Edmund G. Brown Jr. is the son of Governor Pat Brown and great-grandson of August Schuckman, a German immigrant who settled in California during the California Gold Rush. He is the longest serving governor in California history, first elected at 36 years old and again at 72. He has served as Secretary of State, chairman of the state Democratic Party, Mayor of Oakland, and California Attorney General. Brown has spent over five decades in public service, tackling climate change and inequality, among many other issues.   

Join Malcolm Young for a conversation with Brown about his long career, protecting the earth and serving the people. 

The Forum will be posted on our Youtube and Apple Podcast channels.    

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American Masters – Jerry Brown: The Disrupter

About the Guest

Jerry Brown was born in San Francisco on April 7, 1938. He graduated from St. Ignatius High School in 1955 and entered Sacred Heart Novitiate, a Jesuit seminary. He later attended the University of California, Berkeley, graduating in 1961 before earning a J.D. at Yale Law School in 1964. Brown was elected Trustee for the LA Community College District in 1969, California Secretary of State in 1970, and Governor of California in 1974 and 1978. After his governorship, he lectured and traveled widely, practiced law, served as chairman of the state Democratic Party, and ran for president. Brown was elected Mayor of Oakland in 1998 and California Attorney General in 2006. He was elected Governor again in 2010 and 2014. Brown currently serves as chair of the California-China Climate Institute at UC Berkeley; executive chair of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists; chair of the Oakland Military Institute College Preparatory Academy, a public charter school he founded more than 20 years ago; and on the boards of the Nuclear Threat Initiative and Council on Criminal Justice. 

About the Moderator

The Very Rev. Dr. Malcolm Clemens Young is the dean of Grace Cathedral. He is the author of The Spiritual Journal of Henry David Thoreau and The Invisible Hand in Wilderness: Economics, Ecology, and God, and is a regular contributor on religion to the Huffington Post and San Francisco Examiner.    

About The Forum

The Forum is a series of stimulating conversations about faith and ethics in relation to the important issues of our day. We invite inspiring and illustrious people to sit down for a real conversation with the Forum’s host and with you. Our guests range from artists, inventors, and philosophers to pop culturists and elected officials, but the point of The Forum is singular: civil, sophisticated discourse that engages minds and hearts to think in new ways about the world.  More about Grace Forum Online.

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