Remembering the legendary C. Boyden Gray

I lost a dear mentor and unconditionally loyal friend Sunday, May 21, when C. Boyden Gray departed to become a bright ornament in the heavens at the age of 80. But the United States lost a national treasure more valuable than Fort Knox. 

I regularly dined with Boyden for over two decades. He poured forth with wisdom, erudition, encouragement and guidance like the Nile overflowing its banks. To the extent I have succeeded, it’s because I followed Boyden’s instruction. He was that unerring.

Boyden was a humble man, but he had little to be humble about. He was in the top tier of the nation’s premier lawyers. He served as counsel to Vice President George H.W. Bush for eight years, followed by four years as White House counsel to President Bush. Boyden sat at the center of power in the White House for 12 successive years, a record destined to live longer than Barry Bond’s 762 career home runs. 

With the brilliance of Toscanini conducting an orchestra, Boyden navigated the 1991 Civil Rights Act through the extremes of Scylla and Charybdis, landing at an Aristotelian mean.

He was the quiet force that navigated and pushed conservative justices on the Supreme Court. Boyden convinced President Bush in June 1991 to nominate Circuit Judge Clarence Thomas to the high court.

He served as ambassador to the European Union under President George W. Bush and later special envoy to Europe for Eurasian Energy. Boyden was the very definition of a polymath, bettering the instruction of his illustrious father, Gordon Gray, national security advisor to President Dwight D. Eisenhower. 

No one surpassed Boyden in assailing the economic albatross created by the omnipresent administrative state via Congress delegating legislative authority to unaccountable bureaucrats eager to create regulatory moats for their expected future employers — the revolving door taken to a new level. Boyden’s persistence in challenging the constitutionality of the sprawling administrative state is poised to be vindicated by the Supreme Court if it overrules the “Chevron doctrine.” It is unfortunate that Boyden will not be around to run victory laps. 

The profusion of superlatives that describe Boyden shroud his greatest trait, which should transform him from a hero to a legend: heartfelt decency and concern for everyone he encountered or befriended. 

Martin Luther King, Jr. dreamed “that one day my four little children will live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” C. Boyden Gray labored every day towards that glorious end. I was a prime beneficiary.

Armstrong Williams (@ARightSide) is the owner and manager of Howard Stirk Holdings I & II Broadcast Television Stations and the 2016 Multicultural Media Broadcast Owner of the Year. He is the author of “Reawakening Virtues.”