COUNTY NATIVE NAMED ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE
President W. George Bush has appointed Arthur E. (Gene) Dewey as Assistant
Secretary of State, Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration. Secretary of
State Colin Powell conducted Dewey's swearing-in ceremony at the State
Department on Monday, Feb. 25. Dewey is the son of the late Reverend Glenn and
Florence Dewey of Mainesburg. Pastor Dewey had churches at Bakerburg and
Austinville and was well known throughout the local area. Gene Dewey is
responsible for overseeing United States Government policies regarding
population, refugee and international migration issues and managing over $700
million in allocations for refugee protection, resettlement, and humanitarium
assistance programs. Mr. Dewey's public and private career background cuts
across several practitioner disciplines: military; diplomatic; United Nations,
and nongovernmental organizations. In 25 years as a military officer, his duties
ranged from two Vietnam combat aviation assignments, including command of a
combat helicopter battalion, to Chief of the Army's Political-Military Division
in the Pentagon. During the "Refugee Decade" of the 1980s, he served for five
years in the State Department as Deputy Assistant Secretary, Bureau for Refugee
Programs. Subsequently, he was named a United Nations Assistant
Secretary-General and served four years in Geneva as U.N. Deputy High
Commissioner for Refugees. In 1993, he was selected to head the NGO
successor to the former House Select Committee on Hunger - the Congressional
Hunger Center. Over the past five years he has worked with military
theater commands in Latin America, Europe, and Asia in bringing realistic
political and humanitarian dimensions into post-Cold War military training
exercises. Dewey is a graduate of the United States Military Academy at West
Point and received his Master's Degree from Princeton University. He was
selected as a White House Fellow in 1968, and was appointed Director of the
President's Commission on White House Fellowships in 1971. During his Army
War College years, he served as an Army Research Associate at the Graduate
Institute for International Studies in Geneva, Switzerland. Dewey was
selected as a Senior Military Fellow, Council on Foreign Relations in New York
in 1975. Dewey is married to the former Priscilla Parce from Utica and Syracuse,
NY. The Deweys continue to maintain the farm near Mansfield, Pennsylvania where
Gene was born and raised. Their daughter, Elisabeth Parce Ainsworth, and her
husband, Anthony Ainsworth, reside in New York City.