Former Texas Governor Ann Richard has diedCommentary by Kevin Dayhoff September 13th, 2006
Photo credit: www.photo.net/equipment/leica/m6
Dorothy Ann Willis Richards, the former Democratic governor of Texas from 1991 to 1995 died from esophageal cancer Wednesday, September 13.
She had risen from one of the most important jobs in the country as a homemaker and teacher to be the governor of Texas. She first broke on the national political scene in 1988 as the keynote speaker at the Democratic National Convention.
Published accounts relate that she passed away at home, surrounded by family.
She was 73 years old. She had been diagnosed with cancer last spring.
She was born Dorothy Ann Willis in Lakeview Texas on September 1, 1933. Her family later moved to Waco where she graduated from Waco High School in 1950.
She attended Baylor University where she earned a bachelors degree. Later she received a teaching certificate from the University of Texas at Austin.
She married David Richards, with whom she had dated since high school.
Often esophageal cancer is caused by sustained alcohol abuse and smoking. Gov. Richards had been a heavy smoker and drinker earlier in life. She was admired for overcoming these obstacles to go on to an accomplished life as a public servant.
After she was elected to the Travis County, Texas Commissioner Court in 1976. The strain of elected office for the subsequent six years precipitated a divorce. She later acknowledged being treated for alcoholism in 1980.
In 1982 she was elected Texas State Treasurer. She was the first woman to hold a statewide office in Texas in half a century. She was re-elected in 1986.
A self-described feminist, she made political waves at the 1988 national convention when she said of President George Herbert Walker Bush, the current president’s father and a fellow Texan: “Poor George, he can’t help it… He was born with a silver foot in his mouth.”
In 1992, she poured salt in her relationship with the Bush family by suggesting that President George H. W. Bush shouldn’t “let the door hit your ass on the way out.”
After being elected governor in 1991, she lost her bid to be re-elected governor to a relatively unknown Republican at the time, George W. Bush, the current president of the United States.
When she lost to our current president 53% to 46% in 1994, many pundits said that it was because she was perceived weak on crime and gun issues. She had previously vetoed a popular concealed-carry weapon bill in the Texas legislature, and many political observers have speculated that her increasing liberal approaches to government weakened her future in Texas politics and the concealed-carry veto was the final straw.
However, the paradox is that while she governor, she was criticized heavily for her use of the death penalty and by liberals for her no-nonsense and tough law and order positions.
By many accounts, Gov. Richards will be fondly remembered for getting into the political arena to give women and minorities a leg-up in the rough and tumble tough Texas politics of white men.
She told a reporter as she was leaving the governorship of Texas in 1995 that “I did not want my tombstone to read, 'She kept a really clean house.' I think I'd like them to remember me by saying, 'She opened government to everyone.'"
She will be remembered for her straightforward approach to liberal issues and standing by her convictions. She will be missed and our nation owes a debt of gratitude for her service.
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