[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 156 (Friday, October 31, 2003)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E2196-E2197]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               COMMEMORATION FOR WALTER EDWARD WASHINGTON

                                 ______
                                 

                       HON. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON

                      of the district of columbia

                    in the house of representatives

                       Thursday, October 30, 2003

  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I arise today to inform the House of the 
passing of the first Mayor of the District of Columbia in the 20th 
century. Some members will remember Walter Washington's service or will 
know him by reputation because no mayor here or, I dare say, elsewhere 
has enjoyed more respect from this body. Mayor Washington enjoyed the 
same bipartisan admiration from the two presidents during his tenure, 
Lyndon Johnson, who appointed Mr. Washington the District's first mayor 
in 1968 and Richard Nixon who signed the Home Rule Act in 1973 giving 
the District its current home rule status, complete with an elected 
mayor and city council.
  The conventional wisdom is that home rule for the District depended 
upon Mayor Washington's performance as appointed mayor. Few would 
disagree. If home rule was past due then, more than 150 years after the 
city's founding, surely full self-government, democracy and 
congressional voting representation are shamefully tardy in coming to 
the city's approximately 600,000 residents today. Mayor Washington, who 
did more than any person to bring self-government to the District, 
deserved to see its full realization before his death. Home rule 
happened because people made it happen, with Walter Washington as the 
leader. Freedom and democracy for an entire city is a lot to have on 
one man's shoulders, but Walter Washington carried the burden easily. 
His gifts were spectacularly broad--deep integrity and ability that won 
him enormous professional respect as well as personal and political 
skills that evoked affection from the people. That combination amounts 
to the sum total of what it takes to lead. Few leaders have it all. 
Walter Washington did.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask that in addition to my own statement at the time 
of Mayor Washington's death, I be allowed to place in the Record a 
Washington Post editorial and a personal tribute from Post editorial 
writer, Colbert King, who was a close friend of Walter Washington and 
who served on the Senate staff when Mr. Washington was mayor.
  I ask the entire House to join me in paying tribute to a man of 
historic stature in the District of Columbia and in offering the 
profound respect and condolences of the House of Representatives to 
Mayor Washington's wife Mary and his family.

  Norton Says Passing of Walter Washington Marks End of Home Rule Era

       Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) today released 
     the following statement on the passing of Mayor Walter E. 
     Washington.
       ``The era of home rule ended today with the passing of 
     Walter Washington. Mayor Washington simultaneously shaped the 
     office of mayor and the practice of home rule governance for 
     a city that had lived without democracy for a hundred years. 
     The District has a strong mayor form of government in no 
     small part because his service as appointed mayor 
     demonstrated that a mayor could lead this city as mayors of 
     other big cities did. His service is significant for far more 
     than the office he held, however; President Lyndon Johnson 
     appointed Walter Washington our first mayor because he wanted 
     a man of great character and ability to pave the way for an 
     elected mayor. The people of the District returned the 
     compliment by electing Walter Washington our first elected 
     mayor. Residents realized he had the ``right stuff' to be 
     mayor--not only outstanding ability and integrity but also 
     the indispensable political skills and common touch that make 
     people want to follow the lead of an elected official. That 
     combination of gifts proved mighty useful during the 1968 
     riots. The mayor was legendary for his way with the President 
     and the Congress, but Walter Washington was appreciated in 
     this town not only because he could talk to power but because 
     he talked equally well to the powerless.
       ``People who missed his years as mayor often got some sense 
     of his political gifts on the public occasions when his 
     extraordinary wit was in full form as it remained throughout 
     Walter's life.
       ``With the passing of Mayor Washington, the home rule era 
     he shaped also passes. Perhaps, almost 30 years after Walter 
     Washington was first elected, Congress will now understand 
     that a new era of full democracy, independence and voting 
     rights is overdue.
       ``Mrs. Mary Cornelia Washington, Walter's daughter, 
     Bennetta Jules-Rosette and his family have my condolences and 
     the sympathy of the city who loved him.''
                                  ____


               [From the Washington Post, Oct. 28, 2003]

                          Walter E. Washington

       ``What I would like to be remembered for is that Walter 
     Washington changed the spirit of the people of this city, 
     that he came in as mayor when there was hate and greed and 
     misunderstanding among our people and the

[[Page E2197]]

     races were polarized. And in the span of just a little over a 
     decade, he brought people together through love and 
     compassion, he helped bring about home rule . . . and helped 
     people have more meaningful, satisfying and enjoyable 
     lives.''
       This noble self-remembrance of Walter Edward Washington, 
     who died yesterday at the age of 88, is--like so much that he 
     accomplished for the city he deeply loved--just right. More 
     than anyone in this century, he was the heart, soul, spirit 
     and creator of the capital city as it is enjoyed today. Were 
     it not for his perfect presence at a critical point in the 
     city's history, the people of Washington would not be 
     enjoying even the limited self-government they now have.
       To appreciate fully the importance of this most likable and 
     shrewd negotiator-leader, we need only recall a 70-percent-
     black city in strict colonial bondage, barred from acting on 
     any significant local policy matter without the assent of an 
     indisputably hostile and domineering U.S. House committee of 
     mostly Southern segregationists. For many years before 
     President Johnson pressured Congress to accord home rule to 
     the District of Columbia--only to suffer an embarrassing 
     defeat--Walter Washington had been among the tireless workers 
     on behalf of enfranchising the citizens of the capital. Mr. 
     Johnson, determined to strike back at Congress, used his 
     executive powers to reorganize the District government from 
     an arm of the federal government headed by three appointed 
     commissioners to a new system with a single appointed 
     commissioner and a council. For commissioner--a position 
     whose holder the president unofficially but forcefully dubbed 
     ``mayor''--the president chose Mr. Washington, the first 
     African American named to lead a U.S. city.
       Thanks to Mr. Washington's keen sense of the politically 
     possible, the knowledge of the bureaucratic ropes that he 
     gained as a federal official and his exquisite abilities to 
     put the most wary people at ease, the city began to enjoy new 
     status on its road to limited home rule. He transformed the 
     face of the District government, placing blacks in key 
     positions that were long the exclusive preserve of whites. 
     Until his arrival, the District Building had been a tomb, 
     barely visited by residents. Powerful local business 
     interests dealt directly with Congress, as did the 80-
     percent-white police force and other organized employee 
     groups. As Mr. Washington involved more citizens in 
     government activities, the top floor of the building came 
     into its own as a local government center. Congress approved 
     a limited home rule bill in 1973; the next year, Mr. 
     Washington was elected mayor.
       Though Mayor Washington was best known for his easygoing, 
     humor-laced manner, he was bold and tough when it mattered. 
     In 1966, when President Johnson first talked to him about a 
     commissioner job with the understanding that another, white, 
     commissioner would supervise the police department, Mr. 
     Washington said no. When he was tapped the next year as lone 
     commissioner, his stance prevailed. It paid off in later 
     years, when Mayor Washington's public safety commissioner, 
     Patrick V. Murphy, and Police Chief Jerry V. Wilson recruited 
     and promoted African Americans and trained a once insensitive 
     force to deal with the protests and riots that came to 
     Washington.
       Mr. Washington's ability to gain the confidence of federal 
     leaders extended to President Nixon, who on his first full 
     day in office toured the riot-torn areas of downtown, 
     expressed confidence in the mayor and pledged new federal 
     support for his rebuilding programs. Mr. Washington, as 
     usual, had done his homework and labored behind the scenes to 
     set the stage. He was always the healer, the pleasant but 
     insistent voice of reason on behalf of the city, able to draw 
     on an unmatched network of sources--from the streets to the 
     businesses, embassies and focal points of federal power.
       To a person, Walter Washington's successors sought his 
     counsel. His politics of inclusion, his honesty and civility, 
     and his strengthening of the local fabric were invaluable. He 
     was, in every sense, the city father--whose family across the 
     wards will remember him fondly.
                                  ____


               [From the Washington Post, Oct. 28, 2003]

                           The End of an Era

                          (By Colbert I. King)

       Tom Eagleton, Missouri Democrat and chairman of the 
     Senate's District of Columbia Committee, was chain-smoking 
     and as keyed up as I had ever seen him. The subcommittee's 
     majority staff director, Robert Harris, on the other hand, 
     was his usual stoic self. I was seated in the customary 
     position of the committee's minority staff director, off to 
     the side. We were in Eagleton's Senate office, and the 
     purpose of the gathering wasn't social.
       Sitting on the sofa directly in front of Eagleton was 
     Walter Washington, the presidentially appointed mayor of the 
     District. Next to him sat Julian Dugas, the mayor's longtime 
     friend and director of licenses and inspections. Walter 
     Washington was the most relaxed person in the room.
       It was 1973. Congress had just passed the home rule bill 
     and Walter Washington ``was positioning himself to run for 
     mayor in the city's first municipal election in 70 years. 
     Eagleton had asked the mayor to come to Capitol Hill because 
     he was going to break some bad news and wanted to do it face 
     to face.
       The committee had asked the General Accounting Office to 
     take a look at the city's books. The GAO's preliminary view 
     was that the books weren't auditable. Eagleton was going to 
     call for a reorganization of the city's finances by a public 
     accounting firm, and he expected the timing would be 
     embarrassing to Washington.
       ``Walter, I don't want to hurt you politically but I won't 
     be able to live with myself if we turn over the D.C. 
     government to the city with the books in a mess,'' I recall a 
     heavily perspiring Eagleton as saying. ``Now you can go out 
     of here and publicly attack me if you want, and I will 
     understand,'' he said. ``But I've got to do this.''
       Washington merely smiled and, calling Eagleton by his first 
     name, said he recognized the problem. The books were a 
     longstanding mess and had been an albatross around the city's 
     neck since the time when it was governed by three 
     presidentially appointed commissioners and tightly controlled 
     by congressional committees, said Washington. And after a few 
     pleasantries, Washington, accompanied by Dugas, shook hands 
     all around and left. It was as if the mayor had given the 
     senator special dispensation to do his job. And Eagleton 
     seemed appreciative.
       I tell the story because it provides a glimpse of the 
     Walter Washington I knew behind the scenes. Unlike the 
     current mayor, Anthony Williams, and the two city chief 
     executives--Marion Barry and Sharon Pratt--who followed 
     Washington in office, Walter Washington operated on Capitol 
     Hill like an impresario, winning small victories here and 
     there for the city in ways that escaped the attention of the 
     average citizen. He managed to get hostile Southern barons to 
     open federal purse strings for city projects long neglected 
     by the three commissioners. And he diplomatically staved off 
     rapacious members of Congress who thought the city was theirs 
     for the taking.
       It's fair to say that without Walter Washington, there 
     would not have been home rule, at least not in the year when 
     it was achieved. The road from appointed to elected 
     government had plenty of pitfalls, both on the Hill and in 
     the city, but Washington deftly steered around them. He 
     cajoled when necessary, pleaded when required and schmoozed 
     unceasingly. He stopped at nothing to get for District 
     residents what they wanted most of all, an end to what 
     Washington called an ``anachronism of votelessness in our 
     capital city.'' As he told the Senate District committee 
     when he was making his pitch to pass the bill in 1973: 
     ``Whatever you call it, home rule, local suffrage, self-
     determination or self-government--I am for it.''
       Much is made of the home rule movement and the people 
     taking to the street to bring about self-government. Much of 
     what you hear about that period is pure, unadulterated myth. 
     It was the work of Walter Washington, moving and shaking 
     behind the scenes on Capitol Hill, that kept alive the drive 
     for home rule. I know. I was there. The thought of an elected 
     District of Columbia government being in Walter Washington's 
     hands probably won as many votes in the Senate and House as 
     any single effort by one individual on the Hill or in the 
     city.
       Washington's victory in 1974 as the city's first elected 
     mayor was the first step in transforming this once 
     overwhelmingly African American city from one dominated by 
     southerners and a predominantly white city government 
     leadership and police department to the multiracial and 
     multicultural city we are today. And Mayor Washington pulled 
     it off without polarizing and balkanizing the city.
       Although I saw a great deal of Walter Washington when he 
     was both an appointed and elected mayor, I saw even more of 
     him in the past several years, as we shared membership in the 
     same close-knit social club, the DePriest Fifteen. The name's 
     no mistake. About 15 of us, all associated with the city in 
     one form or another, would gather on a Saturday night once a 
     month without our spouses for an evening of eating and 
     drinking whatever we wanted without the presence of overseers 
     and tattletales. We would share complete and unabridged war 
     stories, the kind we are likely to take to our graves. Walter 
     Washington had a storehouse of the best, which he shared with 
     great relish. I can't imagine how we'll do it without him.
       With his death, we are witnessing not only the passing of a 
     local icon but also the passing of an era. His was a time 
     when leaders understood the meaning of the words civility and 
     comity. Walter Washington will be remembered as a uniter, not 
     a divider, as a healer, not a destroyer.
       And he did it all with a style and a light touch--and out 
     of love for this city and the people in it--that we shall 
     never see the likes of again.

                          ____________________