When former Rep. David Lee Hobson, R-Ohio, died Oct. 6 — 11 days before his 88th birthday — he was barely recalled by anyone beyond his constituents and colleagues in both the Ohio Senate and later Congress.
Hobson, a soft-spoken lawyer and commercial real estate broker, never sought nor received much publicity. In an era when politicians increasingly coveted the "blow-dried look," and often won nominations by raising big money or spending their own, Hobson came up through GOP ranks and was finally tapped for the state Senate at age 46 when then-State Sen. Mike DeWine, who is now governor, ran for Congress in 1982.
Democrats and Republicans alike in Columbus came to like him.
"Dave Hobson was an old school Republican who would work with anyone when he was in Columbus or Washington," a former top aide to an Ohio Senator recalled to Newsmax. "He was a tough negotiator but would gladly spend time socially with political foes when the business of the day was done. "
To the surprise of no one, Hobson was elected majority whip and Senate president pro tempore.
When friend DeWine left Congress to run for lieutenant governor in 1990, Hobson was the obvious choice of the Republican organization to succeed him. He had virtually no trouble at the polls right up to his retirement in 2018.
With a lifetime American Conservative Union rating of 79.78%, the Buckeye State lawmaker was considered a moderate-to-conservative Republican. He did join the centrist Republican Main Street Partnership. He had a particular passion for improved healthcare, a balanced budget, and government involvement in revitalizing the economies of factory towns that had grown moribund with the decline of the manufacturing industry.
"Dave was one of the best of my 'Cardinals,'" former House Appropriations Committee Chair Bob Livingston, R-La., said, using the term commonly used to describe Appropriations subcommittee chairs, "On the Energy and Water Development Subcommittee, he would always be finding problems to the infrastructure and water supply that could lead to real trouble and then ways to deal with them."
Former Rep. Melissa Hart, R-Pa., hailed Hobson because "he taught us how to work together."
It was no surprise to any of his onetime colleagues that Hobson was on the House Budget Committee in 1997, when a balanced budget was crafted, enacted by a Republican-controlled Congress, and signed into law by Democrat President Bill Clinton.
His father, a postal worker, died when Dave was in the 8th grade, He and his three sisters were raised by their teacher mother and her sister-in-law. After graduation from Ohio Wesleyan University and the Ohio State University College of Law, Hobson practiced law and then moved to Springfield, Ohio, to engage in commercial real estate.
He also served in the Ohio National Guard from 1958-63 and was called to active duty during the Berlin Wall crisis in 1961. The young Hobson met wife Carolyn when they were undergraduates at Ohio Wesleyan and, throughout 65 years of marriage, the adjective most often used by friends to describe them was "inseparable."
"I think he wanted to do things that mattered," DeWine said of Hobson. "He wanted to get things done."
One example of that was cited by Franklin County (Columbus) GOP Chair Doug Preisse. Recalling his days as a staffer in the Ohio legislature during the late 1980s, Priesse told Newsmax that "before it was 'popular,' and well before it was 'OK' for a Republican leader, Dave wrote the state's first legislation dealing with AIDS/HIV.
"I loved Ronald Reagan. But in those days, he did not lead in these issues. Dave Hobson did. He was a conservative member who recognized the issue and he addressed it in Ohio. I didn't recognize I was a conservative gay Republican then. But I knew it made a difference."
John Gizzi is chief political columnist and White House correspondent for Newsmax. For more of his reports, Go Here Now.
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