Eckhardt: There Once Was a Congressman from Texas

Focus on American History

by Al Gore (Foreword), Gary A. Keith

Runner-up, Violet Crown Award, Writer's League of Texas, 2008 Renowned for his "brilliant legislative mind" and political oratory—as well as for bicycling to Congress in a rumpled white linen suit and bow tie—U.S. Congressman Bob Eckhardt was a force to reckon with in Texas and national politics from the 1940s until 1980. A liberal Democrat who successfully championed progressive causes, from workers' rights to consumer protection to environmental preservation and energy conservation, Eckhardt won the respect of opponents as well as allies. Columnist Jack Anderson praised him as one of the most effective members of Congress, where Eckhardt was a national leader and mentor to younger congressmen such as Al Gore. In this biography of Robert Christian Eckhardt (1913-2001), Gary A. Keith tells the story of Eckhardt's colorful life and career within the context of the changing political landscape of Texas and the rise of the New Right and the two-party state. He begins with Eckhardt's German-American family heritage and then traces his progression from labor lawyer, political organizer, and cofounder of the progressive Texas Observer magazine to Texas state legislator and U.S. congressman. Keith describes many of Eckhardt's legislative battles and victories, including the passage of the Open Beaches Act and the creation of the Big Thicket National Preserve, the struggle to limit presidential war-making ability through the War Powers Act, and the hard fight to shape President Carter's energy policy, as well as Eckhardt's work in Texas to tax the oil and gas industry. The only thorough recounting of the life of a memorable, important, and flamboyant man, Eckhardt also recalls the last great era of progressive politics in the twentieth century and the key players who strove to make Texas and the United States a more just, inclusive society.

448 pages, Hardcover

First published December 1, 2007

About the author

Albert Gore, Junior, known as Al, served earlier as a United States senator from Tennessee from 1985 to 1993 and as vice president of the United States from 1993 to 2001 under William Jefferson Clinton and shared the Nobel Prize of 2007 for peace for his efforts to raise awareness about global warming.

This forty-fifth vice president also served in the House of Representatives of the United States from 1977 to 1985. Gore, the Democratic nominee for president in the election of 2000, ultimately lost to the Republican candidate George Walker Bush in spite of winning the popular vote. The Supreme Court eventually settled a legal controversy over the election recount of Florida in favor of Bush.

People awarded this prominent environmental activist together with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change for the "efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change."

He also starred in the Academy Award–winning documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, on the topic of global warming. Gore helped to organize the Live Earth benefit concert for global warming on 7 July 2007.

Gore is currently chairman of the Emmy Award–winning American television channel Current TV, chairman of Generation Investment Management, a director on the board of Apple Inc., an unofficial advisor to Google's senior management, chairman of the Alliance for Climate Protection, and a partner in the venture capital firm, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, heading that firm's climate change solutions group.