52 Facts About Dick Molpus

Dick Molpus unsuccessfully ran for governor in 1995 against Republican incumbent Kirk Fordice.

Dick Molpus lobbied on the governor's behalf for education reform in the state legislature.

Dick Molpus successfully ran for secretary of state in 1983, campaigning on his managerial experience and promises to reform the office.

Dick Molpus oversaw the digitization of the office's records, the renegotiation of thousands of leases on public lands to raise money for public education, reformed the state's election laws, and sought reforms in corporate law and lobbying rules.

Dick Molpus unsuccessfully ran for US Senate in 1988, losing the Democratic nomination to Wayne Dowdy and accruing the third highest campaign debt for any senatorial candidate nationwide.

Dick Molpus started a timberland investment management organization in 1996 and was appointed to the United States Endowment for Forestry and Communities in 2006.

Dick Molpus graduated from Philadelphia High School in 1967, and from the University of Mississippi with a Bachelor of Business Administration degree in 1971.

Dick Molpus married Sally Galbraith Nash, with whom he had two children, in 1971.

Dick Molpus began working for the company at a young age.

Dick Molpus returned to work for the company after graduating from college, assuming temporary control after his father suffered a stroke.

Dick Molpus rose to the position of vice president for manufacturing and oversaw the establishment of a second lumber facility in Morton in 1975.

Dick Molpus served on the board of directors and executive committee of the Mississippi Forestry Association, vice-president of the Mississippi Lumber Manufacturers Association, and on the board of directors of the Morton chamber of commerce.

Dick Molpus co-chaired a blue ribbon highway study committee during Governor Bill Waller's tenure.

Dick Molpus volunteered for Winter's 1975 campaign and for his successful 1979 gubernatorial campaign.

Dick Molpus's father was one of Winter's leading supporters during the 1967 and 1975 elections, but later supported Republican nominee Gil Carmichael in the 1975 election and Jim Herring in the 1979 Democratic primary.

Dick Molpus was Winter's first announced appointee when he was selected as executive director of the Governor's Office of Federal-State Programs, on November 15,1979.

Dick Molpus helped Winter lobby the Mississippi State Legislature to pass the 1982 Education Reform Act, hosting the governor's staff at a cabin he owned for strategy sessions, delivering over 35 speeches to build public support for the bill, and organizing a phone call campaign to pressure a state senator to support the creation of public kindergartens.

Dick Molpus was considered a candidate to succeed Pittman and he considered running for either secretary of state or public service commissioner from the Central District.

Dick Molpus announced his resignation from Winter's administration effective May 9, and launched his campaign for secretary of state on May 16,1983.

Dick Molpus was the second member of Winter's staff to run for statewide office after Mabus announced his campaign for state auditor.

Dick Molpus announced that he would seek reelection on May 5,1987, and won in the election.

Dick Molpus announced his campaign on January 11,1991, and facing no opposition in the primary or general elections was elected unopposed.

Dick Molpus wanted to shift the focus of the secretary of state from clerical and administrative duties to handling education, public lands, securities, and elections.

Dick Molpus supported Steve Patterson's bid for the chairmanship of the Mississippi Democratic Party in 1984.

Dick Molpus endorsed Mike Espy during his campaign for a seat in the United States House of Representatives during the 1986 election and Epsy's victory made him the first black person to represent Mississippi in the United States Congress since the Reconstruction era.

Dick Molpus endorsed Bill Clinton during the 1992 Democratic presidential primaries and was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention.

Dick Molpus was elected to the board of officers of the National Association of Secretaries of State, being the only Southerner on the board and became its secretary in 1987, its treasurer in 1988, its vice-president in 1989, and was selected as its president in 1993.

Dick Molpus was succeeded by Eric Clark at the secretariat of state on January 4,1996.

Dick Molpus convinced the legislature to raise the office's filing and brokerage fees to the Southeastern average rates in 1985, switching the office's source of money from the state general fund to a special self-generated fund.

Dick Molpus oversaw a $4 million effort in automating the office's processes with technology and digitizing its records.

Dick Molpus appointed a 29-person Business Law Reform Task Force in 1986 to lobby for revisions of laws pertaining to corporations, nonprofit organizations, limited parties, and securities.

Dick Molpus withdrew the lawsuit a few months later due to a jurisdictional error.

Dick Molpus co-founded Parents for Public Schools, a group which sought to promote the improvement of public schools, in 1989.

Dick Molpus proposed election reforms which would eliminate the dual voter registration law that required voters to register at the city and county levels, allow circuit clerks to accept voter registration outside of county courthouses, and end runoff elections.

Dick Molpus oversaw the 1984 presidential election in the state which was the first time that voters directly voted for the presidential candidates rather than their electors.

Dick Molpus successfully pushed for the legislature to reform lobbyist laws to require lobbyists to report all money spent on public officials.

Dick Molpus announced a twenty-five member task force on June 19,1984, to review Mississippi's election laws and recommend improvements.

Dick Molpus supported the revival of state ballot initiatives in 1992.

Dick Molpus announced his campaign for the Democratic senatorial nomination on December 1,1987, with Crews, who worked as Winter's press secretary, as his campaign manager.

Dick Molpus was criticized for running for another office as he was reelected in 1987.

Dick Molpus faced US Representative Wayne Dowdy in the primary.

Dick Molpus ended his campaign with the third highest debt for any 1988 senatorial candidate in the country at $356,700.

Dick Molpus sought to prevail with a coalition of blacks, white progressives, and possibly white blue collar workers.

Dick Molpus argued that such a scheme would undermine public schools.

Dick Molpus hoped to leverage the incident to his advantage by appealing to more women voters, presenting himself as a gentlemen acting in defense of his wife's honor.

Dick Molpus earned only 364,210 votes, though he received about 25,000 more votes than Democrat Mabus had in 1991.

Dick Molpus garnered less than 20 percent of the white vote while Fordice won fifty-one of the fifty-eight majority white counties, but won twenty-one of the state's twenty-four majority black counties.

Dick Molpus' supporters accused Fordice of prevailing due to the use of racist dog whistles.

Dick Molpus acquired its first client the following year and purchased several thousand acres of timberland.

Dick Molpus was declared one of the Mississippi Center for Justice's "Champions of Justice" in 2008.

Dick Molpus was shocked by the insinuation, and received numerous emails and phone calls from associates who felt he had been portrayed unfairly.

Dick Molpus supported Doug Jones in Alabama's 2017 US Senate special election, stating that he was a "Southern hero".