Don Edwards This article is about an American politician. There is also a Canadian hockey player named Don Edwards and a American cowboy singer of that name. William Donlon Edwards, (born January 6, 1915) known as Don, is an American politician of the Democratic Party, formerly a member of the United States House of Representatives from California. Born in San Jose, California, he attended the public schools there, graduating from San Jose High Academy, before earning a B.A. from Stanford University in 1936; he then attended Stanford Law School and was admitted to the bar in 1940. Edwards was a special agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation from 1940-1941, when he joined the United States Navy as a naval intelligence and gunnery officer during World War II. He was the president of Valley Title Company, of Santa Clara County from 1951 to 1975, and a delegate to the Democratic National Conventions of 1964 and 1968.
Edwards was elected as a Democrat to the Eighty-eighth and to the fifteen succeeding Congresses (January 3, 1963-January 3, 1995). He was one of the managers appointed by the House of Representatives in 1988 to conduct the impeachment proceedings against Alcee Hastings, judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida, and again in 1989 to conduct the impeachment proceedings against Walter Nixon, judge of the United States District Court for the District of Mississippi. Edwards was the chairman of the House Subcommittee on Civil Liberties and Civil Rights for 23 years. He was not a candidate for reelection to the One Hundred Fourth Congress.
The Don Edwards San Francisco Bay National Wildlife Refuge in the south end of San Francisco Bay is named in his honor.
