[8] He graduated summa cum laude from the University of Mississippi, where he was a member of Beta Theta Pi, with a Bachelor of Arts in English and political science.

He earned a Master of Arts in political science from Johns Hopkins University and a Juris Doctor, magna cum laude, from Harvard Law School.

He had been offered a Fulbright Scholarship, had held a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship, and had traveled widely throughout Europe, the Middle East, Russia, and Latin America.

[9] Prior to attending law school, he also served two years in the Navy as a surface warfare officer from 1970 to 1972 aboard the cruiser USS Little Rock (CLG-4), achieving the rank of lieutenant junior grade.

[14] State Senator Ellis B. Bodron, who was broadly opposed to the legislation, denounced Mabus and the other young Winter aides—including Dick Molpus, David Crews, Bill Gartin, Andy P. Mullins, and John Henegan—as the "Boys of Spring", a moniker which they thereafter took pride in.

King wrote an open letter to Mabus rejecting his claims as exaggerations and asked a legislative committee to conduct a review of the Department of Audit.

Mabus convinced the legislature to permit the department to contract out auditing services to private Certified Public Accountant firms to work on the backlog.

[28] Mabus warned the Mississippi Association of Supervisors that he would enforce financing laws strictly and would disapprove of misuse of local government resources or noncompliance with purchasing practices.

In order to ease compliance, he created a technical assistance division in the Department of Audit to provide legal and accounting advice to county boards of supervisors.

[27] Mabus' office ultimately audited all 82 counties during his term, enabling five to have their bond ratings restored and leading to $1.7 million in misused funds being returned to the state.

[37] In the Democratic primary he faced seven other candidates, including former governor Bill Waller, Attorney General Ed Pittman, Maurice Dantin, John Arthur Eaves, and Mike Sturvidant.

A businessman from Tupelo, Reed had worked with Winter on education reform and ran as a moderate, leaving voters with the impression that the two candidates had little to distinguish one from the other.

[12] He pledged to raise the state's teacher salaries to the Southeastern average, which Reed criticized as necessitating either a tax hike or funding cuts to other government responsibilities.

[49] Addressing the legislature in joint session, Mabus denounced the beat system as an antiquated form of government which "made stealing too easy and too tempting" and created inefficiency.

[55] During the 1988 session, Mabus vetoed a bill which would have forced the Fiscal Management Board—which he chaired as governor—to uniformly reduce expenditures if a projected revenue shortfall became apparent.

[58] The bond proposal expired due to disagreement between the Senate and House, so Mabus called the legislature into special session to address the issue.

[63] Focus groups convened by Mabus' campaign organization in the aftermath of the special session largely interpreted the governor's failure as a result of his unwillingness to compromise with the legislature.

[66] In January 1988, Mabus indicated that he wanted to replace the chairman of the Mississippi Democratic Party, Ed Cole, the first black man to hold the position.

Mabus and his allies attempted to cast Cole as an "old guard" moderate of an ineffective organization while portraying his desired candidate, Billie Thompson, as an effective reformer and fundraiser.

[46] Fordice had not been expected by most observers to win his own primary and thus entered the general election with momentum, while Mabus had been harmed by his narrow victory in the Democratic contest.

[46] Republican-hosted focus groups found the governor to be "aloof" and unconcerned with the necessities of "average" Mississippians[72] and Fordice's signature campaign television ad attacked the incumbent for having "tried" but "not accomplished much".

[89] Later in his tenure the destroyer USS Mason successfully operated on a biofuel blend that cost only $1.99 per gallon, a fact which Mabus claimed was overlooked.

Additional naming controversies occurred due to the naming of the auxiliary ship USNS Cesar Chavez (T-AKE-14) after civil rights activist Cesar Chavez[91] and a littoral combat ship the USS Gabrielle Giffords (LCS-10) in honor of former Arizona Democratic Congresswoman Gabby Giffords, after she suffered life-threatening wounds in the 2011 mass shooting in her home district of Tucson, Arizona.

Congressional Republicans accused Mabus of politicizing the ship-naming process, and Representative Steven Palazzo unsuccessfully attempted to amend a defense appropriation bill to bar the secretary from naming ships after congressmen who were not military service members.

[95] In June 2010, Obama ordered Mabus to draft a long-term plan to restore the condition of the Gulf Coast in the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

[96] Some regional businessmen and environmentalists were critical of the assignment, being troubled by Mabus' previous investments in energy trading companies and worried that as the secretary of navy, he would not be able to devote his full attention to the cleanup effort.

However, when Ash Carter became defense secretary the next month, he replaced the board chairman, the McKinsey results were classified as secret, and its report was removed from public websites.

Carter's draft budget for the Department of Defense did not reflect this appropriation, and in December 2016 Mabus released a memo stating that he did not wish to cut money from shipbuilding, citing the decline in the size of the navy from 2001 to 2008.

His actions provoked the ire of members of Congress, with Representative Duncan D. Hunter demanding his resignation and others criticizing the narrow timeframe he had given the corps.

[106] During his tenure as Navy Secretary, he threw ceremonial first pitches at all 30 major league baseball parks in the United States, the only person ever believed to have done so.