After a very successful tenure as Chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Ronald Brown (1941-1996) was appointed Commerce Secretary by President Bill Clinton. His reign as Secretary was cut short when his plane crashed during a mission to Bosnia-Herzegovina, killing all on board.

Ron Brown made history in 1989 when he became the first African American chosen to lead a major U.S. political party. From 1989 through 1992, Brown served as the highly visible deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee (DNC). Prior to that, he was Jesse Jackson's manager at the 1988 Democratic National Convention. But Brown's liberal roots go even deeper: he was earlier the National Urban League's chief Washington lobbyist, the deputy campaign manager for U.S. Senator Edward (Ted) Kennedy's 1980 presidential bid, and a chief counsel for the Senate Committee on the Judiciary. Brown's confirmation in 1993 as President Bill Clinton's secretary of commerce, however, focused the nation's...