As we all know by now, Florida is a swing state in politics. Statewide elections for president and governor are contentiously fought and usually very close. In the last two gubernatorial elections won by Gov. Rick Scott, the final difference was approximately 1 % — a mere 60,000+ vote difference in an election where more than 6,000,000 people voted in 2014.
Back in 1994, we had a classic political contest between two, well liked and able politicians, Lawton Chiles, the incumbent Democratic governor who had held office continuously since 1958 and Republican Jeb Bush, son of the former president, brother of a future president and someone with as much name recognition as the governor.
Gov. Chiles was practically an institution in Florida and the Democratic Party. The slow-talking, self-styled country lawyer with boyish amiability had burst upon the scene in 1970 as a little known state senator from Lakeland who upset the better known Republican William Cramer, Florida’s first Republican congressman since Reconstruction.
The entire campaign for an open U.S. Senate seat that year seemed to focus on Chiles’ walking tour of the state. He set foot from Pensacola and finished the trek 91 days later in Key West. Chiles quickly became known as “Walkin’ Lawton” and answered almost every question posed to him during the campaign with a quote from someone he met on his marathon walk. It was a “public relations stroke of genius” and gave Chiles enormous public appeal. He won easily and kept on winning: three terms in the United Stated Senate, featuring a stint as Chairman of the powerful Budget Committee, and a post-retirement victory in 1990, when he walloped Republican Governor Bob Martinez by 13 points.
Meanwhile, John Ellis Bush (Jeb to everyone) was building his own impressive resume: Andover prep school, graduated Phi Beta Kappa and magna cum laude from the University of Texas where he majored in Latin American studies and was captain of the tennis team.
After college, Bush went into the banking business and moved to Miami in 1980 to work in real estate for Armando Codina, a Cuban self made millionaire. A few years later, the two partnered to form the Codina Group. “I want to be very wealthy, Bush once said, “ and I’ll be glad to tell you when I’ve accomplished that goal.”
It was about this time that the Bush family business (politics) entered his life. He got active in the local Republican Party and soon was elected Chair. That was a bad day for Democrats, as the energetic Bush revitalized the party and led it to numerous victories locally and statewide. In ’89 he chaired the campaign of Ileana Ros Lethinen as she became the first Cuban American elected to the U.S. Congress.
By 1991 Bush was deep into state politics and became Florida’s Secretary of Commerce, serving under newly elected Republican governor Bob Martinez. He then set his sights on the governor’s mansion where the redoubtable Chiles held sway.
As the 1994 governor’s race got underway, Bush demonstrated he was a formidable campaigner against a man who had never lost an election. In their debates, Bush spoke often in Spanish and was the more charismatic candidate. The race was close all the way, but the wily Chile, dressed in his trademark plaid shirt, closed fast with a more aggressive campaign. On election night the difference was a scant 63, 490 votes and a margin of 1.5% for the undefeated and still Governor of of Florida Lawton Chiles.
The very next day, while Chiles made a victory tour around the state, Bush got up, left his Coral Gables home and drove toward his office. When he got near Bird Road and U.S.1, there under the Metrorail tracks was none other than the newly re-elected governor. He was with supporters waving campaign signs to the motorists passing by. The resourceful Bush stopped the car and made his way over to Governor Chiles. He smiled, shook Chiles’ hand and said, “I just wanted to say congratulations to you.” The press surrounded Jeb, but he declined to answer questions. “This is his day,” Bush said. “I was just driving down U.S. 1 when I saw him, and I wanted to say congratulations.”
That was the last day Democrats have celebrated a victory in a Florida’s governor’s race. Bush came back in ’98 besting Chiles’ Lt. Gov. Buddy McKay 55%–45% and was re-elected four years later, easily defeating Bill McBride 56%-43% to become the first Republican two term governor in the state’s history.
About the Author
Bob Goldstein is a retired broadcaster and advertising executive who has lived in South Florida for more than forty years. He is a veteran political activist (dsdcfl.org) and a member of the South Florida Writers Association. If you would like to comment on Bob’s columns, send your response by email to robertgrimm62@yahoo.com.
