JOHN WILLIAM WARNER, Republican from Virginia, was elected to the United States Senate on Nov. 7, 1978. He was reelected to a second term on Nov. 6, 1984, and won a third term on Nov. 6, 1990, with 82 percent of the vote.
Senator Warner is the second most senior member of the Armed Services Committee. Recognizing his interest in defense and national security matters, Majority Leader Dole appointed Senator Warner to the National Security Working Group and the Commission on Roles and Capabilities of U.S. Intelligence. The latter commission, proposed by Warner legislation, will review U.S. intelligence community activities in the post Cold War global environment.
He also serves as the second most senior member of the Environment and Public Works Committee, and as a member of the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Committee, Small Business Committee, and the Rules and Administration Committee.
Before entering the Senate, Senator Warner carried out special assignments for the United States in government- to-government negotiations on military, scientific, economic, educational and cultural matters, which gave him a background in national security and foreign affairs.
His experience in the area of defense issues has included service from 1969 to 1973 as Department of Defense representative to the Law of the Sea talks in Geneva.
He served as Undersecretary of the Navy from 1969 to 1972, and as Secretary of the Navy from 1972 to 1974.
His position as co-chairman of the Nunn-Warner Working Group on Nuclear Risk Reduction helped lead to the September 1987 White House signing by Secretary of State George Shultz and Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze of an Executive Agreement establishing nuclear risk reduction centers in Washington and Moscow.
In January 1985, he was appointed by the Senate leadership to serve with a bipartisan group of senators as an observer of arms control talks with the Soviet Union in Geneva.
He was head of the U.S delegation to the Incidents at Sea Conference with the Soviet Navy, culminating in May 1972 with the signing in Moscow of the " Incidents at Sea Agreement," of which Senator Warner was the principal negotiator and signatory for the United States.
The agreement, covering operational movements of United States and Soviet surface and air naval forces, has been acclaimed as a successful confidence-building measure with the Soviet Union.
Before he was elected to the Senate, Warner also served as national administrator of the American Revolution Bicentennial Administration from 1974 to 1976.
Mr. Warner was appointed a law clerk in 1953 to the late Chief Judge E. Barrett Prettyman of the United States Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C.
In 1956, he was appointed an assistant United States Attorney and served for four years in the trial and appellate divisions. From 1960 to 1969, he was in private law practice, specializing in bank, securities and corporate cases.
In 1944, at the age of 17, he left high school to volunteer for the United States Navy. He was released from active duty as a 3rd-class electronics technician in July 1946, and enrolled at Washington and Lee University. He was awarded a B.S. degree in basic engineering in 1949.
He then entered the University of Virginia Law School. In September 1950, he volunteered for another tour of active duty, this time in the United States Marine Corps. He served in Korea as a first lieutenant and communications officer with the First Marine Air Wing.
He was released from active duty in May 1952. He returned to law school and was awarded a law degree by the University of Virginia in 1953.
From 1967 to 1972, he was a trustee of the Protestant Episcopal Cathedral of Mount St. Albans in Washington, D.C., and from 1968 to 1979 he was a member of the Board of Trustees of Washington and Lee University.
Senator Warner is a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars; American Legion; Alpha Chapter of Omicron Delta Kappa at Washington and Lee University; and Emmanuel Episcopal Church, Middleburg, Virginia.
Mr. Warner was born Feb. 18, 1927. He is the grandson of John W. and Mary Tinsley Warner of Amherst County, Virginia, and the son of the late Martha Budd Warner and the late Dr. John W. Warner, a physician and surgeon. He has three children and two grandsons.