Hunt biography is an insider's view

The cover of Gary Pearce's new biography of Jim Hunt, appropriately titled "Jim Hunt: A Biography," is a flattering and beguiling photo of the four-term governor. The content of the "authorized" biography is just as flattering.

Hunt, who served as governor 1977-85 and 1993-2001 after a term (1973-77) as lieutenant governor, opened up to Pearce in a series of interviews and urged his friends to talk to Pearce as well. The author, a former newspaper reporter, had signed on as Hunt's press secretary at the beginning of his first run for governor and stayed on as adviser and consultant throughout Hunt's political career. He also advised other Democratic politicians. Pearce says he strived to be objective in this biography, but his book is clearly an insider's version of the Hunt years, and it's admittedly an admirer's version as well.

Pearce's main point, that Hunt, a rural farm boy without significant family political connections, transformed North Carolina and presided over the state during some of its most turbulent times, is accurate. In that, it's an amazing and tantalizing story. Pearce's perspective, unfortunately, is from inside the Hunt administration, and he fails to credit other forces that helped transform North Carolina during those years. If Hunt and his administration made mistakes or headed down the wrong path at times, Pearce fails to see those detours, and he has little patience for politicians who opposed Hunt initiatives.

Pearce accurately portrays Hunt as a man untiringly and relentlessly pushing his state forward with all kinds of new programs and initiatives. Hunt's enthusiasm, however, sometimes overlooked the long-term costs of his dreams, as newly elected Gov. Mike Easley found out in the budget crisis that greeted him in 2001. Pearce also fails to address the allegations of cronyism and political favoritism that followed Hunt through most of his career.

The crucible of Hunt's political career is the 1984 Senate contest against incumbent Jesse Helms. Had Hunt won, Pearce says, he might have been the Democratic nominee for president by 1988 or 1992, and he's probably right. Democrats nationwide would have owed Hunt a major debt for knocking off the conservative icon, and Hunt as a senator would have been just as hard-working, just as determined and just as persistent as he had been as governor. The 1984 election, Hunt's only defeat at the polls, was one he should have won. Pearce hints at the problem in 1984: The Helms people outsmarted and outplayed the divided Hunt contingent. Helms went all out, with biting television spots, veiled accusations and self-righteous contempt that convinced the electorate (or at least 52% of it) that Hunt was wishy-washy, untrustworthy and not genuine. Pearce is convinced that Helms was a racist and that racial appeals swayed the 1984 election. Helms undoubtedly manipulated racial prejudice with his vocal opposition to the Martin Luther King Holiday (which President Reagan supported) and was willing to use subtle racial appeals, but Helms was too complex to be dismissed with one word. He could be extremely gracious and courtly, but he had a mean streak that would lash out at opponents. Race played a role in the 1984 election, but Hunt's loss had more to do with errors made in the Hunt camp than with Helms' willingness to play the race card.

Pearce has often been asked what Hunt is "really" like, the implication being that his goody-two-shoes earnestness and drive for improvement cannot be real. But, he says, it is. What you see is what you get. Although I was a skeptic when I first met Hunt about 35 years ago, I now have to agree that Pearce is right — Hunt really is the simple farm boy with a burning desire to improve his state and to help the people who cannot help themselves. He really is deeply committed to education and is willing to try almost any strategy to improve public education. He is earnestly and sincerely doing all he can, even in his 70s and 10 years out of office, to improve his native state.

Pearce's biography will be valuable because Hunt opened up to Pearce, revealing some inner thoughts and motivations, and so did some of his colleagues. But this short (297 pages) book is not the ultimate biography of Jim Hunt. It is not a historian's biography on the level of William Manchester's biography of Douglas MacArthur or Robert Caro's biography of Lyndon Johnson. This book, and the transcripts of interviews behind it, will be a valuable resource to some future biographer who will take a wider view of the Hunt years. Until that lengthier biography is written, Pearce's book gives an insider's view of some of the most progressive and important years in North Carolina's history.