I met Dale Bumpers when we were both running for state office for the first time. I was a 23-year-old candidate for the Arkansas legislature. He was a small-town attorney--"the best lawyer in a one-lawyer town," as he'd put it--who had launched his campaign for governor with threadbare funding and 1 percent name recognition.
Little did anyone know that Dale Bumpers was also the most gifted politician that Arkansas at the time had ever seen. He soared above a primary field packed with giants, including legendary former governor Orval Faubus, and never looked back. He would not lose a race over the next 30 years before retiring from the United States Senate in 1999.
Tributes since Dale Bumpers passed away on Jan. 1 have captured his unique blend of charisma, humor, honesty and effectiveness. He nurtured, challenged and blazed a path for a generation of leaders, including a future Arkansas governor who would become his close friend and the 42nd president of the United States.
Of all Dale Bumpers' talents, perhaps none seems greater today than his ability to inspire people to rise above their differences. The vocation came naturally: he believed in the nobility and humanity of politics from an early age. And it stands out sadly now, when this quality is so painfully absent from our current political scene.
Consider a few principles from the Bumpers playbook. He didn't run negative advertisements or disparage his political opponents. He took positions that he believed were right, even when many voters disagreed. This was the case in 1954 when he led the racial integration of schools in his hometown of Charleston. As governor, he raised taxes to support education. As senator, he opposed a proposal to permit prayer in public schools and voted in favor of the Panama Canal Treaties.
As a rookie state legislator, I watched with awe as Gov. Bumpers took on powerful personalities and interests in his own party and won them over by cajoling, charming, persuading, and leading them toward reform. He created a model for centrist and bipartisan state government by building trust and consensus. He had faith in the politics of respect, and he practiced it.
He knew that he was more liberal than most of his constituents. So why did they keep voting for him? In an oral history interview, he said that voters don't judge politicians "based on whether they think you're too liberal or too conservative or moderate or anything else. They're going to judge you based on your day-to-day activities. It's the overall picture. And this is the reason politicians should always, in each individual case, do what he thinks is right."
Dale Bumpers wasn't alone. During the 1970s and '80s, he was part of a wave of youthful, progressive Democratic governors across the South. These included his friend Jimmy Carter of Georgia, Reubin Askew of Florida, Terry Sanford of North Carolina and William Winter of Mississippi.
Arkansas had its own rising stars. To be on the campaign trail in the state was to witness one of the greatest shows on earth. It featured four of the most erudite and mesmerizing political orators in the country: Dale Bumpers, his successor as governor and later Senate colleague David Pryor, Jim Guy Tucker, and Bill Clinton. Each combined a command of complex policy issues with gifts for language, persuasion and storytelling that I have not seen equaled. They reached people directly in their minds and hearts.
The election of President Clinton in 1992 was built in part on a foundation set by Dale Bumpers and others. President Clinton reinvigorated the Democratic Party around themes of responsibility, pragmatism and community. He attracted centrist voters back into a big tent that could hold a racially diverse electorate, businesses, unions and independents.
Today, of course, the picture is much different. Politicians seem to view the country as the divided states of America, and appeal to those divisions. In the South the tide has turned. Statehouses and congressional districts from the Carolinas to Texas are dominated by Republicans. Centrists are an endangered species.
When he retired from politics, Sen. Bumpers warned that partisanship had run amok and that the corrupting influence of campaign money "threatens our very democracy." He lamented that "good men and women are opting out of public service, or not to enter public service."
It might be easy to conclude that in today's polarized and toxic environment Dale Bumpers could not get elected in the state that he served with such brilliance and distinction. But I would never bet against him.
Mack McLarty is chairman of McLarty Companies and McLarty Associates. He was formerly White House chief of staff to President Bill Clinton.
Editorial on 01/10/2016