Rockefeller served as assistant secretary of State for American Republic Affairs for Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman (1944–1945), as well as Undersecretary of Health, Education and Welfare (HEW) under Dwight D. Eisenhower from 1953 to 1954.

[32] Rockefeller formed the International Basic Economy Corporation (IBEC) in 1947 to jointly continue the work he had begun as Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs.

He was tasked with providing the president with advice and assistance in developing programs by which the various departments of the government could counter Soviet foreign policy challenges.

The Quantico panel developed a proposal called "open skies" wherein the United States and the Soviet Union (USSR) would exchange blueprints of military installations and agree to mutual aerial reconnaissance.

It was an ambitious study created to define the central problems and opportunities facing the United States in the future, and to clarify national purposes and objectives.

From this period Rockefeller employed Kissinger as a personally funded part-time consultant, principally on foreign policy issues, until the appointment to his staff became full-time in late 1968.

[48] Rockefeller was re-elected in the three subsequent elections in 1962, 1966, and 1970, increasing the state's role in education, environmental protection, transportation, housing, welfare, medical aid, civil rights, and the arts.

The proposals supported by his administration would not have repealed the long-standing prohibition but would have expanded the exceptions allowed for the protection of the mother's health, or in circumstances of fetal abnormality.

[51] He supported the bill, enacted in June 1966, which acquired Olana, home of Hudson River School artist Frederic Edwin Church, as a state historic site.

[66] Despite his personal support for capital punishment, Rockefeller signed a bill in 1965 to abolish the death penalty except in cases involving the murder of police officers.

After four days of negotiations, Department of Correctional Services Commissioner Russell Oswald agreed to most of the inmates' demands for various reforms but refused to grant complete amnesty to the rioters, with passage out of the country and removal of the prison's superintendent.

Opponents blamed Rockefeller for these deaths in part because of his refusal to go to the prison and negotiate with the inmates, while his supporters, including many conservatives who had often vocally differed with him in the past, defended his actions as being necessary to the preservation of law and order.

[73][74] In 1971, he championed the creation of Empire State College to provide higher education to adults by removing impediments to access such as time, location, and institutional processes.

[77] Rockefeller worked with the legislature and unions to create generous pension programs for many public workers, such as teachers, professors, firefighters, police officers, and prison guards.

[79] In April and May 1969, at the request of President Nixon, Rockefeller and a team of 23 advisors visited 20 American republics during four trips to solicit opinions of their inter-American policies and to determine the needs and conditions of each country.

Among the recommendations in Rockefeller's report to the President were preferential trade agreements with Latin American countries, refinancing the region's foreign debt, and removing bureaucratic impediments that prevented the efficient use of United States aid.

[79] In 1967 Rockefeller won approval of the largest state bond issue at the time ($2.5 billion) for the coordinated development of mass transportation, highways, and airports.

The MTA merged the New York City subway system with the publicly owned Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority, the Long Island Rail Road, Staten Island Rapid Transit, and operation of lines that would later become Metro-North Railroad, along with the newly created MTA Bus Company, which were purchased by the state from private owners in a massive public bailout of bankrupt railroads and struggling private bus companies located in Queens, New York.

[81] A supporter of universal healthcare, Rockefeller served as consultant for Senator Jacob Javits' "Medicare for All" bill that would expand benefits to every American.

[82][83][84] Rockefeller's bid in the 1960 Republican Party presidential primaries ended early when then-Vice President Richard Nixon surged ahead in the polls.

At a discouraging point in the 1964 California primary campaign against Goldwater, his top political aide Stuart Spencer called on Rockefeller to "summon that fabled nexus of money, influence, and condescension known as the Eastern Establishment.

[91] Rockefeller's stump speeches often used the phrase "the brotherhood of man, under the fatherhood of God"; reporters covering his campaign came to abbreviate the expression as BOMFOG.

Rockefeller underwent extended hearings before Congress, suffering embarrassment when it was revealed he made massive gifts to senior aides, such as Henry Kissinger, and used his personal fortune to finance a scurrilous biography of political opponent Arthur Goldberg.

[100] He had also taken debatable deductions on his federal income taxes, and ultimately agreed to pay nearly one million dollars to settle the issue but no illegalities were uncovered, and he was confirmed.

When he learned that Ford had proposed cuts in federal taxes and spending, he responded: "This is the most important move the president has made, and I wasn't even consulted.

"[119] Connery and Bejamin further argued: "During his administration, the tax burden rose to a higher level than in any other state, and the incidence of taxation shifted, with a greater share being borne by the individual taxpayer.

AIA was a philanthropy for the dissemination of technical and managerial expertise and equipment to underdeveloped countries to support grass-roots efforts in overcoming illiteracy, disease and poverty.

In 1956, Frederic Huntington Douglas was named honorary Curator of the American Indian section of the Nelson Rockefeller Museum of Native Arts in New York.

In his diary, Rockefeller intimate Ken Riland used a tone of knowing irony when mentioning Malinda, putting the word stepfather in quotes.

[156] In 2017, the New York Daily News stated that following Rockefeller's death, "it wasn't long before Johnny Carson could start drawing laughs merely by uttering the words 'Megan Marshack.