Sen. Richard Lugar to Deliver Terry Sanford Distinguished Lecture at Duke Jan. 14
The chair of Senate Foreign Relations Committee, is expected to discuss national security, free trade and economic growth
DURHAM, N.C. -- U.S. Sen. Richard G. Lugar, current chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, will deliver a public lecture, "The United States Rediscovers the World," at Duke University on Jan. 14.
The lecture by Lugar, an Indiana Republican, begins at 4 p.m. in the Terry Sanford Institute of Public Policy and is free and open to the public.
In delivering the 2004 Terry Sanford Distinguished Lecture, Lugar is expected to discuss national security, free trade and economic growth, and his longstanding advocacy of U.S. leadership in the world.
"This lectureship is the institute's most prestigious, since it honors our founder and his extraordinary public service to the university, the state and the nation," said Sanford Institute Director Bruce W. Jentleson. "We are very pleased that Senator Lugar, who has dedicated his career to forging productive partnerships nationally and internationally, will help us honor Terry Sanford's legacy."
A senator since 1976, Lugar helped forge a bipartisan partnership with then-Senate Armed Services Chairman Sam Nunn (D-Ga.) to secure and dismantle weapons of mass destruction in the former Soviet Union. Since its ratification in 1991, the Nunn-Lugar program, also known as the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program, has deactivated nearly 6,000 nuclear warheads.
As chair of the European Subcommittee of the Foreign Relations Committee, Lugar chaired the first hearings in 1995 on expanding NATO to the countries of Eastern and Central Europe and helped facilitate a dialogue between the Clinton administration and Congress on the issue. Efforts to enlarge the NATO Alliance resulted in the Senate's approval of membership for Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic in 1998.
Lugar also is a member and past chair of the Senate Agriculture Committee who is currently is serving his fifth term in the U.S. Senate.
The Terry Sanford Distinguished Lecture was endowed by a gift to the university from the William R. Kenan Jr. Charitable Trust in honor of the late Terry Sanford, who served as Duke president for 16 years. Sanford was also founder of the Terry Sanford Institute of Public Policy. Previous lecturers include former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres, former Costa Rican President Ocar Arias, former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, former Harvard President Derek Bok and U.S. Sen. Joseph Lieberman.