• Office Sought: Senator, Tennessee
• Birth Date: July 3, 1940
• Occupation: Public Official
• Religion: Presbyterian
• Web site: http://www.alexander.senate.gov

Education

• New York University Law School, JD
• Vanderbilt University, BA

Andrew Lamar Alexander Jr. was born in Maryville, Tenn., and lives in Nashville. He graduated from Vanderbilt University and New York University School of Law. He practiced law briefly before joining Howard Baker's 1966 Senate campaign and following Baker to Washington as a legislative aide.

Alexander worked as a congressional liaison in the Nixon White House but left before Watergate and returned to Tennessee.

In 1978, he ran for governor and defeated incumbent Democrat Ray Blanton after mounting a 1,000-mile campaign walk across the state in which a red-and-black flannel shirt became his trademark.

He was sworn in three days early to prevent Blanton from selling pardons for cash, and was re-elected four years later as the first Tennessee governor to win successive terms.

He was president of the University of Tennessee from 1988 to 1990. He was U.S. education secretary from 1990 to 1993. He ran unsuccessfully for the Republican presidential nomination in 1996 and 2000.

Alexander and his wife, Leslee "Honey", have four children.