.S Senator, serving three terms from 1977 until 1995. While in office he sponsored an amendment to the Panama Canal Treaty of 1977, allowing the U.S. to take steps deemed necessary to reopen the Canal and restore its operations.
DeConcini served on a number of committees such as the Senate Appropriations Committee where he chaired the subcommittee on Treasury, Postal Service and General Government. DeConcini also served on the Senate Judiciary Committee and chaired several subcommittees. In February 1995 DeConcini was appointed by President Clinton to the Board of Directors of the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation, where he served until May 1999. In 2006 the former senator was selected by the governor of Arizona to serve as a member of the Arizona Board of Regents.
John Horace Dickey was a Liberal party member of the Canadian House of Commons. He was a barrister, executive and lawyer by career.
He was first elected to Parliament at the Halifax riding in a by-election on July 14, 1947 which was called after the death of William Chisholm MacDonald, one of the riding’s Liberal incumbents. Since Halifax riding elected two members to the House of Commons at that time, Dickey joined the other incumbent, fellow Liberal Gordon Benjamin Isnor. Both Dickey and Isnor were re-elected in the 1949 election. Isnore was appointed to the Senate in May 1950 and was joined by another Liberal, Samuel Rosborough Balcom, following a by-election the following month. Both Dickey and Balcom were re-elected to a full term in Parliament in the 1953 election, but were defeated in the 1957 federal election by the two Progressive Conservative party candidates Robert McCleave and Edmund L. Morris. In the 1958 election, Dickey was joined by Leonard Kitz in an unsuccessful attempt to win back the riding for the Liberals. Dickey died in 1996 aged 81
Edwin Russell Durno was a physician, politician, an infantry sergeant who was awarded a Purple Heart, and a basketball player recognized in the Oregon Sports Hall of Fame. He was a Republican member of the United States House of Representatives representing Oregon’s 4th congressional district from 1961 to 1963.
Durno was the University of Oregon’s first basketball All-American and was a three-time All-Pacific Coast Conference selection. A prolific scorer, Durno led the Ducks to the 1919 conference title and was team captain during his senior year of 1921. He was inducted into the Oregon Sports Hall of Fame in 1981, and the University of Oregon Sports Hall of Fame in 1992.
Durno served in both World War I (as an infantry sergeant) and World War II (in the Medical Corps) where he was awarded the Purple Heart for his service. Durno returned to Oregon after World War II where he practiced medicine in Medford and served on the Oregon Board of Medical Examiners from 1947 to 1958.
In 1958, he was elected to the Oregon State Senate, and in 1960, was elected to the United States House of Representatives, unseating liberal Democrat Charles O. Porter. Doubtful of reelection in a politically marginal district, he did not seek reelection to the House in 1962, instead seeking the Republican nomination for Wayne Morse’s seat in Oregon’s 1962 U. S. Senate election. Durno lost the nomination to Sig Unander and returned to his medical practice in Medford. Durno died in 1976.
Jim Edgar served as the Governor of Illinois for eight years (1991 – 1999). Prior to serving as the Governor of Illinois, Jim served as the Illinois Secretary of State for ten years (1981 – 1991). In 1999, Jim was awarded the Order of Lincoln which is the state of Illinois’ highest honor.
William Haselden Ellerbe was the 86th Governor of South Carolina from 1897 to 1899. Born in Marion, South Carolina, he was raised in the Pee Dee region of South Carolina and attended Wofford College and Vanderbilt University.
His political career began when he was elected as Comptroller of South Carolina in 1890, serving until 1894. In the 1896 gubernatorial election, he won the Democratic primary and convincingly won in the general election to become the 86th governor of South Carolina. He sought re-election two years later in the 1898 gubernatorial election and was unopposed in his bid. However, he died on June 2, 1899, before he was able to finish his second term as governor and was buried in Marion.
