Jim Wright
56th Speaker of the United States House of Representatives
In office January 6, 1987 – June 6, 1989
President	Ronald Reagan George H. W. Bush
Preceded by	Tip O'Neill
Succeeded by	Tom Foley
House Majority Leader
In office January 3, 1977 – January 3, 1987
Deputy	John Brademas (1977-1981) Tom Foley (1981-1987)
Preceded by	Tip O'Neill
Succeeded by	Tom Foley
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Texas's 12th district
In office January 3, 1955 – June 30, 1989
Preceded by	Wingate H. Lucas
Succeeded by	Pete Geren
Mayor of Weatherford, Texas
In office 1950–1954
Member of the Texas House of Representatives
In office 1947–1949
Personal details
Born	(1922-12-22) December 22, 1922 (age 89) Fort Worth, Texas
Political party	Democratic
Alma mater	Weatherford College University of Texas at Austin

James Claude Wright, Jr. (born December 22, 1922), usually known as Jim Wright, is a former Democratic U.S. Congressman from Texas who served 34 years in the U.S. House of Representatives and was the Speaker of the House from 1987 to 1989. Wright resigned from the House in 1989 because of a scandal.

Early life[link]

Wright was born in Fort Worth. Because his father was a traveling salesman, Wright and his two sisters were reared in numerous communities in Texas and Oklahoma. He mostly attended Fort Worth and Dallas public schools, eventually graduating from Oak Cliff High School, then studied at Weatherford College in his mother's hometown of Weatherford, the seat of Parker County west of Fort Worth and then at the University of Texas at Austin, but he never received a bachelor's degree.^[1] In December 1941, Wright enlisted in the United States Army Air Forces, and after training was commissioned as an Air Corps 2nd Lt. in 1942. He trained as a bombardier and earned a Distinguished Flying Cross flying combat in B-24 Liberators with the 530th Bomb Squadron, 380th Bomb Group (Heavy) in the South Pacific during World War II. His retelling of his wartime exploits is contained in his 2005 book The Flying Circus: Pacific War—1943—As Seen through A Bombsight.^[2]

After the war, he made his home in Weatherford, where he joined partners in forming a Trade Show exhibition and marketing firm. As a Democrat, he won his first election without opposition in 1946 to the Texas House of Representatives, where he served from 1947 to 1949. He was defeated in his bid for reelection in 1948, after a rival claimed that Wright was weak in opposing both communism and interracial marriage.^[1] He was the mayor of Weatherford from 1950 to 1954. In 1953, he served as president of the League of Texas Municipalities.^[2]

Career in Congress[link]

In 1954, he was elected to Congress from Texas's 12th congressional district, based in Fort Worth but also including Weatherford. He won despite the fervid opposition of Amon G. Carter, publisher of the Fort Worth Star Telegram newspaper and later the benefactor of the Amon Carter Museum. Carter supported the incumbent Democrat Wingate Lucas. Wright would be re-elected fourteen times, gradually rising in prominence in the party and in Congress. He developed a close relationship thereafter with Amon G. Carter, Jr. Wright often said that the easiest way to "defeat an enemy is to make him your friend."^[1] In 1956, Wright refused to join most of his regional colleagues in signing the segregationist Southern Manifesto.^[3] In 1957, he voted for the Civil Rights Act, which created the Division of Civil Rights within the U.S. Justice Department and the investigatory Civil Rights Commission. Signed by U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower, the law was pushed through Congress by U.S. Senator Lyndon B. Johnson and Speaker Sam Rayburn. However, Wright refused to support the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which required desegregation of public accommodations and established the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. It was signed into law by Wright's friend, President Johnson.^[1]

In 1961, Wright finished in third place in the special election called to fill the U.S. Senate seat vacated by then Vice President Lyndon Johnson.^[1] Two finalists for the Senate emerged from a field of seventy-one candidates. College professor John G. Tower, then of Wichita Falls, narrowly defeated the interim appointee William Blakley, a Dallas industrialist, in a runoff election. Tower hence became the first Republican senator from Texas since Reconstruction.^[2]

Wright continued to serve in the House and was elected House Majority Leader by one vote in December 1976, defeating Richard Bolling of Missouri and Phillip Burton of California. Wright won the majority leadership position with the support of all but two Democrats from the large Texas delegation, all party members of the Public Works Committee, and virtually all other Southern representatives members as well.^[1]

In the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex, Jim Wright is known for the Wright Amendment, a contentious law he sponsored that restricts air travel from Dallas's secondary airport, Love Field. Passed in 1979, the Wright Amendment was originally designed to protect the fledgling Dallas Fort Worth International Airport. The Amendment allows non-stop flights originating from or bound to any commercial airport within 50 nautical miles (93 km) of the DFW Airport Control Tower to serve only states bordering Texas. This requires any flight going to or coming from a destination within that 50-mile (80 km) radius (Dallas Love Field and the now defunct Greater Southwest International Airport in Fort Worth were the only airports affected) to land in a contiguous (bordering) state before continuing on to its destination. This effectively limited traffic from Love Field and GSIA to small, regional airlines (and provided the springboard for the later success of Southwest Airlines, which initially flew only within Texas) who were largely unable to compete with DFW Airport as a result. While the Amendment was welcomed at first, there were increasing doubts about its necessity as DFW grew into one of the three largest airports in the world. Many saw it as a boondoggle to benefit one particular group. Others saw it as an unlawful restraint of trade imposed against the two affected airports, and no others. However, the largest opposition came increasingly from people who simply felt that the Amendment had outlived its usefulness and was also an unwarranted intrusion on the free markets of the deregulated airline industry. In 2006 Congress passed the Wright Amendment Reform Act of 2006, which repealed the Wright Amendment in stages, with the last restrictions on travel from Love Field scheduled to be lifted in 2014.^{[4][5][6][7] [8]}

Wright strongly supported the Superconducting Super Collider project in Waxahachie in Ellis County,^[1] but the work was halted by the Bill Clinton administration in 1993.

Speaker Wright

Speaker of the House[link]

In 1986 he was elected Speaker of the House, succeeding Tip O'Neill [1] when the latter retired the following January.

In 1988, he chaired the Democratic Party convention that nominated Michael Dukakis for president. During that convention, Wright introduced John F. Kennedy, Jr, for Kennedy's first televised speech.^[2] About 25 years earlier, on November 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy, in his final speech before being assassinated, praised Wright's service in the Congress, saying "and here in Fort Worth he has contributed to its growth. He speaks for Fort Worth and he speaks for the country, and I don't know any city that is better represented in the Congress of the United States than Fort Worth." ^[9]

Aide controversy[link]

In 1989, controversy arose from media reports that Jim Wright's main aide, John Mack, had violently attacked Pamela Small sixteen years earlier. Small was attempting to replace blinds in a store Mack managed, and he took her to the storeroom where he then asked her to lie down. When she refused, he repeatedly hit her in the head with a hammer, stabbed her with a steak knife, and slashed her throat, before putting her body in his car and going to see a movie.^[10][11]

Pamela Small survived the attack, and reported it to the police. John Mack pled guilty to malicious wounding "with the intent to maim, disfigure, disable and kill" and was sentenced to fifteen years in prison. However, after repeated correspondence with Rep. Wright, whose daughter was married to his brother, Mack was paroled after serving less than 27 months and given a job working for Wright on Capitol Hill. Critics, including feminist activist Andrea Dworkin, alleged that Wright manipulated the legal system to get Mack off and, subsequently, protected him from media scrutiny.^[12] The story later broke in 1989, when Pamela Small gave an interview about her ordeal with the Washington Post. Amid media criticism, John Mack resigned from his post.^[13]

Ethics investigation and resignation[link]

In 1988 Wright became the target of an inquiry by the House Ethics Committee. Their report in early 1989 implied that he had used bulk purchases of his book, Reflections of a Public Man, to earn speaking fees in excess of the allowed maximum, and that his wife, Betty, was given a job and perks to avoid the limit on gifts. Faced with an increasing loss of effectiveness, Wright tendered his resignation as Speaker on May 31, 1989, the resignation to become effective on the selection of a successor.^[14] He was the first Speaker to resign because of a scandal. On June 6, the Democratic Caucus brought Wright's speakership to an end by selecting his replacement, Tom Foley of Washington, and on June 30 Wright resigned his seat in Congress.^[15]

The incident itself was controversial and was a part of the increasing partisan infighting that has plagued the Congress ever since. The original charges were filed by Newt Gingrich^[16] in 1988 and their effect propelled Gingrich's own career advancement to the Speaker's chair itself.^[2]

Michael Parenti, critic of the national security state, attributed Wright's forced resignation to the critical questions he was raising in the late 1980s with regard to CIA covert actions in Nicaragua.^[17] Wright had not only criticized Reagan's policy, but taken the extremely unusual step of entering into negotiations with the Nicaraguan government as speaker.^[18]

Life after Congress[link]

After his resignation from the House, Wright retired to Fort Worth. He serves as a professor at Texas Christian University there, teaching a course titled "Congress and the Presidents". He has also written several books since his retirement. He is an avid reader but has been stricken with macular degeneration.^[1]

In 2004, Wright was inducted into the Texas Trail Hall of Fame in the Fort Worth Stockyards. His exhibit says "Fort Worth Loves Him!"

References[link]

Notes[link]

1. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h} Jim Riddlesperger of Texas Christian University, "Jim Wright", West Texas Historical Association and East Texas Historical Association, joint meeting in Fort Worth, Texas, February 26, 2010
2. ^ ^{a b c d e} "James D. Wright Papers". UT-Arlington Special Collections. http://www.lib.utexas.edu/taro/utarl/00180/arl-00180.html. Retrieved 21 March 2012. 
3. ^ Badger, Tony (1999). "Southerners Who Refused to Sign the Southern Manifesto". The Historical Journal 42 (2): 517–534. JSTOR 3020998. 
4. ^ Wright Amendment Reform Act of 2006 At The Library of Congress http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d109:SN03661:@@@R%7C/bss/d109query.html
5. ^ Wright Amendment Reform Act of 2006 Enacted Into Law http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=92562&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=917522&highlight=
6. ^ Dallas Love Field Chronological History http://www.dallas-lovefield.com/lovenotes/lovechrono.html
7. ^ CAB Asks Fort Worth and Dallas to Pick One Airport to Serve Both, Wall Street Journal (1964) http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/djreprints/access/320169912.html?dids=320169912:320169912&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:AI
8. ^ "Two Cities Agree on Site for a Regional Airport". New York Times. October 24, 1965. http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=FB061EFE3F5A157A93C6AB178BD95F418685F9. 
9. ^ http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=9538#axzz1wBayMCpo
10. ^ Ringle, Ken (7 May 1989). "Victim Sees Attacker Rise To Power". Washington Post. http://articles.philly.com/1989-05-07/news/26112437_1_plastic-surgeon-staff-assistant-attacker. Retrieved 13 April 2011. 
11. ^ Oreskes, Michael (5 May 1989). "Wright Aide's Past Shocks Capitol". The New York Times (New York: NYTC). ISSN 0362-4331. http://www.nytimes.com/1989/05/05/us/wright-aide-s-past-shocks-capitol.html. Retrieved 13 April 2011. 
12. ^ Dworkin, Andrea (14 May 1989). "Political Callousness on Violence Toward Women". Los Angeles Times. http://articles.latimes.com/1989-05-14/opinion/op-121_1_steak-knife-wright-s-daughter-blinds. Retrieved 13 April 2011. 
13. ^ Toner, Robin (12 May 1989). "Wright Aide Quits Amid Furor on '73 Crime". The New York Times (New York: NYTC). ISSN 0362-4331. http://www.nytimes.com/1989/05/12/us/wright-aide-quits-amid-furor-on-73-crime.html. Retrieved 13 April 2011. 
14. ^ The Washington Post. 21 July 1998. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/special/clinton/frenzy/wright.htm. 
15. ^ English, Ross M (2003). The United States Congress. Manchester University Press. p. 150. ISBN 978-0-7190-6309-1. 
16. ^ Smith, Stephen S (2007). The American Congress. Cambridge University Press. p. 139. ISBN 978-0-521-70836-4. 
17. ^ Michael Parenti, "State vs. Government," in Contrary Notions: The Michael Parenti Reader [San Francisco: City Lights, 2007], p. 203.
18. ^ Parenti, Michael (1995). Against Empire. City Lights Publishers. p. 149. ISBN 0-87286-298-4. 

Further reading[link]

• Barry, John. The Ambition and the Power: The Fall of Jim Wright: A True Story of Washington. New York : Viking Press, 1989. ISBN 0-8317-8302-8. (Paperback: Penguin, 1992. ISBN 0-14-010488-7)
• Wright, Jim. Balance of Power: Presidents and Congress from the Era of McCarthy to the Age of Gingrich. Turner Publications, 1996. ISBN 1-57036-278-5.
• Wright, Jim. Reflections of a Public Man. Fort Worth, TX : Madison Publishing Company, 1984.
• Wright, Jim. The Flying Circus: Pacific War—1943—As Seen Through A Bombsight. Guilford, CT: The Lyons Press, 2005. ISBN 1-59228-656-9.
• Wright, Jim. The Coming Water Famine. New York: Coward-McCann, 1966.

v t e Speakers of the United States House of Representatives Muhlenberg Trumbull Muhlenberg Dayton Sedgwick Macon Varnum Clay Cheves Clay Taylor Barbour Clay Taylor Stevenson Bell Polk Hunter White Jones Davis Winthrop Cobb Boyd Banks Orr Pennington Grow Colfax Pomeroy Blaine Kerr Randall Keifer Carlisle Reed Crisp Reed Henderson Cannon Clark Gillett Longworth Garner Rainey Byrns Bankhead Rayburn Martin Rayburn Martin Rayburn McCormack Albert O'Neill Wright Foley Gingrich Hastert Pelosi Boehner

v t e Majority Leaders of the United States House of Representatives Payne Underwood Kitchin Mondell Longworth Tilson Rainey Byrns Bankhead Rayburn McCormack Halleck McCormack Halleck McCormack Albert Boggs O'Neill Wright Foley Gephardt Armey DeLay Blunt (acting) Boehner Hoyer Cantor

v t e Democratic Party Leaders in the United States House of Representatives Bailey Richardson Williams Clark Underwood Kitchin Clark Kitchin Garrett Garner Rainey Byrns Bankhead Rayburn McCormack Rayburn McCormack Rayburn McCormack Albert Boggs O'Neill Wright Foley Gephardt Pelosi Hoyer Pelosi

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Jim Wright

• Jim Wright at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
• View Photos from the Jim Wright Collection from Weatherford College, hosted by the Portal to Texas History
• Media Watch comparison of the treatment of the Meese and Wright resignations
• Stories I Never Told the Speaker, by Wright's Chief of Staff Marshall Lynam

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (April 2010)

Ann Nesby ^[1] is an American R&B, gospel, and dance music singer and actress. She is the former lead singer of Sounds of Blackness;^[2] a songwriter with credits including hits sung by Patti Labelle and Gladys Knight; plus she co-starred in the 2003 romance musical The Fighting Temptations with Cuba Gooding Jr. and Beyonce Knowles. Nesby had various appearances on the hit television series American Idol. Nesby has been nominated four times since her departure from the Sounds of Blackness, most recently for her 2007 album This Is Love; plus the lead single "I Apologize" was nominated for a Grammy at the 2008 Grammy Awards.

Career[link]

Nesby joined Sounds of Blackness in the late 1980s. The Sounds of Blackness were awarded two Grammys in 1991 and 1993, and Nesby sang on a number of their tracks including "I Believe," "Optimistic," "I'm Going All The Way," "Soul Holiday," and "The Pressure."

In 1996 Nesby released her debut solo album, I'm Here for You. Her "Witness Ep peaked at #42 in the UK Singles Chart in December 1996.^[3]

Tyler Perry cast Nesby in a lead role in his 1998-2000 stage production, I Know I've Been Changed. By 2002, Nesby released her second album, Put It on Paper. The lead single of the same title featured Al Green, leading Nesby to her first solo Grammy nomination in 2003, and the album included Nesby's first #1 song "Lovin' Is Really My Game," a cover version of the 1977 hit dance tune by Brainstorm.

She appeared in the 2003 film, The Fighting Temptations. Nesby subsequently garnered three additional Grammy nominations between 2004 and 2008.

Her latest album, The Lula Lee Project debuted at #13 on the US Billboard 's Top Gospel Album Chart and #57 on the R&B chart. Nesby’s latest nominations include - Best R&B Performance By A Duo Or Group with Vocal for her duet with Calvin Richardson, "Love Has Finally Come at Last" and Best Traditional R&B Vocal Performance for "Sow Love".

Discography[link]

Albums

Other Contributions

See also[link]

• List of number-one dance hits (United States)
• List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website
• Ann Nesby at the Internet Movie Database