[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 8]
[Senate]
[Pages 11288-11289]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         REMEMBERING ALAN DIXON

  Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, yesterday at 6 p.m. on Capitol Hill 
there was a gathering at a nearby restaurant known as The Monocle. It 
was a gathering of former staffers of U.S. Senator Alan Dixon of 
Illinois. They picked The Monocle because he would have picked it. It 
was his favorite place on Capitol Hill. And it was a sad day, because 
Senator Dixon passed away Sunday morning in Fairview Heights, IL.
  His staff gathered at The Monocle the next day, which would have been 
his birthday, to toast him and to pay tribute to a great boss, a great 
friend, and a great Senator from the State of Illinois.
  Senator Dixon passed away in his sleep in the early hours on Sunday 
morning. His son Jeff had dropped him off at home, and he was there 
with his wife Jody when he passed away. So instead of celebrating his 
birthday on Monday, we had a day of remembrance of an extraordinary 
public servant for the State of Illinois.
  Alan Dixon used to be known in political circles as Al the Pal, and 
he loved it. It really described him. For him, friendship and loyalty 
were everything. It showed in his life and, I think, was a great part 
of his success.
  He was a person who gloried in representing Illinois. He never 
harbored any national ambitions. Being a Senator from Illinois was his 
goal in life. He reached it and performed so well as Senator that he is 
fondly remembered by many who served with him in the House and in the 
Senate.
  He represented an old-school style of politics. He believed in his 
heart that people of good will could find common ground if they worked 
at it. He knew how to make this government work, how to make this 
Senate work, and work for the State of Illinois.
  In his memoir, which he published last year, he wrote:

       Generally speaking, my political career was built on good 
     will and accommodation.

  He was known by Senators on both sides of the aisle as a friendly, 
helpful, articulate, and effective colleague.
  He was a downstate guy in our State. He grew up in Belleville and St. 
Clair County, not too far away from my hometown of East St. Louis. He 
grew up just across the river from the great city of St. Louis. His dad 
owned and ran the Dixon Wine and Liquor Company in Belleville.
  Alan served in World War II, in the U.S. Navy Air Corps. After the 
war, he went to the University of Illinois where they had a special 
arrangement for vets to earn a bachelor's degree. He went for a short 
time to the University of Illinois Law School and then, when his dad's 
business was struggling, he transferred to Washington University Law 
School where he graduated second in his class.
  In 1948, at the age of 21, a neighbor said: Alan, I have been 
watching you and I think you ought to consider running for police 
magistrate in Belleville, IL. Alan hadn't even graduated from law 
school, and his friend reminded him you didn't have to be a lawyer to 
be a police magistrate in those days. So he ran and he won.
  Two years later, after getting out of law school and passing the bar, 
both in Missouri and Illinois, he was elected to the Illinois House of 
Representatives--the youngest member ever elected to the Illinois 
General Assembly. His starting salary: $3,000.
  He went on to become one of the most successful vote-getters in the 
history of the State of Illinois. He won 29 consecutive bids for public 
office, for State representative, State senator, secretary of state, 
and state treasurer. During one of those races, he carried all 102 
counties in Illinois, all 30 townships in Cook County, and all 50 
wards. That is a record I don't think anybody will ever break.
  When he served in Springfield, IL, as a State representative and a 
State senator, he did a lot of things, but he pointed with pride to his 
passage of a constitutional change in Illinois to finally modernize our 
judiciary. He remembered his days as police magistrate and thought our 
system of justice had to be brought into the 20th century. Alan Dixon 
of Belleville, IL, led that effort--an enormous political lift. He got 
it done. He was effective. People trusted him and they respected him.
  He led an unpopular fight against loyalty oaths during the McCarthy 
era, and he helped create the Illinois college system.
  In 1980, the people of Illinois chose Alan Dixon to represent them 
here in the Senate. He teamed up with his old friend a couple years 
later who had joined him in the Illinois General Assembly, his seatmate 
in the Assembly, a man named Paul Simon. Senator Dixon and then-
Congressman Paul Simon, soon to be Senator Paul Simon, were colleagues 
and buddies and business partners. What an unlikely duo. There was Paul 
Simon who might be persuaded once in a blue moon to drink a little 
glass of wine, and there was Alan Dixon who loved that cold beer that 
he grew up with in Belleville, IL. But the two of them were fast 
friends. I witnessed that friendship over the years. I didn't see the 
early days when they owned newspapers together--Paul was a newspaper 
man and Alan more an investor--but I did witness the political part of 
that friendship, and it was amazing to see.
  There were moments in their lives when the two of them could have 
clashed over their political ambitions, but they always worked it out. 
They were always friends, and that made a big difference in both of 
their lives.
  It was Alan Dixon as Senator who came up with an idea that had never 
been tried before in Illinois: He decided to try to get all of the 
members of the Illinois congressional delegation--Democrats and 
Republicans--together for lunch on a regular basis. Well, he had to 
persuade a few of the oldtimers who weren't really open to the idea, 
but it was his personality and his determination that got it done, a 
tradition which continues to this day.
  In his 12 years in the Senate, Alan Dixon didn't forget where he came 
from. He remembered growing up in a family of modest means in 
Belleville. He remembered those tough summer jobs--and there were 
plenty of them. And he never forgot the working people he represented 
in St. Clair County and across the State of Illinois.
  Alan was at the top of his game and in the strongest voice when it 
came to standing up for working people and the little guy. He fought 
for affordable housing and lending practices. He denounced wasteful 
spending and created a procurement czar to oversee spending at the 
Pentagon.
  One of the things which he is remembered for as a Senator was 
deciding to personally test a new weapons system. They sent him down to 
test the Sergeant York gun. They put him in a helmet and sat him on the 
gun. He was going to test it and fire it, and he soon discovered the 
gun was a dud--it couldn't shoot straight. He came back and reported it 
to his colleagues in the Senate, including Senator Sam Nunn, and they 
went along with Senator Dixon and said: We are going to junk this 
project. It is a waste of taxpayers' money.
  It was Alan Dixon who called for tougher oversight of the savings and

[[Page 11289]]

loan industry and vigorous prosecution of scam artists who defrauded 
S&Ls and left taxpayers holding the bag.
  In 1992, Alan lost his bid for reelection to the Senate in a hotly 
contested three-way primary. It was the political upset of the year. It 
isn't often around here that a Senator would lose in a primary race for 
reelection--and a lot of people were wondering, his first political 
loss, how would it affect Alan Dixon.
  Election night, Alan stood up and gave the most heartfelt, touching 
speech I can ever remember of a person who lost a campaign. It was 
repeated over and over that he was a real gentleman, and his words that 
he had to say even in defeat added to his reputation as a fine, honest, 
great public servant. A tearful crowd listened as he said he had 
``loved every golden moment'' of his time in politics.
  His fellow Democratic Senators had twice unanimously elected him to 
serve as chief deputy whip. After his loss in that election and then 
retirement, he was praised on the floor of the Senate by not only Ted 
Kennedy and George Mitchell but Bob Dole and Strom Thurmond as well.
  In 1995, his public life was resumed when President Clinton appointed 
Alan Dixon to chair the base closure commission known as the Defense 
Base Realignment and Closure Commission. It made sense. As a Senator, 
Alan Dixon had written the section of the Defense authorization bill 
that created the BRAC.
  Here was a man who had spent his entire career making political 
friends, but now he took on a job that was bound to test some of those 
friendships. He accepted that assignment because the President asked, 
and Dixon knew it was right for America. It was the same decision he 
made when he enlisted to serve in World War II.
  Last October, Alan Dixon published his memoirs with the appropriate 
title ``The Gentleman From Illinois.'' He returned to Washington 
briefly with Jody and members of the family to head on over to his 
favorite Capitol Hill restaurant, The Monocle. It is about a stone's 
throw from the Dirksen Senate Office Building where he used to have his 
old meetings in his office. The Monocle was the place where, 
afterwards, you joined for bipartisan dinners and a lot of good times.
  Alan Dixon told his old friends gathered at The Monocle that evening:

       What this country needs now is more friends on the Hill 
     working together and talking together, and working for 
     solutions that will serve the interest of the public.

  Well, Alan Dixon was right about that. I hope that some day, in his 
memory, we will see the return of that spirit in this Senate Chamber. 
This country truly needs to work together.
  Before Dixon left the Senate, then-Senator Paul Simon praised him 
with these words:

       In generations to come, his children, his grandchildren, 
     and his great-grandchildren will look back and say with 
     pride, ``Alan Dixon was my father, my grandfather, my great-
     grandfather,'' whatever that relationship will be.

  Those words by Paul Simon about his lifelong political friend and 
colleague Alan Dixon ring true today as we reflect not only on his 
service as a Senator and public official but also as a person.
  I lost a pal when Alan Dixon passed away. My wife and I extend our 
condolences to Alan's wife of 60 years, Jody. What a sweetheart of a 
woman. People don't realize what spouses put up with because of our 
public lives. She put up with it for many years. There were good times, 
but I am sure there were tough times too. Mothers have to work a little 
extra harder when the father happens to be in public life. She was his 
rock.
  To Alan and Jody's three children Stephanie, Jeff, and Elizabeth, and 
to their families, to the grandchildren and the great-grandchildren--
you can be proud of Alan Dixon. He was truly ``the gentleman from 
Illinois.''

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