Former SC governor turns 90, looks back on life, reaching highest level of public service

Former S.C. Governor Richard W. Riley stepped away from politics 22 years ago, but public service keeps pulling him back in.

He’d have it no other way.

Riley celebrates his 90th birthday on Monday in good health.

“Thank the Lord,” he said.

He’s involved in his law firm Nelson Mullins and in the Riley Institute at Furman University, centered on leadership diversity and (polite) public discourse on a range of issues.

Riley is well-known for his gentlemanly approach to life and politics — soft-spoken yet driven, especially with regard to reforming education. He is known for listening to a chorus of voices and sometimes even changing his own thinking.

Alex Sanders, a former state appeals court judge and former president of the College of Charleston, said in a statement released by his daughter, Zoe, “Dick Riley was my inspiration, my guiding light and my friend from childhood — his and mine.”

The State newspaper spoke to Riley recently about the highs and lows of his 38-year career in public service beginning in 1963 as a state representative and ending in 2001 as U.S. education secretary in the Clinton administration, and what he has done since and what he thinks about the state of politics today.

Riley was born in Greenville County in 1933.

He never ventured far for long — two years in the Navy, eight years in the governor’s office and eight years in Washington as education secretary.

He graduated from Furman in 1954 and served as a U.S. Navy officer on a minesweeper. His service was cut short when he was diagnosed with a type of arthritis that warped his spine and left him unable to turn his neck despite a demanding exercise regimen.

Riley graduated from the University of South Carolina School of Law and joined his father’s Greenville law firm. Edward Riley, known as Ted, was Greenville County’s attorney, which at that time also represented the school district, and was chair of the state Democratic Party. He also worked on John F. Kennedy’s presidential campaign.

He couldn’t stand to see a child suffer, especially as a family court judge, Riley said. He considers his father the most influential person in his life.

Riley in office

Dick Riley served in the General Assembly for 14 years before being elected governor in 1978.

His seminal work as governor was the Education Improvement Act, which imposed a 1-cent sales tax dedicated to education reform and included enhancing teacher achievement and testing students’ knowledge of basic skills.

During the interview with The State, Riley remembered going with his wife, Tunky, to schools across the state as they worked to pass the education legislation. Conditions were not good, to put it mildly, engendering his career-long focus on education. At that time, South Carolina was at or one mark off from the bottom in terms of quality education across the country. This year, U.S. News and World Report listed it as 44th.

Riley laments that the act’s testing requirement caused teachers to teach to the test, but he is pleased there are now tech schools that offer hands-on learning to provide context and real-world experience in lessons like measuring the angles of a golf ball — geometry.

Ever the optimist, Riley, it seems, can’t offer criticism without following with something positive.

He was a strong supporter of Bill Clinton’s campaign for president in 1992 — the two already had a long friendship, having both been elected governor of small Southern states in the same year — and served on Clinton’s transition team.

Riley turned down jobs on the federal bench and ambassador to Ireland but said yes to working on education.

When Riley’s papers were unveiled at the University of South Carolina, keynote speaker Clinton said among Riley’s achievements were after-school programs, internet connectivity in schools and a direct student loan program.

“I believed that the future of the country depended upon our ability to educate everyone,” Clinton said, “and I knew that he believed that ability is evenly distributed but opportunity is not.”

Riley has been praised for hiring staff made up of people from different backgrounds and for being willing to listen — and sometimes modify — his beliefs based on what he heard.

He counts as one of his best friends Madeleine Albright, who was secretary of state in the Clinton administration. She died last year at 84.

Riley after public service

Since leaving office, he’s worked with a group of lawyers at Nelson Mullins Washington D.C. office focused on education policy.

And he’s particularly proud of the Riley Institute’s Diversity Leadership program, which has worked with more than 2,500 people so far. About 100 people are in the five-month-long program now.

The current state of American politics is nothing like the politics he has pursued.

At the 2018 USC event, Riley said, “Politics can be a wonderful thing and it can be an unpleasant thing. But I hope they will see in this exhibit, which will be a tremendous exhibit, that you can be a politician and be into issues and not bring people down.”

Asked about former President Donald Trump, Riley first talked about the recent cold snap, then about President Joe Biden, who Riley said he believes is doing a great job.

“He is a good person, a very good person,” Riley said.

Reminded he had said nothing about Trump, Riley said, “His leadership was not good for the country.”

He said he remains close to Hillary Clinton — “tremendous respect for her.” He was South Carolina co-chair of her presidential campaign (also of Jimmy Carter’s and stumped for Al Gore).

Riley still lives in the home he and his wife built when they came back to Greenville after leaving the governor’s mansion in 1987.

Tunky Riley died in 2008 at age 72 of complications from breast cancer, which she was initially diagnosed with when her husband was governor.

Their extended family — four children, 14 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren along with spouses and friends converged on Greenville to honor him the week after Christmas for his birthday.

He said his goal for the year ahead is to live to be 91.

Riley has received so many honors, all appreciated, but he counts as best the Riley Institute and the statue of him reading a book alongside two small children — one Black, one White. He’s sitting on a bench outside the Peace Center for Performing Arts.

It was crafted by his first cousin, sculptor Zan Wells, who created many of the statues in downtown Greenville, and includes a page about the renowned artist Jasper Johns, another first cousin and Wells’ half brother.

It brings together all he’s worked for — diversity, the arts and quality education.

Etched in the concrete bench beside him is a simple phrase: “Education Really Matters.”