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'Vincent Walker Foster, Jr.' (January 15, 1945 – July 20, 1993) was a deputy White House counsel during the first term of President Bill Clinton, and also a law partner and personal acquaintance of Hillary Clinton. His death was ruled a suicide by multiple official investigations, but became a subject of conspiracy theories.

Contents

Early life and education

Arkansas lawyer

White House counsel

Death

See also

References

Footnotes

Books

External links

Early life and education

Foster was born in Hope, Arkansas, where he was a childhood neighbor and friend of Bill Clinton for his first eight years until Clinton moved away. He graduated from Hope High School in 1963.^[1] He attended Davidson College, graduating in 1967. After starting at Vanderbilt University Law School, he transferred to the University of Arkansas School of Law, where he was managing editor of the Law Review^[2] and graduated first in his class in 1971. Additionally he scored the highest in his class on the Arkansas bar exam.^[3]
Foster married Elizabeth Brader in 1968.

Arkansas lawyer

After law school Foster joined the venerable Rose Law Firm in Arkansas,^[4] and within two years was made partner. He was the head of the Arkansas Bar Association committee that oversaw legal aid, and as such worked with legal aid clinic worker Hillary Rodham in successfully overcoming an unreasonably measuring requirement for indigent clients. Foster then initiated the hiring of Rodham at Rose Law Firm, where she became its first ever female associate (and later partner).
Hillary Rodham Clinton's memoirs call Foster "one of the best lawyers I've ever known," and compared him in style and substance to Gregory Peck's Atticus Finch role in the classic 1962 film ''To Kill a Mockingbird''.
Foster practiced mostly corporate law,^[5] eventually earning nearly $300,000 a year.
By the time Bill Clinton was elected president in 1992, Vince Foster was at the pinnacle of the Arkansas legal establishment,^[6] having received the Outstanding Lawyer Award from the Arkansas Bar Association,, while being described as the "soul" of Rose Law Firm and soon being named one of "The Best Lawyers in America".

White House counsel

After Clinton's election, Foster joined his White House staff. The Foster residence was on Cambridge Place in the Georgetown section of Washington, D.C.^[7]
Foster had difficulty making the transition to life and politics in Washington. He was only a deputy counsel, but he was personally the target of several hostile ''Wall Street Journal'' editorials. He handled the Clinton's Madison paperwork and three tax returns as deputy White House counsel. He was also upset over the Travel Office scandal.

Death

Wrestling with clinical depression, Foster was prescribed a mild sleeping aid/anti-anxiety pill, Trazodone, over the phone by his doctor, though he only had taken a few before he died. The next day, Foster was found dead in Fort Marcy Park, a federal park in Virginia. He was found with a gun in his hand and gunshot residue on that hand. An autopsy determined that he was shot in the mouth and no other wounds were found on his body. A suicide note of sorts, actually a draft of a resignation letter, was found torn into 27 pieces in his briefcase, a list of complaints specifically mentioning the ''Wall Street Journal'' and complaining "I was not meant for the job or the spotlight of public life in Washington. Here ruining people is considered sport."
Investigations by a coroner and independent counsel Robert B. Fiske concluded that Foster had committed suicide, though some suspect a cover-up. After a three-year investigation, Whitewater independent counsel Kenneth Starr^[8][9] released a report also concluding that the death was a suicide.
His funeral Mass was held at the Cathedral of St. Andrew Catholic Church in Little Rock. Bill Clinton gave an emotional eulogy in which he recalled their boyhood times together and quoted a line from Leon Russell's "A Song For You": "I love you in a place that has no space and time."^[10] Foster was buried in Memory Gardens Cemetery in his hometown of Hope. Foster was forty-eight years old and left behind a widow, Lisa, and three adult children, Vince, III, Laura, and Brugh.

See also

★ Death of Vince Foster

★ Whitewater (controversy)

References

Footnotes

1. "Vince Foster", Rotten Library biography. Accessed July 25, 2007.
2. "TRIBUTE TO VINCENT FOSTER, JR.", Congressional Record, July 29, 1993.
3. Vince Foster: One of the Best and Brightest
4. Hillary Rodham Clinton, ''Living History'', Simon & Schuster, 2003, ISBN 0-7432-2224-5, pp. 78-81.
5. Jason DeParle, " A Life Undone: Portrait of a White House Aide Ensnared by His Perfectionism", ''The New York Times'', August 22, 1993. Accessed July 29, 2007.
6. David Von Drehle and Howard Schneider, "Foster's Death a Suicide", ''The Washington Post'', July 1, 1994. Accessed July 28, 2007.
7. Vince Foster Home
8. Full text of the report on the 1993 death of White House counsel Vincent W. Foster, Jr., compiled by Whitewater independent counsel Kenneth Starr.
9. Report: Starr Rules Out Foul Play In Foster Death CNN February 23, 1997
10. Jason DeParle, " President Returns Home To Bury Boyhood Friend", ''The New York Times'', July 24, 1993. Accessed July 28, 2007.

Books

★ Brock, David. "Blinded by the Right : The Conscience of an Ex-Conservative''." (Three Rivers Press, 2003)

★ Clinton, Bill (2005). "''My Life''." Vintage Publishing. ISBN 1-4000-3003-X.

★ Conason, Joe. and Lyons, Gene. "''The Hunting of the President : The Ten-Year Campaign to Destroy Bill and Hillary Clinton''." (St. Martin's Griffin, 2001)

★ Dan Moldea. "A Washington Tragedy : How the Death of Vincent Foster Ignited a Political Firestorm" (Regnery Publishing, Inc, 1998)

★ Evans-Pritchard, Ambrose. "The Secret Life of Bill Clinton", Regenery Publishing, 1999. ISBN-13:978-0895264084.

External links

★ The Official Foster Report (This version is the full report except the appendix.)

★ Rotten.com biography

★ ''Frontline'': Once Upon a Time in Arkansas: Vince Foster's journal

★ Foster Report posted by the Washington Post

★ CNN Report

★ ''Conspiracy theory changed course of Clinton presidency'' Peter Baker, Washington Post July 20,1998