Bill Pope

News Obituary Article

ATLANTA: Bill Pope, political campaign strategist

By KAY POWELL

Bill Pope knew what people would vote for and managed successful political campaigns in Georgia for 30 years.

"He was a behind-the-scenes kingmaker," said Mary Anne Summers of Decatur. She worked with Mr. Pope in the first campaign of five-term U.S. Rep. Elliott Levitas in 1974.

"He just had an uncanny knack for knowing what people would vote for," said Mrs. Summers, Mr. Levitas' campaign manager and congressional administrative assistant. "He was a newspaper man by trade and just kept his finger on the pulse of the public."

Syndicated political columnist Bill Shipp of Acworth covered the campaigns of Mr. Pope's candidates, including Jimmy Carter's successful second run for governor in 1970. "Pope was the opposition research guy," said Mr. Shipp. "He was just intuitively good and super sharp."

As a political consultant, Mr. Pope summed up his work as judging the judges, the judges being the voters, said his wife, Sandra Pope of Atlanta.

William Baker Pope, 71, died of complications from lung cancer Friday at his Atlanta residence. The body was cremated. Memorial service plans will be announced by Cremation Society of the South.

Mr. Pope was an editor and writer for The Atlanta Constitution before leaving journalism for a career in public relations and political campaigns. He was consultant on his last campaign in the 1990s, David Poythress' run for labor commissioner, said his wife.

A 1974 Atlanta Constitution article said Mr. Pope was "the professional political strategist for hire who helped engineer successful campaigns for Gov. Jimmy Carter and U.S. Sen. Sam Nunn, both of whom fought uphill battles as relatively obscure candidates."

"He combined both communication skills and political instincts," said Mr. Levitas. "He was able to take ideas and put them into easily understandable messages for the public.

"He also was someone you did not need to take care of. I could say, 'Bill, this is what I need, go out and do it.' And he would come back with a product or a laundry list of ways to accomplish it.

"Bill was very much a loner and worked best on his own. He was an excellent inside politician, and he would tell you he was not a good outside politician."

"He was a scrappy old bird. He was good company, if he liked you," Mrs. Summers said. "If he didn't like you, he didn't mind telling you. He didn't suffer fools lightly. He was just one of a kind."

Most of his campaigns were successful, his wife said. "This is a guesstimate, but it was pretty much like 90-10 or 85-15 won-loss, somewhere in there," she said.

"Pope was a very intellectual guy and very entertaining," said Mr. Shipp.

Survivors include a daughter, Juliette Pope of New York City; a son, Andrew Pope of Cambodia; and a half sister, Helen Garfield of Boulder, Colo.

© 2004 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution