A native Oregonian, he served in the United States Navy in the Pacific Theater during World War II after graduating from Willamette University.

[3] On June 10, 1940, the 17-year-old Hatfield, driving his mother's car, struck and killed a pedestrian, 6-year-old Alice Marie Lane, as she crossed the street to deliver milk to her neighbors.

[6] While attending Willamette, Hatfield became a brother of Alpha Phi Omega and Kappa Gamma Rho, which he later helped become a chapter of Beta Theta Pi.

[8] In college he also worked part-time for then Oregon Secretary of State Earl Snell, where he learned how to build a political base by sending out messages to potential voters after reading about life changes posted in newspapers, such as deaths and graduations.

[3] A lieutenant, he also witnessed the effects of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, as one of the first Americans to see the ruins of the city (later, as Senator, Hatfield opposed arms proliferation and the Vietnam War).

[3] After his discharge as a Lieutenant (junior grade),[11] he spent one year at Willamette's law school, but decided politics or teaching better suited him.

[3] During his tenure as professor, he built a political base by sending out messages and speaking at any public forum where he could get an invitation.

He also received national attention for his early support for coaxing Dwight D. Eisenhower to run for President of the United States as a Republican.

[18] While in the legislature, he continued to apply the grassroots strategy he learned from Earl Snell, but expanded it to cover the entire state to increase his political base.

Hatfield defeated fellow state senator Monroe Sweetland for the office, receiving 51.3% of the vote in the November general election.

[5] After the election, Holmes attempted to appoint David O'Hara as Secretary of State to replace Hatfield, who would have to resign to become governor.

[27] While governor he worked to begin the diversification of the state's economy, such as recruiting industrial development and holding trade missions.

[3] As part of the initiative, he helped to found the Oregon Graduate Center in 1963 in what became the Silicon Forest in Washington County.

[28] In lieu of the standard portrait for former governors, Hatfield is represented by a marble bust at the Oregon State Capitol.

[3] Limited to two terms as governor, Hatfield announced his candidacy in the 1966 U.S. Senate election for the seat vacated by the retiring Maurine Neuberger.

In 1968, Hatfield was on Richard Nixon's short list for vice president,[3] and received the strong backing of his friend, the Rev.

[31] Hatfield was considered too liberal by many conservatives and Southern moderates, and Nixon chose the more centrist Maryland Governor Spiro Agnew.

On the show, Hatfield and Buckley primarily discussed Senator Barry Goldwater's unsuccessful bid for the presidency in the 1964 election.

Buckley eventually prompted Hatfield to expand upon his ideal system of presidential nominations by asking, "If, in fact, you invite four candidates to participate in a national primary, would you then understand that the Convention would meet merely to ratify the process, or would that be an advisory judgment by the people," to which the Senator replied, "I would like to see this as the final decision by the people themselves.

"[33] Hatfield was opposed to abortion and the death penalty, though as governor he chose not to commute the sentence of a convicted murderer and allowed that execution to go forward.

[35] Hatfield voted in favor of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 and the Civil Rights Restoration Act of 1987, as well as to override President Reagan's veto,[36][37][38] for the nomination of Thurgood Marshall to the Supreme Court[39] and the bill establishing Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a federal holiday.

In 1970, with Senator George McGovern (D-South Dakota), he co-sponsored the McGovern-Hatfield Amendment, which called for a complete withdrawal of U.S. troops from Vietnam.

[48][49] Hatfield appeared alongside Frank Church, Charles Goodell, Harold Hughes, and George McGovern on a bipartisan broadcast concerning the Vietnam War on May 12, 1970.

[62] In 1991, Hatfield voted against authorizing military action against Iraq in the Gulf War, one of only two members of his party to do so in the Senate.

Hatfield compared the balanced budget amendment to President Reagan's tax cuts, claiming that both were examples of "imagery versus substance".

Hatfield was sometimes called "Saint Mark" because of his squeaky-clean reputation,[47] but in 1984 columnist Jack Anderson revealed that Hatfield's wife Antoinette, a Washington, D.C., real estate lawyer, had been paid $55,000 by Greek arms dealer Basil Tsakos in connection with a real estate purchase.

[64] Tsakos had been lobbying Hatfield, then Appropriations Committee chairman, to support a trans-Africa oil pipeline megaproject.

[68] In 1991, it was also revealed that Hatfield had failed to report a number of expensive gifts from the president of the University of South Carolina, James B.

[72] In 1993, he became the longest-serving senator from Oregon, surpassing the record of 9,726 days in office previously held by Charles McNary.

[73] In 1996 the National Historical Publications and Records Commission, a group he served on previously, granted him their Distinguished Service Award.