Time's up

Governor Easley finishes up two terms having tried to improve life in North Carolina but having let opportunities to lead slip away

Has it really been eight years since that frigid Saturday when Michael Francis Easley, after taking for the first time the oath of office as governor, dedicated himself to the noble vision of "One North Carolina"? Well, the calendar doesn't lie, and tomorrow it will be Beverly Perdue's turn to deliver her inaugural address and take the reins as Tar Heel chief executive.

So will end a long and in many ways fruitful stint of public service for Easley. Two terms as governor, with his second victory in 2004 more decisive than the first and with popular appeal that hardly wavered. Two terms prior to that as attorney general, in which he helped reach significant, public-interest agreements with cigarette manufacturers and pork producers. Earlier years as a local prosecutor and scourge of drug runners.

It is as governor, understandably, that Easley will be most clearly remembered. And in peering for an early glimpse of his legacy, it's tempting to fall back on that old expression that combines admiration with a touch of sympathy: "Bless his heart."

Mike Easley's heart was in the right place. He understood -- understands -- the gulf that exists in North Carolina between the urban enclaves of mansions and BMWs and boutiques and the soul-crushing poverty of so many rural communities and hard-luck city neighborhoods.

He wanted to close that divide, by bringing more opportunity to the struggling. He wanted to improve the schools, and to give children the kind of solid start enabling them to take full advantage of public education. Amid economic upheavals that have altered North Carolina's very character, he wanted to bring well-paying, lasting jobs to the people.

He took office in the face of a severe budget shortfall, which he handled boldly. Easley kept a focus on schools, emphasizing innovative programs for kids as they set out along the education path. Economic development was a slow and sometimes frustrating grind, but the governor and his team had their share of successes. Not for nothing does North Carolina continue to rate as a top place to do business.

Easley was a relentless and finally successful advocate for a state lottery, which he saw as a way to enhance education investment. There were reasons why a lottery actually wasn't a good policy choice, but the governor was effective in pushing it to passage. Would that he had been as focused on and publicly committed to other aspects of his job.

His own way

The governor seems to have set out to prove a point: He would march to his own drummer. Unlike the stereotypical politician who craves public interaction and adulation, he tended to avoid appearances and events that didn't directly help advance his relatively narrow agenda.

As to leading the state Democratic Party as its highest-ranking officeholder in Raleigh, he might as well have said thanks but no thanks. Strangely for a man with a wonderful gift of gab, a sharp and sparkling sense of humor and a proven record of success at the polls, the word "reclusive" comes to mind.

Perhaps his pride and sense of integrity simply wouldn't allow him to be seen as stooping to ingratiate himself with legislators, business executives, members of the news media. But the upshot in the General Assembly was that he was regarded as difficult to deal with -- hardly the kind of image that helps a governor secure the cooperation he needs.

His relations with the press became strained -- surely due in part to his penchant for secrecy and an overall lack of communicativeness. News organizations don't expect to be coddled or pampered, but it does help when a governor shows elemental respect for the media's role as a conduit of important information, as unflattering as it may be, to the public.