Reply #26: It's true, Hillary was born a Republican, but she changed forever in 1968 - 40 years ago [View All]

In 1965, Rodham enrolled in Wellesley College, where she majored in political science.<15> She served as president of the Wellesley Young Republicans organization during her freshman year.<16><17> However, due to her evolving views regarding the American Civil Rights Movement and the Vietnam War, she stepped down from that position;<16> she characterized her own nature as that of "a mind conservative and a heart liberal."<18> In her junior year, Rodham was affected by the death of Martin Luther King, Jr.,<8> and became a supporter of the anti-war presidential nomination campaign of Democrat Eugene McCarthy.<19> Rodham organized a two-day student strike and worked with Wellesley's black students for moderate changes, such as recruiting more black students and faculty.<20> In that same year she was elected president of the Wellesley College Government Association.<21><22> She attended the "Wellesley in Washington" summer program at the urging of Professor Alan Schechter, who assigned Rodham to intern at the House Republican Conference so she could better understand her changing political views.<20> Rodham was invited by Representative Charles Goodell, a moderate New York Republican, to help Governor Nelson Rockefeller’s late-entry campaign for the Republican nomination.<20> Rodham attended the 1968 Republican National Convention in Miami, where she decided to leave the Republican Party for good; she was upset over how Richard Nixon's campaign had portrayed Rockefeller and what Rodham perceived as the "veiled" racist messages of the convention.<20>

Rodham returned to Wellesley, and wrote her senior thesis about the tactics of radical community organizer Saul Alinsky under Professor Schechter (which, years later while she was first lady, was suppressed at the request of the White House and became the subject of speculation as to its contents).<23> In 1969, Rodham graduated with departmental honors in political science. Stemming from the demands of some students,<24> she became the first student in Wellesley College history to deliver their commencement address.<22> According to reports by the Associated Press, her speech received a standing ovation lasting seven minutes.<25><26> She was featured in an article published in Life magazine, due to the response to a part of her speech that criticized Senator Edward Brooke, who had spoken before her at the commencement;<8> she also appeared on Irv Kupcinet's nationally-syndicated television talk show as well as in Illinois and New England newspapers.<27> That summer, she worked her way across Alaska, washing dishes in Mount McKinley National Park and sliming salmon in a fish processing cannery in Valdez (which fired her and shut down overnight when she complained about unhealthy conditions).