William Taulbee: A Stain on the Capitol

(Source)

In most sex scandals involving elected officials, the damage is limited to a politician's career. The scandal is easy fodder for a political opponent to use in the next election. Some voters may be willing to forgive infidelity, but others see it as a sign that the official is untrustworthy, morally unsound, or just plain sleazy.

Occasionally, however, a sex scandal ends in bloodshed. One of the most famous examples is the case of Representative Daniel Sickles, a New York Democrat, who shot and killed his wife's lover within sight of the White House. Arthur Brown, a Republican and one of the first two U.S. senators from Utah, was murdered by his mistress about nine years after he left office.

William Preston Taulbee is another federal politician who wound up meeting his end as a result of a sex scandal. It is unusual, however, in that he did not die at the hands of a jilted lover, cuckolded husband, or angry wife. Instead, he was gunned down by a reporter he had been routinely harassing for his coverage of the scandal.

Taulbee and Kincaid

Taulbee was born on October 22, 1851, near Mount Sterling in Morgan County, a mountainous area of eastern Kentucky. He attended the common schools and was also tutored by his father, who later served in the state's general assembly. In his youth, Taulbee also helped run the family farm.

Although he worked for a time shoveling coal, Taulbee soon left to become a teacher. He married Lou Emma Oney in 1871, and would have five sons with her. Taulbee continued teaching until 1877, when he began to study theology. He became an ordained minister and was admitted to the Kentucky conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church South. Taulbee also studied law and opened a practice after he was admitted to the bar in 1881.

Taulbee's first foray into politics occurred in 1878, when he was elected clerk of the Magoffin County Court. He was re-elected in 1882. Two years later, he became the Democratic candidate for the House of Representatives and handily defeated his Republican opponent, William L. Hurst. He faced a tougher re-election fight in 1886, even though he was battling the same opponent. Both Taulbee and Hurst traveled extensively through their district prior to the election, engaging in fiery debates on 27 occasions. Although it was a tighter race, Taulbee was returned to the House.

There is little information about Taulbee's service in the nation's capital. He was known as a gifted speaker, described as having a dignified bearing despite his rather young age. He was also popular enough in his district that one phrase suggested, "As goes Taulbee, so goes the mountains." His supporters nicknamed him "Our Pres" or "Pres Taulbee."

Soon after winning his second term, rumors began to circulate that Taulbee would not run again in 1888. He essentially confirmed these suspicions when he said he had purchased a house in Washington, D.C. and planned to live there after retiring from Congress.

(Source)

Charles Euston Kincaid was slightly younger than Taulbee. He had been born on May 18, 1855, and spent much of his early life around Lexington. Kincaid graduated from Centre College and began working in journalism, editing a newspaper in Lawrenceburg for two years. He then worked as a correspondent for the Lexington Courier-Journal, covering state politics and later matters related to the South and Cuba.

Kincaid also dabbled in politics. He picked up the nickname "Judge Kincaid" after he was elected a municipal judge in Lawrenceburg in 1879, and a year later he was appointed a state railroad commissioner. Kincaid also spent a good deal of time abroad, serving as a consular agent to England under President Grover Cleveland. In 1884, he was one of the emissaries appointed by the state legislature to travel to Italy and persuade the authorities there to repatriate the body of Kentucky sculptor Joel T. Hart. Kincaid also served as the private secretary to Governor Proctor Knott and later to Senator John Williams.

By the late 1880s, Kincaid was working as the Washington, D.C. correspondent for the Louisville Times. He was a social friend of several congressmen, but also known for unflinching accounts challenging those in power. Most targets simply shrugged off the attacks, however. Senator James B. Beck, a Kentucky Democrat, commented, "He's one of those small, buzzing bees. He won't hurt anybody, and he's too little to take hold of."

It is unclear how well Taulbee and Kincaid were acquainted during the former's last years in the House. Kincaid undoubtedly had contact with the congressman while covering the actions of Kentucky's congressmen and senators. But any hope of a cordial relationship disappeared after Taulbee became involved in a salacious scandal in December 1887.

"Brown-Haired Miss Dodge"

The first report that Taulbee was having an extramarital affair didn't even include the congressman's name. The Washington Post issued a brief article saying a Patent Office employee had caught a Kentucky representative "in a very compromising position" with one of the office's clerks. This wasn't exactly an uncommon occurrence. The model room of the Patent Office, where the miniature versions of various inventions submitted with patent applications were stored, was nicknamed the "Lovers' Retreat" because it was a popular place for flirtatious clerks and their wooing suitors to meet during lunch breaks. The thick cases holding the models offered plenty of hiding places for discreet trysts.

The Patent Office's model room as it appeared in the mid-1860s (Source)

Kincaid pursued the matter further, publishing an article in the Louisville Times with a rambling headline: "Kentucky's Silver-Tongued Taulbee Caught in Flagrante, or Thereabouts, with Brown-Haired Miss Dodge, Also of Kentucky." The headline also declared that the duo had been "lunching on forbidden fruit and hidden waters" and asked, "What's the world coming to?"

Kincaid's reports gave more details than the Washington Post brief, but still erred on the side of Victorian modesty. Taulbee and the clerk had been discovered "in a compromising way," "held sweet communion for half an hour before going to plebeian Monday lunch," and were "rather warmer than they were proper." Kincaid also detailed the circuitous routes Taulbee took to rendezvous with his mistress as well as other maneuvers he employed to try to keep the affair hidden, and determined that the congressman had helped the clerk get her job so they could arrange their meetings more easily. He would later maintain that he had told Taulbee he would be glad to interview him to get his side of the story, but that the congressman had not accepted the offer.

The clerk, Laura L. Dodge, was more accommodating. She sat down for an interview with Kincaid, who described the 17-year-old as beautiful, petite, "plump as a partridge," and "bright as sunshine and saucy as a bowl of jelly." Dodge admitted that she was not from Kentucky, as she had told the Patent Office. She refused to answer Kincaid's question about where she was actually from, saying she didn't want to get Taulbee in trouble. The congressman was a gentleman, Dodge said, and she was supposed to be a lady. "We will both swear on a stack of Bibles that we have not done anything," she declared.

Kincaid wasn't convinced. "What a mess this is for an ex-Methodist minister and a Congressman from the grand old Commonwealth of Kentucky," he ended the article.

Abuse of Kincaid

While newspapers in Kentucky picked up the tale of infidelity, the scandal aroused little interest in the nation's capital. The Washington Post didn't even follow up on its brief to identify the congressman. Patent Commissioner Benton J. Hall said he would investigate the matter, but the outcome was never reported. It seemed one likely result was the dismissal of Dodge, who left the Patent Office in the wake of Kincaid's articles but was soon able to find work in the Pension Office.

Taulbee did not seek the Democratic nomination in 1888, but it seemed clear that he had already made this decision soon after starting his second term, not because he had been exposed as an adulterer. He had also irritated his party a few years earlier. At the 1887 state convention, he proposed censuring President Grover Cleveland. The suggestion which was greeted by hisses and easily voted down.

After leaving office at the beginning of 1889, Taulbee stayed in Washington, D.C. to work as a lobbyist. He was successful in this role, earning a great deal of money. He lost some of these assets in the same year he left office, when House cashier Craven Silcott absconded with $75,000 in congressional payroll funds. The vanished funds included some savings Taulbee had had with the Sergeant at Arms, but he remained comfortably wealthy. His reputation in Kentucky also seemed to be intact. Kentucky's Semi-Weekly Interior Journal suggested that he was still "the most popular man in the district," and that his endorsement would all but guarantee victory for any congressional hopeful from eastern Kentucky.

Kincaid was still working as a correspondent covering Congress, so he ended up frequently crossing paths with Taulbee. Even though Taulbee had weathered the scandal fairly well, he was apparently none too fond of how the reporter had portrayed him. There were suggestions that Kincaid's articles had helped destroy Taulbee's marriage to Eliza, although the matrimony seems to have survived as well; the two would ultimately be buried together. Perhaps Taulbee simply held a grudge against Kincaid for the tenor of his articles.

Whatever the reason for Taulbee's enduring hatred for Kincaid, he rarely if ever encountered the reporter without bullying him. On several occasions, Taulbee insulted Kincaid or warned that he would someday kill him. Sometimes the harassment carried over into physical abuse. Kincaid recalled separate incidents where Taulbee had shoved him against an iron railing, slammed him into the door of a streetcar, and crushed his foot under his heel while the two men were in an elevator. Taulbee also got into the habit of tweaking Kincaid's nose or ear to indicate that he didn't consider the reporter to be worth fighting.

A brawl between Taulbee and Kincaid would have been extremely one-sided. The former congressman was described as "tall and sinewy," having retained the muscular physique built up in his youth of hard labor. Kincaid, by contrast, was "a little pint of cider fellow," barely five feet tall and weighing less than 100 pounds. He also had a range of health problems, including astigmatism which limited his vision as well as liver and digestive problems. On two occasions in the previous five years, he had nearly died of typhoid fever.

Kincaid never responded to Taulbee's insults, threats, or abuses. He did not want to worry his sick mother, he later said; he also told Taulbee that he did not want any trouble. He hoped that Taulbee would simply tire of this behavior and leave him alone.

Instead, the bullying continued unabated for a full year. It finally culminated in a confrontation on a House stairwell on a winter afternoon.

The final confrontations

On the morning of February 28, 1890, Taulbee spotted Kincaid near the entrance to the House of Representatives chamber. He called out that he wanted to see him. Kincaid responded that he couldn't, since he was "waiting for a gentleman."

Perhaps taking this as an insult, Taulbee responded by grabbing Kincaid by the collar, throwing him about, and giving his ear a violent twist. The House doorkeepers, who controlled access to the chamber, separated the two men.

The exact verbal exchange that followed between Taulbee and Kincaid is uncertain, but the intent of the words is clear. Kincaid protested, "I am not prepared to cope with you physically," to which Taulbee replied, "Well, you had better be." Another version had Kincaid saying, "I am a small man and unarmed," with Taulbee responding, "You had better be armed, or go arm yourself."

Both Taulbee and Kincaid were able to enter the House soon after the scuffle. Word of the altercation spread through the press gallery and among the members of Congress. Some had long expected that the feud between the two men would only end when one of them killed the other. Taulbee's words suggested that the fatal showdown was imminent.

About two hours after the initial confrontation, Kincaid and Taulbee met again on the eastern side of the House wing of the Capitol Building. A Y-shaped staircase descends toward a basement restaurant, and the encounter occurred near where the twin sets of marble stairs meet.

Kincaid had gone home in the interim and retrieved a revolver. Referencing Taulbee's earlier request, Kincaid allegedly declared, "Taulbee, you can see me now." He then raised the gun and shot Taulbee in the face.

An illustration of the incident, inaccurately showing Kincaid shooting Taulbee in the back of the head (Source)

The shot was audible in many parts of the building, including the House chamber. The bullet just missed Taulbee's eye, piercing his cheek. Bleeding profusely, Taulbee managed to stagger away from the scene. Kincaid promptly surrendered to a police officer who rushed to the scene, confessing that he was the shooter.

Although he had suffered a serious wound, Taulbee managed to stay conscious and conversant. He spoke with Senator John Griffin Carlisle, a Kentucky Democrat and former colleague; Carlisle had served in Congress since 1876, including three terms as Speaker of the House. Taulbee admitted to the earlier altercation with Kincaid, but told his friend, "He ought not to have done it. Why did he do so?"

Kincaid, speaking from his jail cell, claimed that he only shot Taulbee after he approached him in a threatening matter. Although the former congressman was said to be unarmed, contemporary articles noted that there were rumors that Taulbee's friends had made sure to relieve him of an "ugly-looking pistol" after the incident. Kincaid told reporters how Taulbee had told several people, including a judge, that he would have Kincaid's blood yet.

"Mr. Taulbee had been dogging me for more than a year. I am almost ashamed to admit it, but he has assaulted me six times," Kincaid said. He added, "No man has suffered more at the hands of another than I have from him. Mr. Taulbee has haunted me like a ghost. He has heaped insult after insult on me, and three different times threatened to kill me."

Reactions to the shooting were split between congressmen and reporters. Elected officials did not always have the best relationships with the press, and some thought that Kincaid and other reporters had dedicated too much attention to the Patent Office scandal. The press corps expressed regret for the incident, but was more likely to sympathize with Kincaid; his fellow reporters described him as an agreeable, fair person who wouldn't have harmed Taulbee unless provoked.

Several newspapermen were aware of the contentious relationship between Taulbee and Kincaid. Jay Durham, a former D.C. reporter, said, "He alway manifested the most intense hatred toward Kincaid. He was voluminous in vile epithets toward the correspondent."

Some accounts suggested that this was simply how Kentuckians settled their disagreements. The infamous feud between the Hatfields and McCoys had been raging for 10 years in the eastern part of the state, and it was only one of several deadly rivalries in the area. A little more than a decade earlier, a judge and former congressman had been gunned down outside his Owingsville hotel by a defendant dissatisfied with his ruling. Ten years after Kincaid shot Taulbee, an unknown assailant would assassinate Kentucky's governor after a contested election. The Courier-Journal of Louisville commented, "that which may regarded in Kentucky and other states of the Union as a matter of self-defense is treated here in Washington as murder in the first degree."

As Taulbee recovered in Providence Hospital, it seemed probable that he would survive. The bullet had lodged somewhere in his skull, and the physicians decided not to try to remove it.

More than a week after the shooting, however, his condition worsened. The bullet had come to rest just inside the skull, and an abscess had formed around the projectile and put pressure on the brain. On March 11, Taulbee died.

Kincaid's trial

Kincaid had been released on $2,000 bail, and turned himself in to face the upgraded charge of murder after Taulbee's death. He was released again due to poor health, and because his friends had helped him raise the $20,000 needed for the new bail, and allowed to return to Kentucky to recuperate.

In the spring of 1891, Kincaid returned to the nation's capital to stand trial on the charge of killing Taulbee. The proceedings had been delayed until after Congress adjourned on March 3, since Kincaid's defense attorneys included Senator Daniel Voorhees, a Democrat from Indiana. Kincaid was also represented by Washington advocate C. Maurice Smith, circuit court judge and former Republican congressman Jeremiah Wilson of Indiana, and Charles Grosvenor, a Republican congressman from Ohio who had left the House after losing his party's nomination in the previous year. U.S. Attorney Charles C. Cole, newly appointed by President Benjamin Harrison, would lead the prosecution.

An attempt to delay the trial a second time occurred after Voorhees came down with rheumatism. However, this request was denied after the court concluded that Kincaid was adequately represented by the remainder of his legal team. Testimony began on March 23.

Over the course of the two-week trial, eight sitting or former members of Congress were called to the stand. A number of Washington reporters also attended the trial as witnesses. The testimony outlined the animosity Taulbee felt toward Kincaid, establishing how the former congressman had tormented the reporter for months. One correspondent quoted Taulbee as saying, "He ought to be killed. By God, I'll kill him." Another said Taulbee had threatened to kick Kincaid's head off if he ever got within 10 feet of him. Many of the reporters said they had relayed these threats to Kincaid, and that he grew increasingly worried about his personal safety.

Two House doorkeepers, William McCormick and Robert Woodbridge, testified that they had witnessed the first confrontation between Taulbee and Kincaid. Woodbridge said he saw Taulbee pull on Kincaid's ear, while McCormick said he'd heard Taulbee call Kincaid a liar. About an hour later, McCormick said, Kincaid returned to the Capitol and spoke with him. He was in an anxious state, wondering what to do since he was a sick man and had been unable to cope with Taulbee while unarmed. McCormick told the reporter he had no advice to give.

The defense expanded on Kincaid's assertion that he had been in fear for his life when he shot Taulbee. Witnesses described Taulbee's long campaign of harassment against the reporter. Kincaid took the stand in his own defense, recounting how Taulbee had once threatened to cut his throat. He also said Taulbee had called him "a damn little coward and monkey" at their first confrontation on the fateful morning of February 28, 1890. The warning to arm himself had been enough to convince him to take up the revolver he never took outside his room.

Kincaid said that he had not been trying to seek out Taulbee, but had simply had another chance encounter with the former congressman. He had been taking one set of stairs down the Y-shaped staircase, intending to go to lunch and meet someone in the basement restaurant, when he unexpectedly came upon Taulbee and a companion on the platform. He said Taulbee immediately reacted by striding toward him, declaring, "I'll show you!"

Taulbee had a hand in his pocket, Kincaid testified. He said he began to retreat, and declared, "You're going to kill me, are you?" Kincaid also remembered that he had drawn his weapon and warned Taulbee several times to stand back. Taulbee had been undeterred, growling, "I'll show you." It was only when Taulbee was within reaching distance of him that he pulled the trigger, deciding that it was a choice between killing or being killed.

The prosecution suggested that Kincaid should have fled before opening fire for it to be a true case of self-defense; they also framed the matter as one of revenge. Kincaid, angered and humiliated by Taulbee's provocations, had finally decided to ambush him and end the harassment once and for all. One of their key witnesses was Samuel Donelson, a House doorkeeper who was the only witness of the shooting besides Kincaid and the deceased Taulbee. Donelson said Kincaid had waited until he and Taulbee were walking down the stairs before shouting, "Taulbee, you can see me now" and firing the single shot.

Taulbee's brother was also called to the stand. He said that three days before his death, Taulbee told him, "I did not know Kincaid was near and did not know who it was who shot me until I was told." Taulbee had also reportedly said he bore "no resentment" toward Kincaid, although he considered the shooting to be cowardly. The defense scrutinized the statements, pointing out discrepancies between the testimony of Donelson and Taulbee's brother.

The trial ended on April 8. After just a few hours of deliberation, the jury returned with a verdict. They determined that the matter had been one of self-defense; Kincaid was not guilty.

Aftermath and legacy

The shooting of Taulbee helped fuel a flurry of reform efforts on Capitol Hill. Constituents demanded for rules that could improve congressional conduct and morals while limiting corruption.

Kincaid returned to Kentucky and continued to work in politics and diplomacy alongside his journalistic endeavors. He also remained in poor health. He died in 1906, only 51 years old, while working for the Cincinnati Enquirer.

Dodge worked at the Pension Office until 1895, when she was fired. Five years later, she married a Pension Office reviewer named William Albert Paul; after his death in 1927, she was re-married to prominent attorney Tracy L. Jeffords and became well-known on the D.C. social scene. She died on Christmas Day in 1959 at the age of 89.

Taulbee's descendants showed little willingness to forgive Kincaid or accept the verdict that he was acting in self-defense. Six decades after the trial, one of his sons, John Taulbee, denounced the trial as "a farce." Not only had the defense bought off witnesses, he accused, but the shooting had nothing to do with Taulbee's hostility toward the reporter; instead, Kincaid had murdered his father because Taulbee had not named him to a political position. Virginia Hinds-Burton, a great-granddaughter of Taulbee's, said in 2007, "My great-grandfather was murdered. And his murderer got away with murder. And five boys were left without a father. A wife was left without a husband to support her."

A contemporary account of the shooting notes how House janitors started scrubbing away the bloodstains as soon as possible. Even so, much of the blood had soaked into the porous marble. "Some of the stains will remain there for all time," the article suggested.

(Source)

(Source)

The observation proved prescient. Visitors to the staircase today can still see dark splotches on the stone. These are said to be Taulbee's bloodstains, still evident after more than 125 years. Those with a belief in the paranormal say the ex-congressman continues to haunt the site of his killing to this day. Reporters who stumble on the stairs aren't just miscalculating a step, they say; rather, Taulbee trips members of the media to show his continuing disdain toward the field of journalism.

Sources

Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, "The Shooting of Congressman William Taulbee on the Steps of the U.S. Capitol" at House.gov, "Charles Kincaid Trial: 1891" at law.jrank.org, "Settled a Grudge" in the Chicago Tribune on Mar. 1 1890, "The Taulbee Inquest" in The Day on Mar. 13 1890, "The Kincaid Case" in the Terre Haute Daily News on Mar. 27 1891, "Kincaid on the Stand" in the Galveston Daily News on Apr. 2 1891, "Are Blotches in Capitol Bloodstains?" in the Poughkeepsie Journal on Nov. 1 1978, "A Historic Killing in the Capitol Building" on NPR on Feb. 19 2007, Kentucky Politicians: Sketches of Representative Corn-Crackers and Other Miscellany by John J. McAfee, Wicked Capitol Hill: An Unruly History of Behaving Badly by Robert S. Pohl, True Tales of Old-Time Kentucky Politics: Bourbon, Bombast, and Burgoo by Bery, Genealogy of the Lewis Family in America, From the Middle of the Seventeenth Century Down to Present Time by William Terrell Lewis

Marion Barry: up in smoke

(Source)

The first brush Marion Barry Jr. had with the law was a dispute over a parking violation in 1969. After spotting two police officers ticketing vehicles, Barry said to one of them, "If you put a ticket on my car...I'll kill you." When the officer called Barry's bluff, he tore the ticket up and threw the pieces into the policeman's face. In the ensuing scuffle, he struck the other officer in the face and tore his shirt. Barry, charged with assault, could have been sentenced to 10 years in prison. Instead, his case ended with a hung jury and two co-defendants were acquitted.

Barry would get in hot water for much more serious charges over the years, none more sensational than a 1990 incident in which he was caught on videotape smoking crack cocaine. Nevertheless, he became such a popular local figure in Washington, D.C. that both his supporters and detractors referred to him as the "Mayor for Life." Going from the son of an impoverished black family in the South to a leadership role in the nation's capital proved to be an inspiring story for many of his constituents, even as Barry's transgressions continued to checker his record well into the 21st century.

The third of 10 children in a family of sharecroppers, Barry was born on March 6, 1936 in Itta Benna, Mississippi. After his father died when Barry was four years old, his mother moved the family to Memphis and eventually married a butcher. Barry worked several jobs in his youth to support the family including selling newspapers, picking cotton, inspecting soda bottles, and bagging groceries. He graduated from Booker T. Washington High School in 1954, successfully becoming an Eagle Scout before doing so.

As the civil rights movement heated up, Barry joined the cause at a local level. He was the president of the student chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People at LeMoyne-Owen College, and was nearly expelled for criticizing a member of the college's board of trustees for a racially insensitive remark. Graduating with a bachelor's degree in chemistry in 1958, Barry went on to earn a master's degree in the subject at Fisk University two years later.

Since there was no NAACP chapter at this school, Barry formed one. He became a more noticeable civil rights figure, helping to organize lunch counter sit-ins in Nashville and participating in voter registration drives in several Southern states. He continued to pursue his studies, working for a year as a teaching assistant at the University of Kansas before transferring to the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. There, he founded a newspaper on civil rights issues entitled the Knoxville Crusader and learned that he was barred from tutoring white students.

This discrimination likely influenced the decision which would prove to be a major turning point in Barry's life. Although he was only a few credits short from receiving a doctorate in chemistry, Barry quit his studies. He had been part of a group of black student leaders who met to form what would become the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. In 1965, Barry moved to Washington, D.C. to begin full-time work as the organization's first national chairman.

By the time of Barry's arrival, "white flight" to the suburbs had transformed the city to one with a majority black population. Despite this demographic shift, whites continued to dominate city positions. This authority was rather restricted, however, given that the status of the city gave its residents rather limited representation. The District of Columbia had not even been allowed to vote in presidential elections prior to the 1964 election. It would not receive its own school board until 1968, and its representation in Congress was limited to a nonvoting delegate in the House of Representatives, a position not created until 1970.

"Home rule" for residents of Washington, D.C. became a major part of Barry's civil rights efforts in the capital. He organized the Free D.C. Movement and frequently wore a dashiki during his speeches. In January of 1966, he organized a one-day boycott of the city's transit system to protest a proposed fare hike. In 1967, he was successful in winning millions of dollars in federal grants to support jobs programs for poor blacks in the city. Two years later, he resigned from SNCC to turn his attention to this issue, founding an organization called Pride Inc. to find work for inner city youth.

Barry was elected to a string of municipal entities in the early 1970s, starting in February of 1970. He earned a spot on the Model Police Precinct, a board set up to improve relations between the police department and the people of Washington, D.C. He resigned a year later to run for the city's school board, defeating chairwoman Anita F. Allen for an at-large seat. He served until 1974, when he was elected to the City Council. At this point, he resigned from Pride Inc. to begin a full-time government career.

The City Council itself was a creation of the District of Columbia Home Rule Act of 1973. Though a mayor-commissioner and nine councilors had been responsible for managing the city since 1967, these positions were appointed by the President. The new legislation allowed the city to elect its own mayor and City Council in 1974, but Congress still had overarching authority in the district. Its members reviewed all of the Council's decisions, reserving the right to veto them, and retained the ability to set the city's budget and taxes.

In his first term, Barry worked to get a pay raise for the D.C. Metro Police and was instrumental in defeating a 1 percent gross receipts tax on city business. He was also an early supporter of gay and lesbian rights. Having built a base of support among numerous different groups and interests, he easily won re-election in 1976.

A year later, Barry was nearly killed in an incident that would help bolster his respect among the city's residents. On March 9, 1977, a dozen members of the Hanafi Muslims (a breakaway entity from the militant black group Nation of Islam) took almost 150 people hostage when they seized three buildings in the nation's capital. The group took over a Muslim religious center, the headquarters of a Jewish organization, and the District Building. They demanded that seven men convicted of murdering seven relatives of siege leader Hamaas Abdul Khaalis be presented for judgment before the Hanafi group. The hostage takers also demanded the destruction of all copies of "Mohammed, Messenger of God," a movie they considered sacrilegious to Islam.

Barry was on the fifth floor of the District Building, which functioned as the District of Columbia's city hall, when the gunmen took over the building. He heard two shots, which killed a radio journalist named Maurice Williams and injured a security guard who later died in the hospital of a heart attack. There was a third blast, and Barry realized he had been hit in the chest. One witness suggested that Barry had been a target; he said that when one gunman learned that he had shot Barry, he commented, "Oh good, we did get who we wanted to get."

Barry stumbled into the City Council chambers, where he was assisted by other people who had taken shelter in the room. He was later evacuated by firefighters who used an extension ladder to take him out through the window. Doctors found that a shotgun pellet had lodged less than an inch from Barry's heart, presumably after losing some of its speed in a ricochet. The slug was surgically removed, and Barry returned to work a week later.

When Barry ran for mayor in 1978, he received support from a variety of sources including the police, firefighters, young white professionals, and retirees. He was an early supporter of gay rights, working to prevent discrimination in housing and hiring, and he won acclaim among Hispanic voters by advocating for bilingual and adult education. The editorial board of the Washington Post named him as their choice for mayor. Though he won only 35 percent of the vote in the Democratic primary, it was enough to defeat City Council chairman Sterling Tucker and Walter E. Washington, the city's first elected mayor. In the strongly Democratic city, Barry easily won the general election by defeating Arthur A. Fletcher, a Republican who had served in both the Nixon and Ford Administrations.

Barry took the oath of office on January 2, 1979, in a strongly symbolic ceremony. He was sworn in by Thurgood Marshall, the first black justice appointed to the Supreme Court. The Post would describe Barry as a "national symbol for self-governance for urban blacks," noting that he secured jobs for black citizens in middle and upper level positions that had been traditionally dominated by whites. He also appointed a number of women to these positions.

Though there were certain racial issues in the District of Columbia—a 1991 study reported that 42 percent of the city's black men between the ages of 18 and 35 were in jail, on probation or parole, or wanted by the police—the city was burdened by numerous other problems as well. Washington, D.C. had little in the way of tax base to rely on. There were few heavy industries, most government employees commuted from suburbs in Maryland or Virginia, and many of the federal buildings and other structures were tax-exempt. Unlike urban areas elsewhere in the United States, the city could not rely on contributions from a state for assistance. The fire department was so strapped that it could only respond to one two-alarm call at a time.

In his first term, Barry completed an audit of the city's budget and trimmed the payroll by 10 percent. Most of the cuts were through attrition, but there were also deep cuts to the city's police force; about 1,500 people working for the D.C. Metro Police lost their jobs.

Barry led an effort to encourage hotel and business development in the downtown area, personally working with developers to help get their building permits approved. The mayor also strove to help the populace as a whole, championing programs that provided summer jobs to the city's youth, helped middle class families purchase a home, and offered food assistance to seniors.

Although Barry could point to some successes in his first term, other problems worsened or remained unresolved. Drug use, homelessness, and unemployment were on the rise. The crime rate increased, and critics pointed to Barry's gutting of the police department as the cause of the problem. In advance of the 1982 election, Barry abandoned the fiscal restraint he had shown in his first term and poured more money into public programs, including $180 million for elderly assistance and job programs. He easily won the Democratic primary and general election, and these victories were repeated in 1986. Though he won more support among the city's more affluent districts in the 1978 election, this trend reversed itself in subsequent contests as he was lionized among poorer voters.

In his second and third terms, Barry was heavily criticized as he seemingly abandoned his earlier commitment to financial responsibility. A 1990 report noted that one out of every 13 citizens in the District of Columbia was employed by the city, and enemies charged that the mayor awarded jobs based on patronage rather than skill. Carl T. Rowan, Jr., a former FBI agent, complained eight years later that the D.C. bureaucracy was "a source of jobs for people whose main qualification was their eligibility to vote for Barry." When Barry's second wife, Mary Treadwell, was sent to prison for embezzling from Pride Inc., he secured her a city job when she was freed.

Over the course of these three terms, 11 city officials appointed by Barry would be involved in scandals. Ivanhoe Donaldson, a former deputy mayor, was convicted in December of 1985 of embezzling $190,000 in city funds during Barry's first and second terms.

When Barry traveled to California to attend the 1987 Super Bowl, he was heavily criticized for not returning to the District of Columbia to oversee emergency management after the city was pounded by two blizzards in a row. These junkets were not uncommon; he met with heads of state in Africa in his first term, was a regular presence at prize fights in Las Vegas, and led a delegation to the Virgin Islands in 1988. Many questioned why Barry was heading to the Caribbean to assist the local government with with overhauling their personnel system, pointing out that Washington, D.C.'s swollen payroll and debt hardly made it a model for this reform.

There were also persistent rumors that the mayor was a philanderer and drug user. The Post said that attractive women were "omnipresent" in Barry's company, and he had been married three times and divorced twice by his third term (he would ultimately be married four times). When he suffered chest pains in September of 1983, he blamed it on a hiatal hernia; a physician not associated his his opinion opined that he had suffered a drug overdose, although this report would not be made public for another six years. A similar incident occurred in January of 1987. A federal grand jury called Barry to testify in January of 1984 during an investigation into the alleged sale of cocaine to the mayor and other D.C. officials. Barry was also in a number of accidents with his municipal vehicle and was rumored to have taken cocaine at a lavish "100 days in office" party, sexually harassed a model, visited a topless club where cocaine was being sold.

The drug rumors would gain steam later in Barry's third term. In June of 1987, he publicly denied a television news report alleging that he used cocaine with a former city employee. An attempted sting operation to purchase drugs from a former city employee named Charles Lewis at a hotel room in December of 1988 was called off when police learned that Barry was present; trace of cocaine were later found in the room. A week later, U.S. Attorney Jay Stephens announced that the incident would be investigated further. Barry apologized for his "bad judgment" in visiting Lewis, but insisted that he had not taken drugs. In January of 1989, Lewis also claimed that he had never used drugs with the mayor.

Lewis changed his story later in the year. In April, he was convicted of four counts of drug possession in the Virgin Islands; a month later, he was indicted on 16 counts of drug possession and perjury in the United States. He accepted a plea bargain in November, pleading to two counts of conspiracy to distribute cocaine and claiming that he had purchased crack cocaine for Barry in 1988 and used drugs with the mayor on the Virgin Islands trip.

The event which would offer undeniable proof of Barry's drug use had its roots in 1985, when Barry met an unemployed model named Hazel Diane "Rasheeda" Moore. She would later claim that they engaged in a two-year affair. Moore was also the beneficiary of $180,000 in city funds over the course of three years, with the money going toward an "image consciousness" campaign aimed at city youth.

On January 18, 1990, Moore invited Barry to visit her at the Vista International Hotel in the northwestern part of the city. Unbeknownst to Barry, Moore was collaborating with the FBI and a surveillance camera was hidden in the room. The tape captured the mayor fondling Moore's breast and leg and inquiring about drugs. She provided him with a crack pipe, and Barry took two deep drags. FBI agents and D.C. police officers stormed the room, placing Barry under arrest.

"Bitch set me up," Barry grumbled as he was placed in custody. "I shouldn't have come up here. Goddamn bitch."

The FBI surveillance footage showing Barry smoking crack cocaine (Source)

The arrest occurred just three days before an event where Barry was scheduled to announce that he would be running for a fourth term as mayor. Some of his advisers had privately suggested to him that he would be better off if he quietly left politics and accepted a university teaching job. He faced more of an uphill battle, due to his past controversies and the possibility that he would face a more powerful challenger. There were rumors that civil rights leader Jesse Jackson, who had recently moved from Chicago to Washington, D.C., would run for mayor; polls showed that he would easily defeat Barry in a mayoral race. 

Barry had been criticized for his remarks in a Los Angeles Times article, published on January 7, in which he was reported as saying, "Jesse don't wanna run nothing but his mouth. Besides, he'd be the laughingstock of America. He'd be run outta town if he ran against me." The article also said that Barry had boasted of his sexual prowess, threatened to punitive action against Jewish constituents who did not support him, and led schoolchildren in anti-drug pledges while denouncing rumors of his drug use as a "racist conspiracy."

There were suspicions that the government was using "selective prosecution" to target black leaders, an argument that gained a good deal of traction among Barry's supporters. They pointed out how the popular Harlem congressman Adam Clayton Powell had been expelled from the House of Representatives in 1967 for contempt of court, even though a House committee recommended that he be allowed to take his seat. "If they had accused Barry of stealing millions, creating a slush fund, awarding corrupt contracts, that would be one thing," said Benjamin Hooks, executive director of the NAACP. "But a personal habit that is bad, dangerous, lethal, that makes him a bad role model? There are 4 million people out there doing it. If there are 4 million, why did they pick out one and stick on his case for eight years?"

Barry's critics accused his supporters of trying to whitewash the crime. Some said that since prosecutors lacked the resources to go after every single offender, it made sense to arrest people whose behavior had compromised a position of public trust. Stephens said Barry's behavior was particularly egregious because he had been held up as a role model for black youth. In a column entitled "Don't Judge Black Politicians by Marion Barry," Mona Charen said there was no indication of racism or selective prosecution in Barry's case, since most of the politicians who had been ousted in recent years had been white. She denounced Barry as a hypocrite, adulterer, and lousy mayor who would be judged on these qualities rather than his race. "Most blacks do not use drugs, do not commit crimes, and do not philander," Charen concluded. "They work hard, pay taxes, and wash the car on weekends. It is no reflection on them that the mayor of Washington self-destructed. And it is no reflection on them that febrile leaders like Ben Hooks imply otherwise."

Three days after his arrest, Barry admitted that he had been wrestling with an addiction to alcohol and prescription drugs. He spent seven weeks at rehab in Florida and South Carolina before returning to Washington, D.C. During the jury selection for his June trial, he announced that he would not seek re-election. Sharon Pratt Kelly, who was working as vice president of public policy for the D.C. utility PEPCO and had been an active member of the Democratic National Committee, was later elected to succeed him.

Barry faced 12 drug possession charges, with one stemming from the hotel sting and the remainder from past instances in which witnesses said he had used cocaine. He had also been charged with three felony counts of perjury, which charged that he had given false testimony before the federal grand jury.

The trial lasted for two months. Lewis, who had started cooperating with prosecutors in exchange for a reduced sentence, claimed that he and Barry had used cocaine as far back as the 1986 trip to the Virgin Islands. Moore said she had agreed to help in the sting operation against Barry after a religious conversion and because she was worried about the mayor's health. The defense sought to discredit Moore as an unreliable crack cocaine addict, though they also argued that Barry's actions on the tape suggested that he had gone to the hotel in search of sex rather than drugs. Moore admitted that she had lied to a federal grand jury, since she had told the jurors—and the agents setting up the sting—that she had last taken cocaine in April of 1989; in fact, she had taken it in early January, even as she prepared for the sting.

In one dramatic moment on June 28, Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan arrived at the court with about a dozen followers. Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson, declaring that their presence would prove disruptive to the trial and intimidating to the jury, declared Farrakhan to be persona non grata in the courtroom. Farrakhan complained that Barry's trial "demonstrates the wickedness of the United States government and the lengths to which this government will go when it targets a black leader to be discredited."

In their closing arguments, prosecutors said it was ludicrous to claim that Barry was the victim in a racist conspiracy. Ten witnesses had attested to the mayor's cocaine use, they said, and the only conspiracy was one of "silence and deceit" to ignore or tacitly accept his behavior. "Mr. Barry is asking you to shut your eyes, cover your ears, to close your mind," said U.S. Attorney Richard Roberts. "Really, he's asking you to insult your intelligence by forgetting the facts."

The defense admitted that Barry used cocaine occasionally, but denied that he used the drug as frequently as the prosecution alleged. If that were true, they contended, he could have easily been arrested much earlier in a more conventional method than a sting operation. In an autobiography published shortly before his death, Barry offered a similar opinion. "They desperately tried to paint my cocaine use into something much more than it ever was," he said. "I had never used cocaine as much as they tried to say I had."

The jury, which included 10 black members and two white members, mulled over the charges for eight days. Five days into these deliberations, Barry announced that he would run an independent campaign for an at-large position on the City Council.

On August 10, the jury found Barry guilty of one count of drug possession. Surprisingly, it was not related to the January sting where his drug use had been caught on camera; in fact, the jury had acquitted him on that charge. Rather, the jurors agreed that the prosecution had proved that Barry used cocaine with Alabama businesswoman and Democratic political consultant Doris Crenshaw at the Mayflower Hotel in November of 1989. The jury could not reach a verdict on the remaining 10 drug charges or perjury charges, leading to a mistrial on those counts. It was a small victory for Barry; if he had been found guilty of perjury, the felony conviction would have barred him from holding any elected office.

Before his sentencing, Barry acknowledged that he was a drug addict and said he was "deeply sorry for his actions." He asked for a light sentence of probation or community service. The prosecution sought the maximum punishment of one year in prison, saying Barry was not sorry for his actions but rather upset that he had been caught. Stephens said that Barry had admitted to prosecutors that he used cocaine on at least a dozen occasions. Prosecutors also argued that he had "seriously impugned the integrity" of the mayor's office, especially since he had urged the city's youth to not use drugs.

On October 26, Barry was sentenced to six months in federal prison and one year of probation. He was also ordered to pay a $5,000 fine as well as the cost of his incarceration, with additional drug and alcohol rehabilitation. Jackson told Barry that he had "given aid, comfort, and encouragement to the drug culture" and set a bad example for the citizens of Washington, D.C. Although Barry told the judge that he was "truly remorseful," he continued to make claims of racial prejudice when talking to the press. "I understand that there are different standards for different people, and that's the American injustice system," he said after his sentencing.

In November, Barry experienced his first electoral loss when he finished third in the City Council race with only 20 percent of the vote. After his appeals were exhausted, he began his sentence at a minimum security facility in Virginia in October of 1991. He again claimed to be the victim of a "racist plot," accusing prosecutors of pursuing him while ignoring the malfeasance of white government officials. Barry was required to spend the entire six-month period behind bars, since sentences of under a year were not eligible for early release. Two months into his sentence, he was transferred to a medium security penitentiary in Pennsylvania after another inmate reported seeing a female visitor giving Barry fellatio in the prison's family reception room.

The drug conviction failed to put a dent in Barry's popularity. When he was released in April 1992, he was chauffeured home in a limousine and accompanied by six busloads of supporters. He immediately sought a Council seat to represent Ward 8, the poorest district in Washington, D.C. and the only one he had carried in the 1990 race. He won the Democratic primary with three times as many votes as incumbent Wilhelmina Rolark and was successful in the general election as well.

In May of 1994, Barry announced that he would seek a fourth term as mayor. "I'm in recovery and so is my city," he declared. He faced a three-way contest in the Democratic primary. Kelly had tried to reduce the city's debt, lobby the federal government for a higher budget, and reign in bureaucracy by eliminating about 6,000 jobs; she was not about to give up the office without an attempt at re-election. Councilor John Ray also entered the primary. Barry managed to defeat both of his opponents, earning 47 percent in the vote. Ray earned 37 percent of the vote, Kelly only 13 percent.

While the Democratic primary win typically guaranteed a victory in the general election in D.C., the Republicans had plenty of past scandals to use against Barry. The GOP chose Carol Schwartz, a city councilor who had unsuccessfully contested Barry in the 1986 election, for their candidate. Schwartz had run a hard campaign against Barry in that year, accusing him of incompetence and corruption during his first two terms; in the 1994 election, she could criticize him for his drug conviction as well. She suggested that Barry's cocaine use had played a part in the District of Columbia's increasing homicide rate.

Schwartz managed to keep the general election from becoming a runaway, but she only managed to take 42 percent of the vote. Barry came away with 56 percent. Despite the many charges of mismanagement and the infamous video of his drug use and arrest, he had been elected to a fourth term.

Washington, D.C. continued to be a city beset by serious problems. Several city agencies had been placed into receivership due to their appalling conditions. One judge described the conditions in a home for juvenile delinquents as "unacceptable for a civilized country." In a nursing home run by the city, some patients were found to have bedsores so severe that limbs needed to be amputated. The high rates of murder, high school dropouts, and infant mortality had not dropped significantly since Barry's first term, and the city was also dealing with high levels of crack cocaine addiction and AIDS infections.

Upon taking office in 1995, Barry appealed to Congress for a bailout to help shore up the city's finances and remedy its widespread problems. Instead, Congress established a financial control board to take over budgetary management from the local government amid allegations of extensive mismanagement and graft. Barry would feud with the board for the remainder of his term, decrying the loss of local level management as a "rape of democracy." He accused Congress, which had swung to the control of the Republican Party after the 1994 election, of trying to limit the home rule allowances which had been won two decades before.

In July of 1997, Congress passed a reform act which stripped Barry of much of his remaining power. Oversight of nine major departments was transferred to the financial control board, leaving only the parks and libraries under Barry's watch. He was essentially a mayor in name only. Barry announced in May of 1998 that he would not seek a fifth term, and he left office in January of 1999.

Barry left a polarizing legacy. He pointed to the revitalization of downtown areas as his signature achievement, including a decision to locate government offices in an area hard-hit by the 1968 race riots to help turn the neighborhood around. Supporters saw him as someone who had risen to success on his own initiative, who was committed to helping the city's youth and poor. Many thought that the frequent criticism directed at the mayor was part of a widespread effort to discredit him and roll back the power achieved by black residents of the District of Columbia. Critics said Barry had done more to harm the city then help it through persistent graft, moral bankruptcy, poor fiscal management, and his inability to stem crime or improve the schools.

Although Barry's fourth term as mayor would be his last, he was not out of politics for good. After working for a few years as an investment banker, he announced that he would run for City Council in March of 2002. However, he abandoned the bid after police found traces of cocaine and marijuana in his illegally parked car. Barry said he had been framed, and no charges were filed. Two years later, he was again elected to the Council from Ward 8. He would hold the position until his death.

A number of troubles continued to plague Barry in his later years. He was arrested on a misdemeanor charge of assault after a female janitor at the Baltimore-Washington International Marshall Airport accused him of exposing himself to her in an airport bathroom in 2000. Barry pleaded guilty to the charge and received a sentence of community service, and was later ordered to pay $35,000 when the woman filed a lawsuit against him.

At a court-ordered screening in 2005, Barry tested positive for cocaine and marijuana. Marion Christopher Barry, his son by his third wife Effi Barry, was convicted of drug possession six years later and received a suspended sentence. Polly Harris, Effi's mother, publicly blamed Barry for his son's drug use.

An audit discovered that Barry had failed to file federal or local income taxes for 1999, 2000, or 2004. He pleaded guilty to two misdemeanor charges in October of 2005, and was sentenced to three years' probation in March of 2006. The punishment came without a fine, allowing Barry to start paying back $195,000 in missed federal taxes and $54,000 in D.C. taxes plus penalties. When he also failed to file his taxes in 2005 and 2007, Barry reached an agreement with the Internal Revenue Service to settle the accounts; he blamed poor health for missing the deadlines.

Even in the midst of these incidents, Barry continued to enjoy widespread support. In 2005, he joined local businesses and volunteers in starting a program to distribute 2,000 turkeys for the holidays. A year later, the National Black Caucus of State Legislators awarded him the Nation Builder Award, recognizing his work as a civil rights activist and politician.

However, Barry would also face some embarrassments in his later years on the City Council. He was arrested in July of 2009 after he was accused of stalking Donna Watts-Brighthaupt, who was described as an occasional girlfriend. Though the charges were dropped, Barry was censured, stripped of a committee chairmanship, and removed from another committee a year later after councilors learned that he had awarded $15,000 to Watts-Brighthaupt as a "personal service" contract. Since Watts-Brighthaupt owed him money, she had simply repaid him from the same funds which Barry had assigned in his capacity as a councilor. A similar incident occurred in September of 2013, when Barry was found to have accepted cash payments from city contractors; he was again censured and stripped of a chairmanship.

Like his first brush with the law, Barry's final controversy involved parking tickets. He was involved in a car accident in August of 2014 after driving on the wrong side of the road. After this smash-up, it was revealed that he had $2,800 in unpaid moving violation fines and parking violations. He promptly paid the outstanding sum to the city.

In June of 2014, Barry published an autobiography entitled "Mayor for Life: The Incredible Story of Marion Barry Jr." He said that there were many who "judge me but don't really know me," arguing that he had completed a number of professional accomplishments in his life. "I always felt like I was two different people in politics; one as a personally religious man who was quiet with a lot of doubts and frustrations; and the other as the politician who had to be brave and courageous, while representing the desires of the people," he wrote. "I seemed to be brave enough to take on anything for the people. But deep down inside, I hurt like anybody else."

By this point, Barry had been suffering from a number of health problems. He had survived a bout with prostate cancer, received a kidney transplant in 2009, and suffered from diabetes. On November 23, 2014, he died of hypertensive cardiovascular disease.

Sources: Council of the District of Columbia, "Black Muslims Terrorize U.S. Capital; Reporter Killed, Many Hostages Held" in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune on Mar. 9 1977, "Bullet Stopped Short of Heart" in the Spokane Daily Chronicle on Mar. 10 1977, "Tale of Hanafi Moslem Terror is Related" in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune on Mar. 13 1977, "D.C. Coalition Leads 'Back to Cities' Move" in the Milwaukee Journal on Dec. 6 1978, "D.C. Mayor Denies Drug Involvement" in the Pittsburgh Press on Dec. 28 1988, "Marion Barry Keeps D.C. Guessing" in the Los Angeles Times on Jan. 7 1990, "Marion Barry Plans to Enter Race in Full Stride: 'I'll Win'" in the Free Lance-Star on Jan. 16 1990, "D.C. Mayor Arrested in Drug 'Sting,' Agents Say" in the Ocala Star-Banner on Jan. 19 1990, "Events in Marion Barry's Career" in the Star-News on Jan. 20 1990, "Don't Judge Black Politicians by Marion Barry" in the Moscow-Pullman Daily News on Feb. 5 1990, "Blacks Claim Barry Singled Out" in the Spokesman-Review on Jun. 9 1990, "Jurors View Videotape of Barry Drug Arrest" in the Washington Post on Jun. 29 1990, "Pained and Shamed, Barry Says" in the Pittsburgh Press on Aug. 3 1990, "Mayor Barry Guilty of Cocaine Charge" in the New Straits Times on Aug. 12 1990, "Marion Barry Seeks Probation" in the Argus-Press on Oct. 26 1990, "Barry Gets 6-Month Prison Term for Cocaine Possession" in the Boca Raton News on Oct. 27 1990, "Marion Barry Begins 6-Month Prison Term" in the News-Journal on Oct. 26 1991, "Ex-Mayor Marion Barry Trying to Make a Comeback" in the Star-News on May 22 1994, "Barry's Tenure Was a Roller Coaster Ride" in the Washington Post on May 22 1998, "Schwartz Launches Third Bid for Mayor" in the Washington Post on June 18 1998, "Tax Charges Net Marion Barry 3 Years' Probation" in the Free Lance-Star on Mar. 10 2006, "Some Things You Never Forget" in the Washington Post on Mar. 12 2007, "Barry Again Fails to File Tax Forms" in the Washington Post on Jan. 29 2009, "From the Archives: The Charmed Life of Marion Barry" in the Washingtonian on Feb. 19 2014, "Marion Barry Dies at 78" in the Washington Post on Nov. 23 2014, "Marion Barry, Washington's 'Mayor For Life,' Even After Prison, Dies at 78" in the New York Times on Nov. 23 2014, Mayor for Life: The Incredible Story of Marion Barry, Jr. by Marion Barry Jr., Democratic Destiny and the District of Columbia: Federal Politics and Public Policy by Ronald Walters and Toni-Michelle C. Travis, African-Americans and Criminal Justice: An Encyclopedia by Delores D. Jones-Brown and Beverly D. Frazier and Marvie Brooks

Joe Waggonner: solicitation immunity

Image from waggonnercenter.org

A close friend of Wilbur Mills, a fellow member of the House of Representatives, Joseph David Waggonner, Jr. was there to support Mills following revelations that he had a dubious relationship with a stripper and was struggling with alcohol problems. Two years later, Waggonner weathered his own scandal.

Waggonner was born in Plain Dealing, Louisiana in September of 1918. He graduated from Plain Dealing High School in 1935 before earning a bachelor's degree from Louisiana Tech University in 1941. Although he entered the business world after this graduation, he joined the Navy for the duration of World War II and returned for service in the Korean War between 1951 and 1952.

Waggonner's first experience with politics began in 1954, when he was elected to the Bossier Parish school board. He served there for six years, spending his last year as a member of the Louisiana state board of education as well. In 1961, he was the president of both the United Schools Committee of Louisiana and Louisiana School Boards Association. Waggonner also ran unsuccessfully for state comptroller in 1959.

When Representative Overton Brooks died in September of 1961, the district held a special election in December to fill the vacancy. Waggonner was chosen as the Democratic nominee and faced off against Republican candidate Charlton H. Lyons, Sr. Both men were extremely conservative and in favor of segregation; in fact, Waggonner had briefly left the Democratic Party in 1960 to run in the general election as an elector for the States Rights Party. When the results came in, Waggonner had defeated Lyons. He would be re-elected in 1962 and in each of the next seven congressional elections.

During his time in Congress, Waggonner was credited with bringing a number of improvements to his district. These included the establishment of an interstate between Lafayette and Shreveport, development to make the Red River navigable, helping convince General Motors to set up a plant in Shreveport, and acquiring funding for the Barksdale Air Force Base and Fort Polk. Waggonner served on the Ways and Means Committee as well as the House committee that administered the space program. He became one of the most prominent leaders of the conservative Southern Democrats and a vocal opponent of liberal Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas, whom he accused of engaging in paid activity while a judge as well as a $200,000 payment to a mobster while Douglas was the head of the Albert Parvin Foundation.

Waggonner also became an outspoken critic of civil rights measures and other initiatives by President Lyndon Johnson. He led the fight against Johnson's school aid and antipoverty measures, declaring, "There's no demand, for the first time in many years, for this legislation except from those who are politically motivated." He described the civil rights group Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee as a "radical, Communist-infiltrated gangs of agitators...dedicated to violence for the sake of the party line." Waggonner claimed that civil rights measures unfairly targeted the South. He said that congressmen were "blackmailed into acting" on a bill on housing discrimination since it was being pushed through Congress at the same time as a number of violent incidents in the South. In response to President Richard Nixon's 1969 civil rights bill, Waggonner complained, "You've got to quit whipping the South."

Despite this criticism, Waggonner was a strong Nixon supporter. He was taken aback when transcripts related to the Watergate scandal were released in August of 1974. "The only thing I've got to say is it hurts," he told a reporter. "I'll let the dust settle before I say more, and think the whole thing through." Yet the men remained close enough that Nixon consulted with Waggonner as the scandal reached its crescendo. Waggonner told Nixon that he could probably rally 70 Democrats to oppose the President's impeachment, but warned that if he did so there would still be a demand to hold Nixon in contempt of the Supreme Court for refusing to turn over his audio tapes as ordered. The advice no doubt played a part in Nixon's ultimate decision to resign. "After my call with Joe Waggonner...realized that we are really looking at about thirty days in which the climactic decision with regard to whether we are able to stay in office," he recorded in his journal.

In June of 1976, reports surfaced that Waggonner had briefly been detained by the Washington, D.C. police earlier in the year after soliciting a police officer posing as a prostitute. According to the police, three vice officers were stationed at a corner frequented by prostitutes and Waggonner circled the block three times before motioning to one of the women. He arranged to meet with her and pay $50 for sex, at which point the policewoman tapped the top of his car as a signal for officers in the area to arrest him. After a trip to the police station, however, Waggonner was released without being charged.

Waggonner had a different version of events, claiming he had been the victim of entrapment. He said a woman was trying to entice him and he refused, but when an unmarked car pulled up he became frightened and fled the scene. He said officers caught him after a short foot chase, but were ultimately satisfied with his account of the events. He was nevertheless none too pleased when the media found out about the incident. The New York Post broke the story, accusing the police and U.S. Attorney's Office of trying to cover the matter up. They quoted Waggonner as saying, "Gentlemen, this will destroy me. This will destroy my family. Do you want to destroy me?"

The incident did have the effect of abolishing a century-old practice in the nation's capital. Soliciting a prostitute was a misdemeanor, punishable by a maximum sentence of 90 days in jail and a $250 fine. Yet as Police Chief Maurice J. Cullinane explained, members of Congress had immunity from all misdemeanors. The original intent of the law was to prevent the arrest of congressmen in relation to civil charges, but the matter involving Waggonner prompted the department to consider changing the policy. After a legal review, the misdemeanor immunity for congressmen was scrapped in July of 1976.

The matter had no effect on the year's election. Waggonner easily won the Democratic nomination in August and had no Republican rival in the general election. In fact, there had been five other sex scandals involving Democratic congressmen in 1976 and most of the officials involved survived for another term. Only Wayne Hays, who opted to resign before the election, and Allan Howe, a Utah representative defeated in the election after his conviction on a charge of soliciting a prostitute, would not return to Congress.

The new term Waggonner won would be his last. His most notable work at this point was his advocacy of the oil and gas industries. In February of 1978, he announced that he was retiring after the completion of his term "to be with my family and to share with them...God's abundance of life." He died in October of 2007 in Shreveport.

Sources: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, The Waggonner Center at Louisiana Tech University, "Democrat Is Favored In Election" in the Spokesman-Review on Dec. 19 1961, "House May Not Accept Open Housing Amendment" in the News and Courier on Mar. 11 1968, "Congress Passes Rights Bill; LBJ Vows 'Early' Signature" in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune on Apr. 11 1968, "Voting Rights Measure Clears House" in the News and Courier on Dec. 12 1969, "House Set To Vote On Cambodia Funds" in The Telegraph on May 10 1973, "Justice Douglas Target Of New Probe Demands" in the Press-Courier on May 10 1973, "Disclosure Stuns Backers" in the Bangor Daily News on Aug. 6 1974, "'Flatfoot Floozie' Catches A Congressman, Paper Says" in the Miami News on June 17 1974, "Hays Will Resign From House Post" in the Free-Lance Star on June 18 1976, "GOP Predicts, Democrats Dispute, Prediction Of House Gains" in the Herald-Journal on Jul. 15 1976, "Immunity Ended For Congressmen" in the Spokesman-Review on July 26 1976, "Incumbent Defeated" in the Spokesman-Review on Aug. 15 1976, "Books Closed on Sex Scandal" in The Telegraph on Dec. 9 1976, "2 Demos To Retire" in the Deseret News on Feb. 11 1978, "2 More Congressmen To Retire" in the Spokane Daily Chronicle on Feb. 11 1978, "Joe Waggonner, La. Congressman" in the Boston Globe on Oct. 10 2007, Time and Chance: Gerald Ford's Appointment with History by James M. Cannon, In Struggle: SNCC and the Black Awakening of the 1960s by Clayborne Carson

Donald Edgar Lukens: deliniquent girls, delinquent bank book

Image from nytimes.com

The first sex charge against Donald Edgar Lukens emerged when he was nothing more than a college kid. He was investigated for child molestation in 1954, but the parents declined to file charges. That same year, Lukens graduated from Ohio State University with a degree in sociology and joined the United States Air Force. He was 23 years old, having been born in Harveysburg, Ohio in February of 1931. He became a captain and served six-and-a-half years with the service, specializing in criminal investigation and counterintelligence, and was later a member of the Air Force Reserve. Thirty-five years later, when Lukens was well into a political career, an aide revealed the criminal investigation from his past. It was only in relation to another allegation, however, and by that time Lukens was well on his way to getting thrown out of office and into a jail cell.

After his time in the Air Force, Lukens (who nicknamed himself "Buz" out of distaste for his given name) became a minority counsel for the House Rules Committee. In 1963, during a tumultuous convention, he became the chairman of the Young Republicans. Lukens was an ultraconservative, and this post marked one of a series of victories that swayed the party farther to the right at that year's convention. New York Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller, a moderate, even accused Lukens and his compatriots of using the "tactics of totalitarianism" at the convention. At one point, Lukens was accused of promoting biased journalism for advocating the injection of 100 Young Republicans into media jobs. He led the organization for two years, which included active stumping for unsuccessful 1964 GOP presidential candidate Barry Goldwater.

In 1966, Lukens came to the House of Representatives and two years later he was re-elected. He was a staunch advocate of the Vietnam War, speaking at a rally in 1969. Imitating President Nixon's "V for Victory" sign, he said, "no one declares North Vietnam to withdraw from the war, and yet they're the ones that started it." He deemed antiwar protesters "selfish Americans and some of them, let's face it, are indeed cowardly." He opted not to run in 1970, instead trying unsuccessfully to win that year's gubernatorial race in Ohio.

Lukens remained in Ohio and began serving in the state senate in 1971. This service was nearly cut short a few years later. He was barred from consideration in the Republican nomination for governor in 1974 after failing to file a 1972 campaign finance report. Lukens said he had done so and that the document must have gotten lost in the mail. The next year, however, he was nearly banned from running for re-election under a campaign financing law penalizing people who did not file such reports in time. The law was amended in time for him to win re-election in 1976. In 1984, the state board of elections split 2-2 on the question of whether he still complied with the residency requirements of his seat after his divorce. Lukens responded that he'd been living with a friend only a few blocks away, and that the issue was simply harassment by the state's Democrats. Lukens finally left the state senate after 15 years when he was elected to the House again in 1986, as well as re-election in 1988. During this second stint in Washington, he opposed the continuation of sanctions on apartheid-era South Africa and supported continuing aid for Nicaraguan contra rebels.

Lukens' fall from politics was an ugly affair that stretched over several years. It began in February of 1989, when he was indicted on a misdemeanor charge of contributing to the unruliness and delinquency of a child. The charge was only punishable by a maximum of 180 days in jail and a $1,000 fine, but it was essentially another child molestation accusation.

The mother of a 16-year-old girl had gone to Columbus television station WSYX regarding the matter and agreed to have the station secretly videotape a meeting between her and the representative. The two met at a McDonald's fast food restaurant, where the woman questioned Lukens about past sexual encounters with her daughter. One occurred in 1985, when the girl was 13; the other in November of 1988, when she was 16. The mother found out about the incidents after overhearing a conversation between the girl and her friend.

When confronted with the allegations at the restaurant, Lukens said he didn't know at the time that the girl was underage. He then said he would see if he could find a government job for the woman. It was a rather baldfaced effort to keep things quiet, but the FBI determined that there wasn't enough evidence for a bribery charge. Lukens denied the charges when they first came up, suggesting that he was set up and approached for money on a general allegation.

The trial began in May of 1989. The girl testified that she told Lukens she was 19, but that he had laughed it off and responded, "No, you're not." Much to Lukens' discomfort, she described the second time they met to have sex. As the girl told it, she and her 19-year-old friend went to Lukens' apartment, where the congressman greeted them wearing nothing but his boxer shorts. Lukens asked them to get changed into black robes (commenting that the white robes he had were for "white people, other kind of people;" both girls were black). They slept together, and Lukens paid her $40 and gave her birthday gifts of a pink lace fan and a silver pillbox. He also gave her friend $30, a bottle of perfume, and a diamond pendant and compensated the duo for cab fare.

The defense attacked the girl's mother as chronically unemployed and desperate for publicity and money, but to no avail. The jury found Lukens guilty after one-and-a-half hours of deliberation. Chalmers Wylie, senior Republican representative from Ohio, called for his resignation immediately. The verdict came down at about the same time as another girl accused Lukens of paying to have sex with her five or six times in 1985, when she was 15. "I refuse to allow the lies and deceit of one delinquent individual to ruin me," Lukens said in a statement responding to the verdict. "I am now fighting for my life." He went on to say that the girl had "fantasies about 'getting even with the establishment.'"

In June, Lukens was sentenced to 30 days in jail and a $500 fine, along with sex offender counseling and testing for sexually transmitted diseases. The sentence was stayed while Lukens appealed, seeking to have the girl's school and juvenile records admitted for consideration by the court. The girl in the case wasn't exactly an angel. A month after the trial, she was in a fight with a man and the preliminary investigation determined that she was a courier for cocaine, money, and guns. In August, her mother had her arrested after a fight between the two resulted in threats and the girl breaking in a door with a crowbar.

The judge and prosecutor had clearly had enough on this score, however. Prosecutor Rita Mangini said the girl's "prior unruliness" did not factor into the case. Judge Ronald Solove declared, "The court is particularly struck by the unwillingness of the defendant to recognize that he was not the victim" and the ridiculousness of the idea that he was "somehow seduced by a child." Prosecutors also threatened to pursue felony charges related to Lukens' 1985 conduct if his appeal of the misdemeanor was successful.

The legal fight came at about the same time that Lukens had to go through the normal run for the GOP nomination. The Ethics Committee said it would look into whether Lukens violated any House rules, along with Democratic congressmen Gus Savage of Illinois (accused of molesting a Peace Corps volunteer during a trip to Zaire) and Jim Bates of California (accused of sexually harassing female staffers). Vice President Dan Quayle, in a trademark gaffe, caused snickers at a Young Republicans meeting when he accidentally used Buz Lukens' name instead of Buzz Aldrin when referring to the 20th anniversary of the Moon landing; the St. Louis Dispatch quipped "Quayle Puts Sex Offender on Apollo 11."

With the convention approaching, Lukens finally gave a curt mea culpa: "I apologize. I made a dumb mistake. I'm sorry." He came in third place in the May primary, with 17 percent of the vote. The nomination, and subsequent series of elections, instead went to state representative John Boehner.

One month later, Lukens' appeal was rejected by a state court. He finally resigned on October 24, 1990 "for the good of Congress and the integrity of the institution." Even then, it took one last incident to force him out. A few days before, he was accused of fondling a young female House elevator operator. The resignation saved him from an inquiry by the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct. The committee had opted not to pursue an investigation after Lukens' primary loss, but in light of his remaining few months of office and the recent allegations they were ready to reopen the matter.

In November, the Ohio Supreme Court upheld the verdict. Lukens finally began serving his sentence in January of 1991, but only completed nine days of the month-long sentence; the judge agreed to an early release so he could start attending sex offender counseling. Lukens was not quite out of hot water yet. The girl's mother filed a lawsuit against Lukens, seeking $250,000 in damages, but a judge threw it out in December of 1993 after Lukens could not be located.

Then the bribery charges started to poke up again. The House Ethics Committee determined in 1978 that Lukens had received two $500 gifts from South Korean businessman Tongsun Park (later indicted for bribery) during his first four years in office. In July of 1994, Pentagon contractor Edward Krishack was acquitted of 16 criminal charges, including one suggesting that he gave Lukens $5,500 to get access to a congressional committee during his last year in office. Krishack was cleared at trial when it was determined that he gave Lukens the money but that it did not constitute a crime.

Lukens found himself in court again not much later. In February of 1995, he was accused of taking $27,500 in bribes from two businessmen who were trying to keep the Cambridge Technical Institute trade school in Cincinnati in the federal student loan program. One businessman, John Fitzpatrick, was also charged; the other, Henry Whitesell, had been murdered in 1990. The state alleged that the bribery occurred at about the same time that Lukens was struggling to find money to pay his legal bills on the sex charge. The potential maximum penalty was much worse this time around: 65 years in prison and a $1.25 million fine.

In October of 1995, a jury found Lukens innocent of three bribery charges but deadlocked on a fourth charge as well as a single count of conspiracy. Another trial was held in March of 1996. Prosecutors argued that he received $15,000 from the businessmen a week before the 1990 primary, when he was operating on a shoestring. In June of 1996, he was convicted of accepting a bribe and sentenced to the minimum term of 30 months in prison; he began serving seven months later. Fitzpatrick pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of conspiracy in March of 1997 and got two years in prison.

Not much was heard of Lukens after that. He moved to Texas, taught English as a second language courses, and volunteered with the Red Cross. He died of cancer in Dallas in May of 2010.

Sources: The Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, "Only Two Incumbent House Members Meet November 8" in the Times-News on Nov. 3 1966, "Thousands Attend Washington Rally In Support Of Nixon Vietnam Policy" in the Toledo Blade on Nov. 12 1969, "Buz Lukens Asks Supreme Court Action" in the Bryan Times on Feb. 24 1973, "Lukens May Get Relief" in the Daily Sentinel on Mar. 8 1974, "Panel Questions Lukens' Status On Residency" in the Toledo Blade on Mar. 2 1984, "Brown Votes To Certify Sen. Lukens For Primary" in the Youngstown Vindicator on Mar. 22 1984, "Tape Links Congressman To Sex With Teen" in the Pittsburgh Press on Feb. 2 1989, "Ohio Congressman Indicted On Sex Charge" in the Tuscaloosa News on Feb. 24 1989, "Congressman Indicted In Sex Case With Teenager" in the Rock Hill Herald on Feb. 24 1989, "Lukens Defends Himself, Says Sex Charge A Setup" in the Toledo Blade on Feb. 27 1989, "Congressman Denies Morals Charge" in The Telegraph on May 20 1989, "Mother Takes Stand In Lukens Sex Case" in the Reading Eagle on May 24 1989, "Teen Says Congressmen Paid Her For Sex" in the Lewiston Daily Sun on May 25 1989, "Lukens Convicted Of Sex Charge" in the Herald-Journal on May 27 1989, "Congressman Won't Resign Despite Morals Charge" in the Anchorage Daily News on Jun. 2 1989, "Girl In Lukens Case In Fight" in the Portsmouth Daily Times on Jun. 7 1989, "Lawmaker Sentenced To Jail For Sex Crime" in the Union Democrat on Jun. 30 1989, "Lukens May Face Felony Charges" in the Gadsden Times on Jul. 4 1989, "A Quayle Of A Gaffe" in the Times Daily on Jul. 16 1989, "House to Probe Lukens" in the Portsmouth Daily Times on Aug. 5 1989, "Lukens' Accuser Jailed On Charges Filed By Her Mother" in the Reading Eagle on Aug. 16 1989, "Lukens Apologizes, But Will Seek Re-Election" in the Portsmouth Daily Times on May 3 1990, "Lukens Loses After Sex Scandal" in the Free Lance-Star on May 10 1990, "Lukens Will Appeal To State High Court" in the Portsmouth Daily Times on Jun. 13 1990, "Lukens Quits To Avoid New Ethics Investigation" in the Eugene Register-Guard on Oct. 25 1990, "Ex-Legislator Loses Appeal In Sex Case" in the Eugene Register-Guard on Nov. 22 1990, "Lukens Released From Jail" in the Toledo Blade on Jan. 10 1991, "Judge Tosses Out Suit Against Former Congressman" in The Vindicator on Dec. 17 1993, "Man Acquitted Of Bribing Lukens" in the Tuscaloosa News on Jul. 11 1994, "Ex-Legislator Accused of Bribery" in The Hour on Feb. 24 1995, "Ex-Statesman Gets Bribery Mistrial" in the Gainesville Sun on Oct. 20 1995, "Lukens Convicted On Bribery Charges" in the Toledo Blade on Mar. 16 1996, "Ex-Congressman Gets 30-Month Prison Term" in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on Jun. 20 1996, "Lukens Begins Sentence For Accepting Bribe" in the Toledo Blade on Feb. 20 1998, "Trade School Operator Enters Guilty Plea" in the Toledo Blade on Mar. 7 1998, "Donald Lukens, 79, Dies" in the Washington Post on May 25 2010, "Donald Lukens, Scandal-Tainted Lawmaker, Dies at 79" in the New York Times on May 25 2010, "Former Congressman Donald Lukens Dies" from United Press International on May 25 2010, The Little Quiz Book of Big Political Scandals by Paul Slansky

Jim West: surfing wipeout

Image from nytimes.com

Some eight years before voters kicked him out of office for ethical issues, James West weathered a criminal charge to keep serving in the Washington state senate. In 1998, the Building Industry Association of Washington ran in ad in a local newspaper suggesting that West wasn't supportive of education. In response, West phoned up the lobbying group's leader, Tom McCabe, and left a message seething, "McCabe, you son of a bitch, you better get me 'cause if you don't you're dead."

When the message was made public, West tried to argue that he meant McCabe would be politically deceased, not physically killed. McCabe brought a criminal harassment complaint against the legislator, and West ended up paying $500 to an Olympia charity. He also paid $250 in court costs, served nine months of probation, and apologized to McCabe and the Spokane community in general. It wasn't the first time West's temper got the better of him. In 1995, he swore at fellow senator John Moyer and his staff after Moyer implied that West didn't support a $2 million appropriation for Spokane's Cheney Cowles Museum. West kicked Moyer's office door during the outburst, and apologized for that incident as well.

West was born in March of 1951 in Salem, Oregon, and attended school in Spokane. After going to the University of Nevada and its Reserve Officer Training Corps, he served in the Army as a paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne Division. He moved to North Carolina to work as an assistant manager in a retail scuba diving store, returning to Spokane in 1974 to pursue a career in law enforcement. He joined the Medical Lake Police Department as a patrolman in 1975, transferring to the Spokane County Sheriff's Office at the end of the year. He opened his own scuba shop in 1977, graduating from Gonzaga University the next year with a bachelor's degree in criminal justice. He was later sued for wrongful death when a student on a dive he was supervising died, but the case was thrown out since the student had signed a consent form.

In 1979, West became the sergeant-at-arms for the Washington house of representatives. The next year, he went into politics himself, becoming the youngest member of the Spokane City Council at age 28. He won an election to fill a vacancy in the house of representatives in 1982, and four years later he moved over to the senate. He spent 20 years in the state legislature, but made a few efforts to get out. He ran unsuccessfully for lieutenant governor in 1996 and mayor of Spokane in 2000. West gained a good deal of influence in the legislature. He successfully proposed extending the state's motorcycle helmet law to all riders, not just juveniles, and helped to create the state's Department of Health. Earning more mockery was a 1990 suggestion that teenage sex be criminalized. One prosecutor jokingly suggested that a bill preventing legislators from procreating with each other would be more beneficial.

In 2003, West was elected mayor of Spokane over Democratic candidate and journalist Tom Grant. In April, West had announced that he had colon cancer. After his victory, he was frequently absent due to surgical procedures. While in office, he managed to pull together support for a $117 million bond issue to repair the city's streets, despite a recent defeat of a similar measure. He also helped get the city out of a failed venture to create a parking garage, advocated a downtown wireless network, worked to prevent the closure of Fairchild Air Force Base, and cut down on city jobs to trim the budget.

Two years after his election, the Spokane Spokesman-Review assessed the mayor as having a fairly successful political record; it also had him on the ropes, fighting calls to resign. An 18-year-old man told the paper that he met the mayor through Gay.com, a homosexual online dating site. His date confided that he was the mayor of Spokane and, after a dinner date, the two had consensual sex. To test the claim, the Spokesman-Review hired a forensic computer expert to set up a sting. Using a profile to pose as an 18-year-old man, reporters chatted with the mayor online, where he identified himself as Cobra82nd and RightBi-Guy. “Remember, I’m very closeted. No one knows I like guys. Except the few guys I’ve been with and highly trusted,” West said in recorded instant message conversations. He offered the nonexistent teen a few perks to try to get him to city hall, including an internship, trips to sporting events, and autographed sports memorabilia.

On May 5, 2005, the newspaper published a major report detailing their findings. Prominently featured were accusations by two men who said West molested them when he was a sheriff's deputy and they were boys. They accused another man, David Hahn, of the same conduct. Hahn also served as a deputy, but didn't have anything to say for himself; similar accusations had already come up over two decades before the scandal, and Hahn had committed suicide with his service weapon in 1981. West knew he was caught, and admitted to reporters that he had been looking for men on Gay.com for a year. "I can't tell you why I go there, to tell you the truth...curiosity, confused, whatever, I don't know," he said of his online dating. Though he did not admit that he was gay, West didn't shy away from a suggestion that he was bisexual. He firmly denied that he ever abused any children, and the accusers' claims were compromised somewhat by the fact that they were both convicted felons and drug addicts.

Within a couple of days, two more men came forward with allegations that West sexually abused or made passes at them in 1980 and 2001. Some politicians said that West's sexuality was something of an open secret, with his proposal to a woman on the floor of the legislature and subsequent five-year marriage working as a ruse to combat such allegations. Past opponents had never used the issue for political fodder, feeling it didn't relate to the political issues at hand. The publicized charges crossed into ethical territory, however; a city councilwoman said that West had admitted to her that he used city computers for the chat rooms and masturbated to them in his City Hall office. When the Spokesman-Review printed this charge, West called them up to deny her account. "I'm being destroyed because I am a gay man, which is fine. I've been in public life, I can accept that. Because I am a gay man, because of this double life, it has been hell," he said. "It's OK to destroy me, but stop destroying this city." The mayor also complained that the newspaper had "brutally outed" him.

West's plight didn't earn him much sympathy in the gay community, as the scandal also exposed him as something of a hypocrite. While in the legislature, he was a conservative Republican well-known for his focus on moral issues. Besides his proposal to criminalize teen sex, he was also opposed to the distribution of information packets on AIDS and was strongly against any measure related to gay rights. He co-sponsored an unsuccessful bill in 1986 to bar homosexuals from employment in schools, day care centers, and some state agencies; the bill was a retaliatory measure against a gubernatorial Christmas order in 1985 prohibiting such discriminatory practices in state hiring. He supported the Defense of Marriage Act to ban gay marriage, and in 1998 Washington became the 27th state to adopt the measure. West explained that he wasn't necessarily opposed to gay rights, but didn't want to create "special classes" for any minority.

One of the more immediate effects of the scandal was West's removal from affiliation with the Boy Scouts of America. He had been volunteering for the organization for over 30 years, but chose to resign from the Inland Northwest Council of the Boy Scouts and the board of directors for Morning Star Boys Ranch, which serves 18-year-olds from troubled backgrounds. One official with the Boy Scouts bluntly said that West would have been kicked off the council if he hadn't resigned, due to the organization's stance against homosexuality and immediate revocation of such offices if there are allegations of sexual abuse. West announced that he would take a leave of absence to prepare a defense, and left deputy mayor Jack Lynch in charge. "Finally, I hope that you and the people will reserve judgment on me until the newspaper is done persecuting me and allow me to have the fair opportunity to respond to each of the allegations in due time," he concluded as he left office. By the end of the month, however, West was back in City Hall. Meanwhile, the Federal Bureau of Investigation began looking into his computer records.

West's colleagues weren't exactly happy to see him return, and the calls for his resignation increased. Business leaders said such an action would limit any potential damage to tourism and the city's image. The city council tied 3-3 in a vote to ask him to take administrative leave, failing only because the members opposed wanted a stronger motion. Not long after, in June, the council voted unanimously to recommend his resignation, a first step toward possible impeachment. A few days later, West made an apology but vowed to stay in office. He said former Democratic President Bill Clinton and former Democratic Washington Governor Mike Lowry both survived sex scandals. "I did things in my private life that I should have known if they became public would cause embarrassment…everyone makes mistakes. I do, too," he said, adding that the ordeal "has been an embarrassing, humiliating and painful experience. But it doesn't need to distract this city." The Lowry example only gave more ammunition to those who saw West as a hypocrite. Investigators found insufficient evidence to prosecute Lowry after a female aide accused him of sexual harassment, but the governor chose not to run for re-election in 1996; at the time, West sent a letter to the speaker of the state house of representatives demanding a swift impeachment process. There was some speculation that West was reluctant to give up the office due to its lucrative $136,000-a-year salary, and even more so for the health benefits covering his cancer treatments.

West also fought an ongoing recall effort against him, which charged that the offers made to the phony 18-year-old represented "an improper exercise of an official duty." His lawyers argued that the recall lacked legal justification and that the judge who first heard the case got personally involved by rewriting the recall proposition. The state supreme court upheld the recall effort, saying the recall process could proceed if it gathered enough signatures. It eventually collected 17,121, a healthy margin greater than the minimum amount at 12,567. A recall election was scheduled for December.

Two months prior to the election, it was determined that West used city computers to browse gay profiles for men in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., when he went to the cities on business. Ironically, one of the people he met in D.C. was Larry Craig, the Idaho senator who would get caught up in his own gay sex scandal in 2007. Around the same month, West said he was contemplating filing suit against the Spokesman-Review based on allegations that they broke federal and state laws regarding privacy issues and computer trespass. "Basically, the reason I'm bringing a lawsuit is, nobody, public or private, should go through what the Spokesman-Review has done to me as far as invading my privacy," he said. The suit never materialized.

In late November, a private investigator hired by the city council reported that West broke the law by hiring a man for the city's Human Rights Commission and then pursuing him sexually, and broke city policy as well by browsing online for gay men. As the countdown to the recall proceeded, West fought to keep his computer records private. He argued that some of the images from Gay.com were automatically downloaded to his computer's browser cache. Only a few days before the recall election, the findings were publicized. They showed that in three months, West spent hours on the site; 6,626 images were downloaded from Gay.com, and some of them were explicit.

Sixty-five percent of the voters agreed to kick West out of office. Dennis Hession, the city council president, took over the mayor's duties. "There have been a lot of lessons out of this, to tell you the truth," West said. "It's helped me straighten out my personal life." Curiously, West said that he stood by his previous anti-homosexual stances, with the exception of the one to prevent homosexuals from working in schools and other institutions involving children. Gay and lesbian groups saw the scandal a different way, saying it had the effect of encouraging openness rather than closeted lives. West said he was resigned to the vote, but the next day he sniped, "I think there are people in this community that could do a better job [as mayor] than anyone on the city council."

In February of 2006, the FBI wrapped up their probe and concluded that there was insufficient evidence to file any charges against West. Their investigation looked only into fraud related to whether he offered jobs or internships in exchange for sex. State charges remained an option, with the city's investigation alleging a violation of a state law that officials could not use municipal computers for personal use. Local prosecution got bogged down, with the county prosecutor having a conflict of interest due to a past $50 contribution to West's campaign, the local police unwilling to proceed, and the city officials not keen on pressing the issue. West ultimately ended up getting a job selling advertisements for a Seattle magazine, and chatted with a radio station about a possible talk show.

West said he wasn't ruling out another bid for office, but his recall came when he had less than a year to live. His cancer spread to his liver while in office, and he died in July of 2006 after complications from surgery.

Sources: "Senator Settles Charge Filed By Lobbyist" in the Moscow-Pullman Daily News on Nov. 10 1998, "Race To Lead Spokane" in the Spokesman-Review on Oct. 19 2003, "West Tied To Sex Abuse In '70s, Using Office To Lure Young Men" in the Spokesman-Review on May 5 2005, "West's Public Policy Conflicts With Private Life" in the Spokesman-Review on May 5 2005, "Online Relationships" in the Spokesman-Review on May 5 2005, "West Has Brought New Tone, New Success To City Hall" in the Spokesman-Review on May 5 2005, "After Spokane Childhood, West Leads Life Of Service" in the Spokesman-Review on May 5 2005, "Spokane Mayor's Accusers Are Felons" in the Ellensburg Daily Record on May 6 2005, "West Resigns From Scout Post, Boys Ranch Board" in the Spokesman-Review on May 6 2005, "West Faces New Allegations" in the Spokesman-Review on May 7 2005, "Rodgers: West Used City Office" in the Spokesman-Review on May 8 2005, "West Denies Having Online Sex In Office" in the Spokesman-Review on May 8 2005, "Mayor Says Sex Act Happened At Home" in the Spokesman-Review on May 9 2005, "Mayor To Take Leave" in the Spokesman-Review on May 10 2005, "Spokane Mayor Urged To Resign" in the Eugene Register-Guard on May 15 2005, "Council Split On West" in the Spokesman-Review on May 16 2005, "It's 'Awkward' With Mayor Back At City Hall" in the Spokesman-Review on May 20 2005, "Spokane Finds It Tough To Get Rid Of Mayor" in the Ellensburg Daily Record on May 28 2005, "Council Wants West Out" in the Spokesman-Review on Jun. 1 2005, "'Everyone Makes Mistakes'" in the Spokesman-Review on Jun. 4 2005, "West Urged Quick Justice In Lowry Sex Scandal" in the Spokesman-Review on Jul. 14 2005, "West Recall Advances" in the Spokesman-Review on Aug. 25 2005, "17,121 Urge West Recall Vote" in the Spokesman-Review on Sep. 22 2005, "West Accessed Sex Sites On Trips" in the Spokesman-Review on Oct. 15 2005, "Spokane Mayor May Sue Paper For Privacy Invasion" in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer on Oct. 22 2005, "West Says Downloads Automatic" in the Spokesman-Review on Nov. 16 2005, "Spokane Mayor's Offer Broke Law, Report Says" in the Seattle Times on Nov. 21 2005, "West Spent Hours Online At Gay.com" in the Spokesman-Review on Dec. 3 2005, "Voters Recall West" in the Spokesman-Review on Dec. 7 2005, "Spokane Mayor, Caught In Gay Sex Sting, Is Ousted In Vote That May Advance Gay Rights" in the New York Times on Dec. 8 2005, "West Challenges Successor" in the Spokesman-Review on Dec. 8 2005, "No Federal Charges" in the Spokesman-Review on Feb. 17 2006, "No Charges After Investigation Of Ex-Mayor's Online Scandal" in the New York Times on Feb. 17 2006, "Prosecution Of Former Spokane Mayor Appears Unlikely" in the Seattle Times on Mar. 22 2006, "Former Spokane Mayor Jim West Dies" in the Seattle Times on Jul. 22 2006