Byrd tapped as next House speaker

The Plant City Republican will take over in 2002 if the GOP keeps a majority in the House.

By ALISA ULFERTS

© St. Petersburg Times,
published October 10, 2001

TALLAHASSEE -- State Rep. Johnnie B. Byrd Jr. unanimously won his bid Tuesday to become the Florida Legislature's next speaker of the House.

The 50-year-old Plant City Republican will assume that title in 2002 if he and a majority of Republicans are re-elected in November of that year. Republicans currently hold a 77-43 majority.

Byrd is the fourth consecutive conservative Republican chosen as speaker, following Daniel Webster, now in the state Senate, John Thrasher and Tom Feeney, the current speaker.

Feeney was among the leading Republicans who backed other GOP candidates in 1996 when Byrd finished second in a four-way primary and then captured the party nomination in a runoff. Republicans gained control of the House that year after more than a century in the minority.

"You forgave me very quickly and became one of the most loyal soldiers in the House," Feeney said.

Under Thrasher and Feeney, the House has largely followed Gov. Jeb Bush's agenda, and Byrd's ascension isn't likely to change that pattern.

Byrd promised "good old-fashioned Republican leadership" before heading off to a strawberry shortcake social at the Capitol. Byrd's district includes Plant City, the self-declared strawberry capital of the world.

Bush told lawmakers that the highest compliment one Republican can pay to another is to compare him or her to President Abraham Lincoln.

"Johnnie Byrd reminds me of Lincoln," Bush said.

Byrd's nature, leadership and way of dealing with others evokes thoughts of Republicans' favorite president, Bush added.

Byrd, an attorney, is chairman of the House Procedural and Redistricting Council and was a member of the education reorganization task force that led to revolutionary changes in the state's governance of schools.

A native of Brewton, Ala., he earned a business degree from Auburn University and a law degree from the University of Alabama. He moved to Florida in 1987.

-- Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.

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