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FLA4!Ep 3ABC
MR. UILLIAM GODFREY JAMES
IITERVIEUER: o6T7 k&L/lN6M/AAJ
TRANSCIRIBE32: DUS
January 4, 1974
---Iert-, some basic biographical material. here h was born,-h
>*O 60 r ae /c3o
education, and how-he bee interested in olitics and so on.
J: I born inr Boyon Beach.,in 1930. Attended schools in Boyton up
until about 1945 when my mother died. I went to Washington, D.C.
and attended Anactia High School. Southeast section ---Forty-five
Forty-six. Part of 7L2.TY-seven, came back to Delray Beach, Florida
in 1947 Christmas time. And graduated from Delray Beach High
School in 1947. allowingng September1 4a the University of Florida-
started off in prelaw course but then in my senior year because
of having taken ROTC and knowing that I had a commitment to go
during the Korean War I switched from prelaw to sales and cales
14L
management. Got a BC BA degree A) d sales and sales management
in 1950^and entered the Army in September '51. -+uinci back
to Delray Beach and married also, '51 November. Ue returned back
to Delray Beach in '53. Sold appliances here in Delray for nearly
about two three years. Sales manager for a local appliance firm.
FLA PETS 3ABC
J: Opened the insurance business, general insurance in 1956, and it
was some where around the Goldwater days that my actual involvement
other being interested in college and helping other people .get
elected. I worked in campus politics to the extent of being one of
the workers who made signs and did that type of thing. No extra
seeking or running for office myself.
W Uere you ever appointed to r student government office?
do
J: I was never appointed. I remember the varcity arty. The Varsity
Vary was defeated I remember what we callVthft ty n of Varsity
our won
party. I remember because o president varsity rty
b/JUMPIt)C OUT OF-
election night. jprdied an airplane over the '-(I-LL l1 7LD
prnnpgn jumping over the ghet- He had jumped
1t-> NOT
before the vice president k-ncr-ked and almost got himself hung up
0 FT
in the telephone wires, but then in the J-f Goldwater days, committees
W^ wdre seeklq v>V^
formed here locally ata^-pigo esist and trying to get
to the point of the National Convention mieTrittg-:7-,1-" 'oldwater to
the presidential candidacy in 1964. Prior to that we worked
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FLA PL-'. 3ABC
K)6T 1I
J: of course, in '60 for Proesident Nixon, but thatt-ste way we got
4PZT77AJ6 p'J T 6E DJFT D 4 UF
involved, get into Jeff Goldwatero meeting peoplee around the state
other people -- -a-- r-of---ur own locality.and uh,
How did you become invied? 'What lnds of things did you personally do?
J: 'ell, in the Goldwater Campaign, I started out being on a local committee.
HTer ^* Dolray cach appoint Goldwater and then, later, when
Congrosnman ramer and others got involved, I became the chairman of -i-
/_ for Goldwater in 1964 tnd thore worc two facts tht had to do
with the slate. I worked ao the chairman of the Goldwater slate aSe fee-
th --Ze0nqe slate Wl also said that they were Goldwatcr people andlt+ I -e
thtrt they were running as f ,no_ .: ter pcople core running
. a- and when the election is-ove with ion ., more seats
than the pl. ae-by far but we did get a lot of votes from it. The
people w1io took over then at that time then made myself and another
Jenndl onta Vd
fellow that lhn he was naimd Fo son, on-ofu,^myself cochairman, l
MAi t s u ,tlth hiii. Then it ,was after the '.4 election, i tallkt/,
about why don't you get intded in the Republican party ThI 1 a
and
wi$,utructurc the mechanic of it.
It was suggested that -- could r-i-eo for the
FLA PER3 3ABC
J: State committee- the next time the job uqs open. so I did run in 1966
with the State Committee and won that race. And then I ; went to
the
the state convention -in Tampa where we selected.chairman and ran
vice particular
for the district.chairman and got that chairman, got that4position.
Then, in '67, shortly thereafter, the special election,AI ran for
the Florida Hlouse of Representatives and was elected in MarchA4967.
I ran for roeehction for Florida House in '68 and atthat time didn't
have any Republican or Democrat opposition. a4-candidates outnumbered
m
the Detocr...ts two to one. Then, in 1970, I had to run again for the
state co'mitteeman's job. And didn't spend any of my money because
I was raving my money for the Sen:te race that I was going to be
involved in.V n again the state committeeman's job for four years.
I didn't run for district vice chairman because the chairman, the now
chairman,Tommy. 2homas, a- on.,y asked 4 to take a position
and ho --s ~eod where he hIs appointments. Hoe jT- .- in'. the
legal gon0A and legislative/an4 after -61appcinted me as
are counscoa -2//ofter that ;ent to the Nixon administration
and one and he resign' -th/ to committee. He resigned from
active/participation Resigned from the-ftipaktment of Gegsaw
FLA PERC 3ABC
nine months later i
J: Jun(. 1972 / I decided that I wanted to run for office again.
because
aa employee and run for the Gettrt House representative
November
again of '72, aid was reelectede /
*. OK. That's light. I think it was very impressive Thank-you. for providing
an insight into Republican politics in Florida CA4and d-lora
politics in the State in this period of time. I'd like to begin
because of what you said about your earlier party activities Begin
with Jeek-Goldwater, the Jack Goldwater movement. What period of time----
G. Herald Alexander was up in the primary leadership oO arty structures.
such as it was. What do you remember about the nan? How close were
you associated with him? And what kind of an effect did he have on people
who were working at this level? yeronally, I didn't have any contact
or knowledge other that what I was told and what I4had seen as a result
of his behind.sceneSmanipulation of the department.
-What have you seen? What did yhu see that made you somewhat?-----
J: Well, his handpicked chairmen% and-as .-.nf ampa area. And I
saw a party that you couldn't that when you read over the state committee
list, of the people involved, you found tfof them had grown up in those
jobs They were elected to them every forufour years
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FLA PERS 3ABC
J: time and time again. They didn't seek out people that were running
(,ltjt, (L.itA
for office local. :' wise or statewse. They were interested primarily
only in whether or not we had a Republican president or they were involved
in the campaign of Republican presidents for te benefits that they might
receive from Washington, but they couldn't relate nor could they even
could have successes
believe that they :in the State of Florida. And because of
their
sort o^AR defeatist attitude on the local and statewide basis
we were not developing grass root Republicanism in the 6tate. They were
not interested in going into precincts or going into counties and cities.-
And seeing te Republican Party come up from Grassroots. They wanted to
the office. es ^I :
come down from Washington tc few post L.-4fit and if you coula
a few judicial appointments and things of this nature. It seemed to
be the only thing that they cared for and in many instances some of these
their
people were only on the state committee because relatives were
were
already postmasters Qt I d If 4 A state committee positions
orthey were on the committee because it met every four years. Somebody
t the person
paid their way to le conventions hey could fote for whoeverspaid th eir
way told them to vote for them in the election.
I Do you have any personal contact with Mr. B~ya?
FLA PERS 3ABC
.,etdid some
J: Yes, I did meet Mr. 17yan and did have.conversations with him.
low FO* UL gentleman
And even though, I think that Byan was a p ty ingentleman
even A Bwrn was a pr t infine
a pretty nice man, someone you could enjoy having Ai a fam acquaintances
(6ra social w air, but his vision was too limited to even conceive p thPe.id be'
a Republican governor or Republican senators from the state ,nd the
majority of the Republicans in the House or even-the Senatecanf-even that's
-c become oj some importance nud 'ha1- /1 a-fact-upon what transpired and
a-'t policies o hat were set in the state. I don't think that he could see
court houses changing over and he could see thgade9fo becoming,
Republicans It was just to him .I don't think that he could vision he
i ^thing happening.
It wasn't Xthen so much that he might have been opposed to that4/btt-ahat"*
4Je. i^o IT ly
heAcouldn't A4 practical.speaking in his own terms?
J: I think so for himself. Now _GAlexander I Oon't think that
had4 ,rs.rvAt.iopn,-, ,
he wanted that. He -.' when we talked to different people,
(Z) G j*AlmXl dor's
who had run for office and had, dominance in the party. He -ever
\ t0Q*c want to hel vnin and to ret a check to you on A certain day.
1 'wan y ^* .
A final
dag d then the *heck would arrive after te the date for receiving
d\ -tlUt C(%tn4^W^U^^^
contributions xAd-somet imes even after election. I think that Frgton
use have one on his office 014S10
FLA PERS 3 ABC
cash h -eekit
J: but he didn't wh e ame in after the results of the
elections So he sent it hack and jstead of caching it, he just VI8Red it.
remind
to /him that G Alexander really wan't interested in seeing Republican
to toj fl7t //' ..
elected.o in 0ny i th- io.h. t
Obviously,
- You were upset with this kind of thing* -' you weren't alone
in feeling disconten te.d with the Republican Party "t fw wre-emoving.
-SE Who and how did the so-called Reforg group get together? What ~ p e^ )
Who as involved?
J: Well, my problem sar ed when locally we didn't have a young Republican
organization*, The one in the West Palm sv_ Beach area had
become pretty dormant. So we were invited to go to a meeting one night
in Boca Ratonad.t organize a yOung Republican group
- Who was going t organize it?
J: Tm $-at Delray Beach or BocaRaton % the present time d all I
know is a g attorney and he's the one who gade the call and I made
some calls and apeoplA ork with goGoldwater ho were some young
men and women in the area and we attended the meetings and
found out that we had more people there than they did and in thinking
about listening to hat this gentleman had to say about
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FLA PERS 3 ABC
J: what he wanted to acomplish and what he wanted to do, we sort of
caucus
had an informal #%fjd around the room and decided that instead of
their slate,
going with a I'd run for president and organizeA the chairman
and I'd control the organization as f ehai rather than this
gentleman who didn't have the confidence in hi itle so we had
an election in even though he called a meeting that was te last
time that we ever saw him.
K Can you ell me where the meeting id at?..
They were
J: It was held in Boca Raton Community Hospital, s tarting toben
:,hospital Boca Raton and had this building on the present site of the
hospital Someone allowed us to meet.there Z!t2 "il
V "- Can you date the meeting?
in
J: It was^1965.
Any idea of the montlat the time? of the year?
J:: I can't recall. I probably have it somewhere in A" records.Y-e*can
probably find it and give it toT but I can't remember exactlybeemea -
It .I remember hs. I recall that it was fterwpd that I was elected Y ~.ne
And the way that the organization works it was
And the way that the organization works, it was a turn ozf the
^ -4 eL1-
FIAPERS 3 ABC
J: baos&e unb then earelon the executive bo .rd of the state the
Young Repiblican federation.
This is what happened to o you? 4f /
J4I went to being chairman to tje next mmeetingA andat-he.district
meeting.~)itting around talking to :other young Republicans around
the state
\S- Where was that now?
J: It was in Gainsville.
11: And can you date that?
J: No. I thought it was in Gainesville, Florida but it was Ocala. It was
in Ocala. Right near Silver Springs. And that was in probably *
I can't remember what time of the year it was.
; It still would have been in '65?
1 t
J: Yeah, I believe i-t-wer
^ 16-5.)OK
J: AT t~at-meeting t& wre '.e k4afina Ia people who wre interested in
... t. interested ig,
S- OK no problem. (it
S-1d meet and
J: What we did at the meeting -7 talk., with other young Republicans
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FLA PERS 3ABC
around the state fact* Why have an
~,that we are concerned about theorganization?. Why work? Why have
to elect or to
an organization? Just, president ,try to get votes for the
Why not
president. try toget people elected to offices.d"bthe State
of Florida. taounty an+A tatc4 itself and discuss why
J 1' n 1 1n it / he
you hear a lot of ,1 ,i Browns, the do-nothings
status quo t ,, t \ ^ .
Republican organization an -hat i there should be some way
that we could change things to eeemingAmore active and become
committee.
activist as it were in getting young-people elected to the state
Getting people involved as chairman of the state committee. Actively
and seek
seek monies,,andidates for office, and oppose Derocrats everyplace that LV-C
w have- a chance and even in some placeswe didn't have a chance to U*t7 .
began
q- So some .ime in late 1965, this small group of young Republicans : the
n or did this come later
first, was it at this meeting. Was tere a plan for it.or was this still
an airing of dissent?
J: We started talking about it and some of us started having meeting
,Jp-tA -at- t
AndA say some of us -a very small numbers -L. .
Can you remember any of the people?
J: Bill Murphin,, up here in Hoke Sound Martin County, a good
friend of his and still is with him wherever Bill Murphi is today
Sh11
FLA PERS 3 C
J: named Jk Cary. You had Fred Hagin from the Orlando area. You had
Lou Frye from theAWinter Park area. You got a Bill Taylor from Jacksone--
ville area. You had a G+ad Griffin from Pinellas County. Bill S ch Bes '..
from the Fort Myers area. Willard or Bill Dover from Broward County ega
S Casi*ha from Dade County. And myself and a viung man named
S. exactly
(-H sZe which was involved at the time. I know.when it all fit
thethis
together as far as the time schedule, but to d young Republicans
needed money or we needed in order to do what we wanted to do.
The young Republicqns didn't have the money to-give*,)V
that organization so a young Republican Foundation type thing was done.
I' Who started hat?
J: It was deoe by the young Republicans Federation, but
it was pr At~by the people most the people I just mentioned.
This nucleus of people and the meeting was held .Maytag in Miami.
It was explained to her what needed to be done ari d hat hnr -nnn ti.nns
witih b war She was also interested in young Republicans
f /that
R/ /<44 when she thought.all these young men and women
that had come along could form the basis and foundation
of thtuture of the Republican Party.
FA PERS 3ABC
S- Did you personally attend? She had lunch with
J:I did not personally attend the meetings. several of them
I b i w where they had lunch.
I believe it was
in Dade County, Thqroutlined the plan that they have been
able to accomplish and take over,if you want to call it that,of the
her was
her
Republican Party. Andfinancing.I believe, the check that she gave
the bach was somewhere around $20,000.00. $20,000 that-e3uld-be used
to-
for salary and expenses. To split the state in two sections
and
and to assign one person to go talk to all the state committee people
in the northern part of the state, one in the southern part of the counties
we h
to explain to them what kind of Republican Party 6uld have
what could be accomplished if people on the state committee were
and
actively attempting to find canvass to raise money-to push the philosophy
und-zrornrdipis m ^-gC -7if
S- This meeting would have occurred sometime again in late 1965 or early
with Mar Maytago A \
1966, At this point and V times Bid G.AAlexander or Tomke.ab ey
Bi 'have any idea that you were doing this kind of thing?
6: Not until after they actually put the people in the.---- Up to
this particular time I don't believe that they had any knowledge of it.
that
They may have, but I don't believe so. And the two people,#g/ were
eventually /J"
hired to do the job were Hal Stayman and ChucLh
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FLA PERS 3ABC
K Who worked where?
J: Chuck w h)Bhf""-'m the north of the state. IHa -f man was
ar N from Ind ian a, I believe,
more nearly sort of> country boyand it was thought that he would
in the Western Panhandle
fit into the rural, country people of North Floridax, An that Hal
sort of it was
Stayman was.a city slicker. And figured that he could talk to
the people that were representing the state committee Dade County
and Palm Beach )' Ut -t-
and Broward County, and relate to then And, also in the more
^ & J C 1 then
populous and urban i-they-had AAchance. And.each one of them
went around and they would report back. teher we started to have
Orlando, \r~a-M4<,t
meetings in Miami, Broward County, and arPying
places and they would make.their calls. They would come back aid
report how these particular people felt. These people were willing
to go along with us in -- reform movement. These people
are not Xhese people are dedicated G. Harold Alexander
--and then we would see
particular CTt1 C U pu i
who we had in those Canvss, and then-the Republicans
itself just in the community hat could
4^ -ir the party Paagainst those people, dttil'theI e
.a chance to beat-4he election.
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FLA PERS 3ABC
-GoCtd we stop long enoughto see if we can't draw up some profiles
the
of.typical Republican united in support of G. Harold Alexander. faction?
and typical1Republican$who would have thought inerms of reform?
Were, for example, the Republicans in support of Aleander generally
older Republicans by age?
J: Yes.
i in terms of
- Were they generally wealthier Republicans economic living?
J: You had both of them that way. You had some in the southern part of
the state or central part of the state that had a good deal of money
or had had a comfortable living, but you had some in North Florida that
from what I know of them, didn't have ~, they were ;just old er
Republicans who had been the only Republican maybe in the Maybe they
had a brother or sister who that was a big Democrat And it seemed that
counties
there was some in North Florida where it was a good thing to have
your brother the big man the Democrat' c~ .id-be the big man Maybe the
only man in the Republican Party that happened tb-be on your side
Y1a have a door open that your buddy took care of going the other
direction. Some of them seemed to be that kind of people. I'm not
criticizing some of those who are still on there because some of these
people continued to t elected
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FLA PERS 3ABC
late
J: we were able to convince I think, over a period of timethat it
a future and
was lime to start being that way and start thinking about see
that AL this thing could be done either aAtwo party thing or
someday Republicanl.4A V
OK so after these two men went into the field and again have a series of
meetings. Was a formal plan set up ? A time saving organization?
this
Chart? How soon was going to occur and
for
J: It was all planned the '66 election because it only happened
U)
every four years and there was no way -. -e didn't want to wait
five years.. and five and a half years for one- oh-A eMed--
e t off the ground.
- Did anyone consider before the election' p)id anybody consider going
to G. Harold Alexander and just simply asking him to resign? Or was
that something that he just never uld have considered doing anyway?
J: Well, it wasn't a question of getting him to resign because
at this particular point he was not the chairman.
Fairfield Briow getting BPown out?
J: I think thIt- Fairfield Brw was talked to. I think that we sent,''
I can't remember whether it was Mipan Stayman, but we had several e I -
FLA PERS 3ABCD
J: talked-mau tier f-o ..hilo.. /nad see what his feelings were about
working with ideas we had instead They dame back with the same th ing
which wqs more or less
that I said earlier, the confusion that it was impossible
Y&^ TO vT a1r Y, P V-1 V_
V!- He was ty e j
J:
nd that G. Harold Alexander was impossible because if he couldn't
if he couldn't
run things ortcontrol things, he didn't want to be involved on the
basis that he was just a participant. He had to be a ka4 or
The one ,
he didn't want to be involved. Yhing we didn't do and nobody in the
group never talked about who the chairman would beior candidate for
our
chairman was ever discussed Almost to .great loss. We were out
checking around and talking to people and it finally got to a point
you know,
that people were sayin4."who are you suggesting?" You are saying that
,"-V ) Vt DJ group
we ought to get rid of G. Harold Alexander but who are you suggesting
8 somebody capable of leading the party to be the chairman? And they
would turn-back in and tell them that they- soeld-gt ti-n this kind of
problem 7 eL0 D
S saw Mrs. So and So wi4- Mr. So and So wh the -ter-
o(u\r candidate. we ae going to get? ,We were not calling ourselves VA 4
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FLA PERS 3ABC
J: We were not calling ourselves we were just interested people,
_.tvvW'^ K.f // J,
ife' Nap group had the best name that we ever had for ourselves, )Mt '
and
We had met in Port St. Lucie, I believe, discussed the problems
of not having a charter. Se-we didn't settle it ye"t We later met in
Orlando, north of Orlando and at that particular point in time we selected
Bill Murphin to e the chairman.
K: How did he become the choice?
J: He was the one man who said that he could take the time from his business/
and still be able to survive. 1e ran for chairman and got elected
chairman. Lu Frye was in the..Senator Gurney's law partner at the time.
And iwe-had been pretty well told that -he- he got directly involved in
trying to throw somebody out or to gt involved as the chairman,
t might be bad for his law practice. It might be bad Acr income btar-
1a oAiTr" a- ) Ae-Aa0. avYCtI%-I
people. 1 was involved in eae insurance business and didn'- see how
I could take time out to travel around the state to talk to all these
people. And then, if I got elected, I didn't have enough time to get e
the arty ta do the job. And we thought that he wouldn't be a one-man
chairman. There would be enough -mae o-asethim in policies and
decisions and whatever you got.
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FLA PERS 3 ABC
J; And)any one of-us elected we might be'taken offthe rollbecause the
J nof'.pW.. m 0H4'1' C 4^ -^^
rest of the group more or less 's-pi rhbtied"to do anything to assist ",
A- campai gn xto make contributions for traveling around the state to t
raise money-to pay for the campaign. 'Then, if elected and after elected
to hnw1*ktime to beto o lre ".art,' -2r, t job .And we felt that
he -:ulhli't be a one man chairman that here would be enough men to as-.ist
him in policies and decisions and whatever you got. hesF any ne of us
that was selected would not be taking the job on his own /he rest of
the group would more or leads committed to do anything that they could.
to asist in the campaigning to make contributions toward traveling
to raise money -T-\_
around the state and.to pay for the campaign,a-d if elected and after
elected, to give of their time to attend meetings. 7o meet before the
regular meeting if necessary aed- to put together agendas and-e -
draft ideas to be presented to committee that is financing plans
enlistment '
or whether it was candidate selection or,. whatever And so he
-cr-
was the one who said I think that-they sent Hal Stayman out of the
room because he was being paid and then the rest of us voted on who
we wanted. e -9 \wado i consensus of bill Murphin.
id he want the job?
FIA PERS 3ABC
J: He wanted the jb. He was bashfull about it. He was a very bashful
person. He didn't like to te much publicly and hadever done any
public speaking d-maybe never got in front of a group to
I: w &- about accepting tae
speak before. And he had real serious... 'e was hesitant?
t you're
the nomination of theetudent group saying going to be the man Ot't to
to go out and say you're running for chairman, and it scared him k
4-i
and rightly so It would scare .anybodg. particularly someone ho-
wasn't that outgoing, pot usejto being out in front of the public.
Having meetings aiet later n; i on some oeneessione to go over
with them- \
parliamentary prodecures and teach them some of t1e basics that
would be necessary In fact, when he got elected, we had to
stop the meeting and take him out in another room and work with him, 7 -
take him back in and let him s-t beauge He was dumbfounded and
speechless it wae embarrassing,when-we stopped it all, and took him
out to get it-all put together. We came back in and he did pretty good.
It was quite some time before he was able to give a speech 0
#e'd take one foot and hide it behind the other. He was a great guy.
but we thrust something on him that wasn't his cup of tea at the time.
He later grew into it real easily.
20
FLA PERS 5 ABC
- I think that it is understandable in front of anybody. I wouldn't worry about it,
M -) UI N Qe --p 6->
-o te sdte executive committee convention is that what yeure-ippygL
You
J: Well,,first have to have the state you have to have the electionsbecause Du -
counties. RJ
people are elected in their various The state committe~tnagem
At*d sa
emberiwere elected by the Republicans in their particular areas. Anee we
that were of this group.
ran. I ran here and others ran in other parts of the state, Bill Murphin
different ones because you even
and -around the statesto get elected tobe considered a candidate for
anything. And you certainly couldn't take over unless you got enough votes.
existing C
So with the people who were .on the committee who were running for
that were pe m e to
re-electior, along with the people we were able to run as candidates,
that committed to us,
either as men or women w1T-were .we were able to come up
with a large number of the hundred and eeme possible1 two people of each
that
of the sixty-seven counties* and the only competition we had at the
convention didn't turn out to be Thom Fairfield Byrfrttbecause by
the time our work was done, another group back;in Charles Holly
area I -
over in Pinellas. got their work done he ended up with just a handlfull
of people theirr that were in G., Alexander's corner And in the corner
of Thom Fairfield "k V-')
When
K- and where was the actual convention held?
K- A
FLA PERS 3 ABC
J: It took place in Tampa June 1966.
And at this meeting, how did the.. how much preliminary work was there
wa-the meeting began and voting take place? Were they unusual
that
incidences-?
We that
J: used the same method we used in our young Republican Federations and
SamongD the people,who they were, al-
our clubs And that we made up a chart :: we continued to meet with
them because, of course,
and caucus with and to keep our accountV a in political
delegate of any type
organizations such as the Convention and when you have a
limited number of people who can vote, it's much easier handling
got lo-tc( {
them-than running for public office. As long as you people sitting loskiJi-
don't '!.! got o P
babyjsitting and making sure that they ..change w e- committee4 J
Vol ou 6 b ,t ables7
we-hae our question' :we had the ones that were definite for somebody
elsepn.d knowing the caucus is around and I guess it wqs the Friday night
before the Saturday vote took place, it became evident that -by-4het.imn
Fairfield ry was no longer a threat w 1hi. they wese.
this group come from?
Who was back1in .Charles Holl and where did
J: Pinellas County and this would be some of Cramers people around the state.
They were outside of Pinellas County, hey were basically friends of the
FLA PERS 3ABC
Cramers. proupj
Y- Were they a group that was backiin Charles Holll to oppose your
Or were they back-in Charles Holl to oppose Drr Fairfield 3ry5Ht?
f you understand the meaning of the question.
J: A little bit of both. I think primarily they didn't think that we were
going to gt enough votes to wrestle control away from G.H Alexander
because we were for the most part in their minds considered to
g
be people without any political experience backround,and knowledge
of
how these things work and so how could we expect to pull off
this particular victory. VWe felt that maybe some of them were oldeL
Republicans that were fed up with G. L. Alexander and Thom Fairfield
Bryant. They thought that they were better able to handle it.
nd if elected, M u wt ''..
they were better able to handle it than me so they
were.sort of wanting to get rid of G.~. AlexanderI and-at the same time
they didn't trust our control and didn't trust whether or not
that C0 r
we could wrestle with control, / but we made a deal dung the night
/ -> a 4 C r fliA -r5.-(( ^
ith G.4c Alexander's people and ended up but it was enough.
whether D 6J^ T
It became meaningful with not knowing some of your doter1e would
go to Holly or not, but we agreed and to let Harry *-ScIooley from over
he
in Lee County take a position wanted district vice chariman, \"
thae I had already spoken for that.
I think that they made him the assistant secretary.
23
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: TIey put him on the executive board,and we did something with a
of them,
couple of othersan~d-so they dislike- the G.H Alexander group
disliked the Bill Cramer group and the Holly group weatk&Ut dislikel-thpEs
go when they saw that they were out of it, they came with us. So
their sup- which
we were able to have /port) ^more or less just closed out
the Cramer people totally. We were in and we were going to win.
the
-ad the balance of the night and next morning, all we did was make sure
e
that our ppple Gamn with us and talked with us on and stayed away from
being talked into you know, leaving the fold. And we won on the
first ballot. we-tried to have a closed I believe somebody
ballot. (C_ -L-
suggested a closed We-u. I have a philosophy closed ballot andO you
going to lose we'll
are going to lose if you think that you are going to lose we'll
takl-c -yu 'U1- tLh d make you say it aloud. ant ye figured 6-
etr people werecommitted to this-and the only way to keep the
commitment was to have them vote out loud-and stand up and say2 KO i OW
we-know ow-hAe vote for Bill Murphin. I 'vote for this one,and once
we vJE \ any
got Bill Murphin, the rest of the slate ran totally, without.opposition
-- the opposition* just stopped.
- Yeah. t
J: Once the chairman was cracked, we got every other position,that-we--ptl-u
24
FLA PERS 3 ABC
C Lt ^ Then we caucused
J: nominations t Bar bang, bang, they went. .and the people
in it. said that they were running for district vice chairman such
even
as myself, and others even if they ,.if that caucus had a lot of the
other people in it, they gould go ahead and say, yeah, he's the one
who got it,e*euseme,. the people that he wants in it, arfs e
have-Uto- the main offices were electedrwithout.any flaws whatsoever.
And so the reform of the Republican Party was complete.a-t that tim
J: was complete at that time.
S-OK .
J: Then we had a piece of luck because what happen in the upcoming
elections r sort of worked in wih our plans. AA-J O-
r- In what way?
J: Well, of course, we didn't have any idea when we took over the Republican
Pary of any success for many years to come. de a work at it
(k 'B with
o-start building. ihen, Robert King High being selected by the
Democrats he guy in the green report coat flying back in from Paris
Claude -A.
ae.^Kirk coming before our young Republicans he-m ayor up in
Gainesville I get Gainesville right here in (lorida)and he came in
25
----------------------------------------_ _ -- ---- _------_ _
FLA PERS 3ABC
SI
J: at the last minute and he was fresh off the plans and flew all the
way back from Paris just to be with ho-au-tocade. and 'I want
to run for governor." "I'deab+ want to be your governor." He sort of
just totally swept the convention. He just became the other people
who were there talking about running about governor He just
forgot-i v -
V- Who were the other people?
J: What was the man from Brevard County?
T from
And-thenw-there was Paul Myers Fort Myers.
(N- That's OK.
J: I can't rem ember the fellow who ran. He was a nio County Commissioner
V, my
from Brevard County, but he was not gedp material in our opinion.
The other man came to the meeting to tell us why he
thought that he ought to be governor with Paul Myers, ?he mayor at that
time wae-Fort Myers. and-.ut the governor Governor Kirk just had
that they Y
such personality enthused him so much, that the Young RepublicansGroup0-
who-was the base of the reform really, the ones that were involved in the
reform and all the rest e-tfhet-.that were in it were the ones that controlled
26
FLA PERS 3 ABC
J: *y{'. i f A tL' ,T ley a
Ti Ui I465 4a.-iV Ia M a,-
This was the man they wanted,-a they thought that should take the party's
banner and lead them on to victoryand it worked out tft*-h a.y-actually
from the standpoint that as they do in so many elections people don't
vote 6 "vote the
for A they against somebody, A negative vote went to minority
party Vf tAO( d
.eah. Claude Kirk was o.ri ,ns far an rh.t -ge6,
,f course, that gave us the ability to .raise money easi, to solicit
for having
funds, and get the necessary monies htaff offices, establish the
Republican Party as oppoentt c i1an'e '
1- Right. Let's go back to the campaign/ and to the AdmiraL Governor
Kirk, coming into the office C( \he campaign itself)I don't want to
skip over that. First of all, what role did you play personallyy ?
Yor
Did you campaign actively thrwugmF-7Governor Kirk in your capacity
as Republican ----?
M i o~cc~ I when
J: I- I v-ary uc& d Claude Kirk in 19 4 e was running for United
State Senator. And I actively campaigned for him in 1964-whf I was
at f 'i any Republican
working for Barry Goldwater. because I iuld- happlwork for
Ie maueltao. -running for office Even if I didn't think that he had
a chance to win. because I thought he all-had-a chance to serve other
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: Republicans n B~42hey-h I that this man got this many votes, /t3z?
have 'V J.
he ought to run because things.changed got more int Peested I' 4
Republicans to keep him en couraging people to step out and run for
At ;/ 4 6-e -o r
political office. United States Senate or Congress) Sktate legislature
\44 r he'd 'Lt a
or lycal office. d ghman-t: campaign, and
-auL o t egd- bu4-didn't seem to bother him.
h- What were his a-t/u~'- r for going to the young Republicans and saying
"I want to run." What did he say?
J: Well, he came here more or less talking about the standpoint ;that he had
run for United States Senate against the top Democrat in the State of Florida.
That he had taken on "he SpeonTi Holland who was the most dmrogetve of
all the Democrats and the strongest of all of them. And he had got
X number of votes He made a good showing in spite of his defeat.
That he had shown his interest, he had shown his ability to involve himself
in statewide ampaign.and he talked about his dream) for America his
dream for Florida and uh
- Did he have any specific issues at this period of time? Things like the
war on crime,
J: No, he never
4-itan- concern?
28
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: No at that particular time Claude Kirk didn't outline' provide us
with -his that he would
to my knowledgeany specipicsc n issues involve himself at all.
Did anybody think that maybe that a 4 k k:"er- --- M'~aE
have ed
to ask him for specific issues?
J: No, that never came up because I don't really believe that he talked
about being conservative. He talked about the suppbot for Goldwater /~
support for conservative people. s/- ".' /
K- Was it a one issue campaign against 0obert-PR-HIrt?
J: NO.
.- Conservatism and liberalism?
J: Yodre talking about what he had told us at the time. Heater in his
he r
campaign went on about two different issues that he' bougI up. and one
people's
thing was taxes were increasing steadily and he ran in the no new
tA-tU,-q ovv-,, -, "A thing,
tax basis,and your-home-is-your-castleconsidering at that time that there
about
was a lot of discussion& /ou couldn't sell your house to who you wanted
You couldn't buy **wr house here. ,&~( <( tt
to. You couldn't do that, and-Claude Kirk would just take-a-few-things
and he would stick to them day in and day out. And let the other man talk
themselves into problems, because the other candidate, Robert King High,
*iwa involved in this issue and thab-issue and got involved in so many issues
29
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: that he was bound to make 50 ,mad every time he mentioned something.
because he had a wide range of things that he wanted to discuss. So Claude
Kirk talked about dreams, he talked about the state. He could be and
about how ^ -
ought to be under Republican conservative leadership, ^Ae
could hold the line good pky policies and so forth.
enthusiastic?
J- When you started te campaign, were you, were young Republicans, were you
personally enthusiastic about his chances?
J: Yes, ,tA
Right from the beginning?
When he 7.d -*fesw
J: Right from the start. into Gainesville and we heard him, we
-F "and .
said ~thr anybody can do it, this man can do it., I didn't know he said
that. I didn't really feel it deep down inside.
That' s really what I wanted to know.
J: Deep down inside I felt you know, we haven't done it before when we made
good candidates and there's just too many other people on the statewide
basis. 7oo badwe outnumber through the statewide.thiang, but then as
the campaign started to velop and I started to sense the way people
feel in this state about somebody from Dade County1
,v\v, ovve
wo the almost total distrust that the rest of the state outside
30
FLA PERS 3ABC
\as
J: starting in Broward County N toward Dade County. And to fnd that
they had selected a candidate from Dade County over all these other s
'J- V r --e-,5
and-4-the in the primary that they had had-4dff4ert eea in their primary
where they had made accusations/and they had more or less destroyed
their own candidate in the process of nominating. The people in North
Florida were totally just ,absolutely) so for the first time we could
see the people who voted Democrat year after year after year. and only
would change for a Republican president)and they were ready to change.
good ^to us.
The Democrats did another.thing\ They had decided that one of these
days the way the Republican candidates were winning the presidency in
Florida that if they weren't careful, a Republican
candidate for governor was going to sua in on the shi-t-tails of
some Republican president. So they went to Tallahassee andas they are
ed
apt to do, they passea law to what they think is going to be their
salvation. They usually work just the opposite. They passed a law
and said they were going to diange the gubernatorial etion to te off
year. And to change it to the off year, you get the people out to vote
only those who are only interested in campaign. And so the people who
were really anti- can get in the smaller vote election ~L-L
31
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: and you don't have president involved and all these other things,
and it worked to our advantageV to have an off election year.
So the first time that we had an off election year, the thing hat
we-feared would happen in the election year presidenthappened to them.
They lost the governorship. They also, of course, they have-
viaa running for office,
a law of not being able to change parties.
They changed that, but they put that in to keep
Democrats from changing to Republicans, and-hat wo\aha-wer against -
presden@-Pfefrm at that particular timeg ut you could seec 9-'
catch on. You could see the fire that he had built You could
could
see his crowds getting larger. You find people on the streets talking
about him, getting more enthusiastic. The calling of the little man.
in a ,pE~
Stop in the filling station or-drug store and say, you know, we *have
a guy named Claude Kirk running for governor You bet you haw-and
He's my kind of man.
I'm voting for him., I like what he is saying.
T9r That's when I ga et.ihe-h-ut who n-a- n really had a
chance .And I predicted and said that he would win it later way
before the election took place. I told people that I had become
a believer an- he could and was and that he was going to be the next
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: governor. And at that time, we just sort of developed a winning
positive attitude. That we were still nervous about it.
- Governor Kirk before he became governor, sa gfor the United States
I personally don't know, but trom
Senate. Now apart from those two things ,
he didn't ,
from all that I have ever read, hve ai vast amount
pride ir in these two a-^-t-
of government experience or political experience.you know in running
a
campaigns or certainly running c- government, being governmental participant.
Did this bother you and other members of the Republican Party?
Did it bother the governor? Was their some program designed to provide
him with.. Was there some concern in this area/L E i// experience?
J: Until we knew that he was going to win, we weren't concerned.
about
We weren't concerned his lack of party ba round because
we felt that)-fer number one, that as far as the organization goes,
his life had been spent more or less as a promoter getting g people
together and getting something accomplished.other than
insurance cola tg and that type of thing. We felt that he would
have to lean upon us and their was nothing wrong with that. That if
he had to cme to us wit4 political advice, that we were the ones
involved in the party structure2
7
FLA PERS 3ABC
it to
J: Thatthat would be a good th ing. That we could teach.him
the way we wanted it taught and he would be o~t- governor so to speak.
but we didn't think enough of him to go with him and sit down and
say, "when you get in, are you going to be a good party man?
Are you going to sit down and council with us as far as appointments
and things of that go. And get it settled. way ahead of time.
b
Primarily, I think, because at the time we didn't think that he was
going to win to start off with even though we were enthusiastic
about him as a candidate. When it became evident that he was going
to win, he did -4t fati become the nominee, in fact, of the party,
We became concerned about his lack of knowledge about state government.
But he took Don Reed/and Skipa 4 And they took him into
hothl rooms around the state Ad they sat down with them and they
discussed emtel y-fr- I ta c the make-up of itT he state agencies
involved7 ,/he cabinet system and the people involved in those particular
offices. I think that at that particular point and-time, he went
-irrt-e other-state capital for the first time in his life. Where-
actually
he.walked through te estte capital and saw the first floor of it and
ett .to-te. vnl tI. v l"that's the governor's office,
34
FIA PERS 3ABC
J: that's your secretary of State's office,c'
There's your commissioner of Education." and- then they then discussed,
as I understand
what those job's" sponsibiities were. To find out what the legislative
branch was and where it was and how it fit into the entire picture3
the scheme of things. He was taught these things and sort of a
pae-p~ot-because of his extremely fine memory and intelligence,
it Because -f
e picked.up I think, rather fast. Being a promoter is something like
anyways
being a politician, I guess and he was sort of natural
for this. As quick as he could, maybe learn so fast that he-4ould
SA-, We
it was ery easy. regretted later) )very much so that we didn't
teach him more about the Republican Party and theprotocol to follow
in the sytm and the system to follow as far as securing appointees -^V r c
to work with him and to work in the various appointments/ that come
under the -re4i-of the governor's office.
K- This is a very important question that we want to get to. As .we will
r
talk about later. The split that occured between party end-regulars. O
Governor Kirk wae-in-h t ruaipng but in this period of time)late in
OL6 \V3a4 aa- ^
the elections, it, fairly clear that he ha excellent chance to in.L
fBewas gcdg into office. At this point an- time, were there members of
the party who were concerned who his political advisors are going to bey
35
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: Well, when we those of us in our group in. allahaa e and Bill
Murphin was thB our leader and our chairman, we went with Murphin
)f/ -t, tLHr j -I e k /011 .0
and we. discussed the fact with hia Who ae-U7yo- going to
)stop
select as his top administrative aidebandpeople in the governor's
office. How close is he going to work with the Republican Party
itself and we sent Murph)and others in to talk with him. I don't
know who else went with Murphin, but Murphin did. Now this is
Yh \piM -L 1
Ahe thing that I can explain in more detail later. aver yime we
lot. if
sent him to see the governor, he'd come back washed. I mean.we
sent him for something specific, the governor always won and Murphin
always lost, but that was just the two men though. The governor
WatJd a-ed atn-aggressive and Murphin was, I guess, in that areaV but
/e were concerned who he was going to appoint as -preaidet advisor
how well / was he going to work in relationship to the party, not
only for appointing. the various agencies but from fund raising and
*\
that a -A
things of this nature # u can use a governor's office for, For-
his political party1 A ut we suggested to him to use somebody older
more
and~pnowledgeable experiencing government)-aa- unfortunately,
because of I his contact with the- tc
37
FLA PERS 3ABC
J; .a his close involvement with Skip aand
teaching him some of the things,because k was a member of the
legislature and he would naturally lean to these elected officials
to
who already there and.know more about government L than those of
44 4- A4c4 e It was through
us who were fiw*g- party mechanics. ,H'is suggestionmthat had a
greater bearing on how the governor selected his aides. Skip was a
young man and the people he had around him were younger and he
suggested some of his young associates and eemn uf ut hi lvb
assoatgsien~and-some of his financial backers peopleT to be in the
governor's office. And then that particular individual more or less
brought in the others to-interview5thregr the governor.
And ended up with some young men that were aggressive in the business
world, but who had no background or experience in government whatsoever.
And it's my feeling that the governorwthr tenure in office and his
\cK o %-eF C00o-D ( ev- AA 0
continuation op~o nite -we- greatly enhanced ft he get selected
for his personal advisors some other people other than he did --some
older people some more experienced people, either Republican or
Democrat whichh is eliminating the difference. Somebody who understood
how the party works, how it relates to the elected office itself.
38
FLA PERS 3ABC
J; How they compliment one another.
n rI^ though KQ *? 5
" Sereally sounds as -'~'s almost too stresteag working, that
here was a man who was non-party in terms of his own background
and experienceand both the party and he lack the experience
of having the governor's chair. That these were not necessarily
the mme stresses, but they were two courses seemingly operating on
both the party and both the man. And eventuallyof course, the party
came to a I.A-
and the man -,a very vicious kind of split in the party sense
of that.-- in nm f th-btzsitri'en What happened from 1966 to 1972
fn your view?
J: Well, in the first place, we were to -6 T T .7evpnd a-e-4maz.
"V,. 0.t 0 'ou S o
successful. IF-was never planned to elect legae4es- in '66.
that
We never planned to be^successful so quicklyI without getting the
structure built) and getting the background and experience for those
of us whe-were just becoming involved. so a were thrust into a
position where first/we elected e governor. e-asstill
p =a t 4o work out a relationship with the governor between the
party and who he was going to have 'as his advisor, hen the legislature
was thrown out,so we were then thrown into a special election.
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: We got notified by the party chairman abeft the legislatveoffice!-
-e~atr the governor's office that here's your chance for more people
swing
to come in because the Republican is on. So we had to put
down some of our work/ an- organize the party to run for office
Some of the people that would have spent probably .y years in the
party machin..ery itself pi0t-t;b Rntogether and putting them into
shaped left that to run for office.
SPeople 'like VLOtdh '
that
J: Peple-Ik- myself,.argard,and others w"-ran for office, Ad- hadn't
fjo of e ., .~IA- t eet was created in
plan' to mn for office whatsoever-tbut-as -nt- --- eattin Palm Beach
County. I was the only person that had any county-wide exposure er VuVKi
c70r that
medical office so it was natural.since I had some name identification 4~C
it would be easier to-get elected in special elections than someone else.
FJ to'ukof
And Chuck Eargard had been around the state made some contacts -whA-+rhin
with the state committee people so he had some acquaintance and some
knowledge of how it works and how you get Qee- what you have to dr.
And so we had the special election and we were successful in increasing
the number of Republicans and-how some Democrats only got to spend from
November to March and they were out of office. I think hat-we added
40
FLA PERS 3ABC
~~< o his issue advisors were going to be? Were the people in the
party now becoming concerned about the practical side of this man
And
who was going to become governor? ,Xas there some discussions
with the governor about who his own closest political advisor should
be? L-A-c A
SD His own
-_.- I understand that here were some of the problems ,staff may have
had something to db with dividing him from the party Later. At this
point and time,
TAPE II
t was becoming clear. It became clear late in the campaign that he had
an excellent chance of winning and, of course, he did become, he did win
the election. He was going to be the governor. Wasn! there any concern
at this time about his closest staff, on the part of the party. Was their
any conversation with the governor as to who e should appoint, how he
should appoint his closest greiupf-advisors not the people
who are going to run the various departments, but the people who were
going to help him shape the issues Aid help him shape his politics
7
for the next four or eight years.
36
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: about eleven more Republicans in the special election that we didn't
have in the '66 election because of the ew-new freshmen. Something
z he 6
of that naturepIbut we-thezn problems that then started developing -&
the governor was the person that could raise money for the party,
getting back to the party end of it. And by having either dinners or
speeches or cocktail parties' we found that you could put on a cocktail
party and say Come to the cocktail party and give $100 to Republican
Party and meet the governor and talk with him and shake his hand.
Of course, the governor had expenses beyond what the state payed him.
And this is something that has been changed under the in na
goverrnie-i but it-e-time Governor Kirk expenses were still there
for the inaugeration because you just didn't ou had no monies
to
to make the changeover. The party had to raise money finance
4c4 AitjX
setting up new offices in Tallahassee and &tat bringing people
in there --zhired is personal staff and things of this nature.
because the legislature provided no funds for the orderly transition
because in the past it was never needed,and from one Democrat to
the next-, they shaking hands and bringing them in, Use their offices
41
FLA PERS 3 ABC
J: but it was the first time inodern History
.... when we had -t change from one party to
another as far as the governor goes. The i augral ball -there
were no funds. Yet you had all these expenses and all these monies
that had to be spent, but most state funds were available for that
type of purpose. We tried through the legislature after
Sgot elected in '67 to get the legislature to pass a lawsto provide
some funds to pay some bills that were still .outstanding, but, of course,
time
with being very partisan at that particular point in ) why- it
that
was impossibleand later the very Republicans who supported
us, supported Governor Askew. because they thought that it was
right then bt it was right now a I would have done the same th ing
if I had been there onthand so forth- but ~r the governor
set up advisory committee around the state as he was accustomed to doing.
I startede-fS on his advisory committee while on the state committee
and after then-was elected special aide here in Palm Beach County.
- Can we stop long enough to explore this advi ory committee? hat were
the purposes of it?
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: The purposes of it wae. to find out what positions and wk4 appointments
were open and were needed to be made by the governor. 2-et out
what jobs would if vacancies created in state jobs, what jobs would be
da I l~i a 3y 's office.
appointed if-tha -tould be handled through the governor* And then, to
find people and to talk to people interested in state employment,
interested in appointments to various boards Things that wan4--tLbe
of + 4'r4-v
contlill-c the governor'to teke applications from them Xo have several
meetings where we ih- oOALs /5,$
looked at applications of people hadmbeen as judges
and-
Judge McTyre retires that, appointment filled We evse-- keep a list O
prospective people for judgeships, eleeted prospective people
I F
on board, and-somebody said that they were interested in the Board of
Regentsappointment came open, wanted tcbon the board of pharmacy
or whatever it might be. We had these applications and interviewed
4vv-- uw^a $,,
the people.we talked to and found that motivation iwle what their
background was, if they had any problems that would surface
ed, when
in case anything happen.and thefAthe governor's office .put
out a list and the part chairman wer-posted that time. Of course, 7 ith it
these are the appointments that are going to be made in the middle of
October or the of January or February We would send forth
45
FIAPERS 3 ABC
J: recommendations that we had in Palm Beach County that we think fit
the billeand ye didn't get very many appointments. We got some but
heard from others,
not very many. And I agree with what I've And
I am always amazed at the quality of people that the governor did appoint to
lb positions that he had the responsibility eesArhe. Not the ones
that he surrounded himself with butpeople that he appointed hwe
were .outstanding in my opinion. He made some of the finest appointments
O-->- -l having
and I think that this is because The-did his background and.surrounded
himself in a corporate structure with people w-h get the job done.
That he had the capacity of talking to a mn and interviewing a man
and looking at his past record/and deciding whether that man could
do the job. He wanted to look good. And he --wanted to look good
agency agency,
because of the job that was being done in this or that A He didn't
to get a lot of
want.criticism. So I never had any quarrel about his appointments. He
4: -Ui4 1-He didn't care yh
was not baduwEd a bit about what party he belonged to. He didn't seek
out and say well I only want a Republican because he wanted the best man
he said for he job and if that happened to be a Democrat, he wanted his
name brought up to 4t. And not nearly as partisan as he ie accused
aesasBdof partisan appointment. You. couldn't even compare what I have
seen before 44
FLA PERS 3ABC
6;DVO M ^' INIOIM
J: and what I have seen with the present eteta ere They ae--bote- totally
jR\ t^ Only occasionally do you ever hear ofa Republican getting
appointed, but in Kirk's administration there were a great number
of them. Of course, he probably felt he was elected by a majority <
the majority of so tat
people of Florida and .people were .Democrats,.he had just as
much responsibility to appoint Democrats as he did Republicans. tluk
One of the problems with our party associa s-tge4er was that he
never did feel that we were the ones that really elected him
to office. We thought that he got elected because eh Demo crats
ww e working the-campaign. great number of people came up to- a
Democrats working for Claude Kirk and they would,,teven if they were I '
Democrat machine they would come out publiciay saying ttht they
were against Robert King High and-thae they were Claude Kirk. >
r
prganjations were built up outside the Republican organization
that he looked to as being just as a real part of his electionand
more or less / you know
then he developed p the idea with his ego that I did it 'And he
didn't do anything bu-t me. This is what I'm doing for you. and I'm
the one who can walk into a cocktail party and raise for the party
$50,000.00. He couldn't do it without me. And you wouldn't even be
45
FLA PERS 3ABC
right
J: the party you are.now. You wouldn't have the people in the legislature.
You wouldn't have all these things. This is what I've done for you.
And instead of seeing that there was an organization put together and
e, 0/->< d,9d
there was an awful lot work pre inctwise or fundraising wise, door-to-
door talking about this man this Qaude Kirk hbut he didn't see that
because of-the big picture, he4age. around giving the speeches and
canvaee4ng throughout the state and I don't th.nk that he ever
a sense of o0t _Z4
developed appreciation of what it takes, some-of-
the -philfe phi- and county level to get someone elect jed
to any office, go tuat-not ever having been involved in titis-
per a n" I9,
e pavt~e \ he didn't realize the significance of it. And he just
it g"
thought th is all his own doings. And that we should be grateful
and thankful to him, that he rcertainlyhad no reason to be so
grateful and thankful to usay ut he did have tremendous expenses. He
liked to move around fast. He liked to go places, salary and
expenses were not enough to cover it.the plane he decided to lease
was very expensive aid so we set up ways where the party would raise
money with his help, but then we could pay expenses, A.plane leases,
and things of that nature. And if I remember certain
46
FLA PERS 3ABC
J:
Night,
our very first problems came up and and he would charge .- -- things
bills
to hotels.and we'd get a bill at Republican headquarters saying that they
owed 1500 dollars and tarke-e ta ther 0, . C>0-V- -
he
Claude Kirk~would lease an airplane and fly all over the country and
we'd get these tremendous bills and we tried our best to pay them
*-0 ke.- (a-
and we-kept having dinners and pP Ige affairs with him again being the
one was basically responsible for raising money, but he wanted to
spend it all, that didn't leave any for the staff and the structure that
we had. ,ried to talk to him about slowing down and taking it easy
and not letting his staff let up these I-'." bills and-wha.-really
happened n0 e
I- This was the frictionpi4 you think that started -ecauee
J: between the parties.
Representing the party in iis talk, I s ewas Bill Murphin.
J: Bill Murphin7 was the one we would send,even- o bd aqsa come out and
and we'd say go in there and tell them that we want to get this done
and that done. He came back ith his tail between
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: his legs. and the governor had whipped him again .r had won him
over. Most of the time the governor would put his arm around and say,
"you know, what are you worrying about, boy?" I'm taking care of you
Y0VV got
aren't I? I -oti a nice office et here and I'm putting on these
speeches and the party is becoming benefactor of fifty per cent of the
little
proceeds, at least, andif I spent a more than fifty once in
awhile, you still have more than you had before, more than
dreamed to get \\ Ah Lt r
you had before. And he.would more or less convince eoth,
you know, I am a lucky guy to-come back He'd say, "I guess
I'm lucky because the governor just explained it to me. And he was just
that kind of a man. o~ q\l A ''\
K- OK. After 1967, you moved into the legislature and much of the friction
1967
from .to 1970 Governor Kirk's experience with Republicans occurred in
the legislature. What were some of the specific issues?
J: Well, to start off with, there was no problems with the governor and
totally
the legislature. Even ... if we didn't .agree with him,
one hundred percent. kL COA
we went along with him right down the line Wei4h
'Ive thirty-nine votes on any issue that he was for or against.
48
FLA PERS 3ABC
us
J: Either way thna he wanted to go, and when the b'(O VUtoo
Vu Ci k II one button went off in the house, be it thirty-
ons
nine red butt,- or thirty-nine green buttons and no questions asked. One in
awhile some of us might have some personal the
in iny was the governor right i being for this issue or against
that issue tut we felt that it was important that we show that we were
Uivl^ owv- g-o04c-e -
indeed -enf&ring that legislature and that we could be molded together
with a solid force, and tha we were. Tha4 he came up with
the iraugeral ball, the in augfral spee ch )and hni s things like War
on Crime. He mentioned a new Constitution for the State of Florida.
^l
and-we ex ~sted under a system of sheriffs that were all-powerful.
The Sheriffs Association that was like a fraternity of crooks, so nobody
.-=_
was going to go in and investigate a sheriff that was accused of being
dishonest because the associationn would have to agree that such an
investigation would be made. 4nd it was evident and it had been evident
for some time that the state law enforcement could upon being notified that
some dishonesty is going on in the particular county, go in there and
make an investigation because things et be changed. And they said
mak a ivetia~jg eweti
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: no, they weren't going to do it. They couldn't have a law
enforcement agency and so he'd use what was considered as sort of
He said tha. if .p
an unathodox thing. you won't give me the funds, Xou won't give me
e start
the people to fight crime in this state5 I'll a citizens war
on crime.
- Do you know where he got the idea for it? Or do you think thet he
conceived it himself? Do you have any specific knowledge?
J: I don't have specific idea but I almoktwould in my mind
woeud think that the evidence& maybe some of the people he talked to
around the state said, you know, maybe we ought to get a citizens'
group like we did in the old days, but7 4t<~ .P-, d c ,
but the idea, I think, basically fe-that- 'te never heard
Cvc t ^-cr
anybody take pricdenme except the governor. ~HesY. It was a shock
to me I wasn't sure I liked it much. I'm not sure I did like it-
hdW-
but I do believe that there are times when-those in politics and those
in political office have-come with itfnman4ien andot-e frth different- a-
r* might not be the accepted method of doing things, but-in order to
act as a catalyst and when you think that this has been talked about
and rejected by the status-quo, -tha do-nothing legislature all those
50
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: years. The citizens war on crime did cause legisla'turelthet-
C- 4 'C V NOV
in reaction to the hadto -taketp he -doing this
all by himself to develop some tao- /he law that established it.
ia-the State of Floridat Thir Law Enforcement and hen, of course,
his appointment to that particular position one h wh r *:ke u~L t '"e -
.an-appointments recognized ""Vr(aio~ Q recognized thronughut--
when
thie. nrn&n-1TnTm just recently he was chosen as the assistant to te FBI director. Bill
Reed
was Democrat, by the way out of Dade County. and then
the Constitution for seventeen years they called-or Constitutional
revision w;r n.t only uLThey didn't even come clo-t. -in-
-- .t
being able to revise Florida Constitution ;but the Govenoremore or less told
the legislature to d' a pub- l -jo ~ou are going to stay here and-de
aktr
your~ -tak wftl. You're going to get out of that whele Constitution and
bring us o a modern-day Constitution if I have to LOU t ~O to lose
your businesses, your--.{ L 'w>Ii 64' you are going to stay
here and do your job* And imayben-- ng y and that type of thing, but
they did it. We had never had a road program that lasted more than two
yea l -range plan os h a tso eer
years. IPo long.road plans or -boea whatsoever
A' /k
FLA PERS 3 ABC
J: and 4w in the State Road Department at the time the Department of
Transportation ,nd- we did develop the first program that -peceeded
the two year term that we were budgeting at 4 t-timebefore the
constitution was adopted by the people,and all that the Republicans
,VIA UI"A
were with him 100 The educational crises, the Republican minority
was -mat- ben him 100C teacher walkout was 1968 in Florida. And there
was no aren though there were maybe differences of opinion among hem--
t Republicans, the program we came up with, it's looking back
with hindsight Ahe program now been developpedl 4e not that
much different from what the governor's Blue Ribbon Commission came up
with in '68. And we talked about raising the monies. We put
as many -a millions of dollars near in education at that time. a.-
ifferent method was used a- at1 =t~an. than we suggested, but nevertheless,
it did happen. Education got a bigger 4we1a-of money than we-go@tia-
its entire history) in one particular period of time. Of course, he was
in many instances Al-tA hI Y'k C
caught as a victim and so were we.and th- ie-s a nagleot over many
years. And trying to play catch-up when you are so far behind you get
into problems like you do in football And so we developed troubles* The
Democrats were budget, 59% I guess it was, Wa. u e to npzak ~f. They
couldn't get their appropriations act through without a great deal of
52
FLA PERS 3ABC
O great deal of '
debate) e~ddiscussion. We ~t together a recommendation
gave it to us,
with the governor in a hurry and they anA just about as fastas
we put it together, they said the5eL4-give you what you want. And there
were problems te-be correCted because again we didn't aike the staff
The Democrats had the staff. We didn't have the committee structures
They had the committee structures. We didn't have the personnel.
Y\ad v GW o'\--
to work on something as demanding as the budget for the ,tate,
but everything, as far as the governor'relationship walked along fine.
until such time that we got involved,in recognizing that the legislature
Republicans themselves,
became knowledgeable that we were not truly a meaningful legislative body.
'-When did that happengand what brought that recognitionon?
J: Well, it started happqping as soon as &- got there. tarted realizing
-tbte there was something wrong. That we vto- a committee meeting and
g. A e, k:i^ would
havig- an experience where the- ~~ legilatji introduce a bill and when-he
started making questions about the bill, he would confess that it wasn't
.\
his bill 'Ter it was Secretary of State's bill. That he was
in the audience and that- would answer any questions you would have.
He- began to ask w-ee"Who is it that develops and passes
legislation in the state of Florida. Is it the legislature or is it
53
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: the cabinet that we rubber stamp whatever the cabinet wants?
thh gt rro san-. and e didn't have the
II!
staff. We didn't have the professional people to go to. seek advice
on legislature- and-en labor o management or schools or university
system or transportation or social problems or whatever it might be.
There wasn't anybody yeoutol+ because there were no professionalism in it
so b^ O-V U I e/ 5$1
whatever. We were necessarily recognized., recognized which-was-g aeal
r '.j&vLu^ I\\^J s&L-fA tefth-
Sthat we ha -t-have a little .bit--eatra .in our own
but La y ed / wLP>
professions, .,e-- w (e had -been leaning on- other people for helping
to dvelop legislation and-- Nproblems that existed in our
atate. And we didn't have it to turn to. So consequently the
with the cabinet a; ao
3egisature had been sort of a rubber stamp and they would -4i
ha-at home,
there every two years t what the cabinet wantedand come backandE
either run or not run again. You can get the people reelected /XV-_
and go up and permit them .-the-ci. again, and so e got working
even Q-\ just Republicarl This was something that
there was a new bref&e in 'V4 We had a -b change -in the -kinof
people that served in legislature. They were for the most part younger
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: and most of them were more formal education than some of the past
Abe"
legislators did. They were more involved in wanting to see things
dhangedThey wesaeot so interested in just ssead--status quo not
going *i and
rocking the boat. They weren't opposed togetting involved in ar
that hidden days before that. ,C 4-
controversyg nd legislation.was i hen
leadership in the Democratic Part, the leadership in the Republican
Pary, Y)e sat around and talked about what we needed. We talked to V-(
citizens in- state'and national citi zens group, state government,
strengthening
various national organizations that were involved in te~r~ oam state VDUV' '
I-v S Ce JO vx D 10 q- *u
er-v Aho pe-+liy state government And they had- C
The wea ;ve. mre of what ey' needed "WherS-atE -the professional staff/
was neede:a- as far as committees, 4oeering committees, what you needed
as far as ----- legislation, what you needed as far as expense
monies go and suggested salary ranges for the amount of time that was
spent. We had studies made on it. And all this the governor told us
all the way along that he supported everything that we were doing to
improve the legislative branch of the government. And that he thought
that it was an excellent idea. And the Republicans agreed with the
Democrat majority '-
55
FLA PERS -3ABC
J: d would work together. We would not use \ minority voice to Eigh
or to try to gpt him in trouble if they did things to strengthen
W \\ legislative O~Ld4(
the legislature, 41p to the very last moment thesalary increase which the-sdate-p
S.we~ the starting of the split between the governor and the Republican
problems his
legislators. He had with the party, but not with'elect "ed
had cemOwra td. 4
Republicans say..~and he to our minority leader and others
in various fitrlde that ~ ot eighteen, why net-twelve, and that he was
twelve At
certainly in favor of a.thousand dollar sa..lary.. One time, I think ttmfi
he even suggested that .he-had-atie for-the governor's salary.. hatt
/ 10
fifty pe ent of whatever the governor made. Therefore, could raise
the governor's salary and raise our own/and it wouldn't wasn't so
with
much trouble the general public. And then, at the time that the
bill ? that he was thinking about vetoing
salary.was passed, we just got the word back out A it.
Wuck"-t ht-h3 zs4 ime -
he Republican minority voted for A We passed around a
list with everybody's name on it VWe& had to gu-a. way before the thing iA
you favor/the t. I' "
happened .salary bill, and-~hey-av-rhed- twelve, do you want ten?,
do you want seventy-five hundred do you want fifteen, eighteen#,. -
,`';,the consensus of both parties, largest number of votes that was A-
~erk\
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: ?- by thLis- time~ 5 'P b this time
twelve thousand. He had commit nments this time ) Ma
nV- 60 i6 the man
Schultz who was much daf efutyla He was that really,
A
I think, caused the head-on collisions, the partisanship of the legislature, ~~
S.Cr>^u r efttyv 'i -u> in
the-ki4nd-t thing of the past, *.= legislat., that work. unity
toward good legislature .4ithe state of Florida /recognizing that we
were there /We weren't going to go away. and. -'t \tt' -
4^ ^i/vdL) it etQt Vq LAA
really felt that if- something$happened and it was like a boil and treated
the thing -and- in a few days it isappeare and W wouldn't have this
problem. These thblge-4-thee weird people would be gone. And Schultz
accepted people and &i-. having some rights and moved us into decent
minority offices. In fact, I had as my office the second term the
minority office. I-th*iAn one little small cubicle asT'-ee
vat f-4the office/that he gave to the Republican Party in i "
Then Schultz wa&- a complex of offices, the staff that really started-5
making the Republican 'eminatie- c hold their head up, useful to
the legislative branch and useful to the people they- represent,
erwe represented. -oz i -the. people had the right to
dir ect 'he-puble if they want to and they had the right to di-scue-them-
tt o i 57j
57
FLA PERS 3ABC
4'
J: Schultz recognized allthis/ and worked with it. We were working in
harmony, wthwh4ie our principles aad philosophies7 never asked that.
You--gt-a-i--ferent-etate* in the legislature d' maihao-
our-political philosophy, Senator 1 ^
AThe governor, I think took advice from.Guqrney, The., he got tbe / 1F'-
[/ 9"" o^ I Ce." t he got some _Trov
J -response to hat he was hearing ia Orange
County, because the bed of opposition to any expenditurefe- money .' r
any: purposes o-t whatsoever, particularly a --fa- ab -t6 legislate)
almost totallyif Orange County. here it started, 3Ak5
was mgTi i restrictedbe- where initiation of it was made. And
Broward County became almost as bad, but it rvffly ja siee
1 J ( -/. S 4-t4 o r since he began i/
-e was from Orange County and represent ag.him Congress got
he got 2< -l h o
calls ,.wires, he got letters and stuff,a flew owF Tallahassee
,I'LL )flAt' l IC)f
and put ltgetheo-gn$ the governor mad a serious mistake Ls ? e
K- You said you think that-you flew into Tallahassee.
J: I saw him personally. Because at a later date,
4e /.u-tL his veto and so forth, &
when it was all taking place and he-wae overriding, f.
Gurney was speaking at the country club
and after the dinner he asked to see me and pu me back in the back
room 58
FLA PERS 3ABC
el he wanted me
J: in front of the little cubicleand told me that, ;
to introduce
to go into the legislature the next day andAtf bill that they just
theirs from thirty-four to
raised, forty -two and I said that I would go back in and
de 4
introduce a bill to 'crease ours to sixand he'll go back to Washington
te-~ppe&it Congress to reduce yours to thirty-five.
I What was his reaction?
J: His reaction was that I was being foolish. And I more or less told him
that and I don't see eye to eye. I wouldn't
give him ten percent
(t 'L tooSpecause k"' c
That's when we started ouaw g.. 4ng thought/ I think eat
poms- besevO /s\want you to go in there and introduce
i gOi L senator.
this bill and I baisd fine if that's what you wantb After all
you' re a senator and you and I know youie senator.
I just outright told him that
and when we gave him opposition)wb /w I wouldn't even think
of doing Jt. And totalling u iUdJ ete
-Do you know that Senator Gurney,if I can call that"applying pressure"
apl OzC -o t4e. n otheru-J-- - 1 6O
appl d that same kind of pressure ther'i oduu ,
59
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: I know that he talked to oth-e-abe t-. He called the minority leader
- at the same time? 1 0-U i r a, -i D s T C ,.
J: before he-cou l ask me to inteduce the-foeign-legi
f V .r -' O 1,
1 was 0 .b &was
ai talked to him several timeswhen It .happening e t -,k '
%TAX7V iK*P& Vw, ^ .*'. ,f^ -00A N 1
J: dzWOttq and th calledsenator to te minority leader. Saying that this
Shta this was
was a horrible thing to do. ~ going to cause the ruination of the
in Flaida,
Republican Party, -Sayng t1at we were going to be blamed for it that, the
somehow
Democrats were.going to twist it around to blame it for us. And that they
vbte
were going to sandbag us on the beas which they did not. Som democrats
;adnt--vote-, some Republicans.didn4t.-
i Who else in the party received Gurney's, Senator QFney's 8-
J: I would imagine that he talked to several senators -frem-se- -- k
/Wt &' that ---- e
-pthe Senate. I'm sure.he talked to Ray Osborn Governor with Kirk.
fO r /
I imagine t- t he talked to Savage but- I don't know, t-+he-factt that
Savage was-like
c1/0 ^ocLVuL r.Ct- /A
but on the basis of what you do know, did he talk to you and he did talk to
\ -- A
J: I know that he probably contacted... I remember at the time that some of the
Orange County people, di the ones who- were really ott- like Hewpd- Gibson
II
and some of the others, had been talked to by Senator Uurney. He more or less
60
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: convinced tem that this was a suicidal type f- approach '&o Y-4"
-a-ctdicrotte salary
- Did governor Kirk before thedea was announced publically as there any
pressure applied from his office or from personal offie?- Was there
any advance warning that this do wa--?
J: *. -tfhere-wes o advanced warning whatsoever. He allowed us to continue on
the plan that we had with his full support.The rumor came up, We-don'Lt kno-hAr m
YI- 14 V vt
it came up and-it was vetoed) and- hof -w ring -vato--it.
What. did the rumor quote come up qauI- ae u..--
J: Somebody just remember my house 0 somebody said, yIu-know, w-'f L -B tha-t-
the governor is going to veto the bill, and Don Reed said, ib true the governors"
gave me a commitment. I said ou have got-t go talk to him. You --mth, e
h d rumor h iande g .ed uh, but even
at that we were not you know, totally at that particular point offended We
could see from the rumor that maybe he had run into a political
problem, maybe he could give us some information that we weren't
the time
knowledgeable of at.present.that would show us that we had errored and that we could
correct it and sustain his vetogpbut, of course, as you know the gentlemar
requested a (4 joint session deliveredhis veto message.He climbed up into
61
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: the rostrum of-the speakers chair and delivered one of the most blistering
Sveto messages that I have ever heard anybody give and didn't separate
the sheep from the goats that he thought that one side was goats and
one
side was sheep. He took a brush and painted everynj black. He said
6 l <( to
that the whole thing was a conspiracy vet, to feather our own beds andApocket
the monies and I think didn't use -that exacting themes- but he did use the
term that we were peopwar caught with our hands in the droj and that type
of thing. And when he called us crooks, both Republicans and Democrats,
and then that's when I think the that was it. We were finished from ta
standpoint. From that point on, we -o-vw his veto very quickly and
I think the press was probably right, myb We were ht te-d~ that
argument, And I think that we had every reason to be angry7 because if
the governor woaid not veto it, ,he governor woud cone out mnd support
evey.bo4dg e ,Kowledge of what-we- had and what we were attempting to do,
I don't think that there had been very little flak whatsoever in this thing.
DV\4b ,\I
W-ith the legislative salary increase, the truth would have been told.
,because he knew the truth. He knew that they had been taking money
under the table and doctoring expenses. They had county supplements 0-
Jacksonville, Hillsborough County, Dade County, Browqrd and Palm Beach.
62
FLA PERS 3ABC
in the state MtI-
J: d-no citizen knew about I got a $1500 check
that I was elected in '67 by County Commissioners. and had no knowledge
that there was a county supplement for legislators in this county.
As far as I was concerned, it must be a mistake. I didn't pay that
II(e t to, T k-'J LkU
much taxes. He-said, ''"''-gong-tvge1tyea county supplement."
^ \- T ', .4 c < "
He-said,"when that happen y k years agog the delegation T C~O-J Us '
was whoaly-e-(L 6c O (
"ase -it the other party They decided that a
hundred dollars a month and expense money was not enough, They needed more money,
b^/ 'L)Ot ^
go they passed a little bi-tand said the county commissioners who
hzid tho urong typ' arc -a yig- $1500 a session. And when you added up
LAwo ot- t~ e when
$600 oa-batefrh-. expenses /(you added up a $1500 county supplement,
pfdo
when you added up the periaem you had $100 t came to $10,800
1040 D-' ( lje
approximately. -oupay- taxes on $1200e Y threw away all county supplements
\,, 0 o ,',. 1 . ,' -,-/,
We-did-away with all undo~toaed- expenses forever and i.'..' "
and statutes, -L ?L, '- " D d
books.ad tax a developped'a salary of $12,000 ust like every other
citizen would. And netwise you ended up probably with less money per
month than you had under the old system which was the under the table deal.
Which the new breed efair- considered to be sort of,, 1J9 \'A ,/);e
63
FLA PERS 3abc
J: L(t T-3 / \k
to get tn saying I'm hunting for a job that pays $100 knowing full
itZ@L {, 0.:,-- d., 5UA'.,."'"'
well that the total pay was $10,800 whenQhe-was-4 and that was
in this county. In Duval it was more and Dade it was more and ampa it
was more, because it had larger county supplements nd li t an
l he realized that-he had been discussing-and so it was just one of those
thingsluncalled for) that the should calL us in and that Senator
Gurney was the one who discussed it with him. He should have called us
in and counseled with us before making a decision. Agai he felt that, l
,-yesry senator's advice statewide candidate elected offidal that eien had
his finger in the .e3. Of course, at that time he had K Crio4A n
in Orange County and George Anderson as State Finance chairman
+-U Ck^e',\ e'V Vowe\, ke R4 0; /Ld b
from.Orange County. So Senffta running for reelection uwas- ~eI1 Lt 5
all around Gurney,-an Gurney' people at that time, so maybe A O
- Before we talk about the upcoming '70 campaign, let's 1et back and let
me ask you something about -the salary issue and the veto/ as it occurred.
Yvbt-
presumably, as a legislator it was a high political issue and it had to
an
be-,.had to be handled with.extreme amount of care by both Democrats and
Republicansand when you -brot ghf yourself a salary increase, not sure
FLA PERS 3ABC
had a study made
J: It was in the papers that we were discussing it and thea we were
that would
that we were that would
.considering legislation, raise the salary to12,000 according to
L C4 1 (z Lo uL
the new constitution ^e-- to d itbut we would check with each
other a4 we would talk to each other about ew-4do you get the letters.
and-we just would not get but one or two letters', three letters, that would
even mention the salary~ until the governor made a political issue,
it was not the issue in the minds of people, I don't thi~k- and I still
believe i -w abs e a that particular point !ad time, that-it had not
become something people were very concerned about. And if it had been
T 1t: ^:lA ijt^ ^OM b.
handled differently maybe- en-maybenbeen that clncern4. Some yes,
but not the majority of citizens,and he said things in speech after speech
after he vetoed-it that continued to fire up the em options of the people,
-i'r fl.- s t the emmotions 4J "-
and he caught up the e6 tions o1-hisj V)e a f. fhis press
releases and things that had-to happened afterwards I > -i c t f ;)
A- <
political issue.
while we are talking about the administration, before we get to the re-election,
of course,
while we're in a four year period,,it probably would have been whl*e clear
to the govern*ent that there was no way Ci ar ("&- A '
,, Sq^^^^-^ 'y^'1~`: ~ ii
FLA PERS 3ABC
all tax payers understand iti/ c2A-- c
-our
I can under 3_ stand hs concern. I would imagine and this is really
.-because I would like for you to tell me.
what I want to ask I shouldn't imagine/ DiduRepublican leadership in
the House and in the Senate which had) the- the year of the governor--
ds 7t turned out you didn't apparently. Did you have to reassure the Democrats
specifically that the governor was not going to veto and did this have
-^uadA_ eie -- k ec
any rupturing effect in- Democratic and Republicanism id-Gurney-
cme down and de this?
J: NoPwe did, of course, have an agreement with the Democrats that we would
break- F/azLe 6WF
not lead them down a ri rose path so to speak. And then. ao on
hti-at the last minute and leave them with the responsibility of-the
salary. Er us to take it, but to be in a position ee-we voted against it
and our governor vetoed and they are the ones who forced the override
and one thing and another. They did want assurance. They -aw-it m-poiss-ibe
soe-peeeible check and see what the governor is-doing for it.
Because he realized that it had the basis of being an issue that was
our
of geeat consequence to k future in politics. Quite frankly,
none of us would f-- uem
65
FLA PERS 3ABC
I'm sure bt- when he organized it, he must have felt -that~thrc .was
nsme prnhlem thxsci, What about in the legislature, wh what kinds of
reaction went on and-what do you as a legislator and asl for a more
permanent funding e. his -ik- employees? Were there any particular
party issue incidents that.come to mind ?
J: When he came to the legislature/ asking for more permanent funding
K- Did he not go to the legislature and sk for the legislature to appoint
thirty 6F A people ."Ale l-f? nd put it on a permanent statewide basis? < ''
J:I-d inu eal I don't recall that ever occurring. I don't recall him
wanting us to pay or financeig- any of his citizen war on crime."
He wanted the legislature to go ahead and act to get the permanent law
enfor cement agency.
but that didn't occur before the--
J: Not to my knowledge)because even when he passed it, he didn't pass it
to& many people to start off with. 1 w funding. He got started but the
fund didn't establish positions foagood
- That is the second question that comes along. Why-ou are limited by
>' 66
FLA PERS 3ABC
\ your total revenues. Many times the .legislature would initiate a
$Lc4-
program and not be able to fund it at the time they initiate, i- -tat
happens at the university many times. where they might say we are going
to put in a college of-pharmacy at this particular university, but
Sr 6ting
then they just put a little money up -et..g. it organized.
A 4nd that's what.we did with because of limitation of funds.
We made a set-up and sae -em4 started saying, "let's get some people
in and start putting it together, at putting together an organizational
structure, writing job descriptions and the-next time/ we'll establish
S1c4(itype of thing because
the positions that they'll need out in the field, next time we'll
tmov e -aYPn ~ .l / /ct trying to live within the budget
insisting
because he was 'also Jfor things like this to be established but
'*L3as pretty well kL
he was also insisting and so were the legislature.insisting that he- live
within a certain revenue 'al ^-{' or'
within a certain revenue plani because you know we the-part-y is a
our ywewuA C
little bit different in that we can't exceed -reeeder. we have
to go -ohold-back ur -reeepds.- and I like that/ because we are limited
by what we take in in revenues. So then you are force'to adopt certain
priorities5 Iut your money where you think your priorities are and in some
instances, in this particular instance
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: the priority was just not as great Education,*transportation, ln
.. to ____.... .... -Cor
so ong_ ut .get the concept started ouG-seeretaries fo-tod th bills
//
and said you know, you won't need to ,vote for the bill. You know
good and well we don't have anything to publieh. They yeah, you vote
for it anyhow. It will make the people happy that we accepted the concept.
y never get around to funding it, w'll still be happy that yeu t -J
established \
thought enough to pass the bill that, the concept. I'm still
saying-that I don't like that particular pe.e4.. If you say that-something
is needed, then you.ought to recognize tfe- honesty that's benrg-
but
S^ espee^iy-to do the job. O9 )t 7 a lea4 / o' d 2 but7
I think that i-a the basic reason that he uccldrn't get along-w4tkr-the staff
find out who youare going to appoint first. He didn't give a
dam, under his total control. As you put in some of the cabinet people eP~c C
ye" were still fighting cabinet, chief executive, phi-alop that we had
to compromise hi& Republicans fromhat standpoint. We finally
had to accept the fact that there would be cabinet people involved in
decisions and controls over ua2t kL&,A c,.- fC(-,-c A'^'<
- OK so I suppose that we ought to ask before we move into the campaign what--
S-C -t r v incident eP poal iae iniduek Lt' -
4s salary veto.issue ;don't want to call it an incident i' .
68 '^t ^ ^ W.D^ \^W- i.
FLA PERS 3ABC
that issue occurred and it was over Ath, what kinds of things happened
toward the end of it? Did anything happen between then and 1973?
Did anything else happen Made this controversy between the legislature
and the governor? UOVI4 ,
J: I was a little bit wrong in my memory dating other problems,
but we did have some problems even before the salary things where we
got involved as legislators with the governor's differences with the
party, even though we,*,
/- How did that happen?
J: Well, the party people would complain to us. 0 f course, I was, also
app&ota. as well as elected and and so forth abot his
expanes~eo-of monies, about his failure to take into consideration
recommendations to the part as far as endIft4aO go appointments
and things of this nature. And not working with parties as close as
they should. And then his attitude toward the legislature itself
on occasions (L-, C LLkt Ce of Oerterae,
Aa he-was sort of looking down his nose at thia-1meatiz~arm *r-endhp
government. And I do remember) I tried my best to remember exactly what
had happenedX ft happened before the veto and probably in '68.
69
FLA PERS 3ABC
I',
J: He decided that his population had gone in sort of a He'd been
-Afftedr a post when he went in and then after the inaugeration,
after the special election)in and down the road in '68 his popularity
had beuan to fall particularly with Republicans. Young Republicans
/ 0- or V, t^v-/
and said and-ptt-
were upset with him r some things that he had done O~i-' doing.
hat kinds of things < ...'2 e,#' I j / c ',
J: -ppointmentsf ey would hear Republicans not being considered for this
or '-
job and the governor not working with party funds and things, he Young
Republicans were the base of the party machinery discussed earlier
/Tey were the first to become offended if we-didn't work with this
group that had gotten the Republican senior party
S- And yet you ye4 today, at least, applaud him for making nonpartisan
appointments.
J: I applauded him for making good appointments. I'm not
saying that he couldn't have found qualified Republicans that might
have been able to do the job just as well. I don't think that it was
just so much in every instance that we got disgusted. It's just we
the appointments that the lack of respect and involving himself in
things of the party, because it was in '68 that we had the selection of
70
FLA PERS -3ABC .. 9-
J: the National Committee and we met in Orlando.
SIDE TWO OF TAPE I
J: Now the selection ,(ur problemreally started ith the governor before
the salary veto took place as far as the selection of national committeee~-
o dom i4k '"'eCl\, supporting
and the meeting took place in Orlando.The party was ,Bill Cramer/
running for re-election national committeeman. They were opposing
anjt Morris, one wh- ~had.be l he background up to this point?
national wo
e committeeman and committeemen were elected throughout
the state on a statewide election by Republicansbut we ha4 as a party under
Murphin had supported both Democrats who were also a little bit tired
of the statewide election for the two positions, hanged the election
allowed
laws., the party to adopt rules for the election of the
rational Fommitte--nen and/ committee women. and we passed that in the
that this was done
interim and this was the first time after the '67 sessionthat we would
actually operate under the selection process/ of electing one by our own
group rather than having the Republicans at large be able tobeeausaqe.f course,
before it took a very wealthy person to travel throughout the state and
Eaine Morris from over in Sarasota was National Committeewoman. She
71
FLA PERS 3ABC
4AAZ-C i-K1-t
J: had been with G. Harold Alexander atthc t-ime of-~t Fairfield .iyaa
group, so there was no way we eeus1d-support Helene. And we were
supporting Pala Hawkinsj W-en I say we, the party structure itself"
for re-
and Bill Cramer. Helene Morris was running on her own election.
The Pinellas group thought that he was wrong in-haking-a party to
support SBi Hawkins because where did she come )from) di she ever
4-- 7 and Mary Gszaeing was the ,first woman legislator in the state
of Florida from the Republican standpoint, at least, and ePrl .,
4-in the state, )a ;-....
president oftWoman's Federation and figured she ought to be the V~rI'
nam>..Well, in the first place she was busy enough being legislator
And we thought, Paula would be more effective as national Committeev)OlO- --or
Wembter On-he-eothr-hand, I nominated Pa3ct that particular
meeting and then Mary was nominated and also Helene. And Mary did''- V*
Paula didif r-an-in the first election, but what got everybody
mad at Claude Kirk was that he had decided to come in and O 0fuo
n .gh. his support behind Mary Grii for the/dationalCommitteeWman
to bring in a very nice guy, Reed in Martin County Net Reed, who is a
fabulous person whcaeverybody loves/ and great environmentalist.
iaanything that he does, Xe does a good job and dedicated job on it.
72
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: but the governor came down oe walkie talkie, that's the first time
that we had had the opportunity to have walkietalkies thrust at us OQA
people walking around that were representing the governor's office.
During the time that we were trying to make our minds up, the governor
participated in applying political pressure to various members of the
state committee as far as taking them off advisory committees We-d-
lI4st-cAi any T7
go with him; not -i-stag of their recommendations op- appointments
that might come up in the future if they didn't go with him as far as U0o
he wanted the-to--drtia th the Natiioal committee He even had given
one of our young Republicans, the position with the
turnpike authority. And iowe was there. working the hotel for the
0o .'S..,, i well
governor's two teaaen and I remembered so .because e -I had a great
for H al "
deal of respectfor his abilities, an particular as executive secretary
of the group and or a person to head up an organization, Eployee
a.-
type of position. And we had quite an .argument that night in the hotel
room because I said, How in the world could you enoy yourself
being up here working against the very people that you worked with t~hepe to
help the party get established and know that our
FLA PERS 3ABC k4ic4.C,1 l> //-i^ i^ t1'-;.
J: : choices for the NCo discussed early and
were in total agreement, and he was explaining to me the realities
of lifeeating and having a job. And I later regretted that I was
really trust as hard as I did because that is something I guess that
has to be taken into consideration in -de at the time.
\
-AAnd, ut we did win. And winning)it left some scars that caused his
popularity that-the Republican Party begin)~ld already begun to fade
fade even farther. The young Republicans were participating there
watching the thing, I- thkd dt-t t t is where their erosion began
to take place to ame degree. And so to get it back to the Tallahassee
situation, we got back to Tallahassee later. He decided to establish
what he called a-thunk session thank- -thank--tank whatever
where
he referred to it, .he would invite from both houses people to 'C4
fimeneion and we would sit around and discuss thingsand we would have
the pulse of tiAings in our district, in our area,. e could benefit
and we could benefit from this type of informal discussion,which -wa
we thought a important as 46 he-leacie idea and so that the first one
.was called and we arrived at the meeting and we were going to have cl~t-
daepth --imenlR n and then go into the living room and sit and talk
74
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: and discuss things.
X- Can you date .- the meeting?
J: It was in '68 what date, I don't know. All I can remember, in trying
to date it was that I was still living the Prince.h a e Hotel. an we
moved out of there when the manager got shot so I could finddout -he
when he got shotthBe* I went with Don Reed 'tucome-t the house we had
Ray Osbore-, Mary GrizzJ. Don Reed, aid myself. So from the Senate
Bill Young.
I think we had I'm not so sure we ,oe I can't remember 0 qL
It's not really important, but we had an interim. and- then as we finished
dinner, I remember the governor looking up from the table down
where.I was sitting and saying "what are you doingk You're not even
\\ /'^ minority
my frieid,a t-I said I was selected by my leader to ?come here,
with \a / ,O'
and so I am here the house people. Then we left the He wasn-1-
ug l- y -; he j-...... U"
gLyr a Ju king .-about- it, He was just laughing and saying
this type of thing. He went into,/E everything was beautiful at dinner.
We didn't have steak; we had some kind of a rice and I was e
to governor about-thar steak s At least b ut we went into the
living room and sat I own in our chairs) and I think that-he might have -
eOu-^f c^T &`-Y^-
FLA PERS 3ABC
Pe in-
J: had on a sweater was very formal and delightful/ to start off
with,and Ito start off w -I'd like to find out how I am doing.
t are people saying about me in the areas that-you live in. hat
you hear7 How am I doing as your governor?" And-they start off -b
maybe Ray Osbor then, rnaha, Mary Grizz mo more or less u know,
you fhaea few problems .andthere they're nothing of any magnitude, and
things are going fairly good for you. We think 4kha- you are
\\ to
all right. They got Don Reed about third or fourth in the group and
"owai
Don told me, "how do you think that I am doing?" 'Well, you come across
arrogant, egotistical people begin not to like youana a person to person
basis do pretty goodrbut you are just too arrogant. ,you know, you are
the Skd i -C
losing. people and you are losing the legislature. And then he turned
Qf t L&- ^Low dw h
theargume aa little bit about Yther he was arrogant or whether
he was anything that he said,They got into sort of a field debate and I
can't for the life of me remember the things that were said, but
began to
at this particular point after the hair on the back of his neckealmost
stand up, rushed out in the middle of the living room and put his finger
stepped
down to the carpet and he run a line across it? and-lokeebaWackand said
you are either over here with me or you can get the hell out.
FLA PERS 3ABC
Jtge-rfheJd out -Ii h l r f -thdIe1oT -TivnIgrToom and ipu- is finger-.
--~doto tihe carpet) - -
W 4A k- a8 left the door open.
and we got up andS-^' got- to the door, and leftAnd I got up
to nmy pleaser and walked to the door and the governor said,"James
where in the hell are you going?\ I said, "I'm following my leader."
the
And we left. And because of our former experiences with -.governor)
1o Its a a little argument and he would come and find you
later andcome back and talk about it some more. So we said let's go
-en. back to the motel room)and go out some place and have a few
drinks- and sort of hide from him so tiat if he decides f4hart he wants
us back we won't spend all night listening to him at the dimonsin.*
So we head out for while and went back to the motel rather late
and Xfathcrao-id- twA jthe next day V P- sA -. like just tired,
njiid [IIJ I w e al3~ .o7-fre d Evcrything goA fr-
~t~c-c~t-bu QAIg2I /~l~~ 0. T a -t1 0A) YJUt MaQ it0 au
with pretty well from a that one experience, bute was
just- ex'Chfs the governor's inaMility to take criticism; And
total belief in himself and that he was right in anybody elses opinion.. *
He asked for criticism but then gave it to him)he didn't appreciate
it. Of course, I should have knoawthen, as I have known all my life A-
77
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: this is true of most of us. you can say, TellKme the truth,
then you tell somebody the truth)and they're not too happy
that you told it to them, that you relate to them,hut that experience
and the one in Orlando was differences that we had with the governor
prior to the One thing to clear up on the salary thing
was I didn't think that was the way to go. I went with the majority.
I went with the- .the same way our system works. Aen it comes to
electing officials we have to believe that the person
who gets the majority of votes is the representative of all the people
at that particular-time. The rest of us did not get a taarity (A
voteThey accepted that this is the way our government works, And
when we voted on eo salary thing/ O we -yoed -i the $12,000
salary at that particular time I had suggested the salary commission
type thing ato aag T' To o0 KAu ~o-
4which they rejected but now i-,t becoming sc ethin- you know with the
committee appointed by the governor to study salaries of the judicial
officers executive officers legislative officers,and to make
rt< i-a"s that ought VF-
recommendations of what we-should be paid, inincreases5o-
allowed., ~ e ,"(0 / after he following election
to be o-makoyt go into effect
if the legislature didn't reject it-,-Y!^L
78
FLA PERS 3ABC
does.
J: similar to what the Federal governmentA And I
thought at the time because a cross section of Florida citizens
should get together to study the jobsof legislature and
did f eYW^^ 0- change the o t
decide if we were- e4ig--te salary, if so and how much
and what. And I even thought that they'd come up with a better
salary than we could get- It-wee jy experience with citizens groups
is thatAthey get behind you and bother you for a couple of weeks,
hey come away with a sort of a new assurance that' .
S- appreciation of the work that is being done.
'- abso .l Aly c V one 0
t Because I cantt records for two'year period and
every hour that I spent in legislative duties, and one year, I remember
specifically, I owi -48 hours more fore-mre- than an eight-hour day)
you see)
five day a week,with two week vacation, in purely legislative involvement, Y-
ties of my job. Qnd I didn't say that everybody did that because
approximately -
everybody didn't, but we based the salary on / fifty per cnt of the
person's :ime being spent in legislative duties. And that the average
executive in Tallahassee, in a position in a department with the salary
was $27,~00. o.a'. EvSn the report came to the conclusion
$12,000 to $15,000 --- IC7Te4 l .- _
FIA PERS 3ABC
5'. ----- -____
4: OK, so the issues exp4eit. 5 5 i % ^r -^ '
I suppose that we ought to move to 1970. And the governor is going to
number one,
run for reelection. irequestion was there any consideration, anybody
did anybody consider trying to convince governor Kirk that he es~kid not
run for re-election?
J: No. Not to my knowledge. hey- don't recall anybody talking together
and saying, 4 .-L ~XLv .iot eeA ~,t
K: Was there anyone talking among themselvesconsidering that the governor
Az should not run for re-election? Not that I recall because I didn't
have any opposition A as far as his, o-f-i -bejig- governor I did ot get
-s.,atisfied with it_-_--
K-: OK.and how did Skip Eckerd, Claude Kirk split How--t happened-
as far as you know? What role did you play? How did all this 'STh
J: Skip Phale thing, I think{ Skip MePhllas decided that the governor
9--c
could not win again in his own mind. He also2
upset that h selected Ray Osborn instead of himself as Lieutenant Governor.
He thought that since he had been p a without even telling people
80
FLA PERS ABC
r
J: he had been slipping into the Gove or's office advising the Governor
things even beyond what we suspectedand I think that since he
ft the.-se-oppse he top assistant's recommendations that
he advised him on other things behind tie scenes that he would be the
natural t{ r tJ l -
lieutenant governor's choice and-wu-ld resolve what he was looking
making his mind up) 7-7 was going to be lieutenant governor. He seemed
to be hurt and-. when Ray OsbifKi-4as elected. So I think that he Lt O
kl-w.^^ Ir V4, C
wanted sort of to get back at the governor the governor itghkt
consider him for lieutenant governor. I think that-after he went around
the state for Awhile and talked about running for governor, that
these Cramer voices felt that this guy will never make it. Even-though.
hell U11 vr vegiv lr-l t -pat. he hasn't got the financial
backing) and he hasn't got the other thin ,s it takes to be a real
reliable candidate for governor, Kirk is going to get re-elected.
And of course,they wanted him t beat it. And I think many of the party
people wanted him to-beat-- it someone else other than Claude Kirk.
t WU ,,"C( O '4'41
I said I didn't hear from the legislative party an~d o I think that o~
Cramer, particular from that faction par tiat-whe- they selected
-6 I 3 1 h e, d ; A T W'o
Eckerd, I think that Edkerd had the financial strength tnt'-he could spend
81
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: on-any necessary qv o d V64 ra r \4- ev6 V
to give the governor a real fight on it. And the, by that time the
governor along with the eomitt h close ally with 4ay-, of course
Gurney ramer was going to run for United States Senate. It was supposed
to be his from all the agreements that had been made. He spuld be unopposed
in his race for the United States Senate. He stepped aside for Gurney, aJ
ie&had waited long enough. Now was his time to go.~.)\A Gurneys and
to resign av
Claude Kirk's conspiracy, they got the iudge Carswellto announce that he
was going to run for United States Senate, which was probably one of the
'c., I think the
most 'pbli4e things that happened all. Because-Judge had a life-time job,
to
andget somebody to resign rndto-t run for
something he didn't have a chance and Id)n't think
t et they were thinking of the judge. I think that-they were thinking of
Claude Kirk and themselves. Thinking that they could get a well-known
SW b t-t-ei-C
man like Judge Carsell to b-aet-ve on the other side and to get in on this
W lead
side, and to lead the ticket; that he- Auld Kirk back to success.
if he didn't
That he might lose otherwise have somebody on the ticket that
gould bring the Democrats into the polls. And the North Florida people %A
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: ithn appuinte the Judge would be ale to do&but I met the judge awn I've
talked with him and I don't have any bad feelings abe"t him at all. I don't
think he had any idea at all what was happening.
-: What prompted. ',
X ^'t V, ^ P^'^ "4e
Jr antieipat d- conspiracy. It was their thinking andjust talked to him and
convinced him that he was the man who ought to do it and somehow were able
to using his ego that he must have t"ha all of us have for him to get
involved )r A -
V-: What prompted you to run for the Stqte Senate? You did run for the
State Senate,-didn&*t=vu in '70?
J: Well.
0 4' / lism
-t: J41 all this faction was going on around you all the
controversy going around you, what consideration prompted you to run for
the State Senate?
J: All this factionalism ig-ftet as
Sto do it.
heavy and I made my decision. Later got heavier and heavier but at that
time, -was no :ffort running and I don't think that at that time I made
~iaI $
the decision announced that there -would -bn hard-we- involve
becausee made the decision and tik-Phaltas made the decision to nm for
83
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: governor, because we have rIeegred the -. umnl -- Jlaw that gotten
-\
-paat and so Me Piaitus wea saying that he was going to run for the
governor's office)would be required to step down in-the Senate Otibt
It was an off-election year. There was nobody running for office 'c co c
Ls>oA- except those who were resigning to run for some other office. And you
had Senator.,.Congressman now, Bill, -
J: No, not Bill Leonard, it's over in Pinellas County. Bfill YP ng.
SBill Young was a State Senator. He was resigning and the House member
B Ware was stepping up to run for that and -m- seat.MehPh~erll was
from that area, aid the most ppuba part area of- Palm Beach CountyJ and
e was resigning. And nobody else in my house delegation was interested
in moving up. ,Mr. e, I thought that Don-Lee shetl be the one.
He was a minority leader, but nevertheless he had more years of experience
that anybody else in the delegation and he had not ever run for a higher
S and-.had never run,
office. He talked about every office in the book.a~d I went to him and,
// 0('j o .lt ,\ ,i]
sail are you going to run for MPhaMlla seat? He said, I don't know. : oap
beside- because I don't think 4hat-we ought to let bha. go and lo e a
K bh- with experience -
seat when we got people in themjmqa delegation that can runt r
84
FIAPERS 3 ABC-
J: I talked to the other man in the delegation and said are you interested
de *,a lwql,tf.u t Jo -^'
in it? And he came back and said, no, I like being my mayer yeu-e-
JA /Ijmy ego and the vacancy being there I said well, shoot nobody else will go,
I'll go. And maybe they didn't want to run for the reasons you talk about.
There was going to be a bad year. Kirk wasn't going to be that popular.
There was controversy in the party, but the office was still there. And
jo me
uh, somebody still had to r nit. I decided it would be* lie didn't like
it too much. My wife didn't. She thought that I ought to stay in the fouse.
a5 7 t wi/afe %l<^
And for Monday she was probably right as it turned out. put
/
at he time I still thought in spite of that because politics don't
actually believe that all these things are going to hurt them. They believe
their popularity is there. They believe their popat. ty 4i here and they-
,you know that is one of our things- we have to be loved,
believe that they are loved and when you believe that you are loved that
much, you don't believe that somebody elses problems are going to cause
you to be turned down, but they do work out that way. It is just one of
those th ings/ but that's all right with me.
K -you lost in a close election. And then you went back to the party.
J: let's say liaison
K -: right. 85
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: ou see, we had the party elections. I told you about in seventy.
And the party people ran in the first primary. September. All the
party offices were selected. Sve-_ had worked fe-rAmPState with
Tommy as-en-indicator
had
and we.particularly in the ninth Congressional District, I had made
a personal visit with him thaf~ each person in that district introduced
him to them, talked to them about it, we flew off to --I had considered
making a run for the state chairmanship myself and bq only on the
basis that the state chairman become the paying job. I couldn't
afford to just leave my business and become state chairman on a full
time basis which I thought was almost necessary to have in a state with
seven million people. So I went to a meeting and I believe again
and
in Winter P ark-i n-Orlando area told them that I was thinking about
making a run for it, discussed it with the people 1 trusted all the year
we
that.were involved in this type of decision and the name was brought up
of T ommy Thomas. We-were in Panama City. I said that I had heard of
him, but that I had never met the mman and they said that before that
get
you make your mind up, that you want to run for it and us make a
decision that we would support the-salaried position here's a man
86
FLA REP 3 ABC
J: that has the money that he can run for the office Aspend the time,
Ul spend the money necessary.
-: Who were these people that you were talking abo .
Who did you consult with?
J: Paula Hawkins, q (Bioy]ltonF~t. Lauderdale, .*e-knol all the people
still is and still as, he never gets out. He stays there and we had
up in Holiday L /<--
some people from.the Panhandle. I think.Ba might have been there
that particular
-at., meeting. There were a number of the state committee- p4-e-
board people
executive that were at the meeting.
I-: And they encouragedyou to go see Tommy Thomas.
J: Well, let me say that the men-there, a couple of them, a couple of
them that were opposed to a salary change. They just didn't pay a
salary chO eck. -- all specifically, but
that was the way
Y1, Paul Hawkins.
to a
J:,IW was the one who was totally opposed t The salary chairman was also
the one who opposed legislative salary the other side against Gruney
WJe rV-4 '
and all politicians necessary to ban I guess now tat she had
87
FLA REP 3ABC
J: been elected,she didnr-t feelthat - -
-: Was ere any problem.or controversy y raised D~tA i.A .-,.. OuU
This is the question that we want to ask. An7 controversy raised over the
idea of having a party chairman for this area that goes from one
6wt c% 14 (t&L 0 0, V 1 0
Panhandle man e faotin and.al1.
J: Maufa"eturirg, I don't think entered into itt4LC O
I think that it was strictly from the standpoint that I had nominated
Paula. We had/i differences and the operation of the committee from
that point went on for a while that I wanted to get rid of ltfn
Chritendon, 'er area and all these people involved were from that
area. And Orange County pretty well had a lock on it so if there had
been any regional type thing, --- had been trying to keep it
was
in that area, but she said that she opposed to paying a chairman
and she and some of the others were leaning one way orA another
They just didn't know what. I just said that I was tired of Chritendon
I want not I want to run against him and want -gize him every
yet. but I'm
consideration to running and I made my mind up totally
thinking about it. If I do, I'll ask him the committee to V//
And so they said would you fly over there or w would you go see
88
FLA REP 3ABC f JY / '
J: Tommy Thomas and Dao, I'll fly you over you and
we' 11 in
we'll in
your wife over and.call and get an appointment set up.
Gray b from
So and Dr. Lane, Bob Ctnd I,Sen.Lane Broward County. We
flew over in Gray's plane to Panama City. We met Tommy and Virgi nia<
We went out to the-pad place on the beach and we were just absolutely
delightedot.P We enjoyed their company. I was impressed with
what he knew about the party, the background, and work he'd done
in Alabama as well as in Flc rida for the Republican party. /And his
ability to meet with people so quickly and to get them to like him.
That it was just personal friendliness that he has about him.
To meet him on a one to one basis. I thought that he could talk
with so-many people and being from North Florida he could get a good
edge with North Florida people and that he could talk and the South
Florida people could fall in love with him just as quickly in my
district and in others districts and he did have a big Chevrolet
that he turned over to Center felds
dealership and They more or less got themselves
than for me
successful in business It was much better for him.and so I
agreed that weekend to support him and work with him
and -o become sort of his(a endntin the campaign.
89
FLA REP 3ABC
bring
J: to go ahead and to tell the story and to him around and to
introduce him to various people and so after we completed this,. d. /iC
I had no idea of working with him at that particular time
of any appointments on the committee because I had been dected to
the sate committee, but I was also running for the State Senate. S0
I figured that I would be too busy in the State Senate to take on
ty
a higher responsiUfi party beyond just being a committee man.
And as it turned out, then I was defeated. He was elected. And I
as our
was elected t the state committee and he was elected chairman.
Cbut wl B unIl January then the Nove mber
^^^-
elections ame and I was-h the Senate. Then, I went back
to the convention. He was still not the chairman. He had only been
elected as state committee man in September so we were still
Sthe way up to
going around meeting people and getting votes allA January
94 I believe. And then, I worked th; E convention. made some
nominating and stuff like that
-,.speeches so we won again our Wtate from then on
always when -
She got up and went back to Gainesville so she- laen-a RaFb;le mV
preesdtSU in terms of the position that she was looking for.
90
FLA REP 3ABC
C I o an
J: aasoM e asked me if I would accept.appointment in legislative counsel
I told him yes. He said that he would like to see it become more than
that since he wanted to meet with us and discuss moving the Republican
Party from Orlando to Tallahassee and this is what I had suggested
J4
to him because this is one of my pet points of view. That I had
run for chairman it would have been to Jlocate a permanent headquarters
in Tallahassee and not let it move to West Palm Beach to Sarasota to
Tampa to Orlando .
>- local area influence to localarea.
J: d11, and, also, people get the idea that some flakey organization. ..
open up a new office someplace every four years. nd that we showed the
whoe they U-C.
other party something because now they followed our suit-opened
up offices in Tallahassee, jut I told him that when I was running the
campaign, I was opening offices in Tallahassee being where the action is,
being where the capital press is,,and the press release in turn puts out
distributed 4l
to be better 4~emm&^tto the state and that this is the plat to work out
XF ;i's
of because we are that related t government. Me-are going to be a party
it ought to be We--- he -wo d-up-that campaign We stieseed this with
that people so it means after his election, we sat down and discuasd the
91
FLA REP 3ABC
J: mechanic of looking for the building and searching in Tallahassee
Fortunately, we found the Chamber of Commerce ef Building with a financial
deal where I think Tbmmy and one other 4/ yiS .
J: No1Miami Uh, American Marine Under writers Joe Bor and I think that
puthi V
the two of them. We discussed everybody on the executive board putheir
signature on the note, but the bank didn't like that idea And they didn't
like the idea of having a lot of fifteen or sixteen people to run around
and chase down people in case the mortgage went though.
look
P So Tommy finally, said to them.suppose two people Leither put up cash
and securities and sign on to the thing and the been making
payment of it since then. Another thing I talked about was that there
was no communication while I was in the legislature. We were forever
wondering why O9it6nd n would say for example that he was against the
salary when we hadn't heard nd all of a sudden the governor
vetoes it.He makes it a-ta gdpSbody -- enrSlOO kU /
He's right.
All the time --.- the debate is going on discussion going
on and he hadn't seen our chairman. So he became a man with the
92
FLA REP 3ABC
disliked. A .
J; with the legislative j sP at accepted
his county Don Reed, the ones from Sarasota from Broward County,
and the rest of them, Pete- GrSffi became a very /] (P
He-waesa--canrdiarbe-and all of a sudden blasting us and we were his
party's elected officialsand he had never advised us of his party's
position and the salaries whatsoever. And so this was a problem that
I thought in communicationW.%* t I had suggested the elected chairman
tell him too that you are going to establish communication between
Republican elected officials in Tallahassee and the party chairman.-
A officeoSays "I got defeated thenSyswould you come up here and
act as a liaison and accept this legislative counsel? 6aasA A
and I did. So we moved to Tallahassee at that session and I handled
the job fromAparty headquarters. It was just a few blocks fom the
our officials /AtCC 1~t lC .
capital. Carrying messages to.Republicanand a-cucuses in case there
;ayz ad I'd tell them what the executive
board had said at its meeting that they had discussed t~ie particular
subject. That there had -ben~any results We didn't try to tell
you woltd vote wou-d
anybody that this wqy or you^vote that way, but if an issue was
there. M"Tney'-try tooseVf the party and discussed it.
FLA REP 3 ABC
J: the majority of the board members felt that this was good legislation tA
,C amd"T "V's bad legislation, it ought to be changed. A "e-~tere-any
I ta Lc e--" the kind of thing that
\iAc specific instances that stand out in your own mind 'a ,"(at7
are talking about. Le value of what you are doing?
J: I think thatin election -- probably(he biggest because the legislative
leadership sometimes appoints some of the most inexperienced people to the
elections/and they get in here and start messing around with election laws.
even
They get. They won't.run for office. They have never had the experience
of trying to raise money 9 hey were-tiying to operate a mechanical party
structure and I think the adoption of the We worked on the bill having
use to
to do with the putting all the taking from thk statutes basicallyspell out
exactly the operation of the Republican and Democrat State Executive
Committee' and ae g committees from the statutes. And I worked
with in
with the Republican members relation committee Republicans .both
houses to help me develop a law that would give the tax voters a part
to some aecotarnTsg committees That the party adopts the rules and
procedures rdherthan have them outlined in the statutes so tat both
parties wouldn't have to be identical because maybe the Democrats PV
would in-ta l tsg rules and procedures tIat would
94
FLA REP 5ABC
J: build its base one -rwaytWe might dkcidethat we want to do it an
entirely different way, but we both ~ ke into being wins you might
say. Following the same procedures basically. There were other
pieces of legislation tha besides elections heWl1, the
corporate income tax was one issue that I worked ith them
and because the Republican Party took a position totally opposed to
corporation and indeamd we were I went to the caucus and explained
the party's position, tbeina g why they were opposed to it and what
how
they thought and they thought that they ought to react to it.
As it turned out, C -.- l.: '-, .*
and-the Republicans- Aoff and we had some deals
made and wetholght that the tax did get through. I still think that
that
to this day.if they had done what we had suggested and stayed
inihere tight, and followed what their caucus but they broke away
from the caucuses and we had people break off from the caucus position
and this I think is when they lost some of their real respect that the
Democ \ratic Party had for them. IswhenAthes- eat party realized
that onimporas they could cr*agthem but before that it wasn't a partisan
issue. Sure we would go wlth-theDemocrate-T-ralgo-id cenought to pass it.
but if something thought was Partisan the party had a position
we .wnL. -UZ -r We stayed in there tight and at this particular
point in time these men, they wece-good-for-progress. They had full
and everything, would
amount of debate. The position.be taken and the next day you find five of
95
FLA PERS 3ABC
J: them going the other way. Instead of staying with the Party position that
_-L
was adopted by thea .n and of curse, you have five of them do it one
day, the next day two more are going to ay, "Well, why should I stick ith
thfop .2 They got away with it. Of course, here's no way to db anything
there was, but
.ever
to them. Nobody suggested 'ust from solidarity and from the standpoh t
that you are not going to be respected as a force in this body unless there comes
a time when44 4 C t itand up and be counted as a Republican and this
LVEW tr taxation;
is te philosophy. This is the philosophy of octhat the corporate
tax, and personal income tax stand up and say this is where we are going to
stand stand here andget run over Whayou need to do they didn't do that.
I can't recall an issure,- Abt I d get. We'd have board meetings in Tallahassee
was -ing
about once a month and sometimes less if something com up. We had board
meetings before hand, and discussed some of the legislation eeme p- at various
sch sl and they discussed it and then I would get get from them their opinion,
and I wuld and other things that I did was go b cabinet meeting and listen to
whether
what he cabinet was doing, to see I could find any information that would be
useful to our chairman. As the loal opositienm out of office you might say,
the minority should be able to ange' things itn light the general public.
dJ-- L e) W ^ ,'C
Even though we did find some things we found some things the cabinet way
and as far as I am concerned as the governor goes we tried it. We iss ed-
Inp--- be, but they didn t get too much play throughout the state. WhJfapt
1(Zi^: ^HAL'LO3 C^I)Q LbZ^ 'L4.3C.-'. '' I'' t.'*
She -pa"epe e. nteh honeymooning with the governor and
he could do no wrong. And maybe our timing on submitting the pieaede t=sT -.
had
Otherwise it didn't work as well as we.expected.
- Any specific issue there you care to give Me-an example y
FLA REP 3ABC
J: As an example, I'd like to bring out the issue of the legislative wings
in Tallahassee. I went to the cabinet meeting and they would discussing
who #a build it and the money was there representing Knott Construction
Company out of Baltimore, Maryland. And so I just started king notes
(w io what they were saying It became apparent to everybody in the room
that Knott Construction Company had come in as a-n -guoVr, but that
the
they had found in the statutestechnicality because they had not either
done something regarding the voting-procedures exactly the way that it
was supposed to be done. And so it was recommended by the governor to
the chairman that the vete-be-thrown out because of i-s technical
violations And the ifct that th ing phd for oz agr- n
thal-tatt Company in Pensacola be accepted, and so I figured that
Pensacola, the governor Pensacola worth looking intc t he
Secretary of State's office and found out who the green-hbts were a4f
what's his financial statements, his wife, his children n, vartuums tb
people in his office by making calls to Pensacola, takig pato-e -in-
realesta;.e to find out who worked for him, aid he was involved directly
between
with the construction and came up with.$8,000 $9,000 contributions
97
FLA REP 3ABC
.just this particular individual and his acquaintances to
-te-the governor's campaign. Find out that Bastew
W) w to the Board of Regulations.
Brockto was appointed Business And that
^- conw a A i 'A .
he was thb elected contractor.,e4 -it was worth the contractor,
was worth 2.1 millions of dollars an this ten million plus That's
before extras, that's just what the contractlr was wort in the
legislative wing. And we thought that there was a tie in. We thought
that it was something that if it had happened in our administration
would have been t.exposed and the governor would have been crucified for
i( of
it. And I thought that I wAud1ad a gold mine political espionage
into the
yo} might say .finances of the campaign. Tha the press was just tZ& 44
{-A7' I!
Saki as but they didn't like it. They didn't enjoy it) a24 arut
And it was fun doing it but still I kinda wasted effort.
I
I
491 C
S- let's backtrack. As a legislator, in 1967 to 1970, what do you A6
significant accomplishment Jour legislative sessions made) in yot
party Republican legistive What significant contributions do you
J:-a!t the Republican Pary itself?
S- As legislatoof the Republican Party..AhtLt C~'- -C
J: Of course, I felt thq greatest contribution waTSe .change that
98
as
It
1
FLA REP 3ABC
J; had taken place that ise-taing p"-a in the legislative branch itself.
don't -t-
Ithink that it could never have taken place if the Republicanshad not
gotten enough people up there to assist in doing it. I don't think
that one party would have accepted the responsibility by itself. O/ L S-
zAot the responsibility so much as the threat that it might have brought
to their political careers, but if there's one thing 'th date that
not just the State of Florida, but every state it's a weakness of
the legislative branch, to be able to handle the responsibility of
government, concerning policies for the state. And we were still operating
on the every two year crisis basis of do nothing, know noth ing legislators
who weren't trained, wevenIt prepared and never understood leg4eatuare that
they were passing beyond the fact that they were told that it was good by
somebody y ty- were voting for And the outstanding contribution, I think,
j4- or5 /ie, 4
:a Republican legislat- 71 participating and willing to step out into a
take a strong, positive position and seeing that4legislative branch
wae-renAequal branch with the judicial ,executive in the State of Florida.
I think that the adoption the second most significant thing was that, ther~ 60
-~thecould not have had the Codstitution 'election of 196f d I think that
the constitutional revision was necessary t6 outlivedthe 1885 Constitution.
99
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