Benjamin J. Lambert, III (born January 29, 1937) is an optometrist and former Virginia legislator elected to the Virginia House of Delegates

Virginia House of Delegates

The Virginia House of Delegates is the lower house of the Virginia General Assembly. It has 100 members elected for terms of two years; unlike most states, these elections take place during odd-numbered years. The House is presided over by the Speaker of the House, who is elected from among the...

 and Virginia Senate as a Democrat.

Early life and education

Lambert was born in Richmond, Virginia

Richmond, Virginia

Richmond is the capital of the Commonwealth of Virginia, in the United States. It is an independent city and not part of any county. Richmond is the center of the Richmond Metropolitan Statistical Area and the Greater Richmond area...

 on January 29, 1937. Lambert attended racially-segregated public schools in Henrico County, Virginia

Henrico County, Virginia

Henrico is a county located in the Commonwealth of Virginia, a state of the United States. As of 2010, Henrico was home to 306,935 people. It is located in the Richmond-Petersburg region and is a portion of the Richmond Metropolitan Statistical Area...

. He received his undergraduate degree from Virginia Union University

Virginia Union University

Virginia Union University is a historically black university located in Richmond, Virginia, United States. It took its present name in 1899 upon the merger of two older schools, Richmond Theological Institute and Wayland Seminary, each founded after the end of American Civil War by the American...

 and a graduate degree from the New England College of Optometry

New England College of Optometry

The New England College of Optometry in Boston, Massachusetts, is the oldest continually operating college of optometry in the United States. It was originally established as the Klein School of Optics in 1894 by Dr. August Andreas Klein, an ophthalmologist...

. He began practicing optometry

Optometry

Optometry is a health care profession concerned with eyes and related structures, as well as vision, visual systems, and vision information processing in humans. Optometrists, or Doctors of Optometry, are state licensed medical professionals trained to prescribe and fit lenses to improve vision,...

 in Richmond in 1962.

Political career

In 1977, Lambert was elected a Member of the House of Delegates from the Richmond-based 33rd district. In 1985, he was elected to the Virginia Senate representing the 9th Senate District, which included all of Charles City County

Charles City County, Virginia

As of the census of 2000, there were 6,926 people, 2,670 households, and 1,975 families residing in the county. The population density was 38 people per square mile . There were 2,895 housing units at an average density of 16 per square mile...

, and parts of Henrico County and the City of Richmond. He was the first African-American in the 20th Century to serve on the Virginia Senate Finance Committee. During his senate tenure, Lambert served on a number of committees, including Education and Health, General Laws, Privileges and Elections, Senate Finance, General Government, and Health and Human Resources. Additionally, he chaired the Subcommittees on Higher Education and General Government, the Brown v. Board Scholarship Commission, and the Lead Abatement Subcommittee.

In 2006, Lambert endorsed Republican U.S. Senator George Allen's unsuccessful reelection bid. The following year, Senator Lambert was defeated for re-election by former Delegate Donald A. McEachin

Donald A. McEachin

Aston Donald "Don" McEachin is a personal injury lawyer and an American politician. A Democrat, he served in the Virginia House of Delegates 1996–2001 and 2006–07. In November 2007, he was elected to the Senate of Virginia...

 who made the Allen endorsement a key factor in the contest.

Corporate and other board service

Lambert currently serves as Secretary of the Board of Trustees of Virginia Union University and Virginia Commonwealth University

Virginia Commonwealth University

Virginia Commonwealth University is a public university located in Richmond, Virginia. It comprises two campuses in the Downtown Richmond area, the product of a merger between the Richmond Professional Institute and the Medical College of Virginia in 1968...

's Health Systems Authority Board. He also serves as a Director of Consolidated Bank & Trust Company and USA Education Inc., (Sallie Mae) Lambert has served as a Director of Dominion Resources

Dominion Resources

Dominion Resources Inc. , commonly referred to as Dominion, is a power and energy company headquartered in Richmond, Virginia that supplies electricity in parts of Virginia and North Carolina and supplies natural gas to parts of West Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and eastern North Carolina...

since 1994.