U.S. district court judge and former state attorney general and senator Warren Warren was born in Raton, New Mexico in 1925 but raised in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin after his father, a Methodist minister, accepted a call from Wisconsin. Warren graduated from Sturgeon Bay High School in 1943 and enlisted in the Army. He returned after the war (decorated with a Purple Heart for a wound received in France) and enrolled at Macalester College in St. Paul. After graduating magna cum laude in 1950, he enrolled in the public administration program at the University of Minnesota. For two years after his graduation Warren worked for the U.S. State Department but found that he did not like life in the capital, and he returned to Wisconsin to pursue a law degree at the University. He graduated from law school in 1956 and practiced first in Elkhorn and then in Green Bay. In 1959 Warren was elected Brown County district attorney, after working for a year as assistant district attorney. In 1964 he was elected to the state senate from the 2nd District.
Warren quickly rose to a position of leadership, and he was elected assistant Republican floor leader in 1966 and was selected for a number of important committee assignments including Joint Finance, the Temporary Committee on Governmental Reorganization, and the Governor's Committee on War Resources. A complete listing of Warren's legislative committee work is contained in the Blue Book.
In 1968 Warren was elected state attorney general. During his six year tenure in this position he earned a reputation for being a conservative, law-and-order official. However, he was equally tough in his enforcement of environmental legislation which won him support from Wisconsin liberals. In 1974 Warren was appointed U.S. district court judge by President Richard Nixon.
