John Edwards was born in Seneca, South Carolina, and raised in Robbins, North Carolina, a small town in the Piedmont. There, John learned the values of hard work and perseverance from his father Wallace, who worked in the textile mills for 36 years, and from his mother, Bobbie, who ran a shop and worked at the post office. Working alongside his father at the mill, John developed his strong belief that all Americans deserve an equal opportunity to succeed and be heard.
A proud product of public schools, John became the first person in his family to attend college. He worked his way through North Carolina State University where he graduated with high honors in 1974, and then earned a law degree with honors in 1977 from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
For the next 20 years, John dedicated his career to representing families and children hurt by the negligence of others. Standing up against the powerful insurance industry and their armies of lawyers, John helped these families through the darkest moments of their lives to overcome tremendous challenges. His passionate advocacy for people like the folks who worked in the mill with his father earned him respect and recognition across the country.
In 1998, John took this commitment into politics to give a voice in the United States Senate to the people he had represented throughout his career. He ran for the Senate and won, defeating an incumbent.
In Congress, Senator Edwards quickly emerged as a champion for the issues that make a difference to American families: quality health care, better schools, protecting civil liberties, preserving the environment, saving Social Security and Medicare, and reforming the ways campaigns are financed.
As a member of the Select Committee on Intelligence, Senator Edwards has worked tirelessly for a strong national defense and to strengthen the security of our homeland. He has authored key pieces of legislation on cyber- bio- and port-security.
Senator Edwards and his wife Elizabeth, whom he met when both were law students at Chapel Hill, were married in 1977. They have four children including their eldest daughter, Catharine, a student at Princeton University; five-year-old Emma Claire, and a three-year-old son Jack. Their first child, Wade, died in 1996.

“Cities are the centers of American life, but they are also sites of the most concentrated inequalities in America. In 1964, President Lyndon Johnson launched the War on Poverty. In 2001, George W. Bush declared war on opportunity by shifting the tax burden from unearned wealth onto work and leaving our cities behind.” Senator John Edwards
Supporting Civil Rights And Equal Opportunity For All Americans
Senator Edwards grew up in the South, in a small town in rural North Carolina. He knows how important it is that we not go backwards in the cause for civil rights. He was brought up to believe in an America where we embrace and lift up everybody, no matter who you are, no matter who your family is, no matter what the color of your skin.