[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 22 (Friday, February 3, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2081-S2084]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
WILLIAM J. BAROODY, JR.
Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, for a quarter century I have been
involved with the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. I
was a member of its first board of trustees in 1969, and served as vice
chairman from 1971 to 1976. During the center's existence, five
remarkable men have served as chairmen of its board: Hubert H.
Humphrey, 1969-72; William J. Baroody, Sr., 1972-79; Max M. Kampelman,
1979-82; William J. Baroody, Jr., 1982-94; and now Joseph H. Flom,
1994- .
William J. Baroody, Jr.'s term on the board expired just this week,
and I would like to join his colleagues at the Wilson Center in
honoring his remarkable tenure. A dinner was given in Bill's honor
following the last board meeting in October, when he stepped down from
its chairmanship, and I ask unanimous consent that the text of the
[[Page S2082]] evening's richly deserved tribute be printed in the
Record.
Remarks at Dinner Honoring William J. Baroody, Jr., October 11, 1994
Mr. Blitzer. I want to join Joe Flom in welcoming all of
you here this evening to this richly deserved tribute to Bill
Baroody, a man who served with enormous devotion skill and
wisdom as Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Woodrow
Wilson Center for nearly half of the Center's life.
During the years I have known Bill, and particularly during
the six years that I've served under his chairmanship, my
respect for him has constantly grown as has my affection. I
can say with absolute sincerity that during those years I
have never asked Bill for his help without receiving it.
Similarly I have never sought his advice without receiving
suggestions that contributed substantially and fruitfully to
my own ideas and those of my colleagues. In many ways I would
say that Bill has been a model of what a chairman should be.
He shared with us the knowledge and the wisdom gained in the
legislative and executive branches of government, including
in the White House, and as the head of a kindred but not
quite identical institution, and in all of this he has
somehow managed to guide without being intrusive.
His chairmanship of the board, a board composed of
distinguished and often strong-minded people appointed by
three presidents of two parties, and his leadership of the
Center under two directors, have been characterized by an
extraordinary combination of effectiveness, tact,
evenhandedness and self-effacement. Indeed if it is possible
to be modest to a fault that perhaps is Bill's singular
fault. With his clear sense of the delicate balance between
the legal responsibility of a board and the authority of a
director, he served the Center well and made the experience
for me at least, and I suspect for my predecessor, of serving
under him a genuine pleasure. It is for that accomplishment,
and for his stewardship of this institution that his fellow
trustees, the Center's staff, his friends, his family and I
join in honoring him this evening with deep respect and
affection.
Ted Barreaux. I have been given the assignment of reading
one of the letters that Bill Baroody has received from the
former Presidents who have appointed him to various posts.
But before that I wanted to tell you all what a pleasure it
is for me to be here tonight because I've known Bill for many
years. The two of us met almost thirty years ago, and we were
both at various points in our lives aides of President Nixon.
Now I don't know if Bill's memory fades in and out as
occasionally most Nixon aides' memories do, but my experience
when I first met Bill was illustrative of what became a very
warm and valued friendship.
I met Bill as I said nearly thirty years ago in the spring
of 1967, when I was in Washington to have lunch on a Saturday
morning with a friend of mine, Congressman Glenn Lipscomb
from California. He was a close ally and colleague of
Congressman Mel Laird, for whom Bill worked.
I didn't have a change to work with Bill while he was at
the Defense Department or in Congress, but I worked very
closely with him when he was the public liaison for President
Ford. I had the pleasure not only of working with Bill when
he was a White House aide but also when I spent twelve years
on the Board of Trustees of the Wilson Center. I served under
Bill's father, I served under Max Kampelman, and I served
under Bill.
The one thing about Bill that impressed me as well as all
of the other trustees and the Fellows is Bill's commitment to
public service. He provided two characteristics that I think
really mean public service to me, and he carried them out
with firmness and commitment and dedication and with an elan
and an ease that made it appear even more beautiful than it
ordinarily is. The first of these is satisfaction. He
demonstrated clearly the satisfaction one derives from the
formulation of public policy. There are dozens of key
policy issues where he played a central role and he did it
always with grace and intelligence and style.
And the second is sacrifice. I was always impressed by the
fact that he never capitalized in a personal way on his
public service, which is terribly impressive when you
consider that although there is nothing wrong with that, he
chose a different road.
President Ford, whose letter I've been asked to read
tonight, shares many of my sentiments, and I'll share his
letter with you now.
``Dear Bill, I write with congratulations and best wishes
on the occasion of your retirement as Chairman of the Woodrow
Wilson Center Board of Trustees. It is indeed an enjoyable
task to acknowledge your generosity and commitment to that
fine institution.
``I also remember with great pleasure your time as a member
of our White House team and I am so pleased that you and many
of your colleagues have continued a tradition of outstanding
public service. Thanks to your dedicated leadership, the
Wilson Center is now known throughout the world as a place of
both scholarly excellence and practical relevance.
``I am delighted to have this opportunity to express my
appreciation of your devotion to the Center and its scholarly
ideals.
``I am delighted to have this opportunity to express my
appreciation of your devotion to the Center and its scholarly
ideals.
``Thank you for your many kindnesses and loyal support.
Warmest, best regards,
Gerald R. Ford.''
I would now like to toast Bill Baroody who is not only a
friend, a colleague and a boss, all three things you get to
be when you're Chairman of the Board of the Center, but he's
also a very special human being.
Gertrude Himmelfarb. I cannot I'm afraid compete with Ted
who has known Bill for thirty years. I can only claim to have
known him for less than twenty years. I was then a Fellow of
the Woodrow Wilson Center and Bill Baroody, Sr. was then
Chairman of the Board. The Baroodys were my introduction to
Washington and I assure you it was a very enjoyable, a very
interesting, a very exciting experience.
I then met Bill some ten years later when I was a member of
the board and Bill, Jr. was its Chairman. I came to admire
Bill as all of us did, and not only for his extraordinary
devotion to the Woodrow Wilson Center, his mastery of all the
details of the operation of the Center, his assiduous
attendance at meetings, board meetings, fellowship and other
committee meetings even in periods of ill health and an
evident discomfort, but also because of his very good
judgment and his wisdom in helping to keep the Center on a
steady course at a rather perilous time for institutions such
as this, for cultural and academic institutions which were
being buffeted about as they still are by all the vagaries of
intellectual fads and fashions and by political and social
pressures. As I say it was a very heartening experience to
serve under a chairman who was able to perform that not
inconsiderable feat.
I'd like now to take the occasion to pay tribute not only
to Bill but also to Charles Blitzer and to the staff of the
Woodrow Wilson Center, all of whom manage to work so
harmoniously together and all of whom manage to resist those
fashions and those pressures, who manage to preserve the
integrity of the Center and to maintain the very high
standards of scholarship and research that the Center is in
fact now known for, always has been known for.
Bill, Sr. would be very proud of you Bill, and I think he
would like to join us in this toast to you. But first I would
like to read a letter from someone who can express his
appreciation of Bill more eloquently than I can.
``Dear Bill, I am delighted to join your friends, family,
and colleagues in congratulating you on the occasion of your
retirement from the Woodrow Wilson International Center for
Scholars.
``I hate to be the one to break the news to you, but I've
found that there is no such thing as retirement! I had a
fleeting notion way back: to find a shady spot under a tree
and a good sturdy hammock. It was a grand plan, but it never
materialized. I hope you have better luck with it than I did!
``Seriously, you have every reason to be proud of your
twelve years of honorable commitment to the Center and to
nationwide scholarship. You have proudly carried on your
family tradition as an able and dignified leader, and it is
that noble legacy which will continue to flourish thanks to
your constant nurturing and tireless commitment. You have my
deepest gratitude and admiration for the wisdom and integrity
you have consistently shown in your devotion to the Center.
``I wish you all the happiness and success you deserve as
you begin this exciting new chapter in your life. God bless
you for your dedication and unwavering faith in this great
nation.
Sincerely,
Ronald Reagan.''
I think President Reagan would like to join us in this
toast to Bill.
Lynne Cheney. I want to bring you greetings, Bill, not only
from myself and from the signator of the letter I'm about to
read, but from Dick Cheney who is sorry he can't be with us
tonight. Dick and I first knew Bill more than twenty years
ago back in the Nixon and Ford years, and you were out there
on the front line for public liaison putting Gerry Ford in
exactly the setting in which he performed most brilliantly,
dealing with citizens in forums across the country, answering
questions, and Dick as White House Chief of Staff, was
exceedingly grateful for your imaginative use of the
President's time and for presenting him as the really great
leader he was. I'm so glad that I was here tonight to hear
Gerry Ford's letter to you.
Dick and I are now at the American Enterprise Institute,
another organization in which you had such an important role
to play, so our lives have been intertwined for quite a long
time. I will remember with gratitude and warmth the
opportunity that I had to serve with you as a member of the
Woodrow Wilson Center's Board of Trustees. We had some
challenging meetings, some interesting issues with which to
deal, and I do love now seeing them all begin to come to
fruition knowing that this Center will soon be housed in a
way that it should be in order to honor the memory of Woodrow
Wilson to whom this Center was established.
So many people are grateful to you for your service, Dick
and I chief among them; and I'm especially proud tonight to
have the honor to read to you a letter from yet another
former President, What friends you have, Bill.
[[Page S2083]] ``Dear Bill, word has reached me of your
retirement as Chairman of the Woodrow Wilson Center's Board
of Trustees, and I am delighted to join your family and
colleagues in congratulating you for a job well done.
``Your distinguished tenure as chairman is one marked by
significant accomplishment, and you can be proud in the
knowledge that your many contributions helped to enhance
America's leadership in a turbulent and sometimes dangerous
world. As one of several Presidents to benefit from your
dedicated career in service to our Nation, I am pleased to
have this opportunity to thank you for your loyal support,
counsel, and friendship through the years.
``You will be missed, but I have a feeling this won't be the
last we hear from you. In the meantime, Barbara joins me
in sending best wishes for your very happiness.
Sincerely,
George Bush.''
I would like all of you to join me in a toast to Bill
Baroody for whom all of us here, like all of the Presidents
who have so far been named, have the greatest respect,
admiration and to whom we'd like to extend our thanks.
James Billington. I would like to speak to you from my
heart about Bill Baroody because we honor tonight someone who
is part of a unique contribution to the life of this city and
to the country.
We have a kind of apostolic succession here. It began with
Hubert Humphrey who was the first chairman, then Bill
Baroody, Sr. succeeded him, then Max Kampelman (who had been
so close to Hubert Humphrey) succeeded Bill, and then Bill,
Jr. succeeded Max, and now of course we have a new chairman.
I second Bea Himmelfarb's warm words of praise for Charles
Blitzer and the staff. It is wonderful to see the sustaining
over the years of the real commitment to quality, one of the
things that the Baroodys have always been committed to and
that Bill has helped this very talented staff sustain so
well.
I liked Ted Barreaux' emphasis on public service, because
it seems to me Bill has had an extraordinary career which has
never been fully documented. There was service in Congress,
with Mel Laird. There was service in the Pentagon, and a
variety of different functions in the White House.
I would say there are four things that characterize Bill's
public service. The first of these is an extremely self-
effacing kind of leadership. When the spotlight is on, Bill
always runs the other way. He reminds me very much of people
like Paul McCracken and Bryce Harlow, names that you don't
read very often in the history books, who had this soft
spoken, quiet kind of integrity when integrity wasn't always
the first currency of the day. Bill is very much a part of
that world and part of that type of public servant who never
gets enough attention, never gets enough praise.
The second is the commitment to dialogue. At the Ford White
House, Bill bridged a gap that was very real in those days
between government and the broader private sector and
established a very important kind of dialogue. It continued
during his days at AEI, and he certainly has sustained the
Center's tradition for dialogue, one of its great
contributions to this city.
And the third thing closely related to it is quality--the
defense of the pure quality of scholarship in a city very
closely concerned with advocacy. To maintain the purest
standards of high quality in the midst of the political
pressures and vortex of this city has been a wonderful
achievement, and I must say we owe that to our whole
apostolic succession of chairmen.
And the fourth thing that Bill has provided is something
that's not always found even where there's dialogue and where
there's quality, and that is genuine depth. One of Bill
Baroody, Sr.'s great contributions to the intellectual
dialogue of this city was introducing deeper themes such as
the role of religion in public life. Bill Baroody, Jr. has
continued that role.
This is a man who not only has quietly in a self-effacing
way sustained dialogue and sustained quality in this
wonderful institution that we celebrate and honor today, but
who
behind it all has a passion and understanding for the deeper
things of life that are somehow inextricably connected to
our broader public and individual lives.
I'd like to propose a toast to Bill Baroody and to the
past--I am reminded of a wonderful evening Max Kampelman
hosted like this for Bill's father here about fifteen years
ago. Please join me in a toast to Bill and to the past,
present and future of a wonderful family.
Max Kampelman. There is an old Yiddish superstition that if
a mother wishes her newborn child to be a great thinker or a
great philosopher she kisses the child on the head. If she
wishes her child to be a great pianist or musician she kisses
the child on the fingers. If she wishes her child to be a
singer she kisses the child on the neck close to the vocal
chords. I don't know where our mothers kissed Bill Baroody,
Joe Flom and me when we were born, but I do know that all
three of us have been blessed with the opportunity to serve
as chairpersons of the Woodrow Wilson International Center
for Scholars. Speaking for myself it has been one of the most
satisfying public experiences of a full and busy life.
My first exposure to the Wilson Center came through my
friend Hubert Humphrey who became the first Chairman of the
Board. I vividly recall the excitement with which he joined
the effort to create a living memorial of scholarship through
which to perpetuate the memory of Woodrow Wilson in our
nation's capital. I recall the deep sense of honor that he
felt in being appointed by President Johnson to serve as this
Center's first chairman. My long-time friend William Baroody,
Bill's distinguished father, succeeded Hubert as its
chairman. Bill, you and I know that your dad was a great man;
a giant of a man, and I am convinced that you have filled his
shoes with distinction.
Tonight we meet to acknowledge your selfless and devoted
service to our Center as its fourth chairman. Your wisdom and
integrity have added luster to our Center and strength to our
staff. The comments we have heard this evening all add
credence to that sentiment. You presided over our Center at a
critical period of our nation's transition away from the Cold
War with its clear challenges and objectives into a new set
of problems and opportunities and you did so with dignity and
determination.
In partnership with our most distinguished director Charles
Blitzer you have further fashioned and strengthened our
Center into one of the most distinguished and respected
institutions of learning in the world.
To Joe Flom, our experienced and wise new chairman, I say
let us rededicate ourselves to our mandate from Congress to
harmonize and strengthen the relationship between the world
of learning and the world of public affairs. It is with that
aspiration that I appropriately ask all of you tonight to
join me in a toast to our friend, Bill Baroody.
Joe Flom. As the new chairman of the Woodrow Wilson Center
for International Scholars I have been given the pleasurable
duty by the board to read a resolution which was adopted
unanimously today with respect to Bill. I would first like to
thank Bill for the help he has given me in the transition.
His courtesy, his wisdom and his judgment are very much
appreciated. He has set a standard which I hope I can match
in my role. I would now like to read this resolution, which
was unanimously passed today by the Board of Trustees:
Whereas, William J. Baroody, Jr., in more than thirteen
years of distinguished service to the Woodrow Wilson
International Center for Scholars, both as a member of its
Board of Trustees and as its Chairman, devoted himself
unstintingly, wisely, and supportively to the Center's growth
and well-being; and
Whereas, his devotion brought to the Center the bountiful
benefits of his extraordinary wisdom, experience, and
thoughtfulness, as well as his deep commitment to and
participation in the worlds of scholarship and public
affairs; and
Whereas, his unfailing dedication to the Center and his
sensitive, fair-minded leadership and often subtle guidance
have increased the Center's stature and strengths,
Therefore, be it resolved that the members of the Board of
Trustees--in their own names, in the names of the Center
staff, of all the scholars who have studied at the Center,
and of all persons, in the United States and throughout the
world, for whom the Wilsonian ideals of scholarship and high
public purpose remain beacons of hope and humanity--extend to
William J. Baroody, Jr., deep gratitude, lasting affection,
and the sincere hope that the Center will remain close to his
considerate and warm heart, and that he will continue to
sustain the Baroody family tradition by participating in its
life and exciting future.
Joseph H. Flom and Charles Blitzer.
Mr. Baroody. I do thank you most sincerely for the kind
words. I guess it's a little like perfume: It's okay to sniff
it as long as you don't swallow it. This has really been a
treat for me. I'm very, very proud that three presidents and
some fifty-two different board members have tolerated my
presence on the board of this incredibly magnificent
institution for as long as they have.
I listened to the tape of a similar event held in honor of
my father on June 9, 1980 just a few weeks before he died. I
don't cite that tape or that event in invite comparisons, but
as Max Kampelman introduced himself in that wonderfully
humble way he has, Max insisted he had not replaced my
father. He said he had succeeded, but not replaced my father
as chairman, for no one could replace him.
I mention that tape of that event among other very personal
reasons because Pat Moynihan, the patron saint of this great
Center, reminisced that night about his affiliation with the
Center and with my father. Pat said that when he and Charles
Blitzer conspired together in 1968 to draft the legislation
to create the Center, their vision was to create a center of
learning which the 22nd Century would regard as having
influenced the 21st.
I used to talk to dad about his vision for the Center, and
in his response he would always mention an exchange he had
with Pat Moynihan concerning the report dad commissioned at
the beginning of his tenure as chairman in 1969 to help the
Center determine what kind of an institution it should
become. Pat Moynihan was then Ambassador to India, and dad
cabled him to ask for his views on the mission of the Wilson
Center. Ambassador Moynihan cabled back one sentence: ``Think
no small thoughts.'' Well, I dare say that all four chairmen
and three directors so far have demonstrated a commitment to
building an institution that can fulfill the dream that
emerged from the legislative drafting session in 1968, and
the mission statement in 1969. From what I've seen of the
[[Page S2084]] Center's fifth chairman, there is no danger of
that vision being distorted as we look to the future.
This fall we conclude the first twenty-five years of the
Wilson Center's existence. It has been my privilege to serve
as the fourth chairman for almost half of the Center's
existence. I have had the good fortune personally of
observing and delighting in the increasing prominence and
impact of the Center throughout the world. The essence of the
Woodrow Wilson Center of course is its Fellows who come here
from all over the world to pursue their scholarly studies and
participate in the life of the Center. More than 1300 Fellows
and guest scholars have been in residence since its creation
and the fellowship selection process has become increasingly
competitive each year, compelling evidence of the Center's
expanding international reputation.
Over the past quarter century the Wilson Center has
retained its unique status in our nation's capital as a high
quality international nonpartisan center. The great public
value of a scholarly center like the Wilson Center cannot be
overstated. Everyone associated with it should not only take
pride in its accomplishments but also in the high reputation
and standards it maintains, and to that end I would be remiss
if I did not single out the two directors of the Wilson
Center who have occupied that position during my tenure.
Jim Billington whose vision and skill were largely
responsible for building the Center into a world-class
institution and Charles Blitzer who was there at the creation
and in its formative years as Dillon Ripley's able agent and
in the last several years as we have been consolidating and
rethinking our mission in preparation for the second twenty-
five years of this great institution. The Wilson Center and
the country have been well served by the stewardship of these
two extraordinarily able leaders and their very able staffs.
I want to thank each of my fellow board members and friends
who spoke tonight. I want to thank all of you for coming and
I would like to conclude by raising my glass in a toast to
the extraordinary men and women who have served on the staff
of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
throughout its first twenty-five years. Its future is assured
if it can maintain that caliber for the future.
____________________