Fulbright: A Biography

J. William Fulbright was the second most successful Oxford-educated politician to come from Arkansas. Author of the Fulbright-Connally resolution that committed the United States to participating in the U.N., and creator of the exchange program that bears his name, Fulbright was the longest serving chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. This volume describes the family dynamic, educational process, and environments–Arkansas, Oxford, Washington, D.C.–which produced this remarkable man. It delves into his complex attitude toward race and details Fulbright’s role in the civil rights movement. The narrative includes the major international events of the Cold War era–the Suez Crisis, the U-2 incident, the Bay of Pigs, the Missile Crisis, Vietnam, the ABM controversies, the Arab-Israeli conflict–and Fulbright’s role in them. Woods explains Fulbright’s shift from a champion of executive power in foreign affairs to a defender of congressional prerogatives.