Obama on Byrd and West Virginia: 'All America shares your loss'

Jul 2, 2010 — USA Today

President Obama lauded the late Sen. Robert C. Byrd for keeping faith with his family, his state of West Virginia, and his beloved U.S. Constitution.

"All America shares your loss," Obama told thousands who gathered for Byrd's funeral on the steps of the golden-domed West Virginia statehouse.

A variety of speakers traced the eventful 92-year life of a former gas station attendant who became a fiddle-playing, Shakespeare-quoting senator who strongly backed the new health care bill, fiercely opposed the Iraq war, and enthusiastically directed many federal projects to his home state. Elected to the House in 1952 and the Senate in 1958, Byrd was the longest serving member of Congress in U.S. history.

Obama also alluded to less admirable aspects of Byrd's life, including his youthful membership in the Ku Klux Klan and his early opposition to civil rights laws. The nation's first African-American president said Byrd once told him he had regrets about his past.

"I said, 'none of us are absent some regrets, senator,'" Obama recalled. "That's why we enjoy and seek the grace of God."

Other speakers included Vice President Joe Biden, former President Bill Clinton. Gov. Joe Manchin, Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-West Va.; House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, R-Nevada.

"The Senate chamber was Robert C. Byrd's cathedral," Biden said. "And West Virginia was his heaven."

The funeral program featured lyrics from John Denver's song Country Roads, which describes West Virginia as "almost Heaven." A local band played the tune at the end of the service.

Byrd's basket, draped with a West Virginia table, rested on a table beside the speakers' podium.

Biden, a long-time senator from Delaware, joked that Byrd "stole" money from other states to help his beloved West Virginia, telling the crowd of mourners: "So be nice to the rest of us."

The speakers lauded Byrd's learned knowledge of history, from classical Rome to the development of the U.S. Constitution, a copy of which he always carried with him. They praised his ornate speaking style, sprinkled with quotes from the Bard and the Bible.

Obama noted that in early days Byrd used his fiddle case as a brief case, and often played tunes for voters and constituents.

Pelosi reviewed Byrd's three terms in the U.S. House before he joined the U.S. Senate in 1959. Reid, one of Byrd's successors as top Senate Democrat, praised Byrd's thirst for knowledge, and how he taught him to also carry a copy of the U.S. Constitution in his pocket.

"He never thought he'd done enough for West Virginia," Reid said. "No one has meant more to a state than Robert Byrd meant to West Virginia."

Former president Clinton also referenced Byrd's past membership in the KKK, quickly adding: "Then he spent the rest of his life making it up."

Rockefeller, his West Virginia colleague, said: "Sen. Byrd, thank you. We will not forget you."