The man who former President Jimmy Carter called the “finest public servant” he had ever known, Warren M. Christopher, died Friday in his Los Angeles home.
Christopher, 85, served as Secretary of State from 1993-1996. The longtime attorney died of complications from bladder and kidney cancer, said Sonja Steptoe of the law firm O'Melveny & Myers, where Christopher was a senior partner.
In 1981, Carter gave Christopher the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian award, for his work leading negotiations for the safe release of 52 American hostages from Iran.
On Saturday, the former President said he still considers Christopher one of the greatest public servants.
“When I gave Warren Christopher the Presidential Medal of Freedom, I stated that he was the finest public servant I had ever known. Our nation has lost a great and revered leader,” Carter said in a statement Saturday.
“Warren was the key American negotiator in securing the release of all the American hostages from captivity in Iran, without their injury or loss of life. In a quiet and effective way, he had many other momentous achievements in his life of dedicated service, during my term of office and while serving under other presidents.”
Former President Bill Clinton tapped Christopher to be Secretary of State in 1993. At the time, the 68-year-old attorney said he didn’t expect to travel much.
But he went on to set a four-year mark for miles traveled by America's top diplomat, including many missions to Bosnia and the Middle East, including some two dozen to Syria alone in a futile effort to promote a settlement with Israel.
After his work finished carrying out the Clinton administration agenda abroad, the longtime Californian returned home for an active life in local and national affairs and with his law firm.
As he prepared to step down in 1996 as secretary “for someone else to pick up the baton,” he said in an interview he was pleased to have played a role in making the United States safer.
The loyal Democrat also supervised the contested Florida recount for Al Gore in the 2000 presidential election. The Supreme Court, on a 5-4 vote, decided for George W. Bush.
While his efforts with Syria didn't bear fruit, he was more successful in the negotiations that produced a settlement in 1995 for Bosnia, ending a war among Muslims, Serbs and Croats that claimed 260,000 lives and drove another 1.8 million people from their homes.
Some critics said the administration had moved too slowly against the ethnic violence. Then-Rep. Frank McCloskey, an Indiana Democrat, called for Christopher's resignation and virtually accused the administration of ignoring genocide against Bosnian Muslims. A handful of State Department officials resigned in protest.
Christopher also gave top priority to supporting reform in Russia and expanding U.S. economic ties to Asia.
While Christopher often preferred a behind-the-scenes role, he also made news as deputy secretary of state in the Carter administration, conducting the tedious negotiations that gained the release in 1981 of 52 American hostages in Iran.
Accepting Christopher's resignation as the nation's top diplomat, President Bill Clinton said Christopher "left the mark of his hand on history."
Christopher's travels became the stuff of diplomatic legend.
In the skies over Africa and approaching his 71st birthday in October 1996, Christopher set a new mark for miles traveled by a secretary of state over four years, the normal length of a presidential term: 704,487.
The crew on his Air Force jet presented him with a congratulatory cake.
Christopher overcame sleep deprivation, difficult negotiations with the likes of the late Syrian President Hafez Assad and nagging ulcers to keep his eye on American interests.
Always crisp, modest and polite, he drove home an agreement in his last year on the job to halt fighting in Lebanon between Israel and extremist Shiite guerrillas.
"We have achieved the goal of our mission, which was to achieve an agreement that will save lives and end the suffering of people on both sides of the Israeli-Lebanese border," Christopher said in Jerusalem, his weeklong mission a success.
Unlike some who held the job, Christopher worked smoothly with the president's other senior advisers.
Although critics complained that the Clinton administration's foreign policy lacked dramatic initiatives, the poised and cautious Christopher indicated he was pleased with the results, especially with what he called the "triple play" of a NAFTA trade agreement with Canada and Mexico, the APEC expansion of U.S. economic ties to Pacific Rim nations, and the GATT accord on international tariffs and trade.
"Taking it overall, we've done very well on the major issues," he said at a news conference in 1993, during which he also cited U.S. support for economic and political reform in Russia and the "partnership for peace" proposal to expand the involvement of former Communist adversaries in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
Christopher also served locally, including chairing a commission that proposed reforms of the Los Angeles Police Department in the aftermath of the videotaped beating by police of motorist Rodney King in 1991. When four officers arrested for beating King were acquitted of most charges the following year Los Angeles erupted in days of deadly rioting.
An ensign in the U.S. Navy reserves, he was called up to active duty during World War II and served in the Pacific.
He received his undergraduate degree from the University of Southern California in 1945 and, after attending Stanford Law School, served as a clerk to Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas in 1949 and 1950.
In the late 1960s, he was a deputy attorney general in the administration of Lyndon Johnson.
He is survived by his wife Marie, and had four children in two marriages: Lynn, Scott, Thomas, and Kristen. Plans were pending for a private memorial service.
-- The Associated Press contributed to this report.
