John B. Henry II

Washington businessman and a descendant of Revolutionary War patriot Patrick Henry, John B. Henry II is a sponsor of the Committee for the Republic. Among other positions, Henry served as senior counsel for the Mobil Corporation. --- The April 12, 2000 article "Online Venture Will Invite Law Firms to Bid for Work" by Richard B. Schmitt in The Wall Street Journal provides some information about John B. Henry and his connection to the Committee for the Republic.

"In the early 1990s, John B. Henry II was a pioneer in brokering corporate 'pollution credits.' Now, he's moving on to corporate lawyers... (For the rest of this article, please see eLawForum Corp.)

According to Schmitt, John B. Henry II:


 * "[is] a fallen-away corporate attorney."


 * "[was] chief executive of the venture." (i.e., eLawForum Corp.)


 * "hired an ex-senior counsel for Mobil Corporation, Kay Ellen Consolver, as his chief operating officer." Henry is also a former senior counsel for Mobil, perhaps where he met Consolver.


 * "raised $2 million from investors such as Thomas Stemberg, the Staples Inc. chief executive (and a classmate at Harvard), and C. Boyden Gray, President George Herbert Walker Bush's chief White House counsel and now a partner with the Washington law firm Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering.


 * "An intense, cerebral man, Mr. Henry lasted less than a year at the Wall Street law firm Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft before quitting. He has long been a student of complex markets."


 * "Before getting his law degree, he wrote a book on the history of U.S. relations with multinational oil producers."


 * "In the 1980s, he launched a company that made bioengineered pesticides, riling environmentalists concerned about the release of genetically altered material."

- Apparently it is not uncommon to find Henry's name linked with that of Gray. Both men, plus Timothy E. Wirth, signed a July 1976 letter published in Harvard Magazine regarding "a mandatory competitive-sourcing program for the University's annual purchase of $1.2 billion in goods and services."
 * "In the 1990s, Mr. Henry formed a trading company, Clean Air Capital Markets, that cashed in on a 1990 federal law allowing utilities to meet clean-air standards by purchasing 'pollution credits' from more environment-friendly rivals. 'We created a market where people said you couldn't,' Mr. Henry says. The company, now defunct, was profitable for a number of years."

Henry graduated from Harvard University, according to his signature, in the class of 1971; Gray in 1964; and Wirth in 1965. ---