[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 44 (Tuesday, April 21, 1998)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3331-S3333]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
CONDOLENCES OF THE SENATE ON THE DEATH OF FORMER SENATOR TERRY SANFORD
Mr. FAIRCLOTH. I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the
immediate consideration of S. Res. 211, which I submitted earlier and
is at the desk.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
A resolution (S. Res. 211) expressing the condolences of
the Senate on the death of the Honorable Terry Sanford,
former United States Senator from North Carolina.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to the immediate
consideration of the resolution?
There being no objection, the Senate proceeded to consider the
resolution.
Mr. FAIRCLOTH. Mr. President, I note that all 100 Senators have
joined me as cosponsors of this resolution.
This resolution is to honor a truly great American and a great North
Carolinian, former Senator Terry Sanford, a man I knew since I was
about 18, 19 years old. In fact, I joined him in managing the campaign
for a candidate for Governor, a man named Kerr Scott, and with that
election we changed the direction of politics in North Carolina.
We had a long friendship. As I say, it began with that campaign, and
we went through many political campaigns together. He had a remarkable
life. He managed two or three senatorial campaigns on which I had the
pleasure of working with him.
Prior to that, Terry Sanford graduated from the University of North
Carolina in the late thirties. During World War II, he was an FBI agent
in the early part of the war, in the very beginning, but being an FBI
agent was not exciting enough for Terry Sanford. He chose to join the
82nd Airborne and became an officer and a paratrooper. He was involved
in five different battles during World War II, and he won the Bronze
Star and the Purple Heart.
Terry Sanford was always a paratrooper. He was ready to go for it. He
was ready to jump into the middle of whatever might be happening.
As I mentioned earlier, he managed and ran some political campaigns,
but he was also a State legislator and took great interest when he was
a State legislator in developing the Port of Wilmington, NC, and
established the ports authority for North Carolina.
He ran for Governor and won. He was Governor from 1961 through 1965,
and never did a man have greater vision for a State than Terry Sanford
had for our State. He was a leader in education, but not just education
in the sense of teaching young people to read and write and the
fundamentals of education. He certainly did that and promoted that. But
far more, he promoted a school of excellence for those children who
were far more gifted. Then he established a school of the arts, which
now exists in Winston-Salem, NC, and is one of the foremost training
and teaching institutions in the country for young people who are
entering the arts from dancing to moviemaking. This school is there
because of him.
Although he did not technically start the community college system,
he did more than any Governor we have had since or before to promote
the community college system in North Carolina with 59 campuses. He
really brought it to fruition.
Again, although he did not start, technically, the Research Triangle
Park, he and his administration were deeply involved in bringing it
about and setting it on the path it has taken.
I mentioned he was a lawyer for many, many years and started a couple
of very prestigious law firms. After his tenure as Governor, he became
president of Duke University and served there for some 15 years. It was
a great school, a great university when he went there, but the changes,
the improvements, the expenditures, the endowment, the doubling of the
medical center all transpired and took place under the leadership of
Terry Sanford as president of Duke. It became an internationally
recognized university under his tenure.
He came to the U.S. Senate and left an admirable record here with
many initiatives that he sought and worked toward. One of them is
something we are still working on today, and that is to ensure the
future and fiscal stability of Social Security.
Senator Sanford was married to Margaret Rose, his wife of 55 years.
They had two children, Terry, Jr., and a daughter Betsy.
North Carolina and the Nation are better places today for all of us
to live in because of men like Terry Sanford and because of Terry
Sanford and his vision and tenacity to carry it forward. The country
will miss him, the State will miss him and I will miss him as a friend.
Mr. President, I believe I said this, but I will note that all 100
Senators have joined me in cosponsoring this resolution.
Are there any other Senators wishing to speak?
Mr. KENNEDY. Will the Senator yield?
Mr. FAIRCLOTH. I yield the remainder of my time.
[[Page S3332]]
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts is recognized.
Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I join in expressing my sadness over the
death of our former colleague, Senator Terry Sanford, and I commend the
Senator from North Carolina for his eloquent statement. Senator Sanford
was an extraordinary leader of many talents. He was an outstanding
Member of this body, an outstanding educator, and an outstanding
Governor of North Carolina.
Many of us had the privilege of serving with him in the Senate and of
knowing him personally. We admired his great ability, his unusual
eloquence, and his abiding commitment to the people of North Carolina
and the nation.
In a sense, I inherited Terry Sanford from President Kennedy. He was
one of the first Southern leaders to endorse my brother for President
in the 1960 campaign. My brother had visited North Carolina as a
Senator, and had been very impressed by Terry Sanford. I know the very
high regard that my brother had for him as a voice of the New South, as
a champion of education, and as a leader who understood the importance
of bringing people together.
In July 1960, at a critical moment leading up to the Democratic
Convention in Los Angeles, Terry Sanford endorsed my brother and then
seconded my brother's nomination for President. It made an enormous
difference. In a very real sense, Governor Sanford helped to lay the
foundation for my brother's New Frontier.
Later, after serving with great distinction as Governor, Terry
Sanford became a President himself--of Duke University, where he served
for 16 years, and won world-wide renown as one of the pre-eminent
educators of the century.
He won election to the United States Senate in 1986. All of us on
both sides of the aisle held him in great respect--and in great
affection as well. In so many ways, Terry Sanford was a Senator's
Senator. He was fair-minded and warm-hearted, and he knew the issues
well. Above all, he impressed us with the power of his commitment, the
eloquence of his words, the remarkable moral authority of his
leadership, and his dedication to excellence in all aspects of public
service. We admired him for his statesmanship, and we loved him for his
friendship. We will miss him very much. He was truly a profile in
courage for our time.
I ask unanimous consent that an article from the New York Times of
April 19 on Senator Sanford may be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
[From the New York Times, Apr. 19, 1998]
Terry Sanford, Pace-Setting Governor in 60's, Dies at 80
(By David Stout)
Washington.--Terry Sanford, who lowered racial barriers as
Governor of North Carolina in the 1960's, setting the style
for a new kind of Southern politician, and later became a
United States Senator and Presidential candidate, died today
at his home in Durham, N.C. He was 80.
The cause was complications from cancer, said Duke
University, where Mr. Sanford was treated and where he was
president from 1969 to 1985.
Until his cancer was diagnosed in December. Mr. Sanford had
taught government and public policy at Duke and practiced
law. He was president of the university, in Durham, after
serving as Governor and before his term in the Senate. Mr.
Sanford was at various times a lawyer, a member of the North
Carolina State Senate, from 1953 to 1955, and, in the early
1940's, an agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Mr. Sanford was Governor from 1961 to 1965, a time when
civil rights demonstrations were frequently met with
violence. In a speech on Jan. 18, 1963, he called for an end
to job discrimination against blacks and announced the
creation of a biracial panel, the North Carolina Good
Neighbor Council, to work toward that end.
``Despite great progress, the Negro's opportunity to obtain
a good job has not been achieved in most places across the
country,'' Mr. Sanford said. Opening more opportunities would
be good for the state's economy, he said, but there was a far
more compelling reason. ``We will do it because it is honest
and fair for us to give all men and women their best chance
in life,'' he said.
By today's standards, those words seem unremarkable. But in
January 1963, when Gov. George C. Wallace of Alabama
delivered his ``segregation forever'' inaugural address, Mr.
Sanford's stand for civil rights was seen as particularly
courageous for a governor from the old Confederacy.
Mr. Sanford established himself as one of the most liberal
Southern governors--too liberal, in the eyes of some
constituents--as he named black people to high state
positions, pushed state lawmakers to raise more money for
schools and started a state anti-poverty program that was a
forerunner to President Lyndon B. Johnson's War on Poverty.
In some ways, Mr. Sanford was a contradictory politician.
He seemed to have good timing but bad luck. He had shrewd
instincts, yet he seemed to lack burning desire. His changes
of mind and heart confounded ally and rival alike.
Mr. Sanford was an early supporter of John F. Kennedy's
quest for the Presidency, and so enjoyed easy access to the
White House in the early 1960's. The President's personal
secretary, Evelyn Lincoln, later wrote in a book that
President Kennedy had told her he was thinking of Mr. Sanford
as his running mate for 1964.
His own liberal programs notwithstanding, Mr. Sanford
preached the virtues of ``state responsibility,'' if not
states' rights, as an antidote to creeping ``big Federal
Government.'' Under state law, Mr. Sanford could not succeed
himself as Governor.
He tried for the White House in 1972 and in 1976, while he
was president of Duke University, offering himself as a
candidate for those disenchanted with the political system
and those who were part of it.
Mr. Sanford, who had declared his support for school
integration, was beaten in the 1972 North Carolina Democratic
Primary by Governor Wallace of Alabama. That humiliating loss
in his home state effectively ended his candidacy.
Four years later, Mr. Sanford ran for President again but
dropped out early. He said he had found it impossible to gain
enough news coverage and to raise enough money, and that he
was sick of campaigning.
In 1986, having left Duke, Mr. Sanford ran for the Senate.
When President Ronald Reagan made several appearances on
behalf of his opponent, Mr. Sanford knew better than to
criticize a President. So he suggested instead that North
Carolina did not need a ``go-along Senator.'' Mr. Sanford won
a narrow victory.
In the Senate, Mr. Sanford gained a reputation for
intelligence, personal decency and, in one celebrated
instance, indecision. In 1987, after President Reagan had
vetoed an $87.9 billion highway bill, Mr. Sanford changed
his mind three times: first voting simply ``present'' on a
vote to override the veto, then voting to sustain the veto
and finally, under tremendous pressure from other
Democrats, switching again and voting to override it. His
vote made the count 67 to 33, the precise margin required
to override.
``Nobody in the Senate thinks I caved in,'' he said later.
In fact, his colleagues on both sides of the aisle were
saddened at seeing him buckle.
``He's a gentleman,'' said Senator Alfonse M. D'Amato,
Republican of New York. ``Maybe that's his problem. He's such
a beautiful man.''
In 1992, Mr. Sanford appeared at first to be in good
position for reelection, but he was hospitalized with a heart
problem during the campaign. His opponent, Lauch Faircloth, a
former Democrat and one-time friend, tried to tar him with
the brush of liberalism. And Mr. Faircloth deftly made an
issue of Mr. Sanford's health by publicly wishing him a
speedy recovery.
Mr. Faircloth's narrow victory ended Mr. Sanford's
political life, one that had begun when he was 11: in a 1928
parade in his hometown, Laurinburg, N.C., Terry Sanford
carried a sign for Alfred E. Smith, the Democratic
Presidential candidate.
Terry Sanford was born on Aug. 20, 1917. His father was a
merchant and his mother a schoolteacher.
He graduated from the University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill in 1939. After a brief stint in the F.B.I., he
joined the Army in 1942. That year, he married Margaret
Knight of Hopkinsville, Ky.
Besides his wife, he is survived by a son, Terry Jr., of
Durham; a daughter, Elizabeth, of Hillsborough; two sisters,
Mary Glenn Rose of Pennsylvania, and Helen Wilhelm of Bern,
Switzerland, and two grandchildren.
As an Army private, Mr. Sanford served as a paratrooper,
taking part in the invasion of Southern France and later in
the Battle of the Bulge, for which he received the Bronze
Star and a Purple Heart.
After the war, mustering out as a first lieutenant, he
received his law degree from the University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill and became active in the North Carolina
Democratic Party.
Whether working for himself or on behalf of other
Democrats, he was known as a tireless campaigner, and a cool
one. While he was running for governor, the pilot of his
small plane seriously misjudged a short landing strip and
came within inches of touching down in a cornfield.
Unruffled, Mr. Sanford stepped out and, grinning, helped
several ashen reporters down the steps.
``Start picking corn, boys,'' he said before walking away.
Mr. BAUCUS addressed the Chair.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.
The Chair would note there are just 32 seconds or so remaining before
the vote.
Mr. BAUCUS. I thank the Chair.
Mr. President, I want to join my friends and colleagues in paying
tribute to Terry Sanford. I did not serve on
[[Page S3333]]
any committee with Terry, but in the few years that we served together,
he immediately struck me as a wonderful man, a good man, with a ready
smile, a very thoughtful, very wise, very good, very deep person, the
kind of Senator that not only North Carolina, I know, is very proud of,
but the kind of Senator that I think most Americans would want their
Senator to be.
I cannot, as I am standing here thinking of Terry Sanford, think of
another person whom I respected more and loved more and appreciated
more, going through all the history, Research Triangle of North
Carolina, the Governor, president of Duke University. But the main
point I want to make is, working with Terry personally, and talking
with him, and working through issues, he was a man who will be very
difficult to replace. And, as I said, I can think of no Senator whom I
would hold in higher esteem or regard than Terry Sanford.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the resolution and preamble
offered by the Senator from North Carolina are agreed to.
The resolution (S. Res. 211) was agreed to.
The preamble was agreed to.
The resolution, with its preamble, is as follows:
S. Res. 211
Whereas Terry Sanford served his country with distinction
and honor for all of his adult life;
Whereas Terry Sanford served his country in World War II,
where he saw action in 5 European campaigns and was awarded a
Bronze Star and a Purple Heart;
Whereas as Governor of North Carolina from 1961-1965, Terry
Sanford was a leader in education and racial tolerance and
was named by Harvard University as 1 of the top 10 Governors
of the 20th Century;
Whereas as President of Duke University, Terry Sanford made
the University into a national leader in higher education
that is today recognized as 1 of the finest universities in
the United States; and
Whereas Terry Sanford served with honor in the United
States Senate from 1987 to 1993 and championed the solvency
of the social security system: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That the Senate--
(1) has heard with profound sorrow the announcement of the
death of the Honorable Terry Sanford and expresses its
condolences to the Sanford family, especially Margaret Rose,
his wife of over 55 years; and
(2) expresses its profound gratitude to the Honorable Terry
Sanford and his family for the service that he rendered to
his country.
SEC. 2. TRANSMITTAL.
The Secretary of the Senate shall transmit an enrolled copy
of this resolution to the family of the Honorable Terry
Sanford.
Mr. FAIRCLOTH. The preamble and resolution have been agreed to?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. That is correct.
Mr. FAIRCLOTH. I move to reconsider the vote and move to lay that
motion on the table.
The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
____________________