Clarence W. Blount: 1921-2003

Blount, 'conscience of the Senate,' dies at 81

Ex-educator blazed trail as 1st black majority leader and helped promote city

By Sarah Koenig and Stephanie Hanes
Sun Staff

April 13, 2003

Clarence W. Blount, the son of a North Carolina sharecropper who became a beloved Baltimore educator and then one of the most influential members of the Maryland Senate, died
yesterday. He was 81.

Mr. Blount, who chose not to run for re-election last year after 31 years in the Senate, died about 1:30 p.m. in Kernan Hospital of complications from a stroke, relatives said. His wife,
Gordine, and other relatives were by his side.

Mr. Blount entered the Senate in 1971 and became the Senate's first African-American majority leader in 1983. From that time until his retirement, his liquid basso voice proclaimed "sine
die" at the end of each General Assembly session.

In 1987, he became the first black chairman of a Senate committee - the Economic and Environmental Affairs Committee.

"Senator Blount was a pioneer among black politicians in Baltimore City and the state of Maryland," said Del. Howard P. Rawlings, the Baltimore Democrat who started his political career
when he joined Mr. Blount in West Baltimore's Five in Five Democratic Club.

"He set such a high standard of achievement. He showed that politics actually worked. He didn't have the kind of sordid image that some politicians have. He came very well
accomplished in his civilian life and was able to do great things later on," Mr. Rawlings said.

Mr. Blount's bearing and background - educator, decorated war veteran - led his colleagues to dub him "the conscience of the Senate." And while he was not known as a charismatic
leader, his stature, aided by a lean, 6-foot-3-inch frame, rarely failed to soothe nerves and tamp down incivility in the sometimes fractious chamber.

"He had a very calming influence on the Senate," said Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller. "He was a very gentle man who would not get angry, would not raise his voice - and
would not stop talking on occasion. ... He had as much if not more influence on my life than anybody other than my parents."

Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. said through a spokesman that Blount "Was always a gentleman, a class act, and will be missed by everyone in Maryland."

Mr. Blount's political strength lay in his ability to make, and keep, friends in high places, including the governor's office. That loyalty resulted in money for the causes he cared about -
mostly education - and vital votes for bills he sponsored.

"He was connected to everyone and always in a positive long-standing way," said Mary Pat Clarke, a former City Council president. "He had a lot of roots in a lot of the community and
was able to promote Baltimore for a long tenure. He's unique. He carried us on his back for 30 years."

While some in the black community criticized him over the years for playing too nice within the white power structure of Annapolis, Mr. Blount refused to change course.

"I just happen to believe that I can help the people I represent more by being a member of the club, in the inner office, sitting at the table of power," he said in a 1981 interview with the
Evening Sun. "I'm an upstanding, dues-paying member of the club, and I'm damn successful at it."

Mr. Blount was born April 20, 1921, in South Creek, N.C., one of four children of Lottie and Charles Johnson Blount Sr. His father worked on a tobacco plantation there.

As a child, Mr. Blount helped his father on the farm, feeding chickens and working in the fields. Because he had no shoes, he couldn't attend school.

Into his 80s, Mr. Blount spoke reverently of the lessons his father taught him.

"My daddy was a tower of strength," he said in a WYPR radio interview last year. "He didn't take any foolishness. We were taught from the cradle up to obey. ... And he established
pride in the family and in the name."

Mr. Blount's mother died when he was 5 years old. A few years later the family moved to Baltimore. He was a tall, gangly 10-year-old when he first went to school, unable to read or count
on his fingers. He credited dedicated teachers with helping him catch up. At 21, he graduated from Frederick Douglass High School, hiding his age from his peers.

A month after entering what was then Morgan State College, Mr. Blount was drafted into a segregated Army to fight in World War II. He saw action in Italy as a member of the 92nd
Infantry in the all-black Buffalo Division, earning a battlefield commission for removing mines from a river passage.

But the indignities suffered by black recruits gave Mr. Blount further reason to do battle. In his radio interview last year, Mr. Blount described how white officers tried to enforce Jim
Crow overseas.

"Some of the great fights of my life were in the service," he said. "While we were fighting supposedly the Germans, I fight Americans just to go into a restaurant in Italy and sit down and
eat. Because we couldn't do that in the United States, so they carried the same thing over there. Well, if I was going to die, I'm going to die in this restaurant."

Mr. Blount re-entered Morgan in 1946 and graduated in 1950. In 1965, he earned a master's degree in education from the Johns Hopkins University. He taught geography at his old junior
high school but had ambitions of becoming a diplomat. He pursued doctoral studies for four years at Georgetown University until a bout of ulcers forced him to quit.

He decided to stay in education, eventually rising to become principal of Dunbar High School, where he gained a reputation among the students for a firm but reasonable hand. In 1973,
Mr. Blount moved to the former Community College of Baltimore. There, he served as chairman of the social services department and later as executive assistant to the president.

Many who knew Mr. Blount said they still think of him as a teacher, despite his decades-long tenure as a legislator.

"He went to the General Assembly and became very famous, but people like me know him as a teacher, a principal, a person who was really crucial to the education of poor children,"
Mrs. Clarke said. "He really lifted them up."

"He was a real teacher at heart," the Rev. Maceo M. Williams, who was Mr. Blount's student at Dunbar and later a close friend of the senator's. "He made a difference in so many people's
lives in the inner city."

It was his experience as a teacher that prompted Mr. Blount to run for office.

"One day I was seated at Dunbar High School in August," Mr. Blount said in his WYPR interview. "I had made the schedule. I was assistant principal. And I said, my gosh, what am I
doing with these kids? Forty-five in a class. Three classes in the auditorium. One on a stairway teaching. What am I doing? So I entered politics to see if I could make a difference, to
bring funds and necessary resources to the education of the kids I was supervising."

In office, Mr. Blount was instrumental in the contentious 1997 "state takeover" of the Baltimore City school system, delivering an impassioned speech minutes before a crucial vote on
behalf of legislation that put millions of dollars into the school system in return for management reforms and a state role in running the system.

"I wasn't going to rise, but for the sake of the children of Baltimore, I'm going to stand on my feet," he said. "Not to say anything would be the worst thing that I could do."

The bill passed. Throughout his years in the Senate, Mr. Blount was known as a gentleman and a statesman. Even at the end of his life, the senator had a "larger than life persona," said
Sen. Lisa A. Gladden, the Baltimore Democrat who won Mr. Blount's seat with his endorsement.

"One time he killed a juvenile justice bill I wanted," Ms. Gladden, a former delegate, said. "So I decided to go over to the Senate and give him a piece of my mind. So I walk in there, and he
says, 'What can I do for you, Delegate?' And I totally fell apart. I said: 'What a nice day, Senator. How are you?" Because he's Senator Blount. Because he represents statesmanship. He's
a statesman. You just didn't yell at a statesman."

Sen. Paula C. Hollinger took over Mr. Blount's committee this year. She recalled how, years ago, during a filibuster over a piece of abortion legislation, Mr. Blount soothed the chamber:

"In my opinion, the toughest time that the Senate ever had was the eight-day filibuster. Everybody's nerves were frayed. People were at each others' throats. It's not often that people feel
that kind of vitriol for each other. He had the ability to stand up and make everybody calm down. He managed to do it in the worst of circumstances. He just had that ability. Nobody
could be angry with him."

Mr. Blount's name was sometimes raised as a possible mayoral and congressional candidate. There was a rumor that Harry R. Hughes might want him for a running mate in 1982, but Mr.
Blount never budged.

"I told him it would have been nice if you could have been president of the Senate or even governor before you retired. He said, he had thought about president of the Senate one time.
But he really liked being majority leader," said State Police Sgt. Marvin D. Dorsey, who had been Mr. Blount's driver.

Through his career, Blount remained free of financial scandal -- though he was embroiled in a dispute in 1998 when a political rival challenged his right to run in his city district while
living in Pikesville much of the time. The Court of Appeals found that he met the standard for residency, and he easily won re-election.

Even in his home life, Mr. Blount played the role of statesman. "He was always around to talk to, he was always bestowing his pearls of wisdom and past experiences with us," said Roy
Owens, Mr. Blount's nephew.

None of Mr. Blount's siblings - one brother and two sisters - lived beyond the age of 45, Mr. Owens said, so Mr. Blount took it upon himself to make sure the family gathered, organizing
regular dinners at his home.

And the senator would cook some of those meals himself.

Mr. Blount is survived by his wife, of Pikesville; a son, Michael C. Blount of Baltimore; a stepson, Mark Chisom of Baltimore; and six grandchildren. He was preceded in death by a
stepson, Tipper Chisom.

Arrangements are pending.

Copyright © 2003, The Baltimore Sun