Ann Richards (1933-2006)
Appreciations
Maura J. Casey     Sidney Allee Abbott     Molly Ivins     Joe Holley     Wayne Slater

Ann R., Alcoholic
by Maura J. Casey
The New York Times - 09.16.06

Former Gov. Ann Richards of Texas will be remembered for her wit, her one-liners and especially for the keynote speech at the 1988 Democratic Convention, which was, in retrospect, the high point in the party's dismal campaign for the presidency that year. To intrigued television viewers nationwide, Ms. Richards, with her big hair and big attitude, epitomized the kind of formidable woman that is a hallmark of the Lone Star State. People liked her down-home phrases. When she said, "We're gonna tell how the cow ate the cabbage," they believed her. She leavened a plain-spoken manner with wisecracks. Both helped elect her governor two years later.

But her political career eclipsed what Ms. Richards called "one of the great, great stories" of her life: her recovery from alcoholism and her nearly 26 years of sobriety. That triumph deserves to be more than a line in her obituary.

In so many ways, her decision to stop drinking and enter a rehabilitation program in 1980, after a painful intervention by family and friends, was necessary for her continued rise in public life. What made Ms. Richards different was her decision to be forthright about the fact that she was a recovering alcoholic. She didn't hide it. "I like to tell people that alcoholism is one of my strengths," she said. She was right. Alcoholics know that seeds of healthy recovery grow from the need to mend their own flaws to stay sober, one day at a time. Ms. Richards faced her imperfections fearlessly, and that enabled others to be fearless, too, if only for a little while.

She never stopped helping people. One well-known author said the first mail she received after enrolling in a rehabilitation program was an encouraging letter from Ms. Richards. A politician who left rehab and wondered how on earth he was going to avoid drinking when he got home well after midnight found Ms. Richards waiting for him when he arrived. As governor, she started treatment programs in Texas prisons. When she visited, she would tell the inmates the simple truth: "My name's Ann, and I'm an alcoholic." Her imperfection had become a source of inspiration for others.

Ann Richards was funny, wise and compassionate. At 73, she died too soon. But she died sober.

Gone too soon. Gone too soon.
by Sidney Allee Abbott
Dallas Morning News - 09.19.06

When some people leave, they leave you lonelier than you knew you could be.

Such a woman was Ann Richards. As a 4th generation Texan, I knew her well though I never met her.

May the Dixie Chicks sing her to her rest, and May former Sec. of Treasury Lloyd Bentsen graciously offer her his seat on a cloud...May Lyndon Johnson give her one of his legendary bear hugs, may the Dallas Cowboys doff their helmets and stand at attention. May the heroes of the Alamo call out 'Hey Ann, How ya doing? as they ride on by... and may Barbara Jordan give her eulogy. - Sidney Allee Abbott

Remembering Ann Richards
by by Molly Ivins
New York Times - 09.19.06

AUSTIN, Texas -- She was so generous with her responses to other people. If you told Ann Richards something really funny, she wouldn't just smile or laugh, she would stop and break up completely. She taught us all so much -- she was a great campfire cook. Her wit was a constant delight. One night on the river on a canoe trip, while we all listened to the next rapid, which sounded like certain death, Ann drawled, "It sounds like every whore in El Paso just flushed her john."

She knew how to deal with teenage egos: Instead of pointing out to a kid who was pouring charcoal lighter on a live fire that he was idiot, Ann said, "Honey, if you keep doing that, the fire is going to climb right back up to that can in your hand and explode and give you horrible injuries, and it will just ruin my entire weekend." She knew what it was like to have four young children and to be so tired you cried while folding the laundry. She knew and valued Wise Women like Virginia Whitten and Helen Hadley. At a long-ago political do at Scholz Garten in Austin, everybody who was anybody was there meetin' and greetin' at a furious pace. A group of us got the tired feet and went to lean our butts against a table at the back wall of the bar. Perched like birds in a row were Bob Bullock, then state comptroller, moi, Charles Miles, the head of Bullock's personnel department, and Ms. Ann Richards. Bullock, 20 years in Texas politics, knew every sorry, no good sumbitch in the entire state. Some old racist judge from East Texas came up to him, 'Bob, my boy, how are you?"

Bullock said, "Judge, I'd like you to meet my friends: This is Molly Ivins with the Texas Observer." The judge peered up at me and said, "How yew, little lady?" Bullock, "And this is Charles Miles, the head of my personnel department." Miles, who is black, stuck out his hand, and the judge got an expression on his face as though he had just stepped into a fresh cowpie. He reached out and touched Charlie's palm with one finger, while turning eagerly to the pretty, blonde, blue-eyed Ann Richards. "And who is this lovely lady?" Ann beamed and replied, "I am Mrs. Miles."

One of the most moving memories I have of Ann is her sitting in a circle with a group of prisoners. Ann and Bullock had started a rehab program in prisons, the single most effective thing that can be done to cut recidivism (George W. Bush later destroyed the program). The governor of Texas looked at the cons and said, "My name is Ann, and I am an alcoholic."

She devoted untold hours to helping other alcoholics, and anyone who ever heard her speak at an AA convention knows how close laughter and tears can be.

I have known two politicians who completely reformed the bureaucracies they were elected to head. Bob Bullock did it by kicking ass at the comptroller's until hell wouldn't have it. Fear was his m.o. Ann Richards did it by working hard to gain the trust of the employees and then listening to what they told her. No one knows what's wrong with a bureaucracy better than the bureaucrats who work in it.

The 1990 race for governor was one of the craziest I ever saw, with Ann representing "New Texas." Republican nominee Claytie Williams was a perfect foil, own to his boots, making comments that could be construed as racist and sexist. Ann was the candidate of everybody else, especially for women. She represented all of us who have lived with and learned to handle good ol' boys, and she did it with laughter. The spirit of the crowd that set off from the Congress Avenue Bridge up to the Capitol the day of Ann's inauguration was so full of spirit and joy. I remember watching San Antonio Mayor Henry Cisneros that day with tears running down his cheeks because Chicanos were finally included.

Ann got handed a stinking mess: Damn near every state function was under court order. The prisons were so crowded, dangerous convicts were being let loose. She had a long, grinding four years and wound up fixing all of it. She always said you could get a lot done in politics if you didn't need to take credit.

But she disappointed many of her fans because she was so busy fixing what was broken, she never got to change much. The '94 election was a God, gays and guns deal. Annie had told the legislature that if they passed a right-to-carry law, she would veto it. They did, and she did. At the last minute, the NRA launched a big campaign to convince the governor that we Texas women would feel ever so much safer if we could just carry guns in our purses.

Said Annie, "Well, you know that I am not a sexist, but there is not a woman in this state who could find a gun in her handbag."

Ann Richards Opened Doors And Her Heart
by Joe Holley
Washington Post - 09.15.06

It was a lovely spring morning, as I recall, or at least it seemed like spring that day in 1991. My new boss was giving me a tour of her new Austin digs -- the stately, antebellum governor's mansion across the street from the green and leafy grounds of the Texas State Capitol.

Gleefully, Ann Richards showed me the varnished-over scars in the stairway banister, where legendary Gov. James Stephen Hogg had hammered a line of tacks to discourage his four kids from sliding down the sweeping stair rail. We wandered upstairs to her high-ceilinged living quarters, where, in her bedroom -- where Sam Houston had slept -- she had me lay my head on her pillow and look out the tall windows. I felt a little ridiculous, but I complied.

"That's what I wake up to every morning," the new governor said, as my eyes took in the brilliant blue sky and the hulking, pinkish-hued Capitol. She was delighted, absolutely delighted, to wake up every morning and walk across the street to go to work. As corny as it sounds, she had no doubt she was working for the people of Texas.

Ann Richards had fun in her 73 years on this Earth. Maybe she had a little too much fun in earlier decades, when the alcohol flowed, certain substances were passed around and she was invariably the life of the party. Some of her '60s-era escapades as part of a politico-literary crowd came back to haunt her on the campaign trail, but as a recovering alcoholic, she was not inclined to deny her past.

After her friends intervened in the fall of 1980 and she reluctantly agreed to get treatment, she still had fun, just more soberly. Fortunately, the more raucous Ann continued to appear occasionally, even after she won election to statewide office in 1982.

It's 1983, she's the new state treasurer and she's imitating a Texas electronics factory owner before an uproarious crowd at the biennial convention of the National Women's Political Caucus. "My girls are happy," she drawls. "My girls are happy, because I know how to treat 'em."

She's wearing a rubber pig's snout.

I remember the slightly more serious Ann -- Ann the governor -- at a gathering of her new appointees to state boards and commissions. Her weathered face beaming, her ice-blue eyes alight, she's mingling with African American men and women from East Texas, Hispanics from the Rio Grande Valley, a sprinkling of Asians. Most have never been asked to serve their state.

This is "the New Texas," she proclaims. It's a far cry from her immediate predecessor, whose appointees were 80 percent Anglo and male. She's having fun.

She wasn't always happy, of course. The flick of her wit could be biting, her temper would flare at times, and you didn't want to get on the wrong side of her.

As a reporter, I had covered Ann over the years, but I didn't know her as well as the gaggle of Texas progressives who had worked alongside her in campaigns on behalf of liberal icon Ralph Yarborough, who twice ran for governor unsuccessfully and eventually was elected to the U.S. Senate, or, more recently, on her own campaigns. Ann's old friends, they made up the inner circle of her administration.

Still, when I sat down at the computer to write for her, I could hear the voice, the twangy Texas voice that reminded me of mesquite trees and barbed wire and dusty pastures in summer. We were both from Waco, so in a way I'd been hearing that voice all my life. Imagining a white wig on my head, I could feel the voice flowing through my fingers. It was real.

More than any other politician I've known, Ann knew intuitively how to connect with people. (Only Bill Clinton and maybe John McCain come close.) One-on-one, on the air or before a crowd, it was the same: She was speaking to you and you alone. Once I began writing speeches for other politicians, I realized how gifted she was.

Watching her in recent years during her occasional appearances on "Larry King Live," listening to her talking clearly and sensibly to viewers who called in, I was pleased to see she still had the gift -- and saddened that so many other politicians don't.

Only it wasn't a gift. It was the essential Ann Richards, the "good ol' girl" from Waco who loved people and who never forgot where she came from.

So why did she lose? Why did such a capable politician serve only one term as Texas governor?

The answer is not that elusive. Democrats in the '80s and '90s were disappearing faster than a freak snowstorm in South Texas, and her election in 1990 was something of an anomaly, aided and abetted by a bumbling, inexperienced Republican opponent.

Four years later, with an affable, disciplined campaigner in George W. Bush, Republicans -- particularly Republican women -- came home, and the numbers just didn't add up for a liberal Democrat.

There was something else: After four grueling years in office, after decades of public service, the happy warrior had lost some of her zest, and she campaigned as if she wasn't quite sure she wanted another four years.

Texas Democrats -- there are still a few, I hear -- would just as soon forget that race. What they'll never forget is that glorious morning in January 1991, when 20,000 Texans linked arms behind a smiling, white-haired woman and walked up Austin's Congress Avenue on their way to take back the Capitol. It seems such a long time ago.

Staff writer Joe Holley was a deputy press secretary for Ann Richards during her one term as governor. © 2006 The Washington Post Company

Former Texas Governor Ann Richards Dies
by Wayne Slater
The Dallas Morning News - 09.14.06

Her wit made headlines, but progressive agenda reshaped state.

Austin - Former Gov. Ann Richards, who opened the doors of state government to women and minorities and won national celebrity with her lively humor and Texas twang, died Wednesday night at her home. She was 73.

She had battled esophageal cancer, which was diagnosed in March. Her four adult children spent the day with her, said Cathy Bonner, a longtime family friend and family spokeswoman.

The second woman to serve as governor of Texas, Ms. Richards broke tradition by pressing for more diversity within state agencies and pursued a progressive agenda that emphasized ethics, the environment and insurance reform.

"Ann Richards was the epitome of Texas politics: a figure larger than life who had a gift for captivating the public with her great wit," Gov. Rick Perry said Wednesday night. "She was an endearing and enduring figure in Texas politics. She paved the way as a leader and a role model for women who aspire to the highest levels of leadership. Anita and I are saddened by a loss that will be felt by many. Ann Richards left Texas a better place."

Ms. Richards was elected governor in 1990 and served for four years before losing to George W. Bush.

During a public appearance several years after leaving office, she was asked about her legacy.

"In looking back on my life, I could of course say the predictable thing: that the greatest thing I've ever done is bear my children and have grandchildren, and all that kind of stuff," she said.

"But the reality is that the greatest part of my life was the opportunity to be in public service. To make a difference for the community I live in, for the state that I love, to be able to try to make things better, whether they turned out in the fashion I expected them to or not.

"Sometimes it's serendipitous. Good things happen accidentally," she said. "But they're not going to happen unless well-meaning people give of their time and their lives to do that."

The "New Texas"

Ms. Richards moved into the state's top elected post after a brutal 1990 campaign, defeating West Texas millionaire cowboy Clayton Williams.

Ms. Richards moved into the state's top elected post after a brutal 1990 campaign, defeating West Texas millionaire cowboy Clayton Williams.

Touting a "New Texas" in which women and minorities would share in the power of government, Ms. Richards fulfilled a campaign pledge to make appointments of blacks, Hispanics and women in proportion to their population.

She put her own stamp on the governor's office, both in terms of progressive policies and the physical accoutrements of her second-floor office at the Texas Capitol.

As the state's chief executive, Ms. Richards ignored past protocol and testified personally before House and Senate committees.

She signed one of the nation's toughest oil-spill cleanup laws and shook up several state agencies, gaining control of the board regulating insurance and attacking lavish spending and questionable practices by the Department of Commerce.

She faced resistance from a more conservative Legislature on several fronts and lost a high-profile battle to overhaul the state's beleaguered school finance system, largely leaving the problem to future administrations.

Sporting a wicked sense of humor, Ms. Richards burst onto the national political stage in 1988, while state treasurer.

Selected to give the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention, she delivered one of her most famous lines in a drawling put-down of then-Vice President George Bush.

"Poor George," she said. "He can't help it. He was born with a silver foot in his mouth."

Barriers to Politics

An only child, Ann Richards was born Dorothy Ann Willis on Sept. 1, 1933, near Waco. She graduated in 1954 from Baylor University, which she attended on a debate scholarship.

In her autobiography, Straight From the Heart, she recalled growing up in modest means and encountering sexism and racism as she encountered the largely male bastion of Texas politics.

"Even though no one told me," she wrote, "there were certain things that you know, and the world knew, that women and girls couldn't do. Running government was one of them. That didn't mean you didn't study or learn about it, it just meant that it didn't apply to you. Any group - blacks, Hispanics, Asians, females - knows that. You know what you're allowed to do and what you're not."

She married high school sweetheart David Richards, a local labor lawyer, and the couple moved to Washington, D.C., and later to Dallas and then Austin. They had four children.

Active in Democratic politics, the couple became involved in civil rights and in the campaigns of several liberal candidates.

In 1972, at age 39, Ms. Richards managed her first political campaign - a victorious one - for Sarah Weddington, a candidate for state representative who had successfully argued the Roe vs. Wade abortion rights case before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Seeking elected office herself, Ms. Richards won a place in 1976 to the Travis County Commission. In 1982, she ran successfully for state treasurer.

Personal Struggles

Public disclosure of her alcoholism, for which she sought treatment in 1980, and her subsequent divorce were publicized, but they did not cause significant political damage.

"Confronting my alcoholism was probably the hardest thing that anyone could deal with," she once said.

During the 1990 Democratic primary, a challenger charged, without proof, that Ms. Richards had used illegal drugs. Her refusal to answer the question - saying it would hurt the recovery efforts of alcohol and drug dependents - became a campaign issue but did not scuttle her nomination and subsequent election as governor.

Ms. Richards' gubernatorial victory was the first by a woman in Texas since Miriam "Ma" Ferguson in 1932.

As governor, Ms. Richards could be a tough taskmaster, aides said.

At the same time, she made an effort several times each week to chat with students touring the Capitol, inevitably urging them to stay in school and get a good education.

"Someday you're going to look in the mirror and your hair is going to be as white as mine," she once told a group of elementary school students outside her office. "And people are not going to hire you because of your good looks. They're going to hire you because of what you have in your brain."

She made the cover of Texas Monthly magazine in 1992, wearing white-fringed leathers and sitting on a white Harley-Davidson motorcycle. The photo had been doctored, but the image underscored a persona the magazine described as the "modern incarnation of the tough prairie earth mother."

In facing George W. Bush in 1994, Ms. Richards found herself challenged by the son of the man she had so publicly skewered six years earlier.

Ms. Richards questioned his lack of political experience, and Mr. Bush labeled her as a career politician and challenged her stewardship as governor, criticizing the size of the state budget and her administration's performance fighting crime.

By avoiding sharp attacks, Mr. Bush succeeded in winning back to the GOP side many suburban Republican women who had abandoned the party and voted for Ms. Richards four years earlier.

Life After Office

After leaving office, Ms. Richards was hired as a lobbyist with a high-profile Washington law firm and later took a job with the Austin-based consulting firm Public Strategies, opening its New York office.

A widely recognized figure, she was a highly sought-after speaker and became a regular on CNN's Larry King Live.

"This whole business of public recognition is a mystery to me," she once told an interviewer. "If I have any talent, it's that I work very hard."

In her autobiography, Ms. Richards expressed amazement by what she had achieved.

"In my mind's eye," she wrote, "I'm probably still that skinny kid trying to make that basket" in the schoolgirls' basketball game back in her hometown of Lacy Lakeview.

Ms. Richards is survived by her four children, Cecile Richards, Daniel Richards, Clark Richards and Ellen Richards; their spouses; and eight grandchildren. Funeral arrangements are pending.

The family requests that memorial gifts be made to the Ann Richards School for Young Women Leaders through the Austin Community Foundation, P.O. Box 5159, Austin, Texas 78763, 512-472-4483, or at www.austincommunityfoundation.org.