WASHINGTON (Reuters) — With fond words and solemn pageantry, a grieving U.S. capital said farewell Wednesday to Commerce Secretary Ron Brown, whose death robbed America of a key black leader and President Clinton of a vital ally.
Clinton, smiling but puffy-eyed with an occasional break in his voice, led a final tribute to Brown sparkling with lighthearted remembrance and filled with the kind of military pomp and ceremony reserved for national heroes. Eulogizing his departed friend and political adviser at an Episcopal funeral rite at Washington National Cathedral, the president called Brown a "trailblazer, a builder, a patriot. He lived a truly American life. He lived his life for America, and when the time came, found himself laying down his life for America," Clinton said, his wife Hillary and daughter Chelsea listening attentively in a front-row pew.
Brown and 32 other Americans were killed last Wednesday when their U.S. military passenger jet slammed into a mountain ridge while trying to land in Dubrovnik, Croatia, in gusty winds and blinding rain. The group, which included a dozen U.S. business leaders, was in the war-shattered former Yugoslavia to explore opportunities for investment in reconstruction projects.
"Ron Brown's incredible life brought us all joy in the morning,'' Clinton told a crowd of mourners that included the entire top echelon of the White House and the cabinet and such other prominent political figures as Colin Powell, the retired army general who once led the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff. After reminiscing affectionately about Brown's love of politics, sports and stylish clothing, Clinton addressed "one last word to my friend. Thank you. If it weren't for you, I wouldn't be here," he said, gesturing toward the casket.
That acknowledged his debt to Brown, a former Democratic Party chief, for helping him capture the White House in 1992. Members of Congress and the Supreme Court also attended the funeral service for Brown, a genial mover-and-shaker who championed an assertive U.S. world trade policy. Rev. Nathan Baxter, dean of the cathedral, conducted the service and Brown's son, Michael, and Eastman Kodak chief George Fisher also spoke.
Michael Brown added his own light touch to the farewells by recalling that his father had been remembered at a memorial Tuesday night as "smooth like a swan" and "graceful under pressure," Michael said he found himself thinking: "Wait a minute. These people never played golf with him!"
Santita Jackson, daughter of civil rights advocate Jesse Jackson, sang a black spiritual and the gospel hymn "Amazing Grace," and trumpeter Wynton Marsalis offered an instrumental tribute before a hushed congregation in the cavernous church.
After the early afternoon memorial, a funeral procession symbolically retraced Brown's life by wending its way through a black urban neighborhood and the heart of official Washington before reaching Arlington National Cemetery. Brown, an Army captain in the 1960s who grew up in Harlem in New York and rose to the heights of U.S. political life, was buried on a cemetery hillside alongside many of America's most illustrious citizens.
His widow Alma, the Clintons and other friends each placed a single lily on Brown's mahogany casket before interment. The president, looking distraught, gently touched a corner of the casket in a parting gesture.
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