Governor remembered by peers

INDIANAPOLIS -- Frank O'Bannon parlayed down-home southern Indiana charm and consensus-building ability into mixed success as his state's governor since 1997.\nO'Bannon, who fell ill Monday while attending a conference in Chicago, died at 11:33 a.m. Saturday at Northwestern Memorial Hospital after his blood pressure and heart rate dropped.\n"Based on the governor's living will, First Lady Judy O'Bannon and the family decided to use no further means of support and care, and the governor died naturally," a written statement from his office said.\nThe return of O'Bannon's body was delayed until his corneas could be removed for transplant. O'Bannon had designated himself an organ donor.\nThe airplane carrying O'Bannon's body landed at Indianapolis International Airport shortly after 11 p.m. An honor guard of Indiana state troopers carried the late governor's flag-draped casket off the plane as newly sworn-in Gov. Joe Kernan, Judy O'Bannon and other family members watched. A hearse then transported O'Bannon's body to Crown Hill Funeral Home in Indianapolis.\nThe former lieutenant governor, who had served as acting governor since Wednesday, was sworn in as governor Saturday night.\nBy late afternoon, mourners, many in tears, were leaving flowers outside the governor's office. Flags fell to half-staff at the Statehouse and other locations in downtown Indianapolis.\n"If a measure of a person is how he lives, he measured up to a very, very high standard," said Indiana House Speaker Patrick Bauer, a fellow Democrat from South Bend.\nPresident Bush called O'Bannon "a dedicated public servant and a good and decent man."\n"He has served the people of his state with integrity and devotion," Bush said in a written statement.\nO'Bannon's tenure began brightly with the economic boom of the late 1990s. Indiana built a record $2 billion surplus, and O'Bannon cut taxes by $1.5 billion, put 500 more police officers on the streets, and won increasing funding for schools and universities. The moderate Democrat coasted to re-election in 2000 over former U.S. Rep. David McIntosh, R-Ind.\nShortly into O'Bannon's second term, the economic good times soured into a recession. Indiana lost 120,000 jobs, and tax revenues flowing into state coffers slowed to a trickle, forcing tax increases and cuts in social services and other agencies while largely sparing education.\nState Rep. Dave Crooks, a fellow Democrat from Daviess County, said the tax-restructuring package approved last year may stand as O'Bannon's most significant achievement.\n"I think he'll be remembered as someone who served for all the right reasons," Crooks said.\nRepublicans, however, blamed O'Bannon for only recently focusing on economic development.\nIn an April 2002 interview, O'Bannon acknowledged the state's worst fiscal crunch in two decades also would be part of his legacy.\n"It will certainly be a part of it. But I don't even think of my legacy. I just look at things I can get done," O'Bannon had said.\nHis critics also accused O'Bannon of running a loose ship as governor. They pointed to the embezzlement by three state employees from a public retirement fund, a slow response by his environmental agency to a big fish kill, and problems at two state centers for the developmentally disabled.\nCriticism of O'Bannon rarely turned personal, though. That reflected his folksy image -- his home is a reconstructed barn on the outskirts of the family hometown of Corydon -- and the good will he had built during 18 years in the Indiana Senate and eight as lieutenant governor.\nBrian Bosma, the Indiana House minority leader, had clashed with O'Bannon on policy issues, but knew the governor's positions were deeply held.\n"He has always done what he has felt was in the best interest of our state. I would never question his integrity or his service or his dedication," said Bosma, R-Indianapolis.\nSen. Evan Bayh, who was governor when O'Bannon was lieutenant governor, hailed him as "a statesman in life, generous of spirit, and always focused on the public good rather than self interest."\nO'Bannon won his first term as governor in 1996, narrowly defeating Indianapolis Mayor Stephen Goldsmith, who had advocated bold moves such as school choice and privatization of government services.\nIndiana residents traditionally have embraced change only when it honors the past, historian James Madison has written. "When forced to change, they were always able to blend the old with the new."\n"I think O'Bannon is a wonderful combination of past, present and future," Madison, an IU historian said in 1996.\nO'Bannon took positions that many of his Democratic counterparts in other states might deem too conservative. He wanted to place a 7-foot stone monument with the Ten Commandments on the grounds of the state Capitol until the courts rejected the idea.\nWhile a legislator, he had been the prime sponsor of the legislation that reimposed Indiana's death penalty in the 1970s. As governor, O'Bannon allowed seven executions to occur without delay but recently granted a 60-day reprieve in one case to allow for DNA testing.\nO'Bannon had succeeded his father in the state Senate in 1970 and held the seat until becoming lieutenant governor. He had actually sought the governor's seat in 1987, but after Bayh entered the race, O'Bannon became the much younger man's running mate. The pair won election that year and then won a second term in 1991.\nOver eight years as lieutenant governor, O'Bannon quietly built ties with farmers, business people and party leaders in preparation for his own gubernatorial run. He was not opposed when he sought the Democratic nomination for governor in 1996.\nO'Bannon received a bachelor's degree in government from IU in 1952. He served two years in the Air Force and then earned his law degree from IU in 1957.\nThat year, he married Judy Asmus, whom he had met on a blind date in college. They returned to Corydon, where he started a law practice and spent time at the family-owned newspaper, the Corydon Democrat. Even as governor, he remained chairman of the O'Bannon Publishing Co., which publishes weekly newspapers in Harrison and Crawford counties.\nThe O'Bannons have three children, Polly, Jennifer and Jonathan, and five grandchildren.