Department History

The University of Maine has offered courses in government and politics for more than a century. A University of Maine catalogue in the 1920s, for instance, lists courses in constitutional law, international law, state and local government, foreign governments, American government and American diplomacy. The faculty at that time consisted of one or two professors and was part of a combined Department of History and Government. The Department was chaired by Dr. Caroline Colvin, a medieval historian who held a Ph.D from the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Colvin served as chairperson for approximately 30 years.

In 1932, Dr. Colvin was succeeded by Edward Dow, who held a Ph.D. in government from Harvard University. His primary field was American state and local government. Dow would lead the Department of History and Government until 1966. Desiring to provide students with practical experience in government, he started the congressional internship program in 1957, and he also helped develop the international affairs interdisciplinary option for students interested in careers in that field. Those two programs continue today.

After Dr. Dow’s retirement, the Department of History and Government separated into independent units. The new Department of Political Science began in 1966 under the leadership of Dr. Eugene Mawhinney. a constitutional law specialist who had earned an M.A. in government at the University of Maine and a Ph.D. from the University of Illinois. Departmental courses have always been arranged according to the four principal areas of political science: American government, comparative governments, international relations and political theory. A fifth area, public administration, was taught until 1986 (that faculty is now part of the College of Business, Public Policy and Health).

Since 1966, the Department of Political Science has regularly had large numbers of undergraduate majors. Its faculty has won numerous recognitions. It is one of the very few departments on campus to have had four faculty recipients of the Distinguished Maine Professor Award: Walter Schoenberger (1963), Robert Thomson (1969), Eugene Mawhinney (1982) and James Warhola (2002).

© Copyright 2008, Political Science Department, University of Maine