Bryan leaves lasting legacy

Benjamin Grove

Saturday, Nov. 18, 2000 | 3:06 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Scrapping for votes in a tough 1958 election for student body president at the University of Nevada, Reno, 21-year-old Richard Bryan's buddies suggested he date a sorority girl.

"In terms of political strategizing we were in real trouble in the Theta House," Bryan said. "So a list was prepared."

Bryan picked the name of a Theta, Bonnie Fairchild, hoping maybe she was from the wealthy airline-industry Fairchild family. ("Turns out her father was a dairyman," Bryan said.)

Bryan took her to a costume dance. He was a Civil War soldier. She wore a flowing champagne-colored gown. Bryan won the student election and the girl.

"I've been following him around ever since," Bonnie Bryan said.

Next week a lame-duck Congress will return to wrap up its session for the year. When Congress returns in January, newly elected Republican Sen. John Ensign will take the seat held for 12 years by Richard Hudson Bryan.

Bryan and his wife of 37 years will walk away from a political career that took him from the college campus to the halls of Congress.

Bryan leaves behind a reputation in the Senate as consumer advocate, nuclear industry foe and casino ally. His accomplishments include passing air bag legislation and managing the Sen. Bob Packwood, R-Ore., hearings. He will be remembered by a few enemies and a notable collection of powerful friends.

"He really snookered me on his retirement announcement," said Bryan's long-time political ally, Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., who cried when Bryan told a Las Vegas crowd last year that he would leave the Senate. Bryan gave Reid just one hour's notice.

"He knows I would have done anything -- probably even kidnap him -- to keep him from making that announcement," Reid said at a lavish Senate reception honoring Bryan, held at the Library of Congress. "I have more to lose than anyone. Washington, D.C., will never be the same for me."

The early days

Bryan's political career is rooted in his Las Vegas childhood.

He looked up to his dad, Oscar, a high-profile guy in a 25,000-population town. People admired Oscar Bryan, one of maybe 40 or 50 lawyers in town, and his son wanted that respect, that recognition and power, Bryan said. It made him want to be governor.

"I would see him every day, greeting people on the street," Bryan said. "They all knew that this was Oscar Bryan's kid."

So Bryan became president of his sophomore and senior classes at Las Vegas High School (now Las Vegas Academy). He had learned his first lesson about responsible fiscal policy as a 14-year-old errand boy at long-defunct Bond's Jewelers downtown.

Bond's was the only jeweler in town that offered purchases on credit. Bryan watched the store ledger fill up with "carrying charges" -- interest -- on loans.

"I said, 'This is not a smart way to go,' " said Bryan, who has long been a Senate advocate for paying down the national debt. "We made a lot of money on those carrying charges."

Later Bryan jumped into politics at UNR.

"Even back in college he made it clear to us that he wanted to be in public service," said former UNR fraternity brother Frank Fahrenkopf, now a leading gaming lobbyist. "He wanted to be governor."

Lawyer, lawmaker

As a young law graduate Bryan served as a Clark County deputy district attorney. At 28, he honed his legal skills as the county's first public defender.

By 1982 Bryan had racked up an impressive resume of public service -- lawyer, state lawmaker, attorney general. That year he won the state's top job, governor. Voters re-elected him in 1986.

Life was good. Bryan had the support of Nevadans, the highest-profile job in the state, keys to the Governor's Mansion, respect, recognition, power.

"I loved being governor," Bryan said. "I loved it. It was the greatest job I ever had."

Then he quit.

By 1987, just a year into his second term, fellow Democrats had tabbed Bryan as the most likely candidate to unseat Republican Chic Hecht in the 1988 Senate race.

Bryan didn't want to go to Washington much. But party leaders kept calling. They wrote letters. On a long drive from Ely to Las Vegas, Reid pressured Bryan and Bonnie to leave the good life in Carson City and fight for Nevada in Washington.

Bryan mulled the decision. As governor, it upset him to watch the federal government run up record deficits. And Congress had just designated Nevada's Yucca Mountain as the nation's nuclear waste dump. "That was the defining issue," Bryan said.

In his first bid for Congress, he won.

Bryan the senator

The Senate's Democratic leader, Tom Daschle, said he was shocked to hear that Bryan wasn't born in Nevada.

"He's as West as West can be," Daschle said.

In fact, Bryan was born in Washington, D.C., but spent his lifetime in Nevada. He didn't know the ropes on Capitol Hill. For Nevada's former chief executive, it was a whole new job to be just one of 100 senators.

Several Senate friends said Bryan has become a sharp lawmaker.

Sen. Paul Sarbanes, D-Md., who serves with Bryan on the banking committee, said Bryan was an avid consumer advocate who successfully sought an "online privacy for minors" law. Bryan also successfully battled for legislation aimed at error-prone credit agencies, Sarbanes said.

"He showed incredible legislative skill in brokering that through," Sarbanes said.

But Bryan knows you don't win 'em all. Behind-the-scenes political games play out every day in Congress.

On a September morning Bryan began his day on Capitol Hill at a 10 a.m. Finance Committee meeting. There was a delay.

Senators met in a back committee room to discuss a bill scheduled for a vote that could help the United States avoid a trade standoff with Europe.

Bryan planned to introduce an amendment that would limit tax breaks to pharmaceutical companies that offer drugs more cheaply to Europeans than to Americans. But committee chairman Sen. William Roth, R-Del., cornered him before the meeting started.

In an unusually brash move, Roth threatened to cancel the whole hearing if Bryan pressed for his amendment. Roth knew the amendment could sink the important underlying trade bill.

Bryan backed down. During the meeting he did not introduce the amendment but made his opinion clear. "It's outrageous" Americans pay more than Europeans for drugs, he told the committee as Roth stared at his notes.

"Most Americans do not understand the nature of international trade," Bryan continued. "But they do understand when they are being gouged."

After the meeting Bryan rushed to the Capitol steps to tape an interview with a Senate cameraman. Because Las Vegas television news stations have no reporters in Washington, they rely on the Senate offices to feed them taped footage of senators.

What happened in the hearing today? Bryan press secretary David Lemmon asked off-camera.

"Unfortunately, the Finance Committee was not prepared to even consider my legislation, and again the American consumer is the loser," Bryan responded.

Grilling Firestone

Bryan's committee assignments -- he's the only senator who sits on the Banking, Finance and Commerce committees -- have offered him a unique view of the fast-changing economy. He believes the single best way to keep the economy chugging is to reduce the national debt.

Bryan's committees also offered him a front-row seat to some history-making news. He is the top-ranking Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, the Senate's CIA watchdog, which mostly meets behind closed doors.

Bryan's Commerce Committee in a single week last month tackled hearings on the Ford/Firestone tire recall, Hollywood marketing violence to children and the airline industry's terrible summer of delays and customer dissatisfaction -- a threat to the Las Vegas tourism economy.

He grilled Firestone officials with the lawyerly approach he developed in his early career, at one point demanding a simple yes or no answer.

"This is a Harvard Business School textbook example of how not to handle a consumer quality and safety problem," he said later in an interview.

It was Bryan's former job as chairman of the Senate Consumer Affairs subcommittee that earned him a name for consumer advocacy in the Senate and garnered him a host of awards. Even now he lists his fight for air bags in cars as one of his greatest achievements.

"How do you celebrate a fella who's best known for air bags?" joked fellow Democrat Sen. Fritz Hollings at Bryan's farewell Senate reception.

Bryan may best be remembered by Nevadans for his work in Congress as an anti-Yucca dump crusader and a casino advocate -- even though he avoids gambling.

"He's been a major, major stalwart in the 12 years he's been here," said gaming lobbyist Wayne Mehl of the Nevada Resort Association. "He fought for everyone from the bottom employee all the way up to the top."

Yet Bryan has never put more than $2 in a slot machine in his lifetime and never wagered on a sporting event in a casino.

"In my view the odds favor the house," Bryan said. "I think that's great for the economy of Nevada, but bad for the Bryan family resources. I've always thought there was a better way to spend my money. And that's my choice."

Bryan's advocacy on Nevada issues also earned him enemies, especially among gambling foes, among them Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., who declined to be interviewed for this story.

Bryan raised the hackles of some war veterans in March when he switched his vote to oppose a constitutional amendment that banned flag burning. And a few environmental groups decry his ties to mining companies they say pollute the state.

"He's been a proponent of the status quo," said Chris Cervini, spokesman for Washington-based Mineral Policy Center.

Bryan also has no friends in the nuclear power industry, who slam him for attempts to slow the federal plans to bury their waste in Nevada.

One of Bryan's most strident foes in the Senate, Larry Craig, R-Idaho, called Bryan a "good friend." But the two have fought bitterly; Craig has been a long-time supporter of the Yucca Mountain plan and has blasted Bryan and Reid for strangling the nuclear industry and harming U.S. energy policy.

"When we get a nuclear waste site established at Yucca Mountain following the certification process that will move forward next year, the reality will set in to Nevadans, as it has with most people in the West, that when the federal government owns 80 to 90 percent of your state you are not masters of your own destiny," Craig said.

One of Bryan's closest Senate allies, Sen. Joe Lieberman, praised Bryan for tirelessly fighting Nevada's battles.

"I don't know anyone who stays in touch more with the people in his state and comes back and fights for their values," Lieberman said at Bryan's Senate reception, calling in from the campaign trail via amplified speaker phone.

Packwood probe

Bryan leaves the Senate with few regrets and a relatively short list of unfinished business, he said. Among the legislation he leaves behind: a bill that would protect the Black Rock Desert in Northern Nevada and financial privacy laws.

Bryan said the worst time of his tenure fell when he was chairman of the Senate Ethics Committee and charged with investigating Packwood for sexual harassment.

Critics bashed the committee members who could not defend themselves because the damning evidence against Packwood -- including Packwood's diary -- were confidential.

After an exhausting three-year investigation, the committee recommended that Packwood be expelled from Congress. Packwood resigned. Packwood, now a successful Washington lobbyist, declined to comment about Bryan for this story.

"There was obviously a lot of personal stress because you are investigating a colleague," Bryan said, scowling at the thought of it even now. "It was not a task that I relished."

Time to go home

Bryan plans to teach a few college classes now and likely will serve in some capacity at a law firm or two, he said. He wants to spend time with his grown children, Richard Jr., Leslie and Blair, and his three grandchildren -- all born in 1999.

Former Sen. Paul Simon, D-Ill., said he had not counseled his friend on how to retire gracefully.

"He doesn't need my advice," said Simon, predicting: "I am sure in some way he will continue to contribute to public service."

Bryan and his wife also plan a cross-country trip together alone, a sojourn back to Nevada.

Bonnie had lobbied her husband to run for re-election. Forty-two years after his college election, she wasn't ready for the end. After 12 years of flying back to Nevada every weekend, she still wanted to explore the East Coast and see more of Washington. She hit her husband with a list of reasons to stay, even arguing that he could pad his pension with another six years.

"He just looked at me and said, 'All these things you say are true. I just know in my heart it's time to go home.' "

As Bryan sought to wrap up the Senate reception in his honor, he invited the assembled members of his staff, past and present, to gather around him. Bonnie stood near. So did chief-of-staff Jean Neal, with tears welling.

Bryan paraphrased an old expression and offered a goodbye.

"You can take the boy away from Nevada, but you can't take Nevada away from the boy," he said, his voice growing quieter. "This is a chapter we will never forget."

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