Ralph Henderson Scott, Sr.

Ralph Henderson Scott, Sr. Image Source: Crawford, Charles. “Tar Heel of the Week - Ralph Scott: Senator from Alamance.” News and Observer. June 20, 1965. Sect. III, p. 2

In 1965, even before East Carolina achieved university status, the General Assembly approved a limited medical program for it with the stipulation that it be established in two years. When the latter failed to materialize, the General Assembly appropriated, in 1969, $375,000 for planning the program. The following year, ECU President Leo W. Jenkins called for an additional $2.6 million for a two-year curriculum. Instead, the 1971 General Assembly approved a one-year program with $1.4 million funding. Despite meager support, ECU opened its medical program in the fall of 1972 with a class of 20 students. That success revived its ambitions, prompting it to seek, in 1973, increased funding for an expanded two-year program, with the ultimate goal being a four-year school. At each step, East Carolina’s most effective backing emerged not from the N. C. Board of Higher Education nor, after 1971, the UNC Board of Governors, but instead from state legislators who realized, among other things, the political consequences of the medical school. Leading Democratic powerbrokers understood that if they were to retain support in the East, an expanded medical school for ECU was an absolute necessity. One of the most eminent legislative movers in the wrangling that resulted in funding for ECU’s expansion was the Democratic senator from Alamance County, Ralph Henderson Scott, Sr. In backing ECU’s ambitions both publicly and behind the scenes with a rare combination of humility and finesse, Scott emerged as one of ECU’s most pivotal and farsighted legislative friends.

A prominent dairyman from Alamance County and a member of the politically influential Scott family — his brother, William Kerr Scott was governor from 1949-1953, and his nephew, Robert W. “Bob” Scott, governor from 1969-1973 — Scott’s career in the General Assembly, from 1951-1980, included thirteen terms as state senator with his last decade and a half coinciding with East Carolina’s push to establish a medical school. ECU’s eventual success is often explained in terms of Pres. Leo Jenkins’ relentless fight to make the medical school a reality. While there is truth in that, Jenkins’ efforts would have come to naught without crucial assistance from powerbrokers in the General Assembly because in the end, ECU’s victory was a political one, achieved despite strong opposition from the UNC Board of Governors, then Gov. James Holshouser, and numerous politicos from the Piedmont and the western part of the state. Scott was from the Piedmont, but as a graduate of N. C. State University he was less beholden to the interests of Chapel Hill, then home of the state’s only publicly supported medical school. A staunch Democrat, Scott understood the medical and humanitarian reasons for supporting ECU’s push, but also the political fallout that would surely follow opposing it – eastern N. C. would likely defect to the Republican fold, further compromising Democratic dominance in state politics. Whatever his motivation, Scott emerged in the early 1970s as the most respected and powerful political operative, especially from outside the east, supporting ECU’s drive to grow its fledgling one-year curriculum into an expanded, more generously funded two-year program intent on becoming a four-year medical school.

When opponents of ECU’s one-year program sought to halt funding for it and thus stunt its growth if not relegate it to a slow demise, Scott partnered with state representative Carl Stewart, D-Gaston, co-chair along with Scott of the powerful Joint Appropriations Committee, to propose a biennial general appropriations bill that provided (1) funding of $15 million for construction of a medical sciences building at ECU, (2) an increase in the number of medical students, and (3) a two-year curriculum. Amendments stipulated that the new medical school focus on training family practitioners and make efforts to recruit minorities. Because these provisions were integral to the general appropriations bill sponsored by Scott and Stewart rather than a separate, surely controversial piece of legislation, expansion of ECU’s medical school was protected from virtually all attacks since the latter would have meant jeopardizing the appropriations bill as a whole. Scott’s shrewd move reflected political wisdom gained from his long years in the state senate as well as his determination to see the new medical school expanded without further, damaging political controversy.

Some claimed that the Scott-Stewart measure undermined the authority of the recently created UNC Board of Governors and its mission of providing comprehensive governance of the state-supported campuses of higher education. In response, Scott, who had earlier supported the establishment of the Board of Governors in 1971, argued instead that the board had failed “to respond to a public need, so the people turned to someone who would.” Scott added that if the General Assembly “doesn’t get behind” the proposed appropriations bill, “we could go away from here empty-handed. If we do that, everybody will be the loser – most of all the people of North Carolina.”

A year earlier, Scott had voiced unequivocal support for expanding the ECU medical school, arguing that if the UNC Board of Governors did not provide for expansion, it would force the hand of ECU supporters who would move the matter to the political arena where they would, given the popular backing for the proposal in the east, prevail. When the Board of Governors commissioned a team of experts to study the matter, Scott publicly advised the team that “We should go ahead and get a two-year medical school started at East Carolina, looking forward to a four-year school.” He added, “if they (ECU) do not have qualified professors, then the American Medical Association should see that they get them.” On another occasion Scott reportedly remarked, “What people don’t realize is that the Board of Governors is a creature of the legislature,” adding that “the feeling was that they [the board] weren’t following the will of the people for medical services. And being representatives of the people and voted on by the people, they expected us to take some actions of some kind. … [the compromise bill] gives them [the Board of Governors] an understanding that we wanted it done.”

Following Scott’s advice, in November of 1973, UNC President William C. “Bill” Friday, who had earlier opposed creation of a medical school at ECU, recommended to the Board of Governors that it authorize a four-year medical school at ECU with its own 200-bed teaching hospital, estimating that such an upgrade would cost an additional $35 million. Scott’s response was that while full funding in the 1975-77 biennial budget “could be a problem,” he added that the Board’s new thinking “is smart all around, politically and because of the needs of the people.”

Scott had been one of the legislative founders of the UNC Board of Governors, established just fifteen months prior to the ECU expansion controversy, but when he saw the board neglecting the medical needs of the people and ignoring the strong support easterners had for the medical school, he used his considerable clout as co-chair of the Joint Appropriations Committee to see that expansion was funded, in effect deciding the matter with a budget line. In doing so, Scott proved to be one of the most crucial and decisive friends of ECU and its growing program in medical education.

Sources:

• Aulis, Jack. “Med School Issue Dominates, Colors 1974 Assembly.” News and Observer. Feb. 15, 1974. P. 29.
• Christensen, Rob. “’Uncle Ralph’ ready for action.” News and Observer. Jan. 7, 1979. Sect. IV, p. 1.
• Christensen, Rob. The Rise and Fall of the Branchhead Boys: North Carolina’s Scott Family and the Era of Progressive Politics (University of North Carolina Press, 2019).
• Covington, Howard. “Scott Backs 1-Year Med School At ECU.” Charlotte Observer. May 12, 1971. P. 1.
• Crawford, Charles. “Tar Heel of the Week – Ralph Scott: Senator from Alamance.” News and Observer. June 20, 1965. Sect. III, p. 2.
• “ECU Med School Backers Playing N.C. Cards Close.” The State (Columbia, South Carolina). March 5, 1973. 7B.
• “ECU Med School Gets Major Prod.” High Point Enterprise. Feb. 26, 1974. P. 1.
• Guillory, Ferrel. “Assembly OK Seen for Med School.” News and Observer. Nov. 12, 1974. Pp. 1, 6.
• Jablow, Paul. “ECU Med School Issue Left Dangling.” Charlotte Observer. Sept. 19, 1970. P. 1.
• Kirby, Russell. “Senator Kirby Will Support ECU Med School Expansion.” Nashville Graphic. Jan. 15, 1974. P. 1.
• Marlowe, Gene. “ECU Seeks Funds For Med School.” News and Observer. Sept. 15, 1970. P. 1,2.
• McBride Bill. “ECU Issue Splits County Solons.” Burlington Daily Times-News. March 31, 1973. P. B1.
• McBride, Bill. “Scott Says ECU Bill A Guide.” Burlington Daily Times-News. Feb. 27, 1974. B1.
• “North Carolina Agricultural Hall of Fame: Ralph Henderson Scott, Sr. 1903-1989.” North Carolina Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. https://www.ncagr.gov/paffairs/aghall/rscott.htm
• Powell, William S. “Scott, Ralph Henderson.” NCPedia. From Dictionary of North Carolina Biography, 6 volumes, edited by William S. Powell (University of North Carolina Press, 1979-1996).
• “Scott Urges Flexibility on Issue.” News and Observer. Feb. 22, 1974. P. 6.
• Sitton, Claude. “ECU Issue Getting Too Hot to Handle.” News and Observer. Feb. 10, 1974. P. 80.
• Wayne, Leslie. “ECU Expansion OKd by Panel.” News and Observer. Feb. 27, 1974. Pp. 1,12.
• Wayne, Leslie. “ECU Med School Opens.” News and Observer. Sept. 7, 1972. P. 1.

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