by Patrick E. Gauen

When I looked in on Mike Lawrence recently, he had a sore throat. It seemed fitting, given the sore throats he caused among reporters who tried to imitate his distinctive nasal voice. It was a generally good-hearted reaction to a colleague who had "crossed over."

It has been 13 years since Mike, the hard-nosed capital reporter, morphed into Mike the hard-skinned press secretary. And three years have passed since he departed from the side of Gov. Jim Edgar ("the only politician I think I could ever work for and be comfortable") for the more abstract world of teaching and think-tankery at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale.

There, he and former U.S. Sen. Paul Simon mold student minds and proselytize political reform in a squat, large-windowed office building that once housed the campus Forestry Department. It was the incubator for recent campaign finance reform in Illinois; it is in the early stages of nurturing parole reform.

For Mike, 57, who began newspapering as a teenager working unpaid summers at his hometown Galesburg Register-Mail to be "near the action" — and who helped Edgar through years of crises, both budgetary and coronary — the new gig is a comfortable blend of public service at a gentler pace. Since he's had sometime to measure this third career, I asked him to reflect on the transitions.

"Newspapering was like being paid to have fun," he said. "I always said that if it stopped being fun, I'd quit." It did, and he did.

This split-ticket voter who spoke for a moderate Republican governor signed up to join a social liberal Democrat to seek public policy solutions.

He had risen by age 29 to managing editor at the Register-Mail. Bored in a bog of personnel issues, he retreated to reporting, eventually becoming the contented chief of the Lee newspaper chain's bureau in Springfield and mentor to a legion of interns and others who admired his tough reporting and wide following. (His column was syndicated to 50 papers.) But a step up to the Chicago SunTimes capital office turned out to be a stumble. Pushed to match wire service stories at the expense of original reporting, Mike explained, "I just burned out."

Secretary of State Edgar, already eyeing the Executive Mansion, had unsuccessfully beckoned Mike in 1985; in 1987, Mike found Edgar still willing. By 1991, he was press secretary and senior adviser to a teetotaling, starched governor who never achieved much comfort with the meddling, sometimes scruffy press. Mike was a little uneasy, too.

"I don't think I was ever as comfortable with promotion as I should have been in that position," he told me. "I'm not a huckster. I'm very direct. I don't have a high tolerance for b.s." But he believed it was honest work to advocate policies for a governor he liked and trusted. "I never lied to journalists," he said. "I don't believe I ever misled a journalist. But there were times when I couldn't tell the whole story and be professional."

He figured he owed Edgar both candor and loyalty. "Once a decision is made, unless it's immoral, illegal or improper, the members of the governor's staff should speak for that policy," Mike explained. In case a decision did happen to be immoral, illegal or improper, he kept an emergency nest egg to make it easier to resign on principle. He never needed it. Their only public disagreement was over Edgar's plan to put an extra levy on cigarettes and call it a "fee" instead of a "tax increase." Mike didn't reveal their dispute; Edgar did.

A restless Mike cut his government tenure short in 1997. This split-ticket voter who spoke for a moderate Republican governor signed up to join social liberal Democrat Simon in the Institute for Public Policy at SIUC. He still finds it rewarding work, seeking bipartisan policy solutions and sharing his extensive experiences by teaching journalism.

Mike hasn't decided if this will be the capstone or a stepping stone on his career trail. One thing he absolutely rules out: seeking elective office. "I'd be a terrible campaigner," explained the guy who apparently wearied from years of holding his tongue. "I'm too blunt." 

Patrick E. Gauen writes an Illinois column for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Illinois Issues March 2000 / 45