| Interment Location | Visited | |
|---|---|---|
| Washington, D.C. | March 29, 2024 |
Most often the graves I visit at cemeteries are pre-planned destinations. Stumbling across an interesting grave is satisfying too, though. Such was the case on a visit to Oak Hill Cemetery one spring afternoon. As I searched for the resting place of Judge Patricia Wald, I happened upon the grave of a politician with whom I was unfamiliar: Charles H. Percy. The father-in-law of Senator Jay Rockefeller, Percy himself served in the senate from 1967 to 1985, chairing the Foreign Relations Committee for four of those years. He was even once regarded as a presidential contender until Gerald Ford’s ascendancy ahead of the 1976 election. Defeated in his bid for a fourth Senate term in 1984, Percy pivoted his professional energies toward a consulting firm in Washington. Still in D.C. in death, his ashes are held in an outdoor niche, one of many that line a staircase in Oak Hill’s Chapel Hill section.
Percy ended his career in business, which is where he began his career. He started as an apprentice at the media technologies company Bell & Howell in 1938, and, in just over a decade of working there and rising through the ranks, he became the company’s president at age 29. During his tenure, Bell & Howell saw rapid growth in its revenue and employee payroll. In the early 1960s, elected officials like John F. Kennedy and Everett Dirksen correctly surmised that Percy, who was showing increased interest in policy, was going to make a career change. His first run for public office came in 1964, when he narrowly lost the Illinois gubernatorial election. In 1966 he was elected to the first of three terms in the U.S. Senate. Percy was a moderate Republican aligned with the liberal wing of the party, comprised of politicians such as Nelson Rockefeller. He proposed legislation — ultimately unsuccessful — to create low-income housing and better enable home ownership for low-income families. He introduced a bill to set the national maximum speed limit at 55 mph. The bill passed and was in effect from 1974 until 1995, with some alterations adopted in between. He had a reputation for working with Democrats and was respected on both sides of the aisle, with at least one notable exception.
Percy was among the first congressional Republicans intent on getting to the bottom of President Richard Nixon’s possible role in the Watergate burglary of June 1972. Percy balked at Nixon’s April 1973 announcement that he was giving new attorney general Elliot Richardson “absolute authority to make all decisions bearing upon the prosecution of the Watergate case and related matters.” Concerned that the president would unduly influence the process, Percy laid it out plainly to his Senate colleagues. “A simple and very basic question is at issue, ” he posited. “Should the executive branch investigate itself? I do not think so.” The Senate adopted the resolution drafted by Percy that pressed for the attorney general to appoint an independent special prosecutor. Less than three weeks later, Richardson announced he had selected former Solicitor General Archibald Cox to head the investigation. Dynamics changed. In 1970, Nixon had followed Percy’s recommendation to nominate his former college classmate, John Paul Stevens, to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Now, Nixon counted Percy among his enemies.
Of Percy’s four Senate campaigns, his first was unquestionably the most difficult, owing to a personal tragedy. On September 18, 1966, Percy’s “best precinct worker” — his 21-year-old daughter, Valerie — was slain in the family’s Kenilworth, Illinois, home. Around 5 o’clock that morning, Loraine Percy followed the sound of anguished groans and discovered a man bending over her stepdaughter’s blood-soaked bed. The intruder blinded the interrupting Mrs. Percy with a flashlight. Percy ran into her bedroom, woke her husband, and pressed a burglar alarm. The man fled the house, leaving behind young Valerie Percy’s battered body. He had bludgeoned the recent Cornell graduate and stabbed her 14 times. Both Charles Perry and his opponent, the soon-to-be-ousted incumbent Paul Douglas, suspended their campaigns for several weeks due to the travesty. No one was ever charged with Valerie Percy’s murder. Her remains were initially interred at Christ Episcopal Church in Winnetka, Illinois. They were exhumed and reinterred in Washington, D.C. in July 2008. Her niche is two steps below that of her father and stepmother. The niche between them was uninscribed and presumably vacant as of my March 2024 visit.
Fast Facts
Born: September 27, 1919 in Pensacola, Florida
Spouses: Jeanne Valerie Dickerson Percy (m. 1943-1947); Loraine Diane Guyer Percy (1950-2011)
Military Service: Lieutenant — U.S. Navy
Political Affiliation: Republican Party
Senate Tenure: 1967-1985
Died: September 17, 2011 in Washington, D.C.
Age: 91
Interment: Oak Hill Cemetery, Washington, D.C.
"One of the exciting things about the future, Mr. President, is that none of us can really prescribe what will happen to our lives."
- Charles H. Percy
1962, after a White House conversation about reciprocal-trade legislation, when President John F. Kennedy asked the then-businessman about his political intentions
Sources Consulted and Further Reading
Clymer, Adam. “Charles Percy, Former Ill. Senator, Is Dead at 91.” New York Times. September 17, 2011. https://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/18/us/politics/charles-percy-former-illinois-senator-is-dead-at-91.html?hp.
Hess, Stephen and David S. Broder. “The Available Mr. Percy.” The Atlantic. September 1967. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1967/09/the-available-mr-percy/660347/.
Naughton, James M. “Congress Pressing Drive For a Special Prosecutor.” New York Times. May 2, 1973. https://www.nytimes.com/1973/05/02/archives/congress-pressing-drive-for-a-special-prosecutor-drive-pushed-for.html.
Nixon, Richard M. “Nixon Watergate Speech, April 30, 1973.” From American Public Media. https://americanradioworks.publicradio.org/features/prestapes/rmn_watergate_speech.html.
TIME. “Illinois: Beyond Grief.” September 30, 1966. https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,836428,00.html.