Former Alabama Governor Albert Brewer dies

Former Alabama Gov. Albert Brewer, who reshaped public education during a fill-in term and then championed constitutional reform as the elder statesman of his state’s politics, died Monday. He was 88.

Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley and Samford University, where Brewer taught constitutional law to generations of students, confirmed his death Monday.

“He was the only governor we had who ever came close to being a ‘New South’ governor,” said Wayne Flynt, a Southern history expert at Auburn University.

Brewer, a Democrat, was lieutenant governor when he was thrust into the governor’s office on May 7, 1968, after the death of Gov. Lurleen B. Wallace.

Brewer brought a low-key, businesslike style to the governor’s office that was dramatically different from George C. Wallace, the outspoken segregationist former governor who got his wife elected while he pursued a presidential campaign.

Left mark throughout government

Brewer’s administration lasted only 33 months, but he left his mark throughout state government, notably with an education package he guided through the Legislature in 1969.

He improved funding for public schools by enacting the state utility tax, created the Alabama Commission on Higher Education to coordinate programs at Alabama universities, raised teacher’s salaries by 21 percent over two years and got a constitutional amendment passed to elect the State Board of Education. It also switched the state superintendent of education from an elected position to one appointed by the board.

“Alabamians have lost a great leader today in the passing of Governor Albert Brewer. He lived his life as an example of integrity and professionalism in public service, and displayed an unwavering commitment to making Alabama a great state,” Bentley said in a statement issued Monday night.

“The Samford University and the state of Alabama have lost a giant in the passing of Gov. Albert Brewer. He was loyal to the university, to his family, to his state and to his God and was the epitome of a Christian gentleman,” Samford University President Andrew Westmoreland said in a statement.

Beyond education efforts, Brewer created by executive order the first state Ethics Commission. He cut the use of personal state vehicles in half by creating the state motor pool to share cars among state agencies. He started the Alabama Development Office to recruit industry to the state. He organized state computer operations into a centralized office — during the early computer era — creating a model that would be used decades later.

Brewer ran for a full term as governor in 1970 but lost a racially charged Democratic runoff to George Wallace. A lawyer by trade, he returned to practicing law, then made another unsuccessful race for governor in 1978. He later became a law professor at Samford University’s Cumberland School of Law in Birmingham, an adviser to many succeeding governors, and a figure frequently cited by Alabama leaders as someone who could have steered the state on a far different course than Wallace.

“If he’d been elected to a full term or two, he’d have been Alabama’s ‘New South’ governor, and he’d have made systemic changes that we’d still be benefiting from today,” the late Paul Hubbert, executive secretary of the Alabama Education Association, once said.

Harvey Jackson, a history professor at Jacksonville State University and author of several Alabama history books, said Brewer could have made a fortune in private law practice after being governor, but he chose to remain involved with his state.

“He became a Jimmy Carter type. He continued to work for Alabama and didn’t go off and play golf,” Jackson said.

Albert Preston Brewer was a Tennessean by birth, born on Oct. 26, 1928, in Bethel Springs. His family moved to Decatur in 1935 so his father could work for the Tennessee Valley Authority. After attending public schools in Decatur, he earned undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Alabama.

He returned to Decatur to practice law and entered politics in 1954, winning a seat in the Alabama House of Representatives. He was re-elected twice without opposition, serving as speaker of the House in his third term. In 1966, he was elected lieutenant governor, defeating three opponents in the Democratic primary without a runoff.

When he moved to the governor’s office after Lurleen Wallace’s death in 1968, he became the only person in state history to serve as speaker of the House, lieutenant governor and governor in succession.

Flynt said Brewer accomplished many goals during his partial term because of his legislative background.

“Brewer had been in the Legislature so long he had a huge network of contacts and could get done what he wanted to get done,” the historian said.

Brewer criticized school busing, as did foes of desegregation, but he appeared moderate on race when compared with Wallace. Unlike Wallace, he worked behind the scenes with black leaders.

In 1970, Brewer sought a full term as governor based on the belief that George Wallace would not run.

With Wallace’s position as a national political figure on the line, he fought back in the Democratic runoff with a vicious campaign rated the worst ever by the 2006 book “Mudslingers: The Top 25 Negative Political Campaigns of All Time.”

The author, Kennesaw State University political scientist Kerwin C. Swint, called it “the last openly racist campaign in America.”

Wallace portrayed Brewer as a sissy, who had formed a “strange bedfellows” coalition with black leaders to win their endorsements. Wallace urged voters to pull back the bedsheet and see who Brewer was in bed with.

That message was reinforced by ads urging white voters to turn out against Brewer’s “bloc vote” from blacks. Another ad showed a white girl surrounded by seven black boys under the headline “Wake Up Alabama! Blacks Vow to Take Over Alabama.”

Anti-Brewer material put out by anonymous groups targeted Brewer’s family, accusing Brewer’s wife of being an alcoholic and his two daughters of getting pregnant by blacks.

In a 2006 interview, Brewer said there was no way to counter the attacks. “You don’t want to go on TV and say, ‘I’m not a drunk,’” he said.

Wallace defeated Brewer by 34,000 votes, dashing supporters’ hopes that Brewer would become a “New South” leader.

1978 campaign derailed

Brewer ran again in 1978, when he was confronted with evidence that his 1970 campaign had accepted $400,000 in secret contributions from Richard Nixon’s Committee to Re-Elect the President. Nixon, who barely won the presidency in 1968 because of Wallace’s third-party campaign, had hoped Brewer would defeat Wallace and leave the feisty governor without a base for a presidential campaign in 1972.

Alabama voters rejected Brewer and other well-known figures in the 1978 governor’s race and gave the office to political outsider Fob James.

Brewer left Montgomery to practice law in Decatur and then became a law professor at Samford, where he started the Public Affairs Research Council, a nonpartisan government research program, and the Institute for Ethics in Business and Government.

Nearly every governor after Brewer called on him to serve on various state commissions and task forces. The absence of scandal in his administration, his decision to stay out of politics, and his continuing interest in the problems facing Alabama made him the only elder statesman among Alabama’s former governors.

“He was universally respected by people who didn’t share his party or his ideology,” Flynt said.

One issue ran throughout Brewer’s public and private career: rewriting the 1901 state constitution that disenfranchised blacks and poor whites and that centralized power in Montgomery.

As governor, he created the Alabama Constitutional Revision Commission, which worked on revising the constitution until Wallace put a stop to the effort. While at Samford, Brewer helped form Alabama Citizens for Constitutional Reform and crisscrossed the state, giving speeches in support of a new constitution. In 2003, he served on a commission created by Gov. Bob Riley to recommend changes in Alabama’s constitution.

Like Riley, nearly every other recent governor called on Brewer to serve on state commissions and task forces. The absence of scandal in his administration, his decision to stay out of politics and his continuing interest in the problems facing Alabama made him the only elder statesman among Alabama’s former governors.

Brewer’s wife, Martha Farmer Brewer, died in April 2008. They had two daughters: Allison and Rebecca.