Mickey Edwards, U.S. Congressman from Oklahoma, 1977-1993, will speak at a President’s Associates dinner at the University of Oklahoma on Wednesday, November 20. Prior to dinner, Edwards will meet with OU students for an informal discussion.
Edwards, who served Oklahoma’s fifth congressional district as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for 16 years and taught at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs for five years. In addition, he serves as vice president of the Aspen Institute and director of the Institute’s Aspen-Rodel Fellowships in Public Leadership program. He was recently elected as a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
During his time in Washington, D.C., Edwards was a senior member of the House Republican leadership as chairman of the Republican Policy Committee, a member of both the House Appropriations and Budget committees and a ranking member of the House Subcommittee on Foreign Operations.
After leaving Congress, Edwards taught government and public policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government for 11 years before moving to Princeton in 2004. He also has taught at Harvard Law School and as a visiting professor at Georgetown University’s Public Policy Institute.
Edwards has been a regular columnist for a number of newspapers, including the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, the San Francisco Examiner and the Boston Globe, as well as broadcasting weekly political commentary on National Public Radio’s “All Things Considered."
His articles also appeared frequently in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, the San Francisco Examiner, the Miami Herald, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the Boston Herald, the Tulsa World and other major newspapers, as well as in such publications as the National Interest, the Public Interest and Policy Review. He is a frequent guest on programs ranging from CNN, PBS NewsHour, Charlie Rose and Moyers & Company, among others.
Edwards is the author of two recent books: the recently published The Parties Versus the People: How to Turn Republicans and Democrats into Americans and the earlier Reclaiming Conservatism: How a Great American Political Movement Got Lost – And How It Can Find Its Way Back. He has also co-authored a book and contributed chapters to several more.
In addition, Edwards has chaired task forces on foreign policy for The Brookings Institution and the Council on Foreign Relations, and is a director of several organizations in the fields of public policy and foreign affairs, including the Constitution Project. He also has been an adviser to the State Department.
Edwards earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism from OU in 1958 and a Juris Doctor from Oklahoma City University’s School of Law in 1969.
Limited seating is available by reservation for OU students, faculty and staff, with overflow seating available to the public. For reservations, more information and accommodations on the basis of disability, please call OU Public Affairs at (405) 325-3784 or email specialevents@ou.edu.
