Tom Coburn was possibly the most influential member of the U.S. Senate in the past 40 years, but most people will never know it. And that would be just fine with Coburn, who died March 28 at age 72 after a battle with cancer, because he never sought credit, praise, or the spotlight. Indeed, he usually shunned them and taught those of us who worked for or with him to shun them as well. The result was an office dedicated to results and contemptuous of egotism.
Tom Coburn was born in Casper, Wyoming, on March 14, 1948. The most important things in his life were his wife, Carolyn, his three daughters, his grandchildren, and his deep faith. He wanted to ensure his grandchildren had the same opportunities and the same freedoms he had, and he was worried we were spending some of those freedoms away.
When Coburn arrived in the U.S. House of Representatives in 1994 and the Senate in 2005, he had already run a successful business, beaten cancer, gone back to medical school in his 30s, and started a successful medical practice — where over his career, he estimated he’d delivered over 4,000 babies.
With family and faith as his anchor, he operated without fear and for a higher purpose. If doing what was right cost him his seat, so be it — he imposed term limits on himself anyway. Plus, he had plenty of babies to deliver, and they cried less than most senators.
That courage earned him the nickname Dr. No, for his practice of putting a hold on Senate legislation set to be passed by unanimous consent, a tool available to all senators but infrequently invoked by most. Directly, at least. In truth, some of Coburn’s “holds” were on behalf of colleagues who wanted to delay a bill but were afraid to do so themselves.
And while the nickname always amused him, he enjoyed it even more after receiving two large framed words in black and white from a constituent one day. One said “No.” The other, “Know.” They remained on the wall of his office until his retirement in 2015.
That other “know” was as central to his identity and the success of his agenda as the first “no.” Coburn knew every single bill he was holding and why. Many times, he knew more about a bill than its author.
His war on waste on both sides of the aisle didn’t make life easy. But it didn’t stop him from being well-liked. He struck up a friendship with Barack Obama, and in 2005, when Coburn took on powerful Alaska Republican Ted Stevens and his $223 million earmark, dubbed the Bridge to Nowhere, he could have made an enemy for life. But that wasn’t Coburn’s style. He bought Sen. Stevens a box of cigars and insisted they smoke them together.
He once flew back to D.C. in the middle seat in the last row of the plane. Since senators fly constantly, they almost always get upgraded to first class due to their mileage status with the airline. And once you’ve flown first class, coach is a tough sell. When I apologized for the seat assignment, he replied, “It’s OK. My ego needed a middle seat, last row. Everyone needs it now and then.”
His servant’s heart served him well. It’s why, unlike so many members, he took the time to mentor his staff. Every class of interns met with him for at least an hour. He was given a biography of every individual who started in the office. He once remarked to another senator who didn’t know his own staffer’s name: “The very least you could do is learn the names of the people who work for you.”
Many staffers thought of him as a father. He saved one of us from an abusive boyfriend, rescued another from severe depression — his medical advice saved my father’s life. He saved some marriages and careers, and he saved souls.
It wasn’t just senators he fought on principle. After receiving two tickets and a written warning from D.C. Parking Enforcement informing him that he had to change his Oklahoma tags to district tags, Coburn composed a prompt response. Included in the packet we mailed to the DMV were selections from The Federalist Papers and a pocket Constitution (highlighted and underlined throughout). We never heard back.
Courtney Shadegg, a government and public relations consultant, is a former aide to Sen. Tom Coburn.
