Duty, Honor, Country

A profile of the Bush political clan patriarch—who he was and what he stood for, the examples he set, the events he shared, and the lives he touched.

Prescott Bush is the only person in US history to be father of a US President, grandfather of a US President, and grandfather of a state governor. Duty, Honor, Country is more than a biography of the U.S. Senator from Connecticut, although it is that. It looks at the principles that Prescott Bush passed on like family heirlooms to his five children, including George H.W. Bush, the forty-first President of the United States: discipline, duty, ethics, commitment, courage, honor, honesty, loyalty, and responsibility. And it looks at the ways the Bush family legacy has made Prescott Bush, former President George Bush, George W. Bush, and Jeb Bush give themselves to public service. “My father believed in the concept of noblesse oblige,” said former President George Bush. “You made your money and you had a duty to serve the community or your country.”

Written with the encouragement and enthusiasm of former President Bush, the book is a readable story of noblesse oblige in action, from the time Prescott Bush served in town government in Greenwich, Connecticut, to his career as a US Senator from Connecticut, to his role in passing far-reaching legislation in the Eisenhower years. It also deals honestly with Prescott Bush’s alleged business relationships with Nazi industrialists and other accusations. Half of the book also shows how the commitment to public service was lived out in the lives of Prescott’s children and grandchildren, focusing on his son George H.W. Bush and his grandsons George W. Bush and Jeb Bush.