C. BOYDEN GRAY, R.I.P.:  Yesterday, Boyden Gray–best known as George H.W. Bush’s White House Counsel–died at the age of 80 of heart failure.   He will be remembered, among other things, for his successful efforts to win Senate confirmation for Bush’s Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas.

The first time I laid eyes on Boyden Gray, I had to love him.  It was at a Federalist Society event at the Mayflower Hotel in the late 1990s.  I don’t recall what the panel discussion had been about.  What I remember is the question-and-answer period.  Two celebrity lawyers lined up at the microphone along with several rank-and-file Federalist Society members.  The first was a well known federal judge who shall go nameless.  The guy just couldn’t resist making sure everybody knew he was a big shot and seemed to assume that he would be adored for it.  He asked a snarky and ultimately pointless question.  Later in line came Boyden Gray–at the time at least as well known as the judge and probably a little more so.  He mumbled his name and identified himself as “a lawyer in Washington.”  His question was gentle and insightful.  If you didn’t know better, you might have thought Boyden Gray was just another Washington lawyer, practicing his craft in relative obscurity.  But most of the people in the room did know better.   That’s why it was so endearing.  A quarter of a century later I still remember it fondly.