Stans, Maurice H., 1908-1998

Investment banker, government executive.

Maurice Hubert Stans (1908-1998), accountant, banker, politician, and author. Stans served as Secretary of Commerce in Richard Nixon's administration from 1969 until he resigned in 1972 to become Finance Chairman of the Committee to Re-Elect the President (CREEP). Stans also served as Deputy Postmaster General and as Director of the U.S. Bureau of the Budget during the Eisenhower administration. In 1981, he became Director of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation.

Maurice H. Stans was born at Shakopee, Minnesota, on March 22, 1908, the son of J. Hubert and Mathilda Nyssen Stans. He was graduated from Shakopee High School in 1925. The same year he began work as a stenographer and bookkeeper for a Chicago importer while attending evening classes at Northwestern University. In 1928 he joined the Chicago-based firm of Alexander Grant and Company, certified public accountants, and continued his part-time studies at Columbia University while working at the firm's New York City office. He was executive partner of Alexander Grant from 1940 to 1955.

Stans is a certified public accountant and a member of various accountants' organizations. He served as president of the American Institute of Accountants, 1954-1955.

Stans entered government service during the Dwight D. Eisenhower administration, and held the positions of financial management consultant to the Post Office Department, 1953-1955; deputy postmaster general, October 1955 - September 15, 1957; deputy director of the Bureau of the Budget, September 16, 1957 - March 17, 1958; and director of the Bureau of the Budget, March 18, 1958 - January 1961.

During 1961 and 1962, Stans was president of Western Bancorporation in Los Angeles, California, and author of a syndicated newspaper column on business and economic concerns. In 1963 he joined the investment banking firm of William R. Staats, Inc. He served as president of the firm, which later became Glore Forgan, William R. Staats, Inc., until President Richard M. Nixon appointed him secretary of commerce in December, 1968.

From 1961 to 1966, Stans also worked with the Republican Party in various capacities: assisting Republican members of Congress in evaluating the federal budget, chairing the party's Task Force on Federal Fiscal and Monetary Policies, and working on the financial organization aspect of Nixon's 1962 and 1968 political campaigns. In 1965 and 1966 he participated in several groups that underwrote expenses incurred by Nixon while on speaking tours and campaigning for Republican congressional candidates.

Stans served as secretary of commerce from January, 1969 to February, 1972, when he resigned to head the Finance Committee to Re-elect the President. In the wake of the Watergate scandals of 1972-1973, he was accused of accepting illegal campaign contributions and of exchanging political favors for large donations. In June, 1973, he appeared before the Senate Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities (the "Watergate Committee") and pleaded with the committee to "give me back my good name." Shortly thereafter, he, former attorney general John Mitchell, and two other Finance Committee for the Re-election of the President officials were indicted on three counts of attempting to interfere with the due administration of justice, one count of concealing knowledge of wrong-doing from the proper authorities, and six counts of perjury. These allegations were connected with political contributions from Robert L. Vesco, a businessman who was then under investigation by the Securities Exchange Commission. The defendants were accused of trying to intervene with the SEC on Vesco's behalf in return for Vesco's contributions to Nixon's re-election campaign. Mitchell and Stans stood trial in New York City in the spring of 1974 and were acquitted on all counts. A year later Stans pleaded guilty to five minor charges of nonwillfully accepting illegal contributions in the 1972 campaign, and was fined.

Stans has been a trustee of Pomona College and the Tax Foundation, a benefactor of the Children's Nature Museum of York County, the director of numerous companies, and president of the Stans Foundation. He married Kathleen Carmody in 1933, and had four adopted children.

Maurice H. Stans died in 1990.

The above sketch was taken from the Stans Papers and from Who's Who in America, 1969. See also Stans' book, The Terrors of Justice.