Meet North Carolina's Thomas Jefferson

Remarks by NC Insurance Commissioner Wayne Goodwin
at NC Center for Voter Education/Spectrum of Democracy Dinner:
Presentation of Robert Morgan Service Award to John L. Sanders
Raleigh, NC
21 February 2013


President John F. Kennedy once invited all of the Nobel Prize laureates to meet with him in Washington, DC. He most famously said to the assembly:

“I think that this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered together at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”

By no means am I comparing any of us to Nobel prize winners this evening!

And this is not the White House, though we are not far from the Governor’s Mansion.

That anecdote is appropos tonight because, in my personal opinion, John Sanders is the closest we will get to Thomas Jefferson in our lifetimes. If you know him, then you know what I mean.

Like Jefferson, John Sanders has mastered and has a cultivated an interest in so many things – from architecture, art, books, and groundskeeping, to history, politics, and oratory, as well as music, historic preservation, writing, and the law. He has written extensively on the subject of North Carolina law and is known as a preeminent scholar of the Constitution, especially of North Carolina’s governing document, the 1971 version of which he crafted for ultimate approval by our legislators and voters.

John has walked with Presidents, Governors, legislators, Chancellors, and royalty, but has treated them in the same manner as he has treated over six decades of college students at the University of North Carolina: with respect, interest, and friendship, and with his hope that they will take every day to learn more about the human condition, how to make our corner of the world a better place, and never to forget the least among us or those that came before us.

John, like Jefferson, has promoted public education. As you will note from his biography, he has spent virtually all of his adult life with the our University system, serving in various administrative and other positions, roles where he helped integrate our campuses, and grow them in many respects for this new century that we’re in. At the Institute of Government, now known as the School of Government, he helped educate public officials as to their duties and answered questions from lawmakers and the public at large. With his correlation of the University’s mission and the duty of every able-bodied citizen to be civicly engaged, John Sanders lives by the tenet of Jefferson: A nation which seeks to be both uneducated and free, wants something that never was and never will be.

And like many folks gathered here, he is a strong proponent of keeping the cost of public education – especially at our state’s institutions of higher learning – at the lowest cost practicable. Why? Because keeping the cost of higher education low translates into more and better educated citizens, and ultimately more productive and more civic-minded citizens, and ensures all have a better opportunity of economic and personal success in life, whether one hails from rural Four Oaks or Hamlet or the urbane Charlotte and Winston-Salem.

John, again like Jefferson, is an ardent believer in public service. Besides his own tenure in the U.S. Navy Reserves and with the Institute of Government at Chapel Hill, every year he would encourage college students to consider how and why they might do their part for their generation. He asked them their opinions and their plans, prodded them to think about things differently, and to consider varying viewpoints, and to hone the best ways to articulate those philosophies.

The NC Association of Student Governments even created the JOHN L. SANDERS STUDENT ADVOCATE AWARD years ago. Also known simply as the Sanders Award, it was established in the 30th Session of the Association in honor of John Sanders, Director Emeritus of the UNC Institute of Government. That Award is to be bestowed annually on one or more public figures for service to the students of the University of North Carolina, to recognize those who advocate for the best interests of North Carolina’s students and thereby contribute to the quality of their lives. The Sanders Award shall be the highest honor bestowed by the Association upon a member of the University of North Carolina community.

Through his friendship and attention, John has fostered decades of North Carolinians to serve at every level of government, starting with student government.

A testament to his impact is found amidst the pages of a book that Patrick Wooten, Ted Teague and I coordinated and co-edited over 20 years ago. In that book, titled “North Carolina’s ‘Invisible Hand’, a phrase associated with 18th century economist Adam Smith, friends of John Sanders wrote about what he meant to them in their respective generations. I encourage you to check it out at the State Library, or over at UNC. (By the way, because it is a now considered a reference book, you can’t actually check it out of the library but you are encouraged to review it and learn even more about John.)

More present proof of his impact than that two decades-old book is found by looking at the gathering of students joining us tonight from the Dialectic and Philanthropic Societies at UNC. At least ten current students and at least ten more alumni members of the University who interacted with John over the years are here tonight to show their respect, admiration and love for our friend.

For many of us, John is not just a friend but a surrogate father and mentor.

Personally I can never thank him enough for taking time to teach me more about North Carolina, the University and its traditions; helping me – inspiring me – to do what I believe to be right, and to know that there is always more to learn, more books to read, and more friends to make and more to do for our great State.

He has been there, like a father, when I graduated from college and law school; became engaged and married; bought my first house and began a family; started businesses and ran for public office; and even when my own grandfather and father passed away, he took the time to be with my family. In times of loss and love and learning, John has been there.

And he’s been there for many others. And he has always been there for North Carolina.

On par with his belief in public education and public service, John has been passionate about civic engagement and voter education, and promoting a stronger, more vibrant, more participatory democratic republic. (Note I didn’t say “democracy”. He would most certainly counsel me to say, “Wayne, we are a republic, not a direct democracy.”

Bill Friday, the late President Emeritus of the University of North Carolina, reflecting upon John’s many career milestones, said:

“Many North Carolinians serve the State with great devotion; none has served more effectively or with greater distinction than you. The General Assembly, the State Capitol, art and artifacts, the performing arts, the University, the history and records of the State, the Institute, public schools and at least seven Governors have all benefited from your wisdom.”

For these reasons and more, it is my honor to recognize this year’s recipient of the Robert Morgan Service Award: John Lassiter Sanders.

# # #

John Sanders coordinated a visit by former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt to the UNC campus over 65 years ago. Here he is with Roosevelt. With him is his wife, Ann.

To view a special video honoring John Sanders, go to this link here.

As Jefferson Lives and Grieves ...

As Jefferson Lives and Grieves …
By Wayne Goodwin
17 October 2007

Several years ago it was all the rage for some folks to ask “What Would Jesus Do?” when confronted with a matter of public policy or morality. I even recall a fellow legislator – yes, a Democrat – who brandished a bracelet that displayed WWJD. It was intriguing – to say the least - to hear debate after debate about whether Jesus would support green legislation or oppose tax cuts or have an opinion about election laws.

That was all before Bush v. Gore.

Subsequent to that infamous Supreme Court case a book caught my attention entitled “What Would Jefferson Do?” Without getting in to the fact that Jefferson was more of a Deist than any particular Christian denomination, the volume authored by Thom Hartmann made a capitalistic play off its predecessor phrase. An amateur historian I am - and a political buff to boot - I did find it an interesting read, however. The author used Jefferson’s voluminous writings – not just the Declaration of Independence – to address certain subjects currently at the zenith of regular political discourse, especially in Congressional and Presidential elections.

Okay, even using his writings as a barometer we still may not know to a tee how “TJ” might feel on every subject today. But employing the “What would . . . ” slide rule made for an interesting parlor game to predict his position.

In the aftermath of the September 11th attacks, I have found myself more regularly thinking about our nation’s Founders and wondering how much deeper Al-Qaeda’s cut will be into our collective moral and principled foundations that we consider “the American way”.

For weeks and months and now years we have witnessed a growing deluge of revelations that strongly suggest America is not what it once was. They include:

● Loss of privacy by its lawful citizens.
● Torture as an acceptable tool.
● A “Patriot Act” that has eviscerated many of our freedoms.
● Significant evaporation of checks and balances among the three branches of government.
● Permanent American armies abroad using unacceptable, unsupervised “contract warriors” (read “Blackwater”) instead of citizen-soldiers following a lawful chain of command and answerable to the Chief Executive
● Breaking covenants with soldiers and their families by mandating unplanned extensions of National Guard tours of duty, and providing shameful medical treatment in our VA hospitals and clinics for the wounded who return home.
● Paying for a war not by the current generation but by placing it on the backs of our children and grandchildren via the national debt, an unheralded practice never tried throughout the history of American military conflicts
● A more corrupt Congress than at any other point in recent memory.
● Unlawful renditions to foreign countries.
● Blatant questioning of and violations of the Geneva Conventions
● The federal government’s allowing cheap imported Chinese toys and food to poison our children and animals.
● The devastation of our manufacturing and industrial base to foreign lands, all in the name of corporate profits but to the detriment of the public’s dual need for good jobs and the national security that comes with making some of our most basic staples.
● The collapse of bridges and degradation of other infrastructure which would have been repaired and perfected but for trillions spent on the current war.
● Outright lies by the President, Vice President and the former Attorney General to Congress, the Courts, to the press, and to the American people.

Whereas a few of these diminutions of American moral primacy have no correlation, the most egregious examples could rightly be deemed victories by Osama bin Laden and radical Islamic terrorists. Think about it: The enemies of the United States oppose America and all for which it stands – freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom of speech, equal rights for women, due process, civil liberties, the right to suffrage, and a government genuinely controlled by “the people” and not by military-industrial, theocratic, and/or plutocratic interests. Aren’t these the same principles we have seen shrink before our very eyes since 2001?

It angers me that certain American political leaders who brandished the sword of liberty and the shield of patriotism may have handed to our enemies a victory even greater than the September 11th attacks: a reduction in what America, in fact, stands for today.

As we have seen the Bush-Cheney administration decimate the goodwill that America had banked for generations among most nations of the world, and strip away various civil liberties we hold dear, I must now resurrect that question of “What Would Jefferson Do?” …

Would the 3rd President and Founding Father – no fan of the Supreme Court in his own day, but respectful to a fault of the role that separation of powers plays – have harsh words for this White House?

Would he have condoned torture?

Would he champion permanent tax cuts for the uber-wealthy and promote an increasingly exorbitant gap between the rich and the middle class?

Would he find the dramatic centralization of power within Washington, DC abhorrent to his very being?

Would he choose to side with the monied pharmaceutical, insurance, oil, and military industries instead of children?

Would he have allowed such a swift, downward spiral of the United States in a mere eight years, if ever?

Would Jefferson believe that another revolution were necessary?

Two hundred years ago the Sage of Monticello began the final year of his last term in the White House.

The nation was then in the hands of a fellow Founding Father, James Madison, who almost was our ultimate President when the British tried re-taking America and actually landed on U.S. soil, burning the White House in the War of 1812. The country was at a serious low point.

However, when Madison’s service concluded we then relied upon James Monroe to transition us to what historians call “the Era of Good Feelings.”

2008 will be a watershed year for Americans.

With next year’s elections, we will face either a return of an Era that lifts up all that is great and good about the land of the free and the home of the brave, and returns us to that shining City on a hill; … or we will witness more of the same from the last seven years.

Jefferson would see this as a revolutionary moment. Carpe diem!

© Wayne Goodwin of Rockingham, NC. All Rights Reserved.