From the nosebleed environs in what was then known as the Pepsi Center in Denver, I watched former Republican Congressman Jim Leach as he strode across the stage to give a national convention speech in prime time.
But it was the 2008 Democratic National Convention.
Leach walked confidently into Barack Obama’s celebration. After all, what politician doesn’t want to speak to a big, excited crowd.
And, of course, he called for cooperation in the service of the common good.
“In Congress, Democratic senators like Pat Moynihan and Mike Mansfield served in Republican administrations. On the Republican side, Arthur Vandenberg helped President Truman launch the Marshall Plan, and Everett Dirksen backed Lyndon Johnson’s landmark civil rights legislation” said Leach, pointing to crucial bipartisanship in the past.
“In troubled times, it was understood that country comes before party, that in perilous moments mutual concern for the national interest must be the only factor in political judgments,” Leach said. “This does not mean that debate within and between the political parties should not be vibrant. Yet what frustrates so many citizens is the lack of bipartisanship in Washington and the way today’s Republican Party has broken with its conservative heritage.
“This is not a time for politics as usual or for run-of-the-mill politicians. Little is riskier to the national interest than more of the same. America needs new ideas, new energy and a new generation of leadership,” Leach said.
ADVERTISING
Leach personified political decency. And now, in our indecent times, we’ve lost him. Leach died Wednesday at age 82.
Leach had no qualms about crossing party lines.“ “I think he was rather pleased to do it,” Greg Wierzynski, Leach’s former congressional chief of staff and longtime friend said.
“He always wanted to be identified as a Republican. And even when times were hard, like when Tom DeLay was the Republican ringmaster in the House,” Wierzynski said.“ “But I guess the Trump thing, the conversion to the Trump brand of Republicans finally drove him out of the party.”
Leach changed his party affiliation to Democrat in December 2022.
Wierzynski met Leach in 1974 as Republicans weathered the first election after the height of the Watergate Scandal. A year earlier, Leach quit his job at the State Department in protest over Nixon’s order to fire Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox, also known as the Saturday Night Massacre.
In 1974, Wierzynski, a journalist at the time, was talking with Republican National Party Chair Ray Bliss.
“And I said, Ray, how are you going to win the election? Are there any good candidates around, or are they all hiding under rocks? And he said, I'll show you,” Wierzynski said. “And he left the room and came back with Jim Leach. He said, ‘here's a guy, here's one of our candidates,’ and that's how I met Jim.”
Leach lost his congressional bid in 1974 but came back and won in 1976. It was the start of a 30-year congressional career.
Leach was a moderate Republican, even considered liberal on social issues. But by the late 1980s and early 2000s, moderates were disappearing, with their seats taken by far more strident conservative partisans. He was one of six House Republicans who voted in 2002 against the use of force in Iraq. He turned down all PAC contributions.
“That was a Republican Party of Jim Leach, and he never really wavered from that,” Wierzynski said.
“I think he felt increasingly marginalized in his caucus, and that combined with a certain fatigue of 15 terms, and, you know, commuting back and forth every weekend to Iowa, from Washington had taken a certain toll on him,” Wierzynski said.
Leach lost his seat in 2006 in a Democratic wave election to Cornell College Professor Dave Loebsack. It was a surprise, given the support Leach had built from the main streets of rural counties to the liberal bastion of Iowa City.
But so many of Leach’s accomplishments transcended politics.
“I direct a program that is funded largely by the U.S. State Department. And Jim was a great ally of our efforts to bring distinguished American International writers to our UNESCO city of literature,” said Chris Merrill, director of the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa.
“I also had the good luck to serve on his National Council for the Humanities when he was the chair of that institution, and I got to watch him work up close. I was always impressed with his range of reference, his ability to read a room and read the times, and most especially by his talent for storytelling,” Merrill said.
The arts held a special, important place for Leach and his wife Deba, who is an art historian. He saw it as a critical tool in diplomacy. But like Republican moderation, Leach’s brand of international relations has faded.
“The America first idea almost always leads to America last, or America forgotten, or when you see the sorts of attacks that are just daily a part of political discourse at this moment,” Merrill said. “Jim was never the kind of public figure who would reduce himself to that. He always honored his interlocutors’ position, even if he didn't agree with it, and he would disagree with those folks in always a polite manner, and he modeled a way of being in the world that I have taken to heart,” Merrill said.
While chairing the National Endowment for the Humanities, Leach visited all 50 states in what became known as a civility tour.
“One of the difficulties in public life is one has to respect almost every perspective, but particularly one has to respect the constitutional process, and we have an elected president, and it's in all of our interests to hope that any administration succeeds, and we should work together to try to see that happens,” Leach told public radio host Diane Rehm in 2009.
“Now, having said that, that doesn't mean there isn't a big role for vigorous differentiation, and so how you balance that out is the challenge,” Leach said.
Wierzynski said the world that comes to mind when he thinks of Leach is “rectitude.” And an element of modesty.
“You know, in just about every congressional office you walk into, there is a wall full of pictures of Congressman Smith with the President, Congressman Smith with the Secretary of State, Congressman Smith, with the President of France, or whatever,” Wierzynski said.
“Jim rebuffed that. His office was lined with prints and paintings from his collection,” Wierzynski said. It was his, you know, his modesty, and at the same time his interest in things that were more than mundane.”
But Leach’s humility receded when it came to his accomplishments as a wrestler. He won a state title in 1960 for Davenport High School.
“He liked to say that he'd been inducted in the Wrestling Hall of Fame,” Wierzynski said.
"I’ve always thought that the most equalitarian place in the world is the wrestling mat," Leach said in a 2009 interview. "You have two people operating with the same goal in mind and abiding by the same rules. Wrestlers may differ in height and body type, but it’s hard to say who has the natural advantage."
Wrestle hard, respect your opponent and follow the rules. Jim Leach lived by those rules. And will be missed.
www.thegazette.com
But it was the 2008 Democratic National Convention.
Leach walked confidently into Barack Obama’s celebration. After all, what politician doesn’t want to speak to a big, excited crowd.
And, of course, he called for cooperation in the service of the common good.
“In Congress, Democratic senators like Pat Moynihan and Mike Mansfield served in Republican administrations. On the Republican side, Arthur Vandenberg helped President Truman launch the Marshall Plan, and Everett Dirksen backed Lyndon Johnson’s landmark civil rights legislation” said Leach, pointing to crucial bipartisanship in the past.
“In troubled times, it was understood that country comes before party, that in perilous moments mutual concern for the national interest must be the only factor in political judgments,” Leach said. “This does not mean that debate within and between the political parties should not be vibrant. Yet what frustrates so many citizens is the lack of bipartisanship in Washington and the way today’s Republican Party has broken with its conservative heritage.
“This is not a time for politics as usual or for run-of-the-mill politicians. Little is riskier to the national interest than more of the same. America needs new ideas, new energy and a new generation of leadership,” Leach said.
ADVERTISING
Leach personified political decency. And now, in our indecent times, we’ve lost him. Leach died Wednesday at age 82.
Leach had no qualms about crossing party lines.“ “I think he was rather pleased to do it,” Greg Wierzynski, Leach’s former congressional chief of staff and longtime friend said.
“He always wanted to be identified as a Republican. And even when times were hard, like when Tom DeLay was the Republican ringmaster in the House,” Wierzynski said.“ “But I guess the Trump thing, the conversion to the Trump brand of Republicans finally drove him out of the party.”
Leach changed his party affiliation to Democrat in December 2022.
Wierzynski met Leach in 1974 as Republicans weathered the first election after the height of the Watergate Scandal. A year earlier, Leach quit his job at the State Department in protest over Nixon’s order to fire Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox, also known as the Saturday Night Massacre.
In 1974, Wierzynski, a journalist at the time, was talking with Republican National Party Chair Ray Bliss.
“And I said, Ray, how are you going to win the election? Are there any good candidates around, or are they all hiding under rocks? And he said, I'll show you,” Wierzynski said. “And he left the room and came back with Jim Leach. He said, ‘here's a guy, here's one of our candidates,’ and that's how I met Jim.”
Leach lost his congressional bid in 1974 but came back and won in 1976. It was the start of a 30-year congressional career.
Leach was a moderate Republican, even considered liberal on social issues. But by the late 1980s and early 2000s, moderates were disappearing, with their seats taken by far more strident conservative partisans. He was one of six House Republicans who voted in 2002 against the use of force in Iraq. He turned down all PAC contributions.
“That was a Republican Party of Jim Leach, and he never really wavered from that,” Wierzynski said.
“I think he felt increasingly marginalized in his caucus, and that combined with a certain fatigue of 15 terms, and, you know, commuting back and forth every weekend to Iowa, from Washington had taken a certain toll on him,” Wierzynski said.
Leach lost his seat in 2006 in a Democratic wave election to Cornell College Professor Dave Loebsack. It was a surprise, given the support Leach had built from the main streets of rural counties to the liberal bastion of Iowa City.
But so many of Leach’s accomplishments transcended politics.
“I direct a program that is funded largely by the U.S. State Department. And Jim was a great ally of our efforts to bring distinguished American International writers to our UNESCO city of literature,” said Chris Merrill, director of the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa.
“I also had the good luck to serve on his National Council for the Humanities when he was the chair of that institution, and I got to watch him work up close. I was always impressed with his range of reference, his ability to read a room and read the times, and most especially by his talent for storytelling,” Merrill said.
The arts held a special, important place for Leach and his wife Deba, who is an art historian. He saw it as a critical tool in diplomacy. But like Republican moderation, Leach’s brand of international relations has faded.
“The America first idea almost always leads to America last, or America forgotten, or when you see the sorts of attacks that are just daily a part of political discourse at this moment,” Merrill said. “Jim was never the kind of public figure who would reduce himself to that. He always honored his interlocutors’ position, even if he didn't agree with it, and he would disagree with those folks in always a polite manner, and he modeled a way of being in the world that I have taken to heart,” Merrill said.
While chairing the National Endowment for the Humanities, Leach visited all 50 states in what became known as a civility tour.
“One of the difficulties in public life is one has to respect almost every perspective, but particularly one has to respect the constitutional process, and we have an elected president, and it's in all of our interests to hope that any administration succeeds, and we should work together to try to see that happens,” Leach told public radio host Diane Rehm in 2009.
“Now, having said that, that doesn't mean there isn't a big role for vigorous differentiation, and so how you balance that out is the challenge,” Leach said.
Wierzynski said the world that comes to mind when he thinks of Leach is “rectitude.” And an element of modesty.
“You know, in just about every congressional office you walk into, there is a wall full of pictures of Congressman Smith with the President, Congressman Smith with the Secretary of State, Congressman Smith, with the President of France, or whatever,” Wierzynski said.
“Jim rebuffed that. His office was lined with prints and paintings from his collection,” Wierzynski said. It was his, you know, his modesty, and at the same time his interest in things that were more than mundane.”
But Leach’s humility receded when it came to his accomplishments as a wrestler. He won a state title in 1960 for Davenport High School.
“He liked to say that he'd been inducted in the Wrestling Hall of Fame,” Wierzynski said.
"I’ve always thought that the most equalitarian place in the world is the wrestling mat," Leach said in a 2009 interview. "You have two people operating with the same goal in mind and abiding by the same rules. Wrestlers may differ in height and body type, but it’s hard to say who has the natural advantage."
Wrestle hard, respect your opponent and follow the rules. Jim Leach lived by those rules. And will be missed.
Opinion: Leach personified decency in politics
Jim Leach UI professor Former congressman From the nosebleed environs in what was then known as the Pepsi Center in …
www.thegazette.com
