I knew only one person who had anything bad to say about Jim Spainhower, the only person in public office I ever would have given any thought at all to working for—-and I still would have refused had he ever offered.    

I missed Jim’s funeral yesterday (Tuesday) because of a couple of things that required staying at home. But Nancy was among several folks from Jefferson City and a lot of other places who were there to say goodbye.  One phrase was heard over and over, or circulated over and over on social media—“good man.”  

Jim had been out of the public eye for a long time.  He was 90 when he died.  It has been almost forty years since he left the State Treasurer’s office after losing a primary race for governor in 1980. 

I met Jim the first time when he was the featured speaker at one of the retreats held in the spring and fall of each year by the college group at the First Christian Church in Columbia.  He was a close friend of our student program minister, Eldon Drennan, and had not yet entered politics.  He was straightforward, thoughtful, eloquent, never presuming to be the only repository of scriptural knowledge.  About the time I graduated, he became a state representative while also remaining a minister in Marshall.  

Later, I covered part of his political career as a reporter.  And still later, when Eldon formed a social/religious studies group made up of Jim and Joanne, Eldon and Ilene, and some other folks from Columbia and Jefferson City, Jim Spainhower was included and became the only political office-holder who was ever welcome in our home. 

Jim knew, however, that except for those few occasions when we gathered in that group, I was always the reporter and he was always the politician.  

I played softball with several of his young employees in the Treasurer’s office, one of who was a second baseman named Bob Holden.  Pretty good with a glove.  Singles hitter.  We were just young guys who liked to play softball.  Never talked politics between innings that I can recall. 

Jim wrote a book called Pulpit, Pew, and Politics and told me when my first book came out that I was entitled to begin my prayers with, “O Thou who also has written a book….”  

 The world was different then, of course.  Today’s religious-political alliance that seeks power to mandate by law those policies that are not convincing enough from the pulpit to bring voluntary participation had not yet materialized. And Jim’s profession of faith in his book fell far short of today’s efforts to claim exclusive access to the path of salvation and to turn dogma into statute:

And although a lifelong Democrat, I know that all political wisdom is not confined to my party. I admire the Democratic party for its record of policy-making on behalf of the underprivileged and needy, but I also admit that there have been periods in this nation’s history whenother parties have better served them.  

I am a member of the Christian faith and of the Democratic party. I declare my religious and political membership in neither a spirit of pride nor by way of apology but only to help the reader better understand and interpret the views expressed…Although I am a Christian, I do not believe all religious truth is confined to the Christian faith.  Jesus did say he came to reveal the way, the truth, and the life but he did not claim his to be the only way, the only truth, the only life.  I am convinced that Jesus’ life and words emphasize the truth about God in whatever religious garment it may be clothed. I have been blessed with the friendship of manypersons of the Jewish faith and impressed by their personal dedication to thesame principles of truth, honor, and justice that my Christian faith has taughtme to uphold. I know we worship the same God.

Membership in a political party does not require unreasonable partisanship. Nor does it necessitate unthinking, blind loyalty to every position a party takes. Parties themselves are so contradictory that the member who insists on following its dictates without raising questions is certain to end up as a fool…

  I stress these points  because it is necessary to guard against making an ideological god out of one’s political party affiliation….Any government, though, that does not consider the moral and ethical implications of policy-making will soon face a disturbing spiritual crisis among those who are governed…I strongly believe that too little emphasis has been placed on the role of religion in providing the ethical ingredient needed to complement political expertise in a well-governed society.

Jim was the youngest of fourteen children, raised in Stanberry, a graduate of Maryville High School.  He became an ordained minister in 1953 and during his eight years in the Missouri House, he earned his master’s and doctorate degrees in political science.

 State Treasurer William E. Robinson, who could have been thefirst state treasurer to succeed himself—thanks to a change in state law—raninto some serious legal problems (he was acquitted) and didn’t run again, Jimwon the office. And it was Jim Spainhower who became the first State Treasurerwho succeeded himself with a second four-year term. He got sixty-nine percentof the vote.  The only statewide office-holder to beat that record since was Auditor Tom Schweich, who ran without major opposition in the general election of 2014.

He was inaugurated for his second term only a few minutesbefore Joseph Teasdale took the office of governor and told a small audience suffering in the most miserable weather in the history of Missouri’s outdoor inaugurations, “I am firmly convinced that the will of God in this election to the office of governor has been manifested through your free will to vote according to the dictates of your conscience.”

Jim later told me, “Never trust a politician with a messianic complex.”  

Four years later, when he could not seek another term as treasurer, Jim ran against Teasdale, whose administration had a checkered record.  He lost in the 1980 primary.Teasdale later lost to Christopher Bond by ten times more votes than he won with against Bond in ’76. 

In 2004, the next time a sitting governor, Bob Holden, was challenged in a primary election (by Claire McCaskill), I called Spainhower and Teasdale and asked them to reflect on how the contested primary in 1980 affected the Democratic party in the general election.  Jim still would not refer to Teasdale by name and Teasdale still blamed Spainhower’s opposition in August for his loss in November.  Forget about the old saw that time heals all wounds.  Not in this case.

After Jim left public office he became the President of the School of the Ozarks at Point Lookout, succeeding the school’s founder, M. Graham Clark.  But he was never comfortable in that role because, as we recall the story, Clark kept an office elsewhere in the same building and Jim felt people still went to Clark with an issue instead of going to him.  When the chance came to become the head of Lindenwood College, Jim moved on. 

Even after he retired as an educator, he remained a pastor.  And a friend although it has been many years since we saw each other.  

Near the end of his book, Jim wrote:

If I have one single ambition in life it is to finish my days on earth knowing that, for the most part, I have done my best to serve God in the manner he desires. I recognize my fallibility and know that when death is just a moment away it will bring to close a life that failed many times to measure up to God’s expectations. But I desire that those failures be as few in number as possible…

I have always taken great comfort in the words of Abraham Lincoln when censored for his unwavering policy in defense of the union…”I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live up to what light I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right; stand with him while he stands right and part company with him when he goes wrong.”

The reaction to word of his death both at the funeral and on social media has been universal: “He was a good man.”  

Yes, he was. 

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