Nelson Rockefeller: Iconic New York Governor, Face of Liberal Republicanism

12th October 1965: American Republican politician Governor Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller (1908 - 1979) at the signing of the Immigration Bill.

Richard Norton Smith talks about his new biography of Nelson Rockefeller, looking at his improbable journey to the New York governor’s mansion, his politically disastrous divorce and remarriage, and his relationships with presidents and political leaders from FDR to Henry Kissinger. On His Own Terms: A Life of Nelson Rockefeller, is an account of the deadly 1971 prison uprising at Attica, Rockefeller’s battles with New York City mayor John Lindsay, and his son’s unsolved disappearance, the punitive Rockefeller drug laws, and the much-gossiped-about circumstances of his death.