booth gardner - Washington Secretary of State

the big league he found himself in. Some of the old hands acknowledged he was likable,
but also worrisome – a squirrely naïf. Others thought he had real promise. They said he’d
come around when he got some real dirt under his fingernails. Fifteen years later, when
Booth was governor, House Speaker Joe King, a wily Democrat from Vancouver, said he still
didn’t get it. Politics, King said, “isn’t always pretty, and it isn’t always fun. Sometimes you
have to hurt people’s feelings. Sometimes you have to say no.”
Booth was happier when he became chairman of the Senate Education Committee
in 1972, but concluded that he was a manager, not a designated hitter. Asked in 2009
to cite his most notable achievement as a state senator, he instantly declared, “None.
Nothing.” “You’re not much of a legislator, are you?” his visitor offered. “I hate legislators!”
he blurted out, adding with a chuckle, “Well, I don’t really, but I love the administrative
aspect of government. I tolerated the legislative aspect of government.”
* * *
Booth was still involved in many community outreach activities, including
Northwest Center, a parent-operated organization founded in the 1960s to assist
developmentally disabled children and adults. Cecile Lindquist, his UW classmate, headed
its board. Katie Dolan, his friend from their Parks Department days, was also in the thick of
things, having graduated from outraged mom to sophisticated activist. Katie’s repertoire of
lobbying tricks included telling fortunes in beer foam, a shtick that won her an appearance
on “What’s My Line.” The Northwest Center’s Mother’s Guild – dubbed the “mothers
in tennis shoes” and “four housewives from Seattle” – began to push the Legislature to
approve an “Education for All” act. It stipulated that Washington children with disabilities
have a constitutional right to a public school education. After a full court press by Dolan,
Lindquist and their equally tenacious pals, Janet Taggart and Evelyn Chapman, House Bill
90 was signed into law with pleasure by Gov. Evans in the spring of 1971. “This wasn’t an
exercise in lobbying or political science,” Dolan said. “From our viewpoint it was a matter of
life and death.” Education for All was the first law of its kind in the nation. With Gardner’s
support, Dolan and Taggart, next helped found Troubleshooters, an advocacy agency for
families dealing with disabilities. Booth served on their board for several years. Dolan, who
died in 2006, “put her whole heart and soul into advocacy for people with disabilities,” says
Lindquist, who once headed the Washington State Developmental Disabilities Council. “She
was extraordinarily creative and driven, which meant she ruffled a lot feathers. But it never
bothered Booth. Katie got things done.”
A time would come when it did bother Booth.
* * *
In the summer of 1971, one of Norton Clapp’s board members called Booth to
relay an offer he couldn’t refuse: President of the Laird Norton Company, with its diverse
network of enterprises: Lumber yards and retail building-supply outlets from Alaska to
Minnesota; prime real estate in downtown Seattle; shopping centers and industrial parks,
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