Obituaries

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Mark Wells White Jr. (March 17, 1940 – August 5, 2017) was an American politician and lawyer, who served as the 43rd Governor of Texas from 1983 to 1987. He also held office as Secretary of State of Texas (1973–77), and as Texas Attorney General (1979–83).

White was elected governor in the 1982 gubernatorial election defeating the incumbent Bill Clements.[1] A member of the Democratic Party, White sought to improve education, transportation, water resources, law enforcement, and taxes to lure new industry to Texas. He appointed the first Hispanic woman to serve as judge of a district court in Texas.[2] In the 1986 gubernatorial election, White lost to former Republican Governor Clements, 52.7% to 46.0%.[3]


As the state's forty-third chief executive from January 18, 1983 to January 20, 1987, White worked to "preserve and enhance... resources so that Texas would not fall back, but go forward as a state of the future".[4] His main concerns were the economy and education. By focusing on Texas' resources, White was able to work on many problems facing the state in the early 1980s. The Texas economy during the early and mid-1980s was volatile. The price of oil declined and pushed Texas into a recession. This led Governor White to "lay the groundwork for a more diversified economy--one less reliant upon the...swings of a single industry".[10]


Governor White in Austin, 1983

White served as governor during Texas' sesquicentennial in 1986 and oversaw a number of the celebrations concerning that anniversary.[14]

Among White's appointments was Elma Salinas Ender as the first Hispanic woman to serve as judge of a district court in Texas.[2] From 1983 until her retirement in 2012, Ender was judge of the 341st Judicial District, based in Laredo.[15]

When he took office, Texas was ranked as one of the lowest performing states for the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) also in teachers' salaries.[16] After taking office, White immediately appointed a committee on Public Education, called a special session of the legislature in 1984, and worked with lawmakers to pass the Educational Opportunity Act (EOA).[17]

By focusing on education, White was able to make Texas a "state of the future" with regard to its most important resource, its children.[16] Through his diligent work as Governor of Texas, many of the problems of the present and future were alleviated.[9]
Among White's advisors as governor were the Dallas industrialist H. Ross Perot and former State Senator Max Sherman, who left a brief stint in the administration to become dean of the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs in Austin.[14]

In the 1986 gubernatorial election, White lost to former Republican Governor Clements, 52.7% to 46.0%.[3] Some believe that the wildly unpopular "no-pass, no-play" policies of the White administration, which prohibited any high school student athletes from participating in varsity sports if they were failing any single element of their overall class load, sealed the doom of a second term.[16] Clements polled 1,813,779 votes (52.7%) to White's 1,584,515 votes (46.1%) in the November 1986 general election and left office on January 20, 1987.[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_White#cite_note-20

"No-pass, no-play" -- High-school students who were flunking a course were unable to participate in sports.It seemed right to me at the time, and it does put priorities in line.