George Wilcken Romney (July 8, 1907 – July 26, 1995) was an American businessman and politician. A member of the Republican Party, he served as chairman and president of American Motors Corporation from 1954 to 1962, the 43rd governor of Michigan from 1963 to 1969, and 3rd
secretary of Housing and Urban Development
The United States secretary of housing and urban development (or HUD secretary) is the head of the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development, a member of the president's Cabinet, and thirteenth in the presidential line of succe ...
from 1969 to 1973. He was the father of Mitt Romney, former
governor of Massachusetts
The governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is the chief executive officer of the government of Massachusetts. The governor is the head of the state cabinet and the commander-in-chief of the commonwealth's military forces.
Massachuset ...
United States senator
The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States.
The composition and powe ...
from
Utah
Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to it ...
; the husband of 1970 U.S. Senate candidate Lenore Romney; and the paternal grandfather of current
Republican National Committee
The Republican National Committee (RNC) is a U.S. Political action committee, political committee that assists the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party of the United States. It is responsible for developing and promoting the Republi ...
chair
Ronna McDaniel
Ronna McDaniel (' Romney; born March 20, 1973) is an American politician and political strategist serving as chair of the Republican National Committee (RNC) since 2017. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party and the R ...
.
Romney was born to American parents living in the
Mormon colonies in Mexico
The Mormon colonies in Mexico are settlements located near the Sierra Madre mountains in northern Mexico which were established by members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) beginning in 1885. The colonists came to ...
; events during the Mexican Revolution forced his family to flee back to the United States when he was a child. The family lived in several states and ended up in
Salt Lake City, Utah
Salt Lake City (often shortened to Salt Lake and abbreviated as SLC) is the Capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Utah, most populous city of Utah, United States. It is the county seat, seat of Salt Lake County, Utah, Sal ...
, where they struggled during the Great Depression. Romney worked in a number of jobs, served as a Mormon missionary in the United Kingdom, and attended several colleges in the U.S. but did not graduate from any of them. In 1939, he moved to
Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...
automobile industry
The automotive industry comprises a wide range of companies and organizations involved in the design, development, manufacturing, marketing, and selling of motor vehicles. It is one of the world's largest industries by revenue (from 16 % such ...
during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
and headed a cooperative arrangement in which companies could share production improvements. He joined Nash-Kelvinator in 1948, and became the chief executive of its successor, American Motors Corporation, in 1954. There he turned around the struggling firm by focusing all efforts on the compact
Rambler
Rambler or Ramble may refer to:
Places
* Rambler, Wyoming
* Rambler Channel (藍巴勒海峽), separates Tsing Yi Island and the mainland New Territories in Hong Kong
* The Ramble and Lake, Central Park, an area within New York City's Centr ...
car. Romney mocked the products of the " Big Three" automakers as "gas-guzzling dinosaurs" and became one of the first high-profile, media-savvy business executives. Devoutly religious, he presided over the Detroit Stake of
the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, informally known as the LDS Church or Mormon Church, is a nontrinitarian Christian church that considers itself to be the restoration of the original church founded by Jesus Christ. The ch ...
.
Having entered politics in 1961 by participating in a state constitutional convention to rewrite the
Michigan Constitution
The Constitution of the State of Michigan is the governing document of the U.S. state of Michigan. It describes the structure and function of the state's government.
There have been four constitutions approved by the people of Michigan. The fi ...
, Romney was elected Governor of Michigan in 1962. Re-elected by increasingly large margins in 1964 and 1966, he worked to overhaul the state's financial and revenue structure, greatly expanding the size of state government and introducing Michigan's first
state income tax
In addition to Federal government of the United States, federal Income tax in the United States, income tax collected by the United States, most individual U.S. states collect a state income tax. Some local governments also impose an income tax, ...
. Romney was a strong supporter of the
American Civil Rights Movement
The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional racial segregation, discrimination, and disenfranchisement throughout the United ...
. He briefly represented moderate Republicans against conservative Republican Barry Goldwater during the 1964 U.S. presidential election. He requested the intervention of federal troops during the
1967 Detroit riot
The 1967 Detroit Riot, also known as the 12th Street Riot or Detroit Rebellion, was the bloodiest of the urban riots in the United States during the "Long, hot summer of 1967". Composed mainly of confrontations between Black residents and the De ...
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as a representative and senator from California and was ...
in polls. After a mid-1967 remark that his earlier support for the
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam a ...
had been due to a "brainwashing" by U.S. military and diplomatic officials in Vietnam, his campaign faltered even more and he withdrew from the contest in early 1968. After being elected president, Nixon appointed Romney as Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. Romney's ambitious plans, which included housing production increases for the poor and open housing to desegregate suburbs, were modestly successful but often thwarted by Nixon. Romney left the administration at the start of Nixon's second term in 1973. Returning to private life, he advocated volunteerism and public service and headed the
National Center for Voluntary Action
The National Center for Voluntary Action was an independent, private, non-profit organization that existed in the 1970s, and then extended on in merged forms, that sought to encourage volunteerism on the part of American citizens and organizations, ...
Romney's grandparents were polygamous Mormons who fled the United States with their children owing to the federal government's prosecution of polygamy. His maternal grandfather was
Helaman Pratt
Helaman Pratt (31 May 1846 – 26 November 1909) was an early leader of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the U.S. states of Nevada and Utah and later in Mexico.
Family
Helaman was the son of Parley P. Pratt and Glasgow-born wif ...
(1846–1909), who presided over the Mormon mission in
Mexico City
Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital city, capital and primate city, largest city of Mexico, and the List of North American cities by population, most populous city in North Amer ...
before moving to the Mexican state of Chihuahua and who was the son of original Mormon apostle
Parley P. Pratt
Parley Parker Pratt Sr. (April 12, 1807 – May 13, 1857) was an early leader of the Latter Day Saint movement whose writings became a significant early nineteenth-century exposition of the Latter Day Saint faith. Named in 1835 as one of the first ...
(1807–1857). In the 1920s, Romney's uncle Rey L. Pratt (1878–1931) played a major role in the preservation and expansion of the Mormon presence in Mexico and in its introduction to South America. A more distant kinsman was George Romney (1734–1802), a noted portrait painter in Britain during the last quarter of the 18th century.
Romney's parents, Gaskell Romney (1871–1955) and Anna Amelia Pratt (1876–1926), were United States citizens and natives of the
Territory of Utah
The Territory of Utah was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from September 9, 1850, until January 4, 1896, when the final extent of the territory was admitted to the Union as the State of Utah, the 45th state ...
. They married in 1895 in Mexico and lived in Colonia Dublán in
Nuevo Casas Grandes
Nuevo Casas Grandes is a city and the seat of the Nuevo Casas Grandes Municipality in northern Mexico. It is located in the northwestern part of the state of Chihuahua, on the Casas Grandes or San Miguel river, situated in a wide, fertile valley o ...
in the state of Chihuahua (one of the
Mormon colonies in Mexico
The Mormon colonies in Mexico are settlements located near the Sierra Madre mountains in northern Mexico which were established by members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) beginning in 1885. The colonists came to ...
), where George was born on July 8, 1907. They practiced monogamy (polygamy having been abolished by the 1890 Manifesto, although it persisted in places, especially Mexico). George had three older brothers, two younger brothers, and a younger sister. Gaskell Romney was a successful carpenter, house builder, and farmer who headed the most prosperous family in the colony,Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 52–54. which was situated in an agricultural valley below the
Sierra Madre Occidental
The Sierra Madre Occidental is a major mountain range system of the North American Cordillera, that runs northwest–southeast through northwestern and western Mexico, and along the Gulf of California. The Sierra Madre is part of the American ...
. The family chose U.S. citizenship for their children, including George.
The Mexican Revolution broke out in 1910 and the Mormon colonies were endangered in 1911–1912 by raids from marauders, including "Red Flaggers"
Pascual Orozco
Pascual Orozco Vázquez, Jr. (in contemporary documents, sometimes spelled "Oroszco") (28 January 1882 – 30 August 1915) was a Mexican revolutionary leader who rose up to support Francisco I. Madero in late 1910 to depose long-time presi ...
and José Inés Salazar.Harris, ''Romney's Way'', pp. 42–43. Young George heard the sound of distant gunfire and saw rebels walking through the village streets. The Romney family fled and returned to the United States in July 1912, leaving their home and almost all of their property behind.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 59–62. Romney later said, "We were the first displaced persons of the 20th century."
In the United States, Romney grew up in humble circumstances.White, ''The Making of the President, 1968'', p. 36. The family subsisted with other Mormon refugees on government relief in
El Paso, Texas
El Paso (; "the pass") is a city in and the county seat, seat of El Paso County, Texas, El Paso County in the western corner of the U.S. state of Texas. The 2020 population of the city from the United States Census Bureau, U.S. Census Bureau w ...
, benefiting from a $100,000 fund for refugees that the
U.S. Congress
The United States Congress is the legislature of the federal government of the United States. It is bicameral, composed of a lower body, the House of Representatives, and an upper body, the Senate. It meets in the U.S. Capitol in Washin ...
had set up. After a few months they moved to
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
, where Gaskell Romney worked as a carpenter.''Current Biography Yearbook 1958'', p. 366. In kindergarten, other children mocked Romney's national origin by calling him "Mex".Kotlowski, ''Nixon's Civil Rights'', p. 50.
In 1913, the family moved to
Oakley, Idaho
Oakley is a city in Cassia County, Idaho, United States. The population was 763 at the 2010 census, up from 668 in 2000.
, and bought a farm, where they grew and subsisted largely on Idaho potatoes.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 63–65. The farm was not on good land and failed when potato prices fell. The family moved to
Salt Lake City, Utah
Salt Lake City (often shortened to Salt Lake and abbreviated as SLC) is the Capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Utah, most populous city of Utah, United States. It is the county seat, seat of Salt Lake County, Utah, Sal ...
, in 1916, where Gaskell Romney resumed construction work, but the family remained generally poor. In 1917, they moved to
Rexburg, Idaho
Rexburg is a city in Madison County, Idaho, United States. The population was 39,409 at the 2020 census. The city is the county seat of Madison County and its largest city. Rexburg is the principal city of the Rexburg, ID Micropolitan Statist ...
, where Gaskell became a successful home and commercial builder in a growing area due to high
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
commodities prices.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 65–67.
George started working in wheat and sugar beet fields at the age of eleven and was the valedictorian at his grammar school graduation in 1921 (by the sixth grade he had attended six schools). The
Depression of 1920–21
Depression may refer to:
Mental health
* Depression (mood), a state of low mood and aversion to activity
* Mood disorders characterized by depression are commonly referred to as simply ''depression'', including:
** Dysthymia, also known as pers ...
brought a collapse in prices, and local building was abandoned. His family returned to Salt Lake City in 1921, and while his father resumed construction work, George became skilled at lath-and-plaster work.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 68–69.''Current Biography Yearbook 1958'', p. 367. The family was again prospering when the Great Depression hit in 1929 and ruined them. George watched his parents fail financially in Idaho and Utah and having to take a dozen years to pay off their debts. Seeing their struggles influenced his life and business career.
In Salt Lake City, Romney worked while attending Roosevelt Junior High School and, beginning in 1922,
Latter-day Saints High School
LDS High School (previously known as Salt Lake Stake Academy or Latter-day Saints' High School, and sometimes spelled Latter-day Saints High School) was a secondary school in Salt Lake City, Utah operated by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-da ...
guard
Guard or guards may refer to:
Professional occupations
* Bodyguard, who protects an individual from personal assault
* Crossing guard, who stops traffic so pedestrians can cross the street
* Lifeguard, who rescues people from drowning
* Prison ...
on the basketball team, and right field on the baseball team, all with more persistence than talent, but in an effort to uphold the family tradition of athleticism, he earned
varsity letter
A varsity letter (or monogram) is an award earned in the United States for excellence in school activities. A varsity letter signifies that its recipient was a qualified varsity team member, awarded after a certain standard was met.
Description ...
s in all three sports. In his senior year, he and junior Lenore LaFount became high school sweethearts; she was from a more well-assimilated Mormon family. Academically, Romney was steady but undistinguished. He graduated from high school in 1925; his yearbook picture caption was "Serious, high minded, of noble nature – a real fellow".
Partly to stay near Lenore, Romney spent the next year as a junior college student at the co-located Latter-day Saints University, where he was elected
student body president
The student government president (sometimes called "student ''body'' president," "student ''council'' president" or "''school'' president") is generally the highest-ranking officer of a student union. While a student government group and a class p ...
.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 71–72. He was also president of the booster club and played on the basketball team that won the Utah–Idaho Junior College Tournament.
Missionary work
After becoming an elder, Romney earned enough money working to fund himself as a Mormon missionary. In October 1926, he sailed to Great Britain and was first assigned to preach in a slum in
Glasgow
Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popul ...
, Scotland.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 73–76. The abject poverty and hopelessness he saw there affected him greatly, but he was ineffective in gaining converts and temporarily suffered a crisis of faith.
In February 1927, he was shifted to
Edinburgh
Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian on the southern shore of t ...
and in February 1928 to London,Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 77–81. where he kept track of mission finances.Harris, ''Romney's Way'', pp. 78, 81. He worked under renowned
Quorum of the Twelve Apostles
A quorum is the minimum number of members of a deliberative assembly (a body that uses parliamentary procedure, such as a legislature) necessary to conduct the business of that group. According to ''Robert's Rules of Order Newly Revised'', the ...
intellectuals James E. Talmage and John A. Widtsoe; the latter's admonitions to "Live mightily today, the greatest day of all time is today" made a lasting impression on him. Romney experienced British sights and culture and was introduced to members of the peerage and the
Oxford Group
The Oxford Group was a Christian organization (first known as ''First Century Christian Fellowship'') founded by the American Lutheran minister Frank Buchman in 1921. Buchman believed that fear and selfishness were the root of all problems. Fur ...
.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 83–87.
In August 1928, Romney became president of the Scottish missionary district. Operating in a
whisky
Whisky or whiskey is a type of distilled alcoholic beverage made from fermented grain mash. Various grains (which may be malted) are used for different varieties, including barley, corn, rye, and wheat. Whisky is typically aged in wooden ca ...
-centric region was difficult, and he developed a new "task force" approach of sending more missionaries to a single location at a time; this successfully drew local press attention and several hundred new recruits. Romney's frequent public proselytizing – from Edinburgh's Mound and in London from soap boxes at
Speakers' Corner
A Speakers' Corner is an area where open-air public speaking, debate, and discussion are allowed. The original and best known is in the northeast corner of Hyde Park in London, England. Historically there were a number of other areas desig ...
Trafalgar Square
Trafalgar Square ( ) is a public square in the City of Westminster, Central London, laid out in the early 19th century around the area formerly known as Charing Cross. At its centre is a high column bearing a statue of Admiral Nelson comm ...
– developed his gifts for debate and sales, which he would use the rest of his career. Three decades later, Romney said that his missionary time had meant more to him in developing his career than any other experience.
Early career, marriage and children
Romney returned to the U.S. in late 1928 and studied briefly at the
University of Utah
The University of Utah (U of U, UofU, or simply The U) is a public research university in Salt Lake City, Utah. It is the flagship institution of the Utah System of Higher Education. The university was established in 1850 as the University of De ...
and
LDS Business College
Ensign College (formerly LDS Business College) is a private college in Salt Lake City, Utah. The college is owned by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) and operates under its Church Educational System. It also includes a ...
.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 89–94. He followed LaFount to
Washington, D.C.
)
, image_skyline =
, image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
Federal Radio Commission
The Federal Radio Commission (FRC) was a government agency that regulated United States radio communication from its creation in 1927 until 1934, when it was succeeded by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The FRC was established by t ...
speedwriting
Speedwriting is the trademark under which three versions of a shorthand system were marketed during the 20th century. The original version was designed so that it could be written with a pen or typed on a typewriter. At the peak of its popularity ...
, then, when his abilities at that proved limited, as a staff aide working on tariffs and other legislative matters. Romney researched aspects of the proposed Smoot-Hawley tariff legislation and sat in on committee meetings; the job was a turning point in his career and gave him lifelong confidence in dealing with Congress.
With one of his brothers, Romney opened a dairy bar in nearby Rosslyn, Virginia, during this time. The business soon failed, in the midst of the Great Depression.Harris, ''Romney's Way'', pp. 91–92. He also attended
George Washington University
The George Washington University (GW or GWU) is a Private university, private University charter#Federal, federally chartered research university in Washington, D.C. Chartered in 1821 by the United States Congress, GWU is the largest Higher educat ...
at night. Based upon a connection he made working for Walsh, Romney was hired as an apprentice for Alcoa in
Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Western Pennsylvania, the second-most populous city in Pennsylva ...
in June 1930.
When LaFount, an aspiring actress, began earning bit roles in Hollywood movies, Romney arranged to be transferred to Alcoa's Los Angeles office for training as a salesman. There he took night classes at the
University of Southern California
, mottoeng = "Let whoever earns the palm bear it"
, religious_affiliation = Nonsectarian—historically Methodist
, established =
, accreditation = WSCUC
, type = Private research university
, academic_affiliations =
, endowment = $8.1 ...
. (Romney did not attend for long, or graduate from, any of the colleges in which he was enrolled, accumulating only 2½ years of credits; instead he has been described as an autodidact.) LaFount had the opportunity to sign a $50,000, three-year contract with
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and abbreviated as MGM, is an American film, television production, distribution and media company owned by Amazon through MGM Holdings, founded on April 17, 1924 ...
studios, but Romney convinced her to return to Washington with him as he was assigned a position there with Alcoa as a
lobbyist
In politics, lobbying, persuasion or interest representation is the act of lawfully attempting to influence the actions, policies, or decisions of government officials, most often legislators or members of regulatory agencies. Lobbying, which ...
. She later said she had never had a choice of both marriage and an acting career, because the latter would have upstaged him, but expressed no regrets about having chosen the former. Romney would later consider wooing her his greatest sales achievement.
The couple married on July 2, 1931, at Salt Lake City Temple. They would have four children: Margo Lynn (born 1935), Jane LaFount (born 1938), George Scott (born 1941), and Willard Mitt (born 1947). The couple's marriage reflected aspects of their personalities and courtship. George was devoted to Lenore, and tried to bring her a flower every day, often a single rose with a love note.Kranish; Helman, ''The Real Romney'', pp. 18–19. George was also a strong, blunt personality used to winning arguments by force of will, but the more self-controlled Lenore was unintimidated and willing to push back against him. The couple quarreled so much as a result that their grandchildren would later nickname them "the Bickersons", but in the end, their closeness would allow them to settle arguments amicably.
As a lobbyist, Romney frequently competed on behalf of the aluminum industry against the copper industry, and defended Alcoa against charges of being a monopoly. He also represented the Aluminum Wares Association. In the early 1930s, he helped get aluminum windows installed in the U.S. Department of Commerce Building, at the time the largest office building in the world.
Romney joined the
National Press Club
Organizations
A press club is an organization for journalists and others professionally engaged in the production and dissemination of news. A press club whose membership is defined by the press of a given country may be known as a National Press ...
Congressional Country Club
Congressional Country Club is a country club and golf course in Bethesda, Maryland, United States. Congressional opened in 1924 and its Blue Course has hosted five major championships, including three U.S. Opens and a PGA Championship. It was a ...
s; one reporter watching Romney hurriedly play golf at the last said, "There is a young man who knows where he is going." Lenore's cultural refinement and hosting skills, along with her father's social and political connections, helped George in business, and the couple met the Hoovers, the Roosevelts, and other prominent Washington figures.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 102–105. He was chosen by Pyke Johnson, a Denver newspaperman and automotive industry trade representative he met at the Press Club, to join the newly formed Trade Association Advisory Committee to the National Recovery Administration. The committee's work continued even after the agency was declared unconstitutional in 1935. During 1937 and 1938, Romney was also president of the Washington Trade Association Executives.
Automotive industry representative
After nine years with Alcoa, Romney's career had stagnated; there were many layers of executives to climb through and a key promotion he had wanted was given to someone with more seniority. Pyke Johnson was vice president of the
Automobile Manufacturers Association
The Automobile Manufacturers Association was a trade group of automobile manufacturers which operated under various names in the United States from 1911 to 1999.
A different group called the Automobile Manufacturers' Association was active in the ...
, which needed a manager for its new
Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...
office.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 108–109. Romney got the job and moved there with his wife and two daughters in 1939. An association study found Americans using their cars more for short trips and convinced Romney that the trend was towards more functional, basic transportation. In 1942, he was promoted to general manager of the association, a position he held until 1948. Romney also served as president of the Detroit Trade Association in 1941.
In 1940, as
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
raged overseas, Romney helped start the Automotive Committee for Air Defense, which coordinated planning between the automobile and aircraft industries.Mollenhoff, ''George Romney'', pp. 58–59. Immediately following the December 1941
attack on Pearl Harbor
The attack on Pearl HarborAlso known as the Battle of Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service upon the United States against the naval base at Pearl Harbor in Honolulu, Territory of Hawaii ...
that drew the U.S. into the war, Romney helped turn that committee into, and became managing director of, the Automotive Council for War Production. This organization established a cooperative arrangement in which companies could share machine tools and production improvements, thus maximizing the industry's contribution to the war production effort. It embodied Romney's notion of "competitive cooperative capitalism".Harris, ''Romney's Way'', pp. 109–111.
With labor leader Victor Reuther, Romney led the Detroit Victory Council, which sought to improve conditions for Detroit workers under wartime stress and deal with the causes of the Detroit race riot of 1943. Romney successfully appealed to the
Federal Housing Administration
The Federal Housing Administration (FHA), also known as the Office of Housing within the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), is a United States government agency founded by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, created in part by ...
to make housing available to black workers near the Ford Willow Run plant. He also served on the labor-management committee of the Detroit section of the
War Manpower Commission
The War Manpower Commission was a World War II agency of the United States Government charged with planning to balance the labor needs of agriculture, industry and the armed forces.
History
The Commission was created by President Franklin D. ...
.
Romney's influence grew while he positioned himself as chief spokesman of the automobile industry, often testifying before Congressional hearings about production, labor, and management issues; he was mentioned or quoted in over 80 stories in ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' during this time. By war's end, 654 manufacturing companies had joined the Automotive Council for War Production, and produced nearly $29 billion in output for the Allied military forces. This included over 3 million motorized vehicles, 80 percent of all tanks and tank parts, 75 percent of all aircraft engines, half of all diesel engines, and a third of all machine guns.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 110–114, 120. Between a fifth and a quarter of all U.S. wartime production was accounted for by the automotive industry.
As peacetime production began, Romney persuaded government officials to forgo complex contract-termination procedures, thus freeing auto plants to quickly produce cars for domestic consumption and avoid large layoffs. Romney was director of the American Trade Association Executives in 1944 and 1947, and managing director of the National Automobile Golden Jubilee Committee in 1946. From 1946 to 1949, he represented U.S. employers as a delegate to the Metal Trades Industry conference of the
International Labor Office
The International Labour Organization (ILO) is a United Nations agency whose mandate is to advance social and economic justice by setting international labour standards. Founded in October 1919 under the League of Nations, it is the first and ol ...
. By 1950, Romney was a member of the Citizens Housing and Planning Council, and criticized
racial segregation
Racial segregation is the systematic separation of people into race (human classification), racial or other Ethnicity, ethnic groups in daily life. Racial segregation can amount to the international crime of apartheid and a crimes against hum ...
in Detroit's housing program when speaking before the
Detroit City Council
The Detroit City Council is the legislative body of Detroit, Michigan, United States. The full-time council is required to meet every business day for at least 10 months of the year, with at least eight of these meetings occurring at a location ...
.Fine, ''Expanding the Frontiers of Civil Rights'', p. 216. Romney's personality was blunt and intense, giving the impression of a "man in a hurry", and he was considered a rising star in the industry.
American Motors Corporation chief executive
As managing director of the Automobile Manufacturers Association, Romney became good friends with then-president
George W. Mason
George Walter Mason (March 12, 1891 – October 8, 1954) was an American industrialist. During his career Mason served as the Chairman and CEO of the Kelvinator Corporation (1928-1937), Chairman and CEO of the Nash-Kelvinator Corporation (1937-19 ...
. When Mason became chairman of the manufacturing firm Nash-Kelvinator in 1948, he invited Romney along "to learn the business from the ground up" as his roving assistant, and the new executive spent a year working in different parts of the company. At a Detroit refrigerator plant of the Kelvinator appliance division, Romney battled the Mechanics Educational Society of America union to institute a new industrial–labor relations program that forestalled the whole facility being shut down.Harris, ''Romney's Way'', pp. 140–143. He appealed to the workers by saying, "I am no college man. I've laid floors, I've done lathing. I've thinned beets and shocked wheat." As Mason's protégé, Romney assumed executive assignment for the development of the
Rambler
Rambler or Ramble may refer to:
Places
* Rambler, Wyoming
* Rambler Channel (藍巴勒海峽), separates Tsing Yi Island and the mainland New Territories in Hong Kong
* The Ramble and Lake, Central Park, an area within New York City's Centr ...
.
Mason had long sought a merger of Nash-Kelvinator with one or more other companies, and on May 1, 1954, it merged with Hudson Motor Car to become the American Motors Corporation (AMC).Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 168–171. It was the largest merger in the history of the industry, and Romney became an executive vice president of the new firm. In October 1954, Mason suddenly died of acute
pancreatitis
Pancreatitis is a condition characterized by inflammation of the pancreas. The pancreas is a large organ behind the stomach that produces digestive enzymes and a number of hormones. There are two main types: acute pancreatitis, and chronic pancr ...
and
pneumonia
Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of productive or dry cough, chest pain, fever, and difficulty breathing. The severi ...
. Romney was named AMC's president and chairman of the board the same month.
When Romney took over, he cancelled Mason's plan to merge AMC with Studebaker-Packard Corporation (or any other automaker). He reorganized upper management, brought in younger executives, and pruned and rebuilt AMC's dealer network. Romney believed that the only way to compete with the " Big Three" ( General Motors,
Ford
Ford commonly refers to:
* Ford Motor Company, an automobile manufacturer founded by Henry Ford
* Ford (crossing), a shallow crossing on a river
Ford may also refer to:
Ford Motor Company
* Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company
* Ford F ...
, and Chrysler) was to stake the future of AMC on a new smaller-sized car line. Together with chief engineer Meade Moore, by the end of 1957 Romney had completely phased out the Nash and Hudson brands, whose sales had been lagging. The Rambler brand was selected for development and promotion, as AMC pursued an innovative strategy: manufacturing only
compact car
Compact car is a vehicle size class — predominantly used in North America — that sits between subcompact cars and mid-size cars. "Small family car" is a British term and a part of the C-segment in the European car classification. However, ...
s. The company struggled badly at first, losing money in 1956, more in 1957, and experiencing defections from its dealer network. Romney instituted company-wide savings and efficiency measures, and he and other executives reduced their salaries by up to 35 percent.
Though AMC was on the verge of being taken over by corporate raider
Louis Wolfson
Louis Elwood Wolfson (January 28, 1912 – December 30, 2007) was an American financier, a convicted felon, and one of the first modern corporate raiders, labeled by ''Time'' as such in a 1956 article. Then sales of the Rambler finally took off, leading to unexpected financial success for AMC. It posted its first quarterly profit in three years in 1958, was the only car company to show increased sales during the
recession of 1958
The Recession of 1958, also known as the Eisenhower Recession, was a sharp worldwide economic downturn in 1958. The effect of the recession spread beyond the United States borders to Europe and Canada, causing many businesses to shut down. It was t ...
, and moved from thirteenth to seventh place among worldwide auto manufacturers.
In contrast with the Hudson's
NASCAR
The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and ...
racing success in the early 1950s, the Ramblers were frequent winners in the coast-to-coast
Mobil Economy Run
Mobil Economy Run was an annual event that took place from 1936 to 1968, except during World War II. It was designed to provide real fuel efficiency numbers during a coast-to-coast test on public roads and with regular traffic and weather conditi ...
, an annual event on U.S. highways. Sales remained strong during 1960 and 1961; the Rambler was America's third most popular car both years.
A believer in "competitive cooperative consumerism",''Current Biography Yearbook 1958'', p. 368. Romney was effective in his frequent appearances before Congress. He discussed what he saw as the twin evils of "big labor" and "big business", and called on Congress to break up the Big Three. As the Big Three automakers introduced ever-larger models, AMC undertook a "gas-guzzling dinosaur fighter" strategy, and Romney became the company spokesperson in print advertisements, public appearances, and commercials on the ''
Disneyland
Disneyland is a theme park in Anaheim, California. Opened in 1955, it was the first theme park opened by The Walt Disney Company and the only one designed and constructed under the direct supervision of Walt Disney. Disney initially envision ...
'' television program. Known for his fast-paced, short-sleeved management style that ignored organizational charts and levels of responsibility, he often wrote the ad copy himself.
Romney became what automotive writer Joe Sherman termed "a folk hero of the American auto industry" and one of the first high-profile media-savvy business executives. His focus on small cars as a challenge to AMC's domestic competitors, as well as the foreign-car invasion, was documented in the April 6, 1959, cover story of ''
Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, ...
'' magazine, which concluded that "Romney has brought off singlehanded one of the most remarkable selling jobs in U.S. industry."The cover can be seen at: The cover story itself is: A full biography of him was published in 1960; the company's resurgence made Romney a household name. The
Associated Press
The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. ne ...
named Romney its Man of the Year in Industry for four consecutive years, 1958 through 1961.
The company's stock rose from $7 per share to $90 per share, making Romney a millionaire from
stock options
In finance, an option is a contract which conveys to its owner, the ''holder'', the right, but not the obligation, to buy or sell a specific quantity of an underlying asset or instrument at a specified strike price on or before a specified da ...
. However, whenever he felt his salary and bonus was excessively high for a year, he gave the excess back to the company. After initial wariness, he developed a good relationship with
United Automobile Workers
The International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace, and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, better known as the United Auto Workers (UAW), is an American labor union that represents workers in the United States (including Puerto Rico) ...
leader
Walter Reuther
Walter Philip Reuther (; September 1, 1907 – May 9, 1970) was an American leader of organized labor and civil rights activist who built the United Automobile Workers (UAW) into one of the most progressive labor unions in American history. He ...
, and AMC workers also benefited from a then-novel profit-sharing plan. Romney was one of only a few Michigan corporate chiefs to support passage and implementation of the state Fair Employment Practices Act.
Local church and civic leadership
Religion was a paramount force in Romney's life. In a 1959 essay for the ''
Detroit Free Press
The ''Detroit Free Press'' is the largest daily newspaper in Detroit, Michigan, US. The Sunday edition is titled the ''Sunday Free Press''. It is sometimes referred to as the Freep (reflected in the paper's web address, www.freep.com). It primari ...
'' he said, "My religion is my most precious possession. ... Except for my religion, I easily could have become excessively occupied with industry, social and recreational activities. Sharing personal responsibility for church work with my fellow members has been a vital counterbalance in my life." Following
LDS Church
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, informally known as the LDS Church or Mormon Church, is a nontrinitarian Christian church that considers itself to be the restoration of the original church founded by Jesus Christ. The c ...
practices, he did not drink alcohol or caffeinated beverages, smoke, or swear. Romney and his wife
tithe
A tithe (; from Old English: ''teogoþa'' "tenth") is a one-tenth part of something, paid as a contribution to a religious organization or compulsory tax to government. Today, tithes are normally voluntary and paid in cash or cheques or more ...
d, and from 1955 to 1965, gave 19 percent of their income to the church and another 4 percent to charity.
Romney was a high priest in the Melchizedek priesthood of the LDS, and beginning in 1944 he headed the Detroit church branch (which initially was small enough to meet in a member's house).Ostling; Ostling, ''Mormon America'', p. 134. By the time he was AMC chief, he presided over the Detroit Stake, which included not only all of Metro Detroit, Ann Arbor, and the Toledo area of Ohio but also the western edge of Ontario along the Michigan border.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 3–4, 87. In this role, Romney oversaw the religious work of some 2,700 church members, occasionally preached sermons, and supervised the construction of the first stake tabernacle east of the
Mississippi River
The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it fl ...
in 100 years. Because the stake covered part of Canada, he often interacted with Canadian Mission President
Thomas S. Monson
Thomas Spencer Monson (August 21, 1927 – January 2, 2018) was an American religious leader, author, and the 16th President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). As president, he was considered by adherents of the re ...
. Romney's rise to a leadership role in the church reflected the church's journey from a fringe pioneer religion to one that was closely associated with mainstream American business and values. Due in part to his prominence, the larger Romney family tree would become viewed as "LDS royalty".
Romney and his family lived in affluent
Bloomfield Hills
Bloomfield Hills is a small city (5.04 sq. miles) in Oakland County in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is a northern suburb of Metro Detroit and is approximately northwest of Downtown Detroit. Except a small southern border with the city of Bir ...
, having moved there from Detroit around 1953. He became deeply active in Michigan civic affairs.Dunbar; May, ''Michigan'', p. 575. He was on the board of directors of the
Children's Hospital of Michigan Children's Hospital of Michigan (CHM) is a for-profit, pediatric acute care hospital located in Detroit, Michigan. The hospital has 227 beds and is affiliated with both the Wayne State University School of Medicine and the Michigan State Universit ...
and the United Foundation of Detroit, and was chairman of the executive committee of the Detroit Round Table of Catholics, Jews, and Protestants. In 1959, he received the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai 's Americanism award.
Starting in 1956, Romney headed a citizen-based committee for improved educational programs in Detroit's public schools. The 1958, final report of the Citizens Advisory Committee on School Needs was largely Romney's work and received considerable public attention; it made nearly 200 recommendations for economy and efficiency, better teacher pay, and new infrastructure funding.Mahoney, ''The Story of George Romney'', pp. 228, 232–233, 236–237. Romney helped a $90-million education-related bond issue and tax increase win an upset victory in an April 1959 statewide referendum. He organized Citizens for Michigan in 1959, a nonpartisan group that sought to study Detroit's problems and build an informed electorate. Citizens for Michigan built on Romney's belief that assorted interest groups held too much influence in government, and that only the cooperation of informed citizens acting for the benefit of all could counter them.
Based on his fame and accomplishments in a state where automobile making was a central topic of conversation, Romney was seen as a natural to enter politics. He first became directly involved in politics in 1959, when he was a key force in the petition drive calling for a constitutional convention to rewrite the
Michigan Constitution
The Constitution of the State of Michigan is the governing document of the U.S. state of Michigan. It describes the structure and function of the state's government.
There have been four constitutions approved by the people of Michigan. The fi ...
. Romney's sales skills made Citizens for Michigan one of the most effective organizations among those calling for the convention. Previously unaffiliated politically, Romney declared himself a member of the Republican Party and gained election to the convention. By early 1960, many in Michigan's somewhat moribund Republican Party were touting Romney as a possible candidate for governor, U.S. senator, or even U.S. vice president.
Also in early 1960, Romney served on the Fair Campaign Practices Committee, a group also having Jewish, Catholic, mainline and evangelical Protestant, and Orthodox Christian members. It issued a report whose guiding principles were that no candidate for elected office should be supported or opposed due to their religion and that no campaign for office should be seen as an opportunity to vote for one religion against another. This statement helped pave the way for
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination ...
's famous speech on religion and public office later that year. Romney briefly considered a run in the 1960 Senate election, but instead became a vice president of the constitutional convention that revised the Michigan constitution during 1961 and 1962.Dunbar; May, ''Michigan'', p. 576.
Governor of Michigan
After a period of pained indecision and a 24-hour prayer fast, Romney stepped down from AMC in February 1962 to enter electoral politics (given an indefinite leave of absence, he was succeeded as president of AMC by Roy Abernethy).
Romney's position as the leader of the moderate Republicans at the constitutional convention helped gain him the Republican nomination for Governor of Michigan.
He ran against incumbent Democratic Governor John B. Swainson in the general election. Romney campaigned on revising the state's tax structure, increasing its appeal to businesses and the general public, and getting it "rolling again". Romney decried both the large influence of labor unions within the Democratic Party and the similarly large influence of big business within the Republican Party. His campaign was among the first to exploit the capabilities of electronic data processing.
Romney won by some 80,000 votes and ended a fourteen-year stretch of Democratic rule in the state executive spot.White, ''The Making of the President, 1968'', p. 37. His win was attributed to his appeal to independent voters and to those from the increasingly influential suburbs of Detroit, who by 1962 were more likely to vote Republican than the heavily Democratic residents of the city itself. Additionally, Romney had appeal to labor union members that was unusual for a Republican. Democrats won all the other statewide executive offices in the election, including Democratic incumbent
T. John Lesinski
Thaddeus John "T. John" Lesinski, (April 28, 1925 – August 13, 1996), was an American politician and judge from the U.S. state of Michigan.
Biography
Lesinski was born in Detroit, Michigan and lived in Detroit and Grosse Pointe Shores. He gra ...
in the separate election for Lieutenant Governor of Michigan. Romney's success caused immediate mention of him as a presidential possibility for 1964, and President John F. Kennedy said privately in 1963 that, "The one fellow I don't want to run against is Romney."
Romney was sworn in as governor on January 1, 1963. His initial concern was the implementation of the overhaul of the state's financial and revenue structure that had been authorized by the constitutional convention.Dunbar; May, ''Michigan'', p. 577. In 1963, he proposed a comprehensive tax revision package that included a flat-rate
state income tax
In addition to Federal government of the United States, federal Income tax in the United States, income tax collected by the United States, most individual U.S. states collect a state income tax. Some local governments also impose an income tax, ...
, but general economic prosperity alleviated pressure on the state budget and the Michigan Legislature rejected the measure. Romney's early difficulties with the legislature helped undermine an attempted push that year of Romney as a national political figure by former
Richard Nixon
Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as a representative and senator from California and was ...
associates. One Michigan Democrat said of Romney, "He has not yet learned that things in government are not necessarily done the moment the man at the top gives an order. He is eager and sometimes impatient." But over his first two years in office, Romney was able to work with Democrats – who often had at least partial control of the legislature – and an informal bipartisan coalition formed which allowed Romney to accomplish many of his goals and initiatives.
Romney held a series of Governor's Conferences, which sought to find new ideas from public services professionals and community activists who attended. He opened his office in the Michigan State Capitol to visitors, spending five minutes with every citizen who wanted to speak with him on Thursday mornings, and was always sure to shake the hands of schoolchildren visiting the capitol. He almost always eschewed political activities on Sunday, the Mormon Sabbath. His blunt and unequivocal manner sometimes caused friction, and family members and associates used the idiom "bull in a china shop" to describe him. He took a theatrical approach to governance, staging sudden appearances in settings where he might be politically unwelcome. One former aide later said that ''willful'' was too weak a word to describe him, and chose ''messianic'' instead. Romney saw a moral dimension in every issue and his political views were held with as much fervor as religious ones; writer Theodore H. White said "the first quality that surfaced, as one met and talked with George Romney over a number of years, was a sincerity so profound that, in conversation, one was almost embarrassed."
Romney supported the
American Civil Rights Movement
The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional racial segregation, discrimination, and disenfranchisement throughout the United ...
while governor. Although he belonged to a church that did not allow black people in its lay clergy, Romney's hardscrabble background and subsequent life experiences led him to support the movement. He reflected, "It was only after I got to Detroit that I got to know Negroes and began to be able to evaluate them and I began to recognize that some Negroes are better and more capable than lots of whites." During his first
State of the State address The State of the State Address is a speech customarily given once each year by the governors of each of the states of the United States, although the terminology for this speech differs for some states: in Iowa, the speech is called the Condition of ...
in January 1963, Romney declared that "Michigan's most urgent human rights problem is racial discrimination—in housing, public accommodations, education, administration of justice, and employment." Romney helped create the state's first civil rights commission.
When
Martin Luther King Jr.
Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister and activist, one of the most prominent leaders in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968 ...
came to Detroit in June 1963 and led the 120,000-strongGreat March on Detroit, Romney designated the occasion Freedom March Day in Michigan, and sent state senator Stanley Thayer to march with King as his emissary, but did not attend himself because it was on Sunday. Romney did participate in a much smaller march protesting housing discrimination the following Saturday in
Grosse Pointe
Grosse Pointe refers to an affluent coastal area next to Detroit, Michigan, United States, that comprises five adjacent individual cities. From southwest to northeast, they are:
* Grosse Pointe Park
* Grosse Pointe
* Grosse Pointe Farms
* Grosse ...
, after King had left. Romney supported the Civil Rights Act of 1964 then under consideration by Congress, and his support for it and advocacy of civil rights in general brought him criticism from some in his own church. In January 1964, Quorum of the Twelve Apostles member Delbert L. Stapley wrote him that a proposed civil rights bill was "vicious legislation" and told him that "the Lord had placed the curse upon the Negro" and men should not seek its removal. Romney refused to change his position and increased his efforts towards civil rights. Regarding the church policy itself, Romney was among those liberal Mormons who hoped the church leadership would revise the theological interpretation that underlay it, but Romney did not believe in publicly criticizing the church, subsequently saying that fellow Mormon Stewart Udall's 1967 published denunciation of the policy "cannot serve any useful religious purpose".
In the 1964 U.S. presidential election, Senator Barry Goldwater quickly became the likely Republican Party nominee. Goldwater represented a new wave of
American conservatism
Conservatism in the United States is a political and social philosophy based on a belief in limited government, individualism, traditionalism, republicanism, and limited federal governmental power in relation to U.S. states. Conservative ...
, of which the moderate Romney was not a part. Romney also felt that Goldwater would be a drag on Republicans running in all the other races that year, including Romney's own (at the time, Michigan had two-year terms for its governor). Finally, Romney disagreed strongly with Goldwater's views on civil rights; he would later say, "Whites and Negroes, in my opinion, have ''got'' to learn to know each other. Barry Goldwater didn't have any background to understand this, to fathom them, and I couldn't get through to him." Romney declared at a dinner held in his honor at Salt Lake City that by appealing to the Southerners who supported racial segregation in order to win the presidency, the Republican Party would forever lose its association as the party of
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln ( ; February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. Lincoln led the nation thro ...
.
During the June 1964 National Governors' Conference, 13 of 16 Republican governors present were opposed to Goldwater; their leaders were
Jim Rhodes
James Allen Rhodes (September 13, 1909 – March 4, 2001) was an American Republican politician who served as Governor of Ohio from 1963 to 1971 and again from 1975 to 1983. , Rhodes was one of only seven U.S. governors to serve four four-yea ...
of Ohio, Nelson Rockefeller of New York (whose own campaign had just stalled out with a loss to Goldwater in the California primary),
William Scranton
William Warren Scranton (July 19, 1917 – July 28, 2013) was an American Republican Party politician and diplomat. Scranton served as the 38th Governor of Pennsylvania from 1963 to 1967, and as United States Ambassador to the United Nations fr ...
of Pennsylvania, and Romney.White, ''The Making of the President, 1964'', pp. 154–155, 157. In an unusual appearance at a Sunday press conference, Romney declared that the nomination of Goldwater could lead to the "suicidal destruction of the Republican Party", and that "If oldwater'sviews deviate as indicated from the heritage of our party, I will do everything within my power to keep him from becoming the party's presidential nominee." Romney had, however, previously vowed to Michigan voters that he would not run for president in 1964.White, ''The Making of the President, 1964'', p. 160. Detroit newspapers indicated they would not support him in any such bid, and Romney quickly decided to honor his pledge to stay out of the contest. Scranton entered instead, but Goldwater prevailed decisively at the
1964 Republican National Convention
The 1964 Republican National Convention took place in the Cow Palace, Daly City, California, from July 13 to July 16, 1964. Before 1964, there had been only one national Republican convention on the West Coast, the 1956 Republican National Convent ...
. Romney's name was entered into nomination as a
favorite son
Favorite son (or favorite daughter) is a political term.
* At the quadrennial American national political party conventions, a state delegation sometimes nominates a candidate from the state, or less often from the state's region, who is not a ...
by U.S. Representative Gerald Ford of Michigan (who had not wanted to choose between candidates during the primary campaign) and he received the votes of 41 delegates in the roll call (40 of Michigan's 48 and one from Kansas).
At the convention, Romney fought for a strengthened civil rights plank in the party platform that would pledge action to eliminate discrimination at the state, local, and private levels, but it was defeated on a voice vote.''National Party Conventions 1831–2004'', pp. 127–128. He also failed to win support for a statement that condemned both left- and right-wing extremism without naming any organizations, which lost a standing vote by a two-to-one margin. Both of Romney's positions were endorsed by former President Dwight Eisenhower, who had an approach to civic responsibilities similar to Romney's. As the convention concluded, Romney neither endorsed nor repudiated Goldwater and vice presidential nominee William E. Miller, saying he had reservations about Goldwater's lack of support for civil rights and the political extremism that Goldwater embodied.
For the fall 1964 elections, Romney cut himself off from the national ticket, refusing to even appear on the same stage with them and continuing to feud with Goldwater privately. He campaigned for governor in mostly Democratic areas, and when pressed at campaign appearances about whether he supported Goldwater, he replied, "You know darn well I'm not!" Romney was re-elected in 1964 by a margin of over 380,000 votes over Democratic Congressman Neil Staebler, despite Goldwater's landslide defeat to President
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), often referred to by his initials LBJ, was an American politician who served as the 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. He had previously served as the 37th vice ...
that swept away many other Republican candidates. Romney won 15 percent of Michigan's black vote, compared to Goldwater's two percent.
In 1965, Romney visited South Vietnam for 31 days and said that he was continuing his strong support for U.S. military involvement there.
During 1966, while son Mitt was away in France on missionary work, George Romney guided Mitt's fiancée Ann Davies in her conversion to Mormonism. Governor Romney continued his support of civil rights; after violence broke out during the
Selma to Montgomery marches
The Selma to Montgomery marches were three protest marches, held in 1965, along the 54-mile (87 km) highway from Selma, Alabama, to the state capital of Montgomery. The marches were organized by nonviolent activists to demonstrate the ...
in 1965, he marched at the front of a Detroit parade in solidarity with the marchers. In 1966, Romney had his biggest electoral success, winning re-election again by some 527,000 votes over Democratic lawyer Zolton Ferency (this time to a four-year term, after a change in Michigan law). His share of the black vote rose to over 30 percent, a virtually unprecedented accomplishment for a Republican.
By 1967, a looming deficit prompted the legislature to overhaul Michigan's tax structure. Personal and corporate state income taxes were created while business receipts and corporation franchise taxes were eliminated. Passage of an income levy had eluded past Michigan governors, no matter which party controlled of the legislature. Romney's success convincing Democratic and Republican factions to compromise on the details of the measure was considered a key test of his political ability.
The massive 12th Street riot in Detroit began during the predawn hours of July 23, 1967, precipitated by a police raid of a
speakeasy
A speakeasy, also called a blind pig or blind tiger, is an illicit establishment that sells alcoholic beverages, or a retro style bar that replicates aspects of historical speakeasies.
Speakeasy bars came into prominence in the United States ...
in a predominantly black neighborhood.Dunbar; May, ''Michigan'', p. 583. As the day wore on and looting and fires got worse, Romney called in the
Michigan State Police
The Michigan State Police (MSP) is the state police agency for the U.S. state of Michigan. The MSP is a full-service law enforcement agency, with its sworn members having full police powers statewide.
The department was founded in 1917 as a wart ...
and the
Michigan National Guard
The Michigan National Guard consists of the Michigan Army National Guard and the Michigan Air National Guard. The State adjutant general is Major general Paul D. Rogers.
Units
Michigan Army National Guard units include:
* Recruiting Office: Ba ...
. At 3 a.m. on July 24, Romney and Detroit Mayor
Jerome Cavanagh
Jerome Patrick Cavanagh (June 16, 1928 – November 27, 1979) was an American politician who served as the mayor of Detroit, Michigan from 1962 to 1970. Initially seen as another John F. Kennedy, his reputation was doomed by the 1967 riots. He ...
called
U.S. Attorney General
The United States attorney general (AG) is the head of the United States Department of Justice, and is the chief law enforcement officer of the federal government of the United States. The attorney general serves as the principal advisor to the p ...
Ramsey Clark
William Ramsey Clark (December 18, 1927 – April 9, 2021) was an American lawyer, activist, and federal government official. A progressive, New Frontier liberal, he occupied senior positions in the United States Department of Justice under Pres ...
and requested that federal troops be sent. Clark indicated that to do so, Romney would have to declare a state of
civil insurrection
Rebellion, uprising, or insurrection is a refusal of obedience or order. It refers to the open resistance against the orders of an established authority.
A rebellion originates from a sentiment of indignation and disapproval of a situation and ...
, which the governor was loath to do from fear that insurance companies would seize upon it as a reason to not cover losses owing to the riot. Elements of the 82nd and 101st U.S. Army Airborne Divisions were mobilized outside of the city.
As the situation in Detroit worsened, Romney told
Deputy Secretary of Defense
The deputy secretary of defense (acronym: DepSecDef) is a statutory office () and the second-highest-ranking official in the Department of Defense of the United States of America.
The deputy secretary is the principal civilian deputy to the sec ...
Cyrus Vance, "We gotta move, man, we gotta move." Near midnight on July 24, President Johnson authorized thousands of paratroopers to enter Detroit. Johnson went on national television to announce his actions and made seven references to Romney's inability to control the riot using state and local forces.Dunbar; May, ''Michigan'', p. 584. Thousands of arrests took place and the rioting continued until July 27. The final toll was the largest of any American civil disturbance in fifty years: 43 dead, over a thousand injured, 2,500 stores looted, hundreds of homes burned, and some $50 million overall in property damage.
There were strong political implications in the handling of the riot, as Romney was seen as a leading Republican contender to challenge Johnson's presidential re-election the following year; Romney believed the White House had intentionally slowed its response and he charged Johnson with having "played politics" in his actions. The riot notwithstanding, by the end of Romney's governorship the state had made strong gains in civil rights related to public employment, government contracting, and access to public accommodations.Fine, ''Expanding the Frontiers of Civil Rights'', p. 335. Lesser improvements were made in combating discrimination in private employment, housing, education, and law enforcement. Considerable state and federal efforts were made during this time to improve the lot of Michigan's
migrant farm workers
A migrant worker is a person who migrates within a home country or outside it to pursue work. Migrant workers usually do not have the intention to stay permanently in the country or region in which they work.
Migrant workers who work outsi ...
and Native Americans, without much progress for either.
Of the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. on April 4, 1968, Romney said it was "a great national tragedy at a time when we need aggressive nonviolent leadership to peacefully achieve equal rights, equal opportunities and equal responsibilities for all. This is indeed a cause for general mourning and redicated effort by everyone to eliminate racial prejudice in all of its ugly and repressive forms." The
King assassination riots
The King assassination riots, also known as the Holy Week Uprising, were a wave of civil disturbance which swept the United States following the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. on April 4, 1968. Many believe them to be the greatest wav ...
affected many cities across the United States over the next few days. There was some rioting in Detroit and Romney ordered the National Guard deployed and imposed a curfew; but the situation was calmer there than the worst-affected cities and much less violent than the 1967 riots had been. See als "Detroit Relatively Quiet; Arson, Arrests Below Par" Associated Press, p. 2 of same. Romney and his wife Lenore attended the funeral of King on April 9.
Romney greatly expanded the size of state government while governor. His first state budget, for fiscal year 1963, was $550 million, a $20 million increase over that of his predecessor Swainson.Mollenhoff, ''George Romney'', p. 269. Romney had also inherited an $85 million budget deficit, but left office with a surplus. In the following fiscal years, the state budget increased to $684 million for 1964, $820 million for 1965, $1 billion for 1966, $1.1 billion for 1967, and was proposed as $1.3 billion for 1968. Romney led the way for a large increase in state spending on education, and Michigan began to develop one of the nation's most comprehensive systems of higher education. There was a significant increase in funding support for local governments and there were generous benefits for the poor and unemployed. Romney's spending was enabled by the
post–World War II economic expansion
The post–World War II economic expansion, also known as the postwar economic boom or the Golden Age of Capitalism, was a broad period of worldwide economic expansion beginning after World War II and ending with the 1973–1975 recession. The ...
that generated continued government surpluses and by a consensus of both parties in Michigan to maintain extensive state bureaucracies and expand public sector services.
The bipartisan coalitions that Romney worked with in the state legislature enabled him to reach most of his legislative goals. His record as governor continued his reputation for having, as White said, "a knack for getting things done". Noted
University of Michigan
, mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth"
, former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821)
, budget = $10.3 billion (2021)
, endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...
historian Sidney Fine assessed him as "a highly successful governor".
1968 presidential campaign
Romney's wide margin of re-election as governor in November 1966 thrust him to the forefront of national Republicans.Ambrose, ''Nixon: Volume Two'', p. 104. In addition to his political record, the tall, square-jawed, handsome, graying Romney matched what the public thought a president should look like. Republican governors were determined not to let a Goldwater-sized loss recur, and neither Rockefeller nor Scranton wanted to run again; the governors quickly settled on Romney as their favorite for the Republican presidential nomination in the 1968 U.S. presidential election.White, ''The Making of the President, 1968'', pp. 38–39.
Former Congressman and
Republican National Committee
The Republican National Committee (RNC) is a U.S. Political action committee, political committee that assists the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party of the United States. It is responsible for developing and promoting the Republi ...
chair Leonard W. Hall became Romney's informal campaign manager. A
Gallup Poll
Gallup, Inc. is an American analytics and advisory company based in Washington, D.C. Founded by George Gallup in 1935, the company became known for its public opinion polls conducted worldwide. Starting in the 1980s, Gallup transitioned its ...
after the November elections showed Romney as favored among Republicans over former Vice President Richard Nixon for the Republican nomination, 39 percent to 31 percent;Johns, "Achilles' Heel", p. 6n14. a
Harris Poll
The Harris Poll (legal name: Harris Insights and Analytics) is an American market research and analytics company that has been tracking the sentiment, behaviors and motivations of American adults since 1963. In addition to the traditional consulti ...
showed Romney besting President Johnson among all voters by 54 percent to 46 percent. Nixon considered Romney his chief opponent. Romney announced an exploratory phase for a possible campaign in February 1967, beginning with a visit to Alaska and the Rocky Mountain states.White, ''The Making of the President, 1968'', pp. 56–57.
Romney's greatest weakness was a lack of foreign policy expertise and a need for a clear position on the
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam a ...
. The press coverage of the trip focused on Vietnam and reporters were frustrated by Romney's initial reluctance to speak about it. The qualities that helped Romney as an industry executive worked against him as a presidential candidate; he had difficulty being articulate, often speaking at length and too forthrightly on a topic and then later correcting himself while maintaining he was not changing what he had said.Witcover, ''Marathon'', p. 88. Reporter Jack Germond joked that he was going to add a single key on his typewriter that would print, "Romney later explained ..." ''
Life
Life is a quality that distinguishes matter that has biological processes, such as Cell signaling, signaling and self-sustaining processes, from that which does not, and is defined by the capacity for Cell growth, growth, reaction to Stimu ...
'' magazine wrote that Romney "manages to turn self-expression into a positive ordeal" and that he was no different in private: "nobody can sound more like the public George Romney than the real George Romney let loose to ramble, inevitably away from the point and toward some distant moral precept." Romney had the image of a do-gooder and reporters began to refer to him as "Saint George".
The perception grew that Romney was gaffe-prone. The campaign, beset by internal rivalries, soon went through the first of several reorganizations. By then, Nixon had already overtaken Romney in Gallup's Republican preference poll, a lead he would hold throughout the rest of the campaign. The techniques that had brought Romney victories in Michigan, such as operating outside established partisan formulas and keeping a distance from Republican Party organizational elements, proved ineffective in a party nominating contest.
Romney's national poll ratings continued to erode, and by May he had lost his edge over Johnson. The Detroit riots of July 1967 did not change his standing among Republicans, but did give him a bounce in national polls against the increasingly unpopular president.
Questions were occasionally asked about Romney's eligibility to run for
President
President most commonly refers to:
*President (corporate title)
* President (education), a leader of a college or university
* President (government title)
President may also refer to:
Automobiles
* Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ...
natural-born citizen
A natural-born-citizen clause, if present in the constitution of a country, requires that its president or vice president be a natural born citizen. The constitutions of a number of countries contain such a clause, but there is no universally ac ...
". Romney would depart the race before the matter could be more definitively resolved, although the preponderance of opinion then and since has been that he was eligible.
Romney was also the first Mormon to stage a credible run for the presidency. By this time, he was well known as a Mormon, especially through profiles in national magazine dating back to his years in business. Indeed, he was perhaps the most nationally visible Mormon since
Brigham Young
Brigham Young (; June 1, 1801August 29, 1877) was an American religious leader and politician. He was the second president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), from 1847 until his death in 1877. During his time as ch ...
. But his membership in the LDS Church not heavily mentioned during the campaign. What indirect discussion there was helped bring to national attention the church's policy regarding blacks, but the contrast of Romney's pro-civil rights stance deflected any criticism of him and indirectly benefited the image of the church. Some historians and Mormons suspected then and later that had Romney's campaign lasted longer and been more successful, his religion might have become a more prominent issue. Romney's campaign did often focus on his core beliefs; a Romney billboard in New Hampshire read "The Way To Stop Crime Is To Stop Moral Decay".
Dartmouth College
Dartmouth College (; ) is a private research university in Hanover, New Hampshire. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, it is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. Although founded to educate Native ...
students gave a bemused reaction to his morals message, displaying signs such as "God Is Alive and Thinks He's George Romney". A spate of books were published about Romney, more than for any other candidate, and included a friendly campaign biography, an attack from a former staffer, and a collection of Romney's speeches.
On August 31, 1967, in a taped interview with locally influential (and nationally syndicated) talk show host Lou Gordon of
WKBD-TV
WKBD-TV (channel 50) is a television station in Detroit, Michigan, United States, affiliated with The CW. It is owned by the CBS News and Stations group alongside CBS owned-and-operated station WWJ-TV (channel 62). Both stations share studios on ...
in Detroit, Romney stated: "When I came back from Viet Nam n November 1965 I'd just had the greatest brainwashing that anybody can get." He then shifted to opposing the war: "I no longer believe that it was necessary for us to get involved in South Vietnam to stop Communist aggression in Southeast Asia." Decrying the "tragic" conflict, he urged "a sound peace in South Vietnam at an early time".Johns, "Achilles' Heel", p. 13. Thus Romney disavowed the war and reversed himself from his earlier stated belief that the war was "morally right and necessary".
The "brainwashing" reference had been an offhand, unplanned remark that came at the end of a long, behind-schedule day of campaigning.White, ''The Making of the President, 1968'', pp. 58–60. By September 7, it found its way into prominence at ''The New York Times''. Eight other governors who had been on the same 1965, trip as Romney said no such activity had taken place, and one of them, Philip H. Hoff of Vermont, said Romney's remarks were "outrageous, kind of stinking ... Either he's a most naïve man or he lacks judgment." The overtones of brainwashing, following the experiences of American prisoners of war (highlighted by the 1962 film ''
The Manchurian Candidate
''The Manchurian Candidate'' is a novel by Richard Condon, first published in 1959. It is a political thriller about the son of a prominent U.S. political family who is brainwashed into being an unwitting assassin for a Communist conspiracy.
Th ...
''), made Romney's comment devastating,Johns, "Achilles' Heel", pp. 13–14. especially as it reinforced the negative image of Romney's abilities that had already developed. The topic of brainwashing quickly became the subject of critical newspaper editorials, as well as television talk show fodder, and Romney bore the brunt of the
topical humor
The topical humor and topical jokes is humor framed around a specific topic related to current events or dealing with issues that are important or popular at the current time. The value of this kind of humor often diminishes when the topic is no ...
. Senator Eugene McCarthy, running against Johnson for the Democratic nomination, said that in Romney's case, "a light rinse would have been sufficient." Republican Congressman Robert T. Stafford of Vermont sounded a common concern: "If you're running for the presidency, you are supposed to have too much on the ball to be brainwashed." After the remark was aired, Romney's poll ratings nosedived, going from 11 percent behind Nixon to 26 percent behind.
He nonetheless persevered, staging a three-week, 17-city tour of the nation's ghettos and disadvantaged areas that none of his advisors thought politically worthwhile. He sought to engage militants in dialogue, found himself exposed to the harsh realities and language of ghetto areas, and had an unusual encounter with hippies and the Diggers in San Francisco's
Haight-Ashbury
Haight-Ashbury () is a district of San Francisco, California, named for the intersection of Haight and Ashbury streets. It is also called The Haight and The Upper Haight. The neighborhood is known as one of the main centers of the counterculture ...
.
Romney formally announced on November 18, 1967, at Detroit's Veterans Memorial Building, that he had "decided to fight for and win the Republican nomination and election to the Presidency of the United States". His subsequent release of his federal tax returns – twelve years' worth going back to his time as AMC head – was groundbreaking and established a precedent that many future presidential candidates would have to contend with. He spent the following months campaigning tirelessly, focusing on the New Hampshire primary, the first of the season, and doing all the on-the-ground activities known to that state: greeting workers at factory gates before dawn, having neighborhood meetings in private homes, and stopping at bowling alleys. He returned to Vietnam in December 1967 and made speeches and proposals on the subject, one of which presaged Nixon's eventual policy of
Vietnamization
Vietnamization was a policy of the Richard Nixon administration to end U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War through a program to "expand, equip, and train South Vietnamese forces and assign to them an ever-increasing combat role, at the same t ...
. For a while, he got an improved response from voters.
Two weeks before the March 12 primary, an internal poll showed Romney losing to Nixon by a six-to-one margin in New Hampshire. Rockefeller, seeing the poll result as well, publicly maintained his support for Romney but said he would be available for a draft; the statement made national headlines and embittered Romney (who would later claim it was Rockefeller's entry, and not the "brainwashing" remark, that doomed him). Seeing his cause was hopeless, Romney announced his withdrawal as a presidential candidate on February 28, 1968.White, ''The Making of the President, 1968'', pp. 60–61, 229. Romney wrote his son Mitt, still away on missionary work: "Your mother and I are not personally distressed. As a matter of fact, we are relieved. ... I aspired, and though I achieved not, I am satisfied."
Nixon went on to gain the nomination. At the
1968 Republican National Convention
The 1968 Republican National Convention was held at the Miami Beach Convention Center in Miami Beach, Dade County, Florida, from August 5 to August 8, 1968, to select the party's nominee in the general election. It nominated former Vice Preside ...
in Miami Beach, Romney refused to release his delegates to Nixon, something Nixon did not forget. Romney finished a weak fifth, with only 50 votes on the roll call (44 of Michigan's 48, plus six from Utah). When party liberals and moderates and others expressed dismay at Nixon's choice of
Spiro Agnew
Spiro Theodore Agnew (November 9, 1918 – September 17, 1996) was the 39th vice president of the United States, serving from 1969 until his resignation in 1973. He is the second vice president to resign the position, the other being John ...
as his running mate, Romney's name was placed into nomination for vice president by
Mayor of New York
The mayor of New York City, officially Mayor of the City of New York, is head of the executive branch of the government of New York City and the chief executive of New York City. The mayor's office administers all city services, public property ...
John Lindsay
John Vliet Lindsay (; November 24, 1921 – December 19, 2000) was an American politician and lawyer. During his political career, Lindsay was a U.S. congressman, mayor of New York City, and candidate for U.S. president. He was also a regular ...
and pushed by several delegations.Ambrose, ''Nixon: Volume Two'', pp. 174–175. Romney said he did not initiate the move, but he made no effort to oppose it. Nixon saw the rebellion as a threat to his leadership and actively fought against it; Romney lost to Agnew 1,119–186.''National Party Conventions 1831–2004'', p. 131. Romney, however, worked for Nixon's eventually successful campaign in the fall, which did earn him Nixon's gratitude.
Presidential historian Theodore H. White wrote that during his campaign Romney gave "the impression of an honest and decent man simply not cut out to be President of the United States". Governor Rhodes more memorably said, "Watching George Romney run for the presidency was like watching a duck try to make love to a football."
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
After the election, Nixon named Romney to be
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
The United States secretary of housing and urban development (or HUD secretary) is the head of the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development, a member of the president's Cabinet, and thirteenth in the presidential line of succe ...
(HUD). The president-elect made the announcement as part of a nationally televised presentation of his new cabinet on December 11, 1968. Nixon praised Romney for his "missionary zeal" and said that he would also be tasked with mobilizing volunteer organizations to fight poverty and disease within the United States. In actuality, Nixon distrusted Romney politically, and appointed him to a liberally oriented, low-profile federal agency partly to appease Republican moderates and partly to reduce Romney's potential to challenge for the 1972 Republican presidential nomination.
Romney was confirmed by the Senate without opposition on January 20, 1969, the day of Nixon's inauguration, and was sworn into office on January 22, with Nixon at his side. Romney resigned as Governor of Michigan that same day, and was succeeded by Lieutenant Governor
William G. Milliken
William Grawn Milliken (March 26, 1922 – October 18, 2019) was an American businessman and politician who served as the 44th governor of Michigan. A member of the Republican Party, he is the longest-serving governor in Michigan history, servin ...
. Milliken continued Romney's model of downplaying party label and ideology, and Republicans held onto the governorship for three more terms until 1983, though Michigan was one of the nation's most blue-collar states.
As secretary, Romney conducted the first reorganization of the department since its 1966 creation.Nenno, ''Ending the Stalemate'', p. 11. The changes were intended to make the department more business-like with fewer independent bureaucracies. His November 1969, plan brought programs with similar functions together under unified, policy-based administration at the Washington level, and created two new assistant secretary positions. At the same time, he increased the number of regional and area offices and decentralized program operations and locality-based decisions to them, moves that were in keeping with Nixon's " New Federalism". In particular, the
Federal Housing Administration
The Federal Housing Administration (FHA), also known as the Office of Housing within the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), is a United States government agency founded by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, created in part by ...
underwent wholesale changes to make it less autonomous.Biles, "A Mormon in Babylon", p. 71. During his tenure, Romney believed his reorganization made the department more efficient and able to withstand some, but not all, of the budget cuts that Nixon imposed on it.
The Fair Housing Act of 1968 mandated a federal commitment towards housing desegregation, and required HUD to orient its programs in this direction.Mason, ''Richard Nixon and the Quest for a New Majority'', pp. 149–150. Romney, filled with moral passion, wanted to address the widening economic and geographic gulf between whites and blacks by moving blacks out of inner-city ghettos into suburbs.Kotlowski, ''Nixon's Civil Rights'', p. 45. Romney proposed an
open housing
Housing discrimination in the United States refers to the historical and current barriers, policies, and biases that prevent equitable access to housing. Housing discrimination became more pronounced after the abolition of slavery in 1865, typical ...
scheme to facilitate desegregation, dubbed "Open Communities"; HUD planned it for many months without keeping Nixon informed.Lamb, ''Housing Segregation in Suburban America Since 1960'', pp. 69–72.Kotlowski, ''Nixon's Civil Rights'', pp. 55–57.
When the open housing proposal became public, local reaction was often hostile. Such was the reaction of many residents in
Warren, Michigan
Warren is a city in Macomb County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The 2020 Census places the city's population at 139,387, making Warren the largest city in Macomb County, the third largest city in Michigan, and Metro Detroit's largest suburb.
T ...
, a predominately white blue-collar suburb of Detroit. While it had no formal discriminatory laws, most blacks were excluded by zoning practices, refusals to sell to them, and intimidatory actions of white property owners, many of whom were ethnic Polish and Catholic and had moved to the suburb as part of
white flight
White flight or white exodus is the sudden or gradual large-scale migration of white people from areas becoming more racially or ethnoculturally diverse. Starting in the 1950s and 1960s, the terms became popular in the United States. They refer ...
.Lamb, ''Housing Segregation in Suburban America Since 1960'', pp. 85–93. By this time, Detroit was 40–50 percent black. HUD made Warren a prime target for Open Communities enforcement and threatened to halt all federal assistance to the town unless it took a series of actions to end racial discrimination there; town officials said progress was being made and that their citizens resented forced integration. Romney rejected this response, partly because when he was governor, Warren residents had thrown rocks and garbage and yelled obscenities for days at a biracial couple who moved into town. Now the secretary said, "The youth of this nation, the minorities of this nation, the discriminated of this nation are not going to wait for 'nature to take its course.' What is really at issue here is responsibility – moral responsibility."
Romney visited Warren in July 1970, where he addressed leaders from it and around 40 nearby suburbs. He emphasized that the government was encouraging affirmative action rather than forced integration, but the local populace saw little difference and Romney was jostled and jeered as a police escort took him away from the meeting place. Nixon saw what happened in Warren and had no interest in the Open Communities policy in general, remarking to domestic adviser
John Ehrlichman
John Daniel Ehrlichman (; March 20, 1925 – February 14, 1999) was an American political aide who served as the White House Counsel and Assistant to the President for Domestic Affairs under President Richard Nixon. Ehrlichman was an important i ...
that, "This country is not ready at this time for either forcibly integrated housing or forcibly integrated education." The Open Communities policy conflicted with Nixon's purpoted use of the
Southern strategy
In American politics, the Southern strategy was a Republican Party electoral strategy to increase political support among white voters in the South by appealing to racism against African Americans. As the civil rights movement and dismantling o ...
of gaining political support among traditionally white southern Democrats, and his own views on race. Romney was forced to back down on Warren and release federal monies to them unconditionally.
When
Black Jack, Missouri
Black Jack is a second-ring suburb of St. Louis, located in northern St. Louis County, Missouri, United States. The population was 6,929 at the 2010 census.
A post office called Black Jack was established in 1872, and operated until 1906. The c ...
, subsequently resisted a HUD-sponsored plan for desegregated lower- and middle-income housing, Romney appealed to U.S. Attorney General John Mitchell for Justice Department intervention. In September 1970, Mitchell refused and Romney's plan collapsed. Under Romney, HUD did establish stricter affirmative racial guidelines in relation to new public housing projects, but overall administration implementation of the Fair Housing Act was lacking. Some of the responsibility lay with Romney's inattentiveness to gaining political backing for the policy, including the failure to rally natural allies such as the NAACP.
Salisbury University
Salisbury University is a public university in Salisbury, Maryland. Founded in 1925, Salisbury is a member of the University System of Maryland, with a fall 2016 enrollment of 8,748.
Salisbury University offers 42 distinct undergraduate and 14 ...
historian Dean J. Kotlowski writes that, "No civil rights initiative developed on Nixon's watch was as sincerely devised or poorly executed as open communities."
Another of Romney's initiatives was "Operation Breakthrough", launched in June 1969. It was intended to increase the amount of housing available to the poor and it initially had Nixon's support. Based on his automotive industry experience, Romney thought that the cost of housing could be significantly reduced if in-factory
modular construction
Modular construction is a construction technique which involves the prefabrication of 2D panels or 3D volumetric structures in off-site factories and transportation to construction sites for assembly. This process has the potential to be superior ...
techniques were used, despite the lack of national building standards. HUD officials believed that introduction of this technique could help bring about desegregation; Romney said, "We've got to put an end to the idea of moving to suburban areas and living only among people of the same economic and social class". This aspect of the program brought about strong opposition at the local suburban level and lost support in the White House as well. Over half of HUD's research funds during this time were spent on Operation Breakthrough, and it was modestly successful in its building goals.Nenno, ''Ending the Stalemate'', p. 13. It did not revolutionize home construction, and was phased out once Romney left HUD. But it resulted indirectly in more modern and consistent
building codes
A building code (also building control or building regulations) is a set of rules that specify the standards for constructed objects such as buildings and non-building structures. Buildings must conform to the code to obtain planning permiss ...
and introduction of technological advances such as the
smoke alarm
A smoke detector is a device that senses smoke, typically as an indicator of fire. Smoke detectors are usually housed in plastic enclosures, typically shaped like a disk about in diameter and thick, but shape and size vary. Smoke can be detecte ...
.
In any case, using conventional construction methods, HUD set records for the amount of construction of assisted housing for low- and moderate-income families. Toward the end of his term, Romney oversaw demolition of the infamous
Pruitt–Igoe
The Wendell O. Pruitt Homes and William Igoe Apartments, known together as Pruitt–Igoe (), were joint urban housing projects first occupied in 1954 in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. The complex consisted of 33 eleven-story high rises, ...
housing project in
St. Louis
St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...
, which had become crime-ridden, drug-infested, and largely vacant.
Romney was largely outside the president's inner circle and had minimal influence within the
Nixon administration
Richard Nixon's tenure as the 37th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 1969, and ended when he resigned on August 9, 1974, in the face of almost certain impeachment because of the Watergate Scanda ...
. His intense, sometimes bombastic style of making bold advances and awkward pullbacks lacked adequate guile to succeed in Washington.Drew, ''Richard M. Nixon'', p. 41. Desegregation efforts in employment and education had more success than in housing during the Nixon administration, but HUD's many missions and unwieldy structure, which sometimes worked at cross-purposes, made it institutionally vulnerable to political attack.Bonastia, ''Knocking on the Door'' pp. 3–5 . Romney also failed to understand or circumvent Nixon's use of counsel Ehrlichman and White House Chief of Staff
H. R. Haldeman
Harry Robbins Haldeman (October 27, 1926 – November 12, 1993) was an American political aide and businessman, best known for his service as White House Chief of Staff to President Richard Nixon and his consequent involvement in the Watergate s ...
as policy gatekeepers, resulting in ''de facto'' downgrading of the power of cabinet officers.Kotlowski, ''Nixon's Civil Rights'', p. 52. Romney was used to being listened to and making his own decisions;Reeves, ''President Nixon'', p. 231. he annoyed Nixon by casually interrupting him at meetings. At one point, Nixon told Haldeman, "Just keep omneyaway from me."Reeves, ''President Nixon'', p. 71. A statement by Romney that he would voluntarily reduce his salary to aid the federal budget was viewed by Nixon as an "ineffective grandstand play".
By early 1970, Nixon had decided he wanted Romney removed from his position. Nixon, who hated to fire people and was, as Ehrlichman later described, "notoriously inadept" at it, instead hatched a plot to get Romney to run in the 1970 U.S. Senate race in Michigan.Kotlowski, ''Nixon's Civil Rights'', p. 53. Instead, Romney proposed that his wife Lenore run, and she received the backing of some state Republicans. There was also resistance to her candidacy and an initial suspicion that it was just a stalking horse for keeping his options open. She barely survived a primary against a conservative opponent, then lost badly in the general election to incumbent Democrat Philip A. Hart. Romney blamed others for his wife having entered the race, when he had been the major force behind it.
In late 1970, after opposition to Open Communities reached a peak, Nixon again decided that Romney should go. Still reluctant to dismiss him, Nixon tried to get Romney to resign by forcing him to capitulate on a series of policy issues. Romney surprised both Nixon and Haldeman by agreeing to back off his positions, and Nixon kept him as HUD secretary. Nixon remarked privately afterwards, " omneytalks big but folds under pressure." Puzzled by Nixon's lack of apparent ideological consistency across different areas of the government, Romney told a friend, "I don't know what the president believes in. Maybe he doesn't believe in anything",Reeves, ''President Nixon'', p. 277. an assessment shared by others both inside and outside the administration. For his work as Secretary of the Housing and Urban Development, in March 1972 Romney was awarded the Republican of the Year Award by the centrist Republican organization
Ripon Society
The Ripon Society is an American centrist Republican public policy organization and think tank based in Washington, D.C. It publishes ''The Ripon Forum'', the U.S.'s longest running Republican thought and opinion journal, as well as ''The Ripon A ...
.
In spring 1972, the FHA was struck by scandal. Since passage of the
Housing and Urban Development Act of 1968
The Housing and Urban Development Act of 1968, , was passed during the Lyndon B. Johnson Administration. The act came on the heels of major riots across cities throughout the U.S. in 1967, the assassination of Civil Rights Leader Martin Luthe ...
and the creation of the
Government National Mortgage Association
The Government National Mortgage Association (GNMA), or Ginnie Mae, is a government-owned corporation of the United States Federal Government within the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). It was founded in 1968 and works to expa ...
(Ginnie Mae), it had been responsible for helping the poor buy homes in inner-city areas via government-backed mortgages. These were financed by
mortgage-backed securities
A mortgage-backed security (MBS) is a type of asset-backed security (an 'instrument') which is secured by a mortgage or collection of mortgages. The mortgages are aggregated and sold to a group of individuals (a government agency or investment ba ...
, the first issues of which Romney had announced in 1970. A number of FHA employees, along with a number of real estate firms and lawyers, were indicted for a scheme in which the value of cheap inner city homes was inflated and they were sold to black buyers who could not really afford them, based on using those government-backed mortgages. The government was stuck for the bad loans when owners defaulted, as the properties were overvalued and could not be resold at the inflated prices.Bonastia, ''Knocking on the Door'', pp. 132–133. Assessments of the overall cost of the scandal were as high as $2 billion. Romney conceded that HUD had been unprepared to deal with speculators and had not been alert to earlier signs of illegal activity at the FHA. The FHA scandal gave Nixon the ability to shut down HUD's remaining desegregation efforts with little political risk; by January 1973, all federal housing funds had been frozen.
In August 1972, Nixon announced Romney would inspect
Hurricane Agnes
Hurricane Agnes in 1972 was the costliest hurricane to hit the United States at the time, causing an estimated $2.1 billion in damage. The hurricane's death toll was 128. The effects of Agnes were widespread, from the Caribbean to Canada, ...
flood damage in
Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania
Wilkes-Barre ( or ) is a city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Luzerne County. Located at the center of the Wyoming Valley in Northeastern Pennsylvania, it had a population of 44,328 in the 2020 census. It is the s ...
, but neglected to tell Romney first. Much of the area lacked shelter six weeks after the storm, residents were angry, and Romney got into a three-way shouting match with Governor
Milton J. Shapp
Milton Jerrold Shapp (born Milton Jerrold Shapiro; June 25, 1912 – November 24, 1994) was an American businessman and politician who served as the 40th governor of Pennsylvania from 1971 to 1979 and the first Jewish governor of Pennsylvania. H ...
and a local citizens' representative. Romney denounced Shapp's proposal that the federal government pay off the mortgages of victims as "unrealistic and demagogic", and the representative angrily said to Romney, "You don't give a damn whether we live or die." The confrontation received wide media attention, damaging Romney's public reputation. Feeling very frustrated, Romney wanted to resign immediately, but Nixon, worried about the fallout to his 1972 re-election campaign among moderate Republican voters, insisted that Romney stay on. Romney agreed, although he indicated to the press that he would leave eventually.
Romney finally turned in his resignation on November 9, 1972, following Nixon's re-election. His departure was announced on November 27, 1972, as part of the initial wave of departures from Nixon's first-term cabinet. Romney said he was unhappy with presidential candidates who declined to address "the real issues" facing the nation for fear they would lose votes, and said he would form a new national citizens' organization that would attempt to enlighten the public on the most vital topics. He added that he would stay on as secretary until his successor could be appointed and confirmed, and did stay until Nixon's second inauguration on January 20, 1973. Upon his departure, Romney said he looked forward "with great enthusiasm" to his return to private life.
''
The Boston Globe
''The Boston Globe'' is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, and has a total circulation of close to 300,000 print and digital subscribers. ''The Boston Glob ...
'' later termed Romney's conflicts with Nixon a matter that "played out with Shakespearean drama". Despite all the setbacks and frustrations,
University at Buffalo
The State University of New York at Buffalo, commonly called the University at Buffalo (UB) and sometimes called SUNY Buffalo, is a public research university with campuses in Buffalo and Amherst, New York. The university was founded in 18 ...
political scientist Charles M. Lamb concludes that Romney pressed harder to achieve suburban integration than any prominent federal official in the ensuing 1970s through the 1990s.Lamb, ''Housing Segregation in Suburban America Since 1960'', p. 57.Lehman College sociology professor Christopher Bonastia assesses the Romney-era HUD as having come "surprisingly close to implementing unpopular antidiscrimination policies" but finally being unable to produce meaningful alterations in American residential segregation patterns, with no equivalent effort having happened since then or likely to in the foreseeable future. In contrast,
Illinois State University
Illinois State University (ISU) is a public university in Normal, Illinois. Founded in 1857 as Illinois State Normal University, it is the oldest public university in Illinois. The university emphasizes teaching and is recognized as one of th ...
historian Roger Biles has termed Romney's tenure as secretary "disastrous" while allowing that none of the secretaries who followed him have done any better.
Public service, volunteerism, and final years
Romney was known as an advocate of public service, and
volunteerism
Volunteering is a voluntary act of an individual or group freely giving time and labor for community service. Many volunteers are specifically trained in the areas they work, such as medicine, education, or emergency rescue. Others serve ...
was a passion of his. He initiated several volunteer programs while Governor of Michigan, and at the beginning of the Nixon administration chaired the Cabinet Committee on Voluntary Action. Out of this the
National Center for Voluntary Action
The National Center for Voluntary Action was an independent, private, non-profit organization that existed in the 1970s, and then extended on in merged forms, that sought to encourage volunteerism on the part of American citizens and organizations, ...
was created: an independent, private, non-profit organization intended to encourage volunteerism on the part of American citizens and organizations, to assist in program development for voluntary efforts, and to make voluntary action an important force in American society. Romney's long interest in volunteerism stemmed from the Mormon belief in the power of institutions to transform the individual, but also had a secular basis. At the National Center's first meeting on February 20, 1970, he said:
Americans have four basic ways of solving problems that are too big for individuals to handle by themselves. One is through the federal government. A second is through state governments and the local governments that the states create. The third is through the private sector – the economic sector that includes business, agriculture, and labor. The fourth method is the independent sector – the voluntary, cooperative action of free individuals and independent association. Voluntary action is the most powerful of these, because it is uniquely capable of stirring the people themselves and involving their enthusiastic energies, because it is their own – voluntary action is the people's action. ... As Woodrow Wilson said, "The most powerful force on earth is the spontaneous cooperation of a free people." Individualism makes cooperation worthwhile – but cooperation makes freedom possible.
patriarch
The highest-ranking bishops in Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy, the Catholic Church (above major archbishop and primate), the Hussite Church, Church of the East, and some Independent Catholic Churches are termed patriarchs (and in certai ...
of the Bloomfield Hills Stake and holding the office of regional representative of the Twelve, covering Michigan and northern Ohio. As part of a longtime habit of playing golf daily, he had long ago concocted a "compact 18" format in which he played three balls on each of six holes, or similar formulations depending upon the amount of daylight. During the early part of the
Reagan administration
Ronald Reagan's tenure as the 40th president of the United States began with his first inauguration on January 20, 1981, and ended on January 20, 1989. Reagan, a Republican from California, took office following a landslide victory over ...
, Romney served on the President's Task Force for Private Sector Initiatives along with LDS leader Monson. In 1987, he held a four-generation extended family reunion in Washington, where he showed the places and recounted the events of his life which had occurred there. Looking back on his and some other failed presidential bids, he once concluded, "You can't be right too soon and win elections."
President George H. W. Bush's Points of Light Foundation was created in 1990, also to encourage volunteerism. Romney received the Points of Light Foundation's inaugural Lifetime Achievement Award from President Bush in April 1991. The Bush administration wanted to tap Romney to chair the new foundation, but he reportedly refused to head two organizations doing the same thing and suggested they merge. They did so in September 1991, and Romney became one of the founding directors of the Points of Light Foundation & Volunteer Center National Network.
In the early 1990s, Romney was also involved in helping to set up the
Commission on National and Community Service
Commission or commissioning may refer to:
Business and contracting
* Commission (remuneration), a form of payment to an agent for services rendered
** Commission (art), the purchase or the creation of a piece of art most often on behalf of another ...
, one of the predecessors to the later Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS). He gave speeches emphasizing the vital role of people helping people, and in 1993 inspired the first national meeting of volunteer centers.
For much of his final two decades, Romney had been out of the political eye, but he re-emerged to the general public when he campaigned for his son, Mitt Romney, during the younger Romney's bid to unseat Senator Edward M. Kennedy in the United States Senate election in Massachusetts, 1994, 1994 U.S. Senate election in Massachusetts. Romney had urged Mitt to enter the race and moved into his son's house for its duration, serving as an unofficial advisor. Romney was a vigorous surrogate for his son in public appearances and at fundraising events. When Kennedy's campaign sought to bring up the LDS Church's past policy on blacks, Romney interrupted Mitt's press conference and said loudly, "I think it is absolutely wrong to keep hammering on the religious issues. And what Ted is trying to do is bring it into the picture." The father counseled the son to be relaxed in appearance and to pay less attention to his political consultants and more to his own instincts, a change that the younger Romney made late in the ultimately unsuccessful campaign.
That same year, Ronna Romney, Romney's ex-daughter-in-law (formerly married to G. Scott Romney), decided to seek the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate from Michigan. While Mitt and G. Scott endorsed Ronna Romney, George Romney had endorsed her opponent and the eventual winner, Spencer Abraham, during the previous year when Ronna was considering a run but had not yet announced. A family spokesperson said that George Romney had endorsed Abraham before knowing Ronna Romney would run and could not go back on his word, although he did refrain from personally campaigning on Abraham's behalf.
By January 1995, amid press criticism of the Points of Light Foundation engaging in ineffective, wasteful spending, Romney expressed concern that the organization had too high a budget. Active to the end, in July 1995, four days before his death, Romney proposed a presidential summit to encourage greater volunteerism and community service, and the night before his death he drove to a meeting of another volunteer organization.
On July 26, 1995, Romney died of a myocardial infarction, heart attack at the age of 88 while he was doing his morning exercising on a treadmill at his home in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan; he was discovered by his wife Lenore but it was too late to save him. He was buried at the Fairview Cemetery in Brighton, Michigan. In addition to his wife and children, Romney was survived by 23 grandchildren and 33 great-grandchildren.
Legacy
The Presidents' Summit For America's Future took place in Philadelphia in 1997, manifesting Romney's last volunteerism proposal, with the organization America's Promise coming out of it. For many years, the Points of Light Foundation (and its predecessor organization) has given out an annual Lenore and George W. Romney Citizen Volunteer Award (later retitled the George and Lenore Romney Citizen Volunteer Award); the inaugural such award in 1987 went to George Romney himself. The Points of Light Foundation and the CNCS also give out a George W. Romney Volunteer Center Excellence Award (later the George W. Romney Excellence Award) at the annual National Conference on Community Volunteering and National Service (later the National Conference on Volunteering and Service). The George W. Romney Volunteer Center itself is sponsored by the United Way of America, United Way for Southeastern Michigan, and began during Romney's lifetime.
The Automotive Hall of Fame of Dearborn, Michigan honored Romney with its Distinguished Service Citation award in 1956. He was then inducted into the hall of fame itself in 1995.
Founded in 1998 with a grant from Romney family, Romney's immediate family, the George W. Romney Institute of Public Management in the Marriott School of Management at Brigham Young University honors the legacy left by Romney. Its mission is to develop people of high character who are committed to service, management, and leadership in the public sector and in non-profit organizations throughout the world.
The building housing the main offices of the Governor of Michigan in Lansing, Michigan, Lansing is known as the George W. Romney Building following a 1997 renaming. The Governor George Romney Lifetime Achievement Award is given annually by the State of Michigan, to recognize citizens who have demonstrated a commitment to community involvement and volunteer service throughout their lifetimes. In 2010, Adrian College in Michigan announced the opening of its George Romney Institute for Law and Public Policy. Its purpose is to explore the interdisciplinary nature of law and public policy and encourage practitioners, academics, and students to work together on issues in this realm.
Authored books
*
* (Galley proofs produced, but prepress process ceased before actual publication)
See also
* List of U.S. state governors born outside the United States
, -
, -
, -
{{DEFAULTSORT:Romney, George W.
George W. Romney, *
1907 births
1995 deaths
20th-century American politicians
20th-century Mormon missionaries
20th-century American businesspeople
Candidates in the 1964 United States presidential election
Candidates in the 1968 United States presidential election
Activists for African-American civil rights
American chief executives in the automobile industry
American leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
American lobbyists
American Mormon missionaries in the United Kingdom
American Motors people
American nonprofit executives
American automotive pioneers
Automotive businesspeople
Burials in Michigan
Businesspeople from Salt Lake City
Centrism in the United States
Citizens of the United States through descent
Republican Party governors of Michigan
Latter Day Saints from Idaho
Latter Day Saints from Michigan
Latter Day Saints from Utah
Mexican emigrants to the United States
Mexican Latter Day Saints
Mexican people of American descent
Mitt Romney
Nixon administration cabinet members
Patriarchs (LDS Church)
People from Bloomfield Hills, Michigan
People from Colonia Dublán
People from Oakley, Idaho
Politicians from Salt Lake City
Romney family
Regional representatives of the Twelve
United States Secretaries of Housing and Urban Development