"I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy. I mean, that's a storybook, man."

Bigmouth Biden Will Be Vocal Veep!

Joe Biden trained as a lawyer and became a senator in 1973 at the age of 30 (the minimum age to become a U.S. senator). He was the fifth youngest senator in U.S. history. In 1974, then freshman Senator Biden was named one of the 200 Faces for the Future by Time magazine. He is now in his sixth consecutive term in the Senate. He is the longest-serving U.S. Senator in Delaware history. He served as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, dealing with issues related to drug policy, crime prevention and civil liberties. He is the current chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Since 1991, Biden has also served as an adjunct professor at the Widener University School of Law, where he teaches a seminar on constitutional law.

Born November 20, 1942 in Scranton, Pennsylvannia, at age 10 he moved to Claymont, Delaware. His father was a car salesman. He is the son of Joseph Robinette Biden, Sr. (1915–2002) and Catherine Eugenia "Jean" Finnegan (born 1918). He was the first of four siblings and is of English heritage on his father's side and Irish heritage on his mother's side. He has two brothers, James Brian Biden and Francis W. Biden, and a sister, Valerie Owens.

In 1961, Biden graduated from Archmere Academy in Claymont, Delaware. In 1965 he graduated from the University of Delaware in Newark, where he double majored in history and political science. He went on to receive his J.D. from Syracuse University College of Law in 1968, and was admitted to the Delaware Bar in 1969.

On August 27, 1966, while pursuing his law degree he married Neilia Hunter. They had three children, Joseph R. "Beau" Biden III, Robert Hunter, and Naomi Christina ("Amy"). In 1972, shortly after being elected to the Senate, his wife and infant daughter died in a car accident. His two sons, Beau and Hunter, though seriously injured in the accident, made full recoveries. Biden was sworn into office from their bedside. Persuaded not to resign in order to care for them, Biden began the practice of commuting an hour and a half each day on the train from his home in the Wilmington suburbs to Washington, D.C., and continues to do so to this day.

Today Biden's sons are successful adults. His elder son, Beau, had been a partner in the Wilmington law firm of Bifferato, Gentilotti, Biden & Balick, LLC until he was elected Delaware Attorney General in 2006. Beau is a captain in the Delaware Army National Guard, where he serves in the Judge Advocate General's (JAG) Corps. He is set to be deployed to Iraq in October 2008. Biden's younger son, Hunter, works as a lawyer in Washington, D.C., serving on the board of directors of Amtrak.

Biden chose to remarry and in 1977 married Jill Tracy Jacobs. They have a daughter named Ashley. The Biden family are members of the Roman Catholic Church.

In February 1988, after suffering from neck pains, Biden was hospitalized and underwent lifesaving surgery to correct two brain aneurysms. The hospitalization and recovery kept him from his duties in the U.S. Senate for seven months.

Biden has been involved in crafting many federal crime laws over the last decade, including the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, also known as the Biden Crime Law, and the landmark Violence Against Women Act of 1994 (VAWA), which contains a broad array of measures to combat domestic violence and provides billions of dollars in federal funds to address gender-based crimes.

As a Senator, Biden has long been a member of and is the current chairman of the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. His efforts to combat hostilities in the Balkans in the 1990s brought national attention when during one meeting he called Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic a "war criminal." Biden also stated in 2002 that Saddam Hussein was a threat to American national security, and that there was no option but to eliminate that threat. The Bush administration rejected an effort Biden undertook with Senator Richard Lugar to pass a resolution authorizing military action only after the exhaustion of diplomatic efforts. In October 2002, Biden voted in favor of the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq, justifying the Iraq War. He has long supported the appropriations to pay for the occupation, but has argued repeatedly that the war should be internationalized, that more soldiers are needed, and that the Bush administration should "level with the American people" about the cost and length of the conflict. Biden is a leading advocate for dividing Iraq into a loose federation of three ethnic states

As chairman of the International Narcotics Control Caucus, Biden wrote the laws that created the U.S. "Drug Czar", who oversees and coordinates national drug control policy. In April 2003 he introduced the controversial Reducing Americans' Vulnerability to Ecstasy Act, also known as the RAVE Act. In 2004 he worked to pass a bill outlawing steroids like androstenedione, the drug used by many baseball players.

With a net worth between $59,000 and $366,000, Biden is considered one of the least wealthy members of the Senate.