UI professor Kenton Bird ‘channels a little bit of Tom Foley’ in discussion of new book about the former speaker of the house

Across the street from the federal courthouse that bears his name and down the hill from where he grew up on the lower South Hill, the top floor of the Chronicle Building was packed with an audience eager to learn of former Congressman Tom Foley’s life and legacy.

“To know that he was in this building quite a bit during his time in Congress, it’s like we can channel a little bit of Tom Foley today,” R. Kenton Bird told his audience who came to hear him speak about the book he co-authored about Foley in the Chronicle Pavilion.

A congressman of three decades, Foley is the namesake to buildings, roadways and university departments around Washington’s 5th Congressional District, where he’s remembered as an effective lawmaker who bridged divides between the political parties.

Bird, a journalist and University of Idaho School of Journalism professor emeritus, was the featured guest at Northwest Passages on Sunday afternoon to discuss his book, “Tom Foley: The Man in the Middle,” co-authored with John C. Pierce. Moderating the discussion was Spokesman-Review columnist Jim Camden, who covered Foley for 14 years as a reporter. Bird and Camden discussed their favorite Foley stories, his life before his extensive political career and his leadership style amid divisive partisanship in Congress.

Foley represented the 5th Congressional District for three decades, from 1964 to 1994, and served as speaker of the house from 1989 to 1994, the first and only Washingtonian to hold that position.

He ran as a Democrat, claiming a seat that was previously considered a Republican stronghold. Though extensive and influential, a mere 25-minute window provided the launch of his Congressional career.

It was the summer of 1964 and Foley was visiting Spokane, his hometown, from where he worked in the attorney general’s office in Olympia. He met some of his Democratic friends for lunch at the Spokane Club, who urged him to run for the congressional seat against 11-term incumbent Walt Horan.

By the end of lunch, he’d made up his mind to run and started the 320-mile drive back to Olympia the day before the deadline to file a run for office.

“After lunch, he drives to Seattle, meets friends and according to one account, stayed out till 3 in the morning,” Bird said. “He gets up late morning and drives to Olympia.”

After his Seattle pit stop, his mission to the state capital stalled again when his car got a flat tire at the outskirts of Olympia the morning of the filing deadline.

With the clock ticking, his tire changed and Foley likely sleep deprived, he filed his candidacy 25 minutes before the deadline at the Secretary of State’s Office in Olympia.

“The way he tells it, they went back to wherever they were staying and he called just as the office closed. He disguised his voice just in case anybody knew who he was, which they wouldn’t have,” Camden said. “He said, ‘Well, who filed for the 5th District as a Democrat?’ And they said, ‘Just some guy named Tom Foley.’”

The rest was history. The only Democrat to file, he advanced to the general election against Horan. Foley won by 11,000 votes in what Bird called a “gentlemanly” campaign. The most salacious either of them got, Camden said, was Horan correcting Foley during a debate saying, “You got that wrong, bud.” Then the chairman of the county Democratic Party called for Horan’s apology for this disrespectful remark, Camden said.

Foley’s courteous campaign carried on into his career, where he was known for working across the aisle during a time when Democrats had a strong majority in Congress.

“With George H.W. Bush as president and Foley as speaker, there was at least the appearance of bipartisanship,” Bird said. “Foley made a strong effort to include Republicans, at least in procedural matters in the House.”

On one infamous occasion with Foley as speaker of the house, he astounded his Democratic colleagues by awarding a voice vote to Republicans when they were louder in the vote based on volume. Despite holding a strong majority that should have made them louder, the Democrats “weren’t paying attention,” Bird said.

“The Republicans were clearly the louder voices, and Foley ruled that the Republican position had prevailed to the astonishment of the Democrats who were used to always winning voice votes,” Bird said. “The Republicans stood up and spontaneously applauded Foley for recognizing that they were part of this legislative body and deserve to be treated fairly.”

During his three decades, Foley was sure to “bring home the bacon” to his constituents in Eastern Washington.

“The voters of the 5th District sent Tom Foley back to Washington, D.C., to not only represent them, but to advocate for their interests. And Tom Foley brought back the goods,” Bird said. “We see that at Fairchild Air Force base, at Washington State University’s research laboratories, at the VA hospital in Walla Walla and throughout the 5th District.”

Though productive, his career ended in 1994 when he lost his re-election to Republican George Nethercutt by a narrow 4,000 votes. It was a “perfect storm” in which he lost his seat, Bird said.

In the midst of scandal surrounding the House and its members, Bird said Foley’s Achilles heel was his defense of the institution and his colleagues that blinded him from the American people’s perception that Congress was unaccountable and out-of-touch.

While attentive to the House, Foley perhaps neglected the needs of his constituents in Washington state, Bird said. The previously unwavering support from his voters faded as a new generation of voters hit the polls. At the same time, his constituency grew redder and redder, and Nethercutt emerged as a “personable” and “credible” Republican, proving himself as a formidable foe unlike Foley’s other challengers.

“It was this confluence of national forces, the rising discontent with Congress and the sense that perhaps it was time for a fresh face in Congress from the 5th District,” Bird said.

The 5th District has been represented by a Republican since, electing current Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers after Nethercutt’s retirement in 2005.

The tides could turn again as McMorris Rodgers decided this year not to seek re-election after two decades in the House. Spokane treasurer and Republican candidate Michael Baumgartner hopes to continue the red streak in the district, while Democratic candidate and political newcomer Carmela Conroy seeks a Foley-level turn of the tides in November to flip the district.