Politics is about more than the big names we see in the paper everyday. It is also comprised of people on the state level who love and serve their state. Politics is not and never should be completely serious all the time. Sometimes it's best to have a person in there that will shake people up a bit.
This diary is about the life and passing of one such man, Jacob Johnson, who served Texas in the House of Representative and had fun in the process.
Jake Johnson, a liberal Democrat and former San Antonio state representative, perhaps best known as a jokester who once fooled 22 of his colleagues into voting against the Bill of Rights, died September 8, 2006.
He served Bexar county from 1961 till 1973. (That's pronounced "Bear" or "Be-har" not "Be-zar" or "Beck-sar".)
From the Corpus Christi Caller Times:
"He was a colorful figure," former state Sen. Carlos Truan of Corpus Christi said in Sunday editions of the San Antonio Express-News.
Johnson told the newspaper in 1965 that his greatest talent was "giving my enemies ulcers and my second is picking up languages. The one I enjoy most is giving my enemies ulcers."
He did indeed like to cause trouble. But always for a good cause:
From the San Antonio Express News:
In 1969, Johnson and then Land Commissioner Jerry Sadler got into a scuffle at a news conference in which Johnson criticized one of Sadler's projects. Sadler put Johnson in a chokehold as a radio reporter stuck a microphone in his face and asked him for comment.
"The land commissioner is choking me!" Johnson answered.
Sadler's project was involved with a company that, while dredging along the Gulf Coast, had found a Spanish galleon. It kept the treasures and hauled them off to Indiana. Johnson, of course, wanted the loot returned.
Put him in a chokehold? How many Commissioners do you see doing that lately? Not that we haven't wanted to, I'm sure!
Afterwards Sadler and he remained friends. When Sadler died and it was known that they would be buried next to each other in the State Cemetery, Johnson was heard to say to his kin, "Be sure my gravestone is taller!" His family is currently looking into this. Ah, revenge is best when served cold!
Then there was this gem:
Once he really pulled the wool over his colleagues' eyes. Recognized to speak about a bill he had on the table, he droned on about the due process of law, unreasonable searches, and the right of people to peaceably assemble.
His colleagues roared an overwhelming disapproval, at which an elated Johnson promptly informed them they had just voted down the Bill of Rights.
There was a race to reverse their votes!
From the San Antonio paper:
Johnson, who was born in Midland in 1931, was stricken with polio at 9 and spent several years in various hospitals. For a time he studied to be a priest, before abandoning it when he realized he didn't have the call.
Fluent in Spanish and French, he spent four years in Mexico with his father, retired Army Gen. Harry Johnson, who served as President Truman's assistant secretary of agriculture.
According to his daughter, he wanted to be cremated. His dog had died earlier and had also been cremated. His family thought he would want to be buried with his pal of so many years. And so they were buried together in the Texas State Cemetery.
Johnson was buried two rows from former Gov. Ann Richards and near Steven F. Austin. His daughter said he would have been so proud!
He had also stated that he wanted some his ashes spread on the lawn of the Texas Capitol--that is illegal here---but somehow I don't think that this will stop a true Texas Prankster...