BURLINGTON — U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., forever will remember the late former Gov. Philip Hoff — the first modern-day Democrat elected to the state post by popular vote — as “a visionary, a trailblazer, a reformer and a transformative influence in both Vermont and on the national stage.”
Oh, and one other thing: The guy who gave him his first job.
Leahy, current dean of his chamber, is the longest-serving U.S. senator in state history. But a half-century ago, he was just another law school graduate looking for work when Hoff hired him as an associate in his Burlington firm in 1964 before appointing him Chittenden County state’s attorney in 1966.
That’s why when Leahy attended a Saturday memorial service for Hoff at Burlington’s Episcopal Cathedral Church of St. Paul, it was anything but a professional obligation.
“He made a real difference,” Leahy said of his first boss, “touching and inspiring countless lives, in countless ways. I am blessed to be one of those whose lives he touched.”
Leahy was one of many Vermont political leaders past and present who, entering or exiting the service, spoke of personal connections to Hoff, who died April 26 at his Shelburne home at age 93.
Fellow U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., had finished third in a 1986 bid for governor when, four years later, Hoff became the first mainstream politician to endorse the independent’s historic 1990 run for Congress.
“Phil Hoff was perhaps the greatest governor in the history of the state,” said Sanders, who revealed he worked for the Vermont Department of Taxes at the end of Hoff’s 1963-69 tenure. “History will remember him as a man of great courage who not only helped transform Vermont but was years ahead of his time in the fight for economic, social and racial justice.”
U.S. Rep. Peter Welch, D-Vt., noted Hoff was not only “a groundbreaking leader” but also “a kind and decent man” who drove to his village of Hartland Four Corners when the two were state senators in the 1980s.
“How is it this larger-than-life figure was having dinner in my house?” Welch recalled thinking. “He always made you feel politics was meaningful.”
Hoff, born a dozen miles from the Vermont border in Turners Falls, Massachusetts, in 1924, served in the South Pacific during World War II before returning to New England to marry the former Joan Brower, father four daughters and, after losing a 1959 bid for Burlington’s local governing board, upend state politics.
Hoff was deemed a “Young Turk” after he won election to the Vermont House of Representatives in 1960. Two years later, he earned the title of first Democratic governor in more than a century when he beat Republican incumbent F. Ray Keyser Jr.
Stephen Terry was a University of Vermont student whose age kept him from voting the night Hoff claimed victory at a 1962 rally in Winooski.
“I was an eyewitness — just a young, awestruck college student,” Terry recalled.
Terry went on to graduate, cover Hoff’s second and third terms as a Vermont Press Bureau reporter and co-author the 2011 book “Philip Hoff: How Red Turned Blue in the Green Mountain State.”
“It was one of the defining moments of the 20th century history of Vermont,” Terry said of Hoff’s election. “A lot of what we know about Vermont now had its beginnings there.”
During Hoff’s tenure, the Vermont House reapportioned itself from a chamber where each of the state’s 246 cities and towns had its own representative to the current 150-member body.
The newly streamlined Legislature went on to ban billboards that once cluttered state highways, move then-local welfare programs to Montpelier, end the poll tax as a voting requirement, convert the state income tax to a percentage of the federal rate, and create what’s now the Vermont Student Assistance Corp., area agencies on aging, Legal Aid and Vermont Public Television.
The Hoff administration also established state government’s first planning office and Vermont’s District Court and Judicial Nominating Commission, Arts Council and Commission on Women.
“We have too long accepted the belief we cannot change with the times,” Hoff said in his first inaugural address in 1963. “We now must lift our eyes to the opportunities that are within our grasp if we only have the courage to reach out for them.”
Hoff continued to be a forward thinker out of office. An advocate against the Vietnam War and for civil rights, the father of four, grandfather of six and great-grandfather of two was an early supporter when the state became the first to adopt civil unions in 2000 and approve same-sex marriage without a court mandate in 2009.
Jenni Johnson opened Saturday’s service by announcing she was one of the more than 1,000 black students who participated in the 1968 Vermont-New York Youth Project created by Hoff and then New York City Mayor John Lindsay.
“He changed my life in more ways than I realized,” Johnson said before singing “What a Wonderful World.”
Former law colleague Richard Cassidy took to the altar to recognize not only Hoff’s varied accomplishments — “scoring the winning touchdown in the longstanding rivalry between his hometown, Turners Falls, and Greenfield” — but also his humility.
“Politics and government are team sports, and Phil would be the first to acknowledge that what was accomplished was not his alone,” Cassidy said. “If you’re looking for his legacy, you don’t have to look far.”
Many in the audience of nearly 400 said Hoff inspired their own political service.
Madeleine Kunin, Democratic governor from 1985 to 1991, noted Hoff was the first contributor to her initial statewide campaign, giving her $200.
“I thought it was a fortune,” Kunin recalled.
Howard Dean, Democratic governor from 1991 to 2003, was Hoff’s doctor.
“I’m not talking about that,” Dean said with a smile, noting patient privacy rules.
James Douglas, Republican governor from 2003 to 2011, said Hoff invited him to meet when he was starting his own political career four decades ago.
“It was kind of him to reach out,” Douglas said.
Current Republican Gov. Phil Scott, who didn’t enter politics until 2000, represented a growing number of Vermonters who either weren’t alive, around or old enough to be aware when Hoff took office. Even so, he took the time to travel from a rare Saturday legislative session to the memorial service.
“I didn’t have the pleasure of knowing him well, but he was a leader of integrity, and a kind person who dedicated his life to public service,” Scott said of Hoff. “He gave a lot back to Vermont.”
