Clinton, Bill (William) 1946-
US Democratic politician and 42nd President

Born in Hope, Arkansas, he was educated at Georgetown University and Yale Law School, and at Oxford (Rhodes Scholar). He taught law at the University of Arkansas (1973-76) before he was elected state Attorney-General (1976). Elected Governor of Arkansas in 1978, he was the youngest person ever to hold that office, and served for five terms (1979-81, 1983-92). In 1992, on a platform of hope and change in a climate of economic recession and voter disillusionment, he defeated George Bush and was elected President, thus ending a 12-year Republican hold on the office. Since his inauguration (20 January 1993) he has been faced with problems at home, such as the need to break his election promise and raise taxes to reduce budget deficit, and problems abroad involving decisions on the intervention of US troops in the Somalian and Yugoslav civil wars. In the 1996 elections he became the first Democrat President to gain re-election since Franklin D Roosevelt in 1936.