Daniel Brewster

Daniel Baugh Brewster, Jr. was born on November 23, 1923, in Baltimore County, Maryland, in the Green Spring Valley Region. He was the eldest of six children of Ottolie Y. (Wickes) and Daniel Baugh Brewster.[1][2] Brewster was born into a wealthy family and was "raised in comfort on a beautifully appointed farm in Maryland fox-hunting country". The Washington Post described him as an "inheritor of the Baugh Chemical fortune". His father died when he was 10 years of age.[2]

Brewster was a great-grandson of Benjamin H. Brewster, an attorney and politician from New Jersey who served as United States Attorney General from 1881 to 1885 and was himself a descendant of Mayflower passenger William Brewster. Brewster was also a great-great-great-grandson of Sarah Franklin Bache and Richard Bache and a great-great-great-great-grandson of Benjamin Franklin, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. He was also related to George Mifflin Dallas (July 10, 1792 – December 31, 1864), a U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania and the 11th Vice President of the United States.

In 1969, Brewster was indicted on 10 criminal counts of solicitation and acceptance of bribes while a United States Senator,[13] in his role as a member of the Committee on Post Office and Civil Service; as well as two counts of accepting illegal gratuities.[4] This stemmed from a campaign contribution by Spiegel, Inc., a mail-order firm. He contended that he had done nothing wrong.[14]

At trial, the judge dismissed five of the charges, saying that Brewster's actions were protected under the Speech or Debate Clause of the U.S. Constitution. The prosecution appealed directly to the U.S. Supreme Court, which heard the case in 1971 and 1972. In June 1972, the Court held 6 to 3 in United States v. Brewster that the taking of illegal bribes was not protected speech, as taking of a bribe was not part of the "performance of a legislative function."[13][15]

The charges were reinstated. Brewster stood trial and was found "not guilty" of the bribery charges but was convicted of accepting an unlawful gratuity "without corrupt intent." However, in August 1974,[13] his conviction was overturned on appeal due to the trial judge's improper instructions to the jury.[4] In 1975, he pleaded no contest to a single misdemeanor charge of accepting an illegal gratuity "without corrupt intent" and was fined and allowed to keep his law license. The government dropped the other charges.[16][17]

After leaving the Senate, Brewster took up farming in Glyndon, Maryland.[3]

As of 1978, Brewster operated his farm, worked as an alcoholism counselor at a veterans' hospital, led the Governor's Advisory Council on Alcoholism, and worked at "a quarter-way house in Baltimore".[2]

Brewster married Carol Leiper DeHavenon of Philadelphia in 1954. The couple had two sons, Daniel Baugh Brewster, Jr. (born 1956) and Gerry Leiper Brewster (born 1958).[18]

In 1967, Brewster "attended the funeral of William Bullitt, the U.S. ambassador to France. There, he became reacquainted with Anne Bullitt, Mr. Bullitt's daughter and Mr. Brewster's first fiancee, who had jilted the senator while he was overseas during the war". Brewster divorced his first wife.[5] On April 29, 1967, he married Anne Bullitt (1924–2007) at Glyndon, Maryland.[19] Brewster's second marriage also ended in divorce.[5]

Brewster was an alcoholic. According to his account, his drinking began to spiral out of control in 1964; by 1969, he was "'drinking with a vengeance'", and he almost died following an "alcoholic collapse". He sought inpatient rehabilitation multiple times, and reportedly became sober in 1973.[2]

In 1976, Brewster married Judy Lynn Aarsand after meeting her at an alcohol treatment facility.[5] The couple had three children, Danielle (born 1977) and twins Jennilie and Dana (born 1979).[4]

Brewster survived large cell lymphoma and leukemia in the 1980s.[5]

Brewster died of liver cancer on August 19, 2007, at age 83.[11][14] He is buried at Saint Thomas' Episcopal Church Cemetery, Owings Mills, Maryland.[3]

Among Brewster's United States Senate staff in the 1960s were intern Nancy D'Alesandro (later Pelosi) of Baltimore, who as a Congresswoman from California would become Democratic leader and, in 2007, Speaker of the House of Representatives, and Steny Hoyer, who served on Senator Brewster's staff for five years from 1962 to 1966 and who served as House Majority Leader under Pelosi.[20]

In 2023, a biography of Brewster, Self-Destruction: The Rise, Fall, and Redemption of U.S. Senator Daniel B. Brewster, was published by Loyola University Maryland's Apprentice House Press, written by John W. Frece.[21]

• List of American federal politicians convicted of crimes
• List of federal political scandals in the United States