[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 118 (Tuesday, July 11, 2023)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E656]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         REMEMBERING ROY HERRON

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. STEVE COHEN

                              of tennessee

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, July 11, 2023

  Mr. COHEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to remember a devoted public 
servant and dear friend, former Tennessee State Senator Roy Herron, who 
died on Saturday after injuries sustained in a jet ski accident at the 
age of 69.
  Roy was a multi-faceted man of the people--a lawyer and Methodist 
minister, who served in the state House and Senate for 26 years and was 
the Democratic nominee for the 8th Congressional District in 2010. He 
also wrote three books about the role of faith in politics and a fourth 
book about Tennessee political humor, co-authored with his friend 
Cotton Ivy.
  A gifted politician, Roy was first elected to the Tennessee House of 
Representatives in 1986 to fill the seat vacated when Ned McWherter 
became governor. He served in the House in the 95th through 99th 
Tennessee General Assemblies and in the Senate in the 100th through 
107th, where he served as floor leader and then chairman of the Senate 
Democratic Caucus. He was my Senate colleague from 1997 until I left 
the state Senate and came to Congress in 2007. He also chaired the 
Select Committee on Children and Youth, the Senate General Welfare, 
Health and Human Resources Committee, and the Joint Tenncare Oversight 
Committee. He was a member of the Senate Finance, Ways and Means 
Committee, the Senate Government Operations Committee, the Joint 
Committee on Charitable Gaming, and the Joint Select Committee on 
Education.
  I was hopeful that we would be colleagues in Washington when he 
declared his candidacy for Congress in 2009 after John Tanner announced 
his retirement. Roy campaigned throughout the 8th District in his old 
red Ford pickup. Despite receiving the endorsement of every major 
Tennessee newspaper, he lost the general election to Stephen Fincher, a 
cotton farmer who refused to debate him, as Tennessee took a hard right 
turn. In 2011, he was seriously injured in a bicycling accident while 
training for an Iron Man competition. He later served as chairman of 
the Tennessee Democratic Party from 2013 to 2015.
  Roy graduated at the top of his class at the University of Tennessee 
at Martin in 1975 and was chosen as a Rotary Scholar and spent a year 
studying religion at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. 
Returning to Tennessee, he received both a master's degree in Divinity 
and a J.D. from Vanderbilt University in 1980.
  Besides his accomplishments and dedication to public service, Roy 
will be remembered as a truly nice guy. I extend my deepest condolences 
to his wife Nancy and his sons John, Rick and Ben, and his many friends 
and supporters. His was a life well lived, and he will be missed.

                          ____________________