William F. Winter
William Forrest Winter (February 21, 1923 – December 18, 2020) was an American attorney and politician who served as 58th governor of Mississippi from 1980 to 1984. A member of the Democratic Party, he also served as the lieutenant governor, state treasurer, state tax collector, and in the Mississippi House of Representatives.
William F. Winter
Evelyn Gandy
Evelyn Gandy
Office abolished
December 18, 2020 (aged 97)
Jackson, Mississippi, U.S.
3
William Aylmer Winter (father)
United States
1943–1946, 1951–1957
Born the son of a legislator and school teacher in Grenada, Mississippi, Winter was educated at the University of Mississippi. He enlisted in the United States Army after graduation and assumed responsibility for training troops before being posted to the Philippines. Upon his return to the United States, Winter enrolled in law school and became increasingly involved in politics, winning election to the Mississippi House of Representatives in 1947. Re-elected twice, he supported bills aimed at governmental reform. Following an unsuccessful bid to become Speaker of the House, in April 1956 he was appointed to the lucrative post of state tax collector. Feeling the office was wasteful, he convinced the legislature to abolish it and was elected state treasurer in 1963. He also became the chair of the board of trustees of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History in 1969, which he served as until 2007.
Winter launched an unsuccessful campaign in the 1967 gubernatorial election. He was elected as lieutenant governor in 1971, and made another unsuccessful bid to become governor in 1975. He was elected to the governorship in the 1979 election, and during his tenure he supported civil service protections for state employees, reformed the judicial appointment process, removed racial considerations from state hiring process, and dealt with continuous budget deficits. Mostly focused on education reform, he pushed the 1982 Education Reform Act through the legislature, which increased spending on public education and established public kindergartens. Winter unsuccessfully ran for a seat in the United States Senate in the 1984 election. Later in his life he taught at the Harvard Institute of Politics, co-chaired Bill Clinton's presidential campaigns in the 1992 and 1996 elections, co-chaired Clinton's Advisory Board on Race, supported altering the flag of Mississippi, and was awarded the Profile in Courage Award before his death in 2020.
Early political involvement[edit]
Early interest[edit]
When he was eight years old, Winter accompanied his father to the Mississippi State Senate in Jackson and watched debates on the Senate floor.[29] They also attended the inauguration of Governor Martin Sennet Conner and met the governor the following day.[30] The trip made an impression on him and piqued his interest in politics.[29] By the time he was in high school he had open ambitions to become an elected official.[31] Unlike his father, Winter supported President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal platform and saw the president's actions as proof "that politics is a worthy profession".[32] While stationed in the Philippines, he wrote to his father to discuss his chances at having a political career.[33]
1967 gubernatorial campaign[edit]
Winter announced his candidacy in the 1967 gubernatorial election in January 1967, despite his own doubts about the potential of a candidate with a moderate position on race.[92] Former governor Barnett (who had been out of office the four previous years due to limits on gubernatorial succession), radio personality Jimmy Swan, and prosecutor Bill Waller also ran in the primary.[93] Early polling showed Winter running second to Barnett. Many Mississippians opposed a second Barnett term and recruited Congressman John Bell Williams, a segregationist with a reputation as an effective campaigner, to run, much to Winter's disappointment.[94]
Winter ran by emphasizing his Mississippian roots and experience in government, and promised to improve education and job opportunities. His campaign also produced some of the first modern television political advertisements in the state's history. Incumbent governor Paul B. Johnson Jr. did not endorse any candidates, but was rumored to favor Winter.[95] An April poll showed Winter leading the primary with forty-five percent of the vote, with Williams following at thirty-one percent.[96] Despite occasional jeering at public appearances accusing him of being a "nigger-lover", he tried to avoid discussing race early on in the campaign,[97] instead saying he wanted to focus on "bread-and-butter issues, not the old emotional ones—not racial issues."[98] None of the other candidates planned to openly appeal to the black electorate despite the passage of the federal Voting Rights Act of 1965 having enabled the registration of thousands of new black voters in the state.[99][98][97]
As the primary campaign went on, Winter increasingly sought to appeal to white segregationists. He attended the Jackson Citizens' Council's forum in May with the other candidates.[97] He stated "The overwhelming majority of Mississippians don't like the chaos that is being forced upon our schools by the HEW [...] I have three little girls and I am not going to forsake them to the HEW social planners and bleeding heart liberals as long as there is a breath in my body," in response to a question concerning school integration.[100] He also stated that "I was born a segregationist and raised a segregationist. I have always defended that position. I defend it now."[100] He finished by saying that it would be "the greatest disservice" if racial issues became "a political football" and said "The people of Mississippi want a man who is not afraid to fight [...] but one who has common sense enough to win. They are tired of losers [...] they want winners.[101] This spawned a new slogan for Winter's campaign, "Fight to Win for Mississippi".[102]
Feeling that he had done enough to address the race issue, Winter refocused his efforts on fleshing out a political platform. He proposed a "Winter Plan for Better Schools" which included decreasing class sizes, boosting teachers' and other school staff members' salaries, and increasing course offerings. He also released 12-point plan for industrial development.[102] His campaign ultimately developed 15 "Winter Plans" for various issues.[103] Winters' opponents kept their focus on race and denounced him as a "liberal".[102] Some black leaders quietly backed him, mindful that a vocal show of support would tarnish his image among white Mississippians.[104] Winter tried to counter segregationists' doubts about him by tying himself to Senators James Eastland and John Stennis—both clear segregationists—and by stressing law and order—a position which placed him in contrast to disorderly civil rights protests and riots elsewhere in the country.[105] He generally refrained from directly attacking the other candidates.[106]
Winter placed first in the primary with Williams in second place and a runoff being required.[106] In anticipation of the runoff primary, Winter and his team decided that they would need to pick up the votes of segregationist who had sided with Barnett and Swan by characterizing Williams as an inadequate defender of segregation.[107] Barnett endorsed Winter to avenge Williams' attacks on himself.[108] Winter initially adopted a hardline stance on segregation, saying he opposed Johnson's presidency and would support Alabama Governor George Wallace or Republican Ronald Reagan in the 1968 presidential election "to preserve conservative government".[109] Quickly losing the will to continue this rhetoric, he returned to his previous messages emphasizing his experience and his plans for reform. Williams and his supporters in turn attacked Winter as disingenuous.[110] His campaign also distributed literature which warned that "William Winter's election will ensure negro domination of Mississippi's elections for generations to come."[111] Winter received the majority of the black vote in the runoff primary, but lost to Williams.[112]
1975 gubernatorial campaign[edit]
Winter began planning another gubernatorial campaign after the 1972 legislative session ended and officially launched his campaign in June 1975.[131] Despite advice from a pollster and other politicians that Mississippians wanted a candidate who represented "change" in wake of the Watergate scandal, Winter's campaign focused on his record and experience. His campaign material attempted to characterize him as warmer and down-to-earth, but this image gained little traction.[132] His attempts to portray himself as honest and principled were sullied by some ethics complaints from State Senator Theodore Smith and his opposition to a limit on campaign spending. Winter attempted to cultivate black support, but made no open appeals to the black community as he feared a backlash from conservative whites.[133] Polls conducted in July 1975 showed Winter still leading in the primary, and he gained the endorsement of several major newspapers.[134]
Meanwhile, Finch, one of his opponents, ran a "working man's" campaign which featured him performing various manual labor tasks. Winter dismissed these as gimmicks and stunts, but they garnered support for Finch. Another candidate, Maurice Dantin, accused Winter of having a conflict of interest by remaining at his law firm while serving as lieutenant governor. Television ads broadcasting in the last two weeks of the campaign before the primary repeated this message and, despite some factual inaccuracies, damaged Winter's appeal.[135] Winter placed first in the primary while Finch came second, and Dantin placed third.[136] Winter and Finch both repeated the same messages they had used in the first primary in anticipation of the runoff, though Winter's campaign literature advertised him as "A statesman. Not a stuntman."[137] He also criticized Finch as lacking in a substantive program, but increasingly the working class began to view Finch as a "friend".[138] Finch also made successful entreaties to black voters.[139] Finch defeated Winter in the runoff with one of the largest victories ever in a gubernatorial runoff.[140][141] The defeat left Winter convinced that his political career was over.[142]
Gubernatorial career[edit]
1979 campaign and election[edit]
Finch's time in office was marred by corruption scandals, and he was viewed with increasing unfavourability as his term approached its end.[142] In January 1979 Winter encountered a former aide, Bill Cole who was assisting another candidate in that year's election and conducting polling. Cole asked if he could add Winter's name to statewide survey on persons who could be elected governor. Winter agreed, and Cole later called him to indicate that his chances in the 1979 gubernatorial election were favorable.[143] After further investigating his chances, he declared his candidacy on June 6, 1979.[144] He denounced the "corruption and mismanagement" of Finch's administration and linked Finch's troubles with Lieutenant Governor Evelyn Gandy, the frontrunner in the Democratic primary race at the time.[143] Instead of appearing at a series of rallies and events, he would typically drive to a supporter's home in a given locale, and use their phone to call up other supporters and potential voters to say he was in the area and would appreciate their vote. He would then go to the local radio station or newspaper office to get free media publicity.[145] Styling himself as economically conservative and supportive of business, Winter's preeminent campaign issue was the reform of the state's educational system.[146] Gandy placed first in the primary while Winter placed second.[147]
Winter was buoyed by his image as a moderate, professional, experienced public official which stood in sharp contrast to the public's perception of Finch's time in office as haphazard. Gandy's reputation was harmed by her association with Finch and the fact that she was a woman.[143] Due to the latter factor, Winter's campaign organization attempted to craft an image of "toughness" for him, and released television commercials that showed him posing with tanks and firing a gun at a weapons range. Winter won the runoff with fifty-seven percent of the vote.[148] In the general election Winter faced Republican nominee Gil Carmichael. Carmichael had lost the 1975 gubernatorial race to Finch and thought that his own moderate and professional image would help him. However, he had been harmed by a bitter Republican primary and in Winter had an opponent who exuded a similar public image but was more experienced in office. Winter won the general election by a margin of 149,568 votes, earning 61 percent of the total vote. He later recalled, "It was the easiest race I ever made."[149] He was inaugurated as Governor of Mississippi on January 22, 1980, in the Old Mississippi State Capitol.[150]
Legacy[edit]
Academic James G. Thomas Jr. wrote, "Governor Winter's legacy is a complex web of sometimes seemingly conflicting politics".[226] Historian Charles C. Bolton wrote, "He made mistakes. He sometimes took actions that were politically expedient or adopted stands he thought necessary to protect a future political career. Yet William Winter steadfastly used his political offices to further the public interest, and his work in the public arena in the more than twenty-five years after he left politics continued that same objective. Our democracy could benefit from more leaders who would emulate the career of William F. Winter."[219] Mabus described him as "the greatest governor Mississippi has ever had".[77] Historian David Halberstam called him "Mississippi's best and strongest governor of modern times. Winter, more than any other politician, is the architect of the new Mississippi and the new America."[227] Academic Maarten Zwiers called him "one of the most successful progressive governors in the history of Mississippi."[228] Historian Tony Badger wrote, "many now see Winter as the most successful governor in Mississippi's history. But he was not then, and is not now, universally admired."[229]
Winter is broadly remembered in Mississippi as its "education governor" for his work on education reform.[230][231][232] Historian David Sansing wrote that "he will be most remembered for the Education Reform Act of 1982".[233] Authors Jere Nash and Andy Taggart credited Winter with having "perfected the use of a special session to focus the public's attention on a single issue".[234] Reform continued to dominate political activity in Mississippi for over a decade after Winter's departure from office until falling out of favor in the 1990s as conservatives such as Kirk Fordice became increasingly predominant.[235] His papers are kept by the Mississippi Department of Archives and History.[236]