As most of us know, ten years ago today Minnesota and America lost a passionate, progressive voice, a dedicated Senator, and a rarity in American national politics: a decent, kind-hearted human being: Senator Paul Wellstone.
If my fellow Kossacks will indulge me, I'd like to relate the story of when and how I met the man, then a Carleton College professor who took a sabbatical to run for office. The day was Martin Luther King Jr. Day, 1990.
Please join me over the little orange angel cloud.
1990 was the first year that the state of Minnesota officially recognized Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a holiday. I was an eighteen-year-old freshman in college, and my school, Hamline University in St. Paul, did not declare the day a holiday (the administration said it would do so starting the next year, 1991).
As a means of protest against the choice, many students boycotted classes that day. I was one of them. But we also wanted to show principle on the matter, so those of us who boycotted class also went to official MLK events. The particular event I went to was held on the steps of the state capitol.
Late that morning, a group of my fellow students and I were huddled on what was a briskly cold winter's day near the top of the steps. Several large vehicles and a makeshift stage were erected on the street at the base of the steps (which was ordinarily open to vehicle traffic in the days before the OKC bombing and 9/11). One of the vehicles was a big green bus that had "Wellstone." written on the side.
Now, I was always interested in politics, but I had no idea who this was. It was early in the cycle, I hadn't noticed who was running against then-Senator Boschwitz. I didn't take much note of it. Nobody in my group really took much note of it either.
As the crowd grew before the event officially started, I noticed -- okay, well, a note here. I am a very big guy. I'm nearly six and a half feet tall and at the time was overweight. So I noticed this very small man bounding up the stairs toward me like a jackrabbit, full of energy and smiles.
He stopped on the step beneath me (did I mention I'm very tall and he's very small?) and thrust his hand up at me. "Hi! I'm Paul Wellstone. I'm running for the US Senate."
My first thought: "Who?" But I took his hand and shook it. And he started talking to me and my fellow students.
Being a college professor himself, he knew how to speak to us. He wasn't afraid to talk about the "bullshit" (his exact word) in Washington and how he wants to change it. He talked about protecting women's rights and the right to choose, raising the minimum wage, and against what at the time was our "cowboy diplomacy" in various countries around the world.
And Paul spoke with passion, sincerity, and projected a genuine desire to change the world if we could. It took about five minutes to win every one of us over.
We ended our time together and we all shook his hand again, pledging our support for his candidacy. Paul was genuinely grateful for our support, and thanked us, and then took off again, merrily leaping off to greet another group of people. He seemed to be energized by the chance to meet people and talk to them.
I'll never forget meeting him that day, and how much I really LIKED him as a person. I've had the chance to say that about very, very few politicians, and I've met many of them over the years.
I had the chance to see Paul a couple more times before he won his first election in 1990, and a few times since then. The last time I met Senator Wellstone was in August 2002 at the Minnesota State Fair. I took him to task for supporting the Patriot Act -- the only time during his service as our Senator that he disappointed me -- and he told me the only reason he supported it was because the provisions that were most objectionable all had "sunsets". (Alas, those sunsets were overridden by future legislation.) But I thanked him for all he'd done and told him how proud I was to call him my Senator.
And on October 25, 2002, he died in a plane crash, along with his wife, daughter, two pilots and three staffers, one of which (Mary McEvoy) I'd worked with in the past in DFL party politics, a dedicated progressive and activist. His loss sent shockwaves throughout Minnesota, and progressive communities everywhere.
But his memory lives on. He joins the ranks of other great Minnesota Democratic senators - Hubert Humphrey, Gene McCarthy, Walter Mondale - as reasons to make us proud of our state. And we will make sure his legacy lives on.