[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 11 (Thursday, January 19, 1995)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E133-E134]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           A SPECIAL ``DEAN''

                                 ______


                          HON. JAMES T. WALSH

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                       Thursday, January 19, 1995

  Mr. WALSH. Mr. Speaker, the most recent edition of the Empire State 
Report, January 1995, contains an excellent article about the 
Washington based correspondent for the Watertown Daily Times known to 
those of us in the New York delegation as the Dean. Alan Emory has 
served his newspaper and the people of the north country for 43 years 
with distinction, style, and grace.
  Recognition from our peers is always a treasured commodity. Last 
December, Alan was elected president of the Gridiron Club, an 
association of Washington journalists, because of his long-time service 
and professional dedication to his chosen field of endeavor. He is 
respected and admired within the fraternity of journalism as this honor 
clearly indicates. Among those in Congress who respond to his 
inquiries, Alan is known for his fairness and integrity. This in itself 
is the mark of a true professional.
  I am enclosing the above-mentioned article for the Record. It is a 
well deserved tribute for one of the true gentlemen in journalism 
today.

                                The Dean

                        [By Jonathan D. Salant]

       At one of U.S. Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan's infrequent 
     gatherings for the Washington press corps from New York 
     newspapers, a New York Times reporter attempted to sit in the 
     front row.
       ``No, no, no,'' Moynihan sputters. ``That's the dean's 
     seat.''
       The ``dean'' in this case refers to Alan Emory, the 72-
     year-old correspondent for the Watertown Daily Times. Most of 
     the reporters who join Emory weren't born when he came to 
     Washington 43 years ago, the result of an effort by his 
     publisher to give the readers something more in exchange for 
     a price hike. The rest of the New York press corps watches 
     Emory take his seat in front and pour a cup of coffee for the 
     senator. They sit silent deferentially to allow Emory to ask 
     the first question, much as the senior wire service reporter 
     opens presidential news conferences.
       Emory began covering Washington before Moynihan, who later 
     served in the administration of four presidents, began his 
     career in public service as an aide to then-Gov. Averell 
     Harriman. Emory has covered Govs. Thomas Dewey, Harriman, 
     Nelson Rockefeller, Malcolm Wilson, Hugh Carey and Mario 
     Cuomo. He has covered Sens. Irving [[Page E134]] Ives, 
     Kenneth Keating, Jacob Javits, Robert Kennedy, Charles 
     Goodell, James Buckley, Alfonse D'Amato and Moynihan.
       Emory has reported on the administrations of Harry Truman, 
     Dwight Eisenhower, John Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Richard 
     Nixon, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan and George 
     Bush.
       Come March, he'll be dining with Bill Clinton.
       ``It's a very exciting prospect,'' Emory says.
       In December, Emory was elected president of the Gridiron 
     Club, an association of powerful Washington journalists. Some 
     of his predecessors include David Broder, Helen Thomas, Carl 
     Rowan and Jack Germond. Emory says he can't remember another 
     reporter from a small newspaper being elected club president.
       Each March, the Gridiron Club holds an ultra-exclusive 
     white-tie dinner featuring the president, his cabinet, and 
     most of Washington's top public officials and politicians. 
     Like the Legislative Correspondents Association's annual show 
     in Albany, the Washington reporters write parodies poking fun 
     at Republicans and Democrats alike. As club president, Emory 
     gets to dine with Clinton and must keep an eye on him 
     throughout the show, the better to report back to the 
     membership on how he reacted to the skits.
       Clinton gets to deliver a rebuttal following the show. Next 
     year's speakers also include Moynihan and former Education 
     Secretary Bill Bennett.
       It's been a long journey between dinner with the president 
     and Watertown, where Emory first was hired in 1947 after 
     graduating from Columbia University with a master's degree in 
     journalism. (He attended Harvard University as a 
     undergraduate.)
       Emory was covering the Dewey administration in Albany when 
     his publisher, John Johnson, called him in August 1951.
       ``We're going to raise the price of the paper. We owe the 
     readers something,'' Emory recalls Johnson telling him, ``How 
     would you like to go to Washington?''
       Emory jumped at the chance. He and his wife, Nancy, packed 
     up and moved south. Shortly after arriving in Washington, 
     they found a house on a lake in a Virginia suburb. They've 
     been there ever since, raising three children. They now have 
     four grandchildren as well.
       He's traveled with presidents, covered the White House, and 
     written on foreign affairs. But his bread-and-butter is the 
     local, day-to-day coverage of New York affairs in Washington. 
     The congressional delegation. The St. Lawrence Seaway. The 
     state lobbying office. Politics. Federal decisions as they 
     affect the Empire State.
       The New York connection has served Emory well. At the 1960 
     Republican National Convention, Emory got there a few days 
     early and hung out with aides to then-New York Gov. Nelson 
     Rockefeller. They told him that Rockefeller was not going to 
     be nominated for president against Richard Nixon. A national 
     scoop.
       ``I got the story long, long before anyone else even came 
     close to it,'' Emory says.
       Likewise, at the 1968 Republican convention, while waiting 
     to interview with William Miller, the former upstate New York 
     congressman who was Barry Goldwater's running mate four years 
     earlier, Emory found a poll that showed Nixon being more 
     popular than Rockefeller in New York. The two men were 
     competing for the 1968 Republican presidential nomination. 
     Emory gave his story to the Nixon folks with the stipulation 
     that they agree to credit his newspaper if they used the 
     information. Sure enough, there was Nixon a few days later, 
     quoting the Watertown Daily Times.
       Emory spends much of his time chronicling the Watertown-
     area congressman, John McHugh (R-Pierrepont Manor). McHugh 
     was three years old when Emory first went to Washington.
       ``I took my first lessons about politics from Alan Emory's 
     column,'' McHugh says. ``I've read about his experiences and 
     his observations. I finally had a chance to meet with him 
     face-to-face and work with him. It was a thrill for me. To 
     most people in the North Country, Alan Emory is our window on 
     the Capitol.''
       Many regional reporters in Washington move onto greener 
     pastures. They land jobs at larger papers or enter the 
     government. Emory says he has never tired of his job or the 
     Watertown paper. He once had a shot at a bigger paper, but it 
     fell through. Otherwise, he says, he's never wanted to leave.
       ``Watertown treats me like a member of the family,'' he 
     says. He goes on vacation when he wants. He has the time to 
     do projects like Gridiron. The paper was very supportive when 
     he underwent cancer treatment a few years back.
       One of Emory's friends, Allan Cromley of the Daily 
     Oklahoman, walks by. ``Don't believe a word he says,'' 
     Cromley says. Emory smiles and goes on.
       ``When people play up to the big metropolitan papers, 
     there's that frustration,'' Emory says. ``But there's a 
     counterweight that comes if you luck into somebody from your 
     neck of the woods who gets way up there.''
       Eisenhower's press secretary, Jim Haggerty, used to work 
     for Dewey. Nixon's secretary of state, William Rogers, was a 
     native of St. Lawrence County. Former Central Intelligence 
     Agency chief Allan Dulles was a Watertown native. All became 
     sources for Emory.
       Others from the North Country have passed through. Former 
     state Sen. Douglas Barclay of Pulaski chaired President 
     Bush's upstate campaign in 1988 and was named to the Overseas 
     Private Investment Corporation. Former North Country Rep. 
     Robert McEwen was appointed by President Reagan to one of the 
     joint U.S.-Canadian commissions. Former Assistant Education 
     Secretary Donald Laidlaw was an Ogdensburg native.
       Another official, former Republican National Committee 
     Executive Director Albert (Ab) Herman, had played 
     professional baseball in Watertown. Emory wrote a story about 
     him, and Herman began hearing from old friends long 
     forgotten. ``He was a fabulous political source from then 
     on,'' Emory recalls.
       In the 1950s, the federal government used to publish a book 
     listing the home congressional district of numerous federal 
     workers. Anyone hailing from the North Country's 
     congressional district could expect a call from Emory.
       ``I would leaf through that book, call them up and do 
     interviews,'' Emory says. ``These were people nobody had ever 
     been in touch with before. They started getting mail from old 
     neighbors who saw their write-ups in the Watertown Daily 
     Times. Also, it gave me all kinds of contacts. If the 
     individual didn't have the answer, he could lead me to 
     someone who did.''
       A U.S. senator named Hubert Horatio Humphrey became a 
     source as well. Humphrey and Emory's mother, Ethel Epstein, 
     served together on the board of the liberal Americans for 
     Democratic Action.
       Emory lists Humphrey and former Michigan U.S. Sen. Philip 
     Hart as his two favorite politicians. He came to know Hart 
     after an aide to New York U.S. Sen. Herbert Lehman joined the 
     Michigan senator's staff.
       Among contemporary politicians, it is Cuomo, who Emory 
     landed as the speaker for the 1988 Gridiron show, who is his 
     favorite. Cuomo sent him a note a couple of years back for 
     his 70th birthday.
       Had Cuomo run for president, he might have been the chief 
     executive accompanying Emory to the Gridiron dinner next 
     March. But Emory says he's not surprised Cuomo never went for 
     the White House.
       ``I was never totally convinced that he wanted to undergo 
     the battle,'' Emory says. ``He would have loved to be 
     president but he would have hated to be a candidate.''

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