GIULIANI, RUDOLPH W.

born May 28, 1944, Brooklyn, New York, N.Y., U.S. in full Rudolph William Giuliani, byname Rudy Giuliani American lawyer and politician who was elected mayor of New York City in 1993 and reelected in 1997. Giuliani was educated at Manhattan College (A.B., 1965) and New York University (J.D., 1968). Beginning in 1970, he worked for the U.S. government, holding positions in the office of the U.S. attorney and in the Department of Justice. From 1977 to 1981 he practiced law privately but in 1981 returned to the Justice Department as associate attorney gerneral. In 1983 he was appointed U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York. Early in his political career Giuliani changed his affiliation to the Republican Party. After being narrowly defeated in 1989, he won election as mayor in 1993, the first Republican to hold the position in two decades. He promised to reform the city's finances and to crack down on crime, and he was credited with success in both areas. He cut expenditures by, among other things, trimming the city's workforce and winning concessions from unions. The mayor encouraged the police to take an aggressive stance against even minor infractions of the laweven litterers, jaywalkers, and reckless cabdrivers were ticketed as lawbreakers. This campaign earned him the sobriquet The Nanny of New York. The crime rate fell, and the mayor claimed that New York had become a more civilized place. Giuliani had his detractors, however. Critics pointed out that he was taking credit for a crime decrease that was part of a nationwide trend. Further, in several incidents involving charges of police brutality, the mayor seemed to be defending officers' misconduct. To some critics the mayor's actions could be petty, as when he refused to meet visiting dignitaries if he disagreed with their policies. In a highly publicized incident in 1999, the mayor denounced a controversial exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum of Art that included works that many observers found offensive or sacrilegious. He attempted to withdraw funding for the museum but was overruled in court. Nonetheless, the mayor generally maintained high approval ratings, and there was speculation that he would run for the U.S. Senate in 2000. However, following the disclosures that he had prostate cancer and that he was separating from his wife, Donna Hanover, Giuliani announced in May 2000 that he would not run.