Another strong connection between Butte and UM is the late, great Montana Senator and US Ambassador to Japan, and UM student, graduate, and professor, Mike Mansfield.
After being discharged from The Marines in 1922, Mansfield worked as a mucker--shoveling mine waste and other garbage--in the mines at Butte. Although a native of New York City and growing up as a kid in Great Falls, most historians believe Mansfield's years in Butte as well as his experience sailing around Asia as a Marine in the early 20's had a huge influence on the future senator.
He frequently complained to his wife Maureen about the corrupt politics of the day, such as the corruption of The Harding Administration--Teapot Dome--and the fact that Montana was controlled and dominated by The Anaconda Company.
Maureen Mansfield challenged her husband, a high-school dropout, to pursue his education and he did so first at The Montana School of Mines, now Montana Tech, and then at UM, graduating the year FDR became president, 1933.
After earning his master's degree at Tuft's University in 1934 in international relations, from 1934-1942, he was a professor of Asian history and other related topics at UM. I had an old client, now deceased, that had Mansfield as a professor at UM and said that he was a great, enthusiastic yet somewhat quiet, very learned professor who wasn't much older than him.
As US Senate Majority Leader from 1961-1977, Mike would preside and help guide the legislation that would create Medicare and Medicaid in 1965 and other Great Society programs such as Head Start , pass the historic Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965, warned JFK and LBJ not to expand US military involvement in South Vietnam starting in 1962--Mike was very depressed after being an initial supporter of South Vietnam after he toured the country at he request of JFK in 1962 and learned of the vast corruption within the government and the inability or refusal of most South Vietnamese Army units to effectively fight the NVA and Viet Cong. He went on this tour at the request of JFK, due to Mike's expertise on Asia.
Mike would help Richard Nixon wind down US involvement in Vietnam from 1969-72, create The EPA, and open a diplomatic relationship with communist, mainland China in 1972. He also appointed the Senate Watergate Committee to investigate Nixon's involvement in the Watergate break in of Democratic Party HQ in 1972 that led to Nixon's resignation and subsequently helped Gerald Ford as he took over the presidency in the late summer of 1974.
Upon the election of Jimmy Carter in 1976, Mike would retire from the senate and serve from 1977-1988 as US ambassador to Japan under first Carter and then Reagan, becoming the longest serving US Ambassador to Japan. The Mansfield Center dedicated to the study of US-Asian relations continues to flourish at UM and bring many Asian exchange students to campus. And when UM wanted to name the library in his honor, he insisted his wife Maureen's name be included as he would have not completed his high school equivalency and studied and graduated from UM and Tuft's without his schoolteacher wife challenging and encouraging his pursuit of higher education.
Although Mike and Maureen Mansfield are buried in Arlington National Cemetery, and their grave is far away from his friend John F. Kennedy's eternal flame and simply says "Michael J. Mansfield, Pvt., US Marine Corps, " I think his years working as a miner in Butte had a very big impact on him, as he could relate to Butte miners and Anaconda smelter workers since he himself had been one of them and much of the legislation he successfully passed in both the House and Senate reflected that Butte experience.
Today, The Mansfield Room in The US Capitol honors his and service as does the Mike and Maureen Mansfield Library and Center at his alma mater, The University of Montana.
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