Richard Carling: The Political Running Machine

By Greg Jarrard

            After spending nearly a quarter of a century in the Legislature, first as a state representative and then as a state senator, Richard Carling is still asked if he would ever consider running again.

            His reply is always the same: “I do it every day.”

            At 69, the Republican ex-senator follows the same routine he did while representing the east side of Salt Lake City. He ties on his running shoes and puts in nine or ten miles at noon instead of picking at a filet in the Alta Club with a lobbyist or old political crony. While other ex-politicians his age count liver spots, he counts miles. While they’re reading Modern Maturity, he reads STOP signs and checks for traffic.

            A self-confessed Type A personality, Carling began his political career fresh out of the U. of U. law school.  Married five years and newly minted as a practicing attorney, he was recruited to run in a central Salt Lake district that was as Democratic in 1966 as it is today. But being the driven man he is, Carling outworked his opponent and won by 200 votes. “I wasn’t just going to be a sacrificial lamb; I was in the race to win,” he says 40 years later.

In 1968, the margin was 100 votes as the Democrats in his district came to realize their man was gone. Two years after that, the margin had shrunk to 17 votes.

            It was time to move — to make room for three small children (at that time)  and run in a more Republican east side district (in the Oak Hills area where he currently resides), first for the House and two years later for the State Senate. When he was first elected, he had no children; when he finally retired from the Senate in 1990, all four of his children were old enough to vote from him, although he admits he doesn’t know if they did or not. In all, he was elected to the House four times and to the Senate four times — add it up: it’s 24 years of service in the state Legislature.

            Over the years, Carling has had plenty of opportunity to reflect on how things were and how they’ve changed.

            According to Carling, those changes are not necessarily good.

            “The political climate today, especially nationally in the Congress, is so partisan and so divisive, it’s surprising anything gets done.”

            He prides himself on working well with Democrats and finding common ground. In fact, he not only works with Democrats, he runs with them, most notably ex-mayor of Salt Lake City and party icon, Ted Wilson.

Carling explains how that all came about:

            “It was 1977, and my wife Diane had been worried that I was so stressed and told me I needed to find some way to relax. She was right; during that legislative session I became quite sick and was taken off the floor of the Senate. I feared I might be having a heart attack. The doctors reassured us that it was just stress, but if I didn’t do something soon, I might experience a real heart attack. That was enough to scare me into action.

            “Shortly after that, I joined the Deseret Gym and began using the two-hour legislative lunch hour to run, much to the chagrin of lobbyists who understood they would only get about 10 minutes before I left for my run, unless they put on their running shoes and joined me. A couple did try, like Frank Pignanelli, who would run for a short while as he made his pitch and then drop out (I accused him of not being able to go the distance). About the same time,

            Mayor Ted Wilson was running around town and pretty soon we were a political odd couple, a Republican-Democrat two-some. That was how it all started, and I haven’t stopped (Ted, however, has been slowed by back problems).”

            A year later, Carling became a legitimate marathon runner when he ran in the Golden Spike race in Brigham City where he finished in the top three for his age. That same year, he and Ted ran in the Deseret News marathon — Carling beat his Democrat running mate (they are the same age). On hand was a Dr. Jack Scaff, director of the Honolulu marathon who invited the political odd couple to run in the Honolulu marathon and enlist their Republican and Democrat counterparts in Hawaii to join them. Scaff assumed that if opponents can run together, maybe they could actually get along. Carling believes there is something to that.

            “Running really helped me health-wise…During the two-hour lunch break, I would run up City Creek canyon, shower and be back on the floor. I lost weight, reduced my stress, my productivity went up and so did my income. In the ensuing years, we would add places like Boston and Honolulu to our vacation list so I could catch a marathon. And I got along great with my running mate Ted, even though we didn’t agree on a lot of political issues…

            “I also had a great relationship with legislators on both sides of the aisle, Democrats as well as Republicans; we didn’t have bitter political fights in those days. I had great respect and admiration for all my colleagues.”

            That was something that the folks running the Honolulu marathon wanted imported to their island paradise. And so Carling and Wilson became Utah’s ambassadors of goodwill. The ex-senator has run in the event for 28 years now — and 29 times in the Boston marathon. And later in another race, Carling discovered that he had been nominated to be the Master of the Marathon for the 11 western states; Ted Wilson was the one who nominated him.

Carling is also concerned about the poison of overly partisan politics seeping into Utah and the nation as well as the self-interest of people in public life.

            “I am concerned about the divisiveness of the upcoming votes on splitting our local school districts. And I worry about the lack of the spirit of public service. What’s happened to public service? When I first came into the Legislature, we were paid $5 a day! Yes, people need to be compensated, but we still need to give things back,” he insists.

            Carling practices what he preaches. He volunteers for two causes near and dear to him: Primary Childrens Medical Center and the Utah Highway Patrol. He serves on the volunteer boards of both organizations (he is a former chairman of the Highway Patrol’s Honorary Colonel’s Association).

            Looking back at his quarter-century of public service, he takes pride in his role as both chairman of the Higher Education Appropriations committee and chairman of the Business and Economic Development Committee.

“Remember, during my days in the Legislature, it wasn’t so much Republican vs. Democrat as it was Salt Lake vs. the rest of the state. And the University of Utah took much of the brunt of that. I worked hard to protect the university’s budget and helped maintain the quality of education at that institution,” he says.

            Another achievement that Carling points to is his revamping of Utah’s liquor laws, always a bone of contention with just about everybody.

            “Senate President Arnold Christensen asked me to author the bill. I told him I would chair the task force but only if it were nonpartisan. My job was to steer a middle road between control and availability while solving a serious legal and political problem. We sat and listened in hearings for two years. When we were near the end of the process, we had no opposition from the LDS Church and the consumer groups. I recall the folks at the restaurant association asking, ‘How’s our bill coming.’ That’s when I knew we had achieved an important compromise and a working agreement. My work with the Highway Patrol helped me ensure we wouldn’t do anything to increase the incidence of DUIs.”

            After he left the Senate in 1990, Carling was appointed as chairman of the Utah Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice, first by Gov. Norm Bangerter and then reappointed by Gov. Mike Leavitt. After that, Carling  served as the vice-chairman of the ethics committee of the Salt Lake Olympic Committee.

            And today at 69, he still goes to his law office, day in and day out. He took the Utah Bar exam in 1965 right after graduation and immediately painted his name on the door and was open for business. Over the years, he has associated with other attorneys, including former GOP activist Kent Shearer, but still maintained his independence and fought for his clients.

            Meanwhile, he has been running and running and running.

            His best time in a marathon was 2:33:21 which he ran in 1982 — to date, he has completed 120 of the events. Another honor he cherishes is being inducted into the Utah Summer Games Hall of Honor. In 1993, he was selected as the Mastercard Master of the Marathon for Utah and 11 western states, and in 2001, he was named Wheaties Energy Crunch Everyday Champion for the State of Utah.

            So, will you see ex-senator Richard Carling’s face on a Wheaties box anytime soon?

Probably not, unless they award one for 40+ years of public service while running without tiring, slowing down, whining or expecting a pot of gold.

            They could call it the Richard Carling Award.

            And the Republican from Salt Lake City would have earned it.

Greg Jarrard is a veteran ad man, writer and publisher best known for running paid ad campaigns for Republican candidates. His recent book, "A Jack Mormon's Travel Guide," is available at Deseret Book. He resides in South Jordan where he digs weeds and claims it is a garden.