|
 His death came on the day his eldest son, Andrew Cuomo, delivered
inaugural addresses in Manhattan and Buffalo, New York, after being
sworn in for his own second term as governor.
The governor's office said in a statement the elder Cuomo, who
served as New York's 52nd chief executive from 1983 through 1994,
had died of "natural causes due to heart failure this evening at
home with his loving family at his side."
The former governor, long a celebrated orator who was a favorite of
the Democratic Party's progressive contingent, was hospitalized on
Nov. 30 for treatment of a heart condition.
His younger son, Chris Cuomo, of CNN's "New Day," informed the
network shortly before 5 p.m. Thursday that his father had died, CNN
reported. During that time Andrew Cuomo was speaking at the Erie and
Buffalo County Historical Society.
In his inauguration address on Thursday, Andrew Cuomo said he had
read his speech to his father the night before.
 “He said it was good, especially for a second termer,” the younger
Cuomo said. “He couldn’t be here physically today, my father. But my
father is in this room. He is in the heart and mind of every person
who is here."
President Barack Obama, in a statement issued from Hawaii where he
was vacationing, saluted the former governor as "an unflinching
voice for tolerance, inclusiveness, fairness, dignity and
opportunity."
White House spokesman Eric Schultz said Obama called Andrew Cuomo by
telephone to extend condolences.
Former U.S. President Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton, a U.S.
senator who went on to serve as Secretary of State during the Obama
administration, said: "It was Mario Cuomo's great gift and our good
fortune that he was both a sterling orator and a passionate public
servant. His life was a blessing."
"Mario's life was the very embodiment of the American dream," the
Clintons said in a joint statement.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio remembered Cuomo as "a man who
campaigned with poetry and governed with beautiful prose."
CHALLENGED 'SHINING CITY'
Mario Cuomo was first elected as governor in 1982 and came to
national attention two years later when he gave an electrifying
keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in San
Francisco, criticizing the policies of then-President Ronald Reagan
and challenged Reagan's metaphor likening America to a "shining city
on a hill."
Cuomo countered by saying, "A shining city is perhaps all the
president sees from the portico of the White House and the veranda
of his ranch, where everyone seems to be doing well.
 "But there's another city; there's another part to the shining city;
the part where some people can't pay their mortgages, and most young
people can't afford one; where students can't afford the education
they need, and middle-class parents watch the dreams they hold for
their children evaporate."
His speech defining Republicans as looking out only for the well-off
and Democrats as champions of the middle class and the poor
propelled Cuomo to the forefront of the party leadership.
After easily winning re-election to a second term as governor, Cuomo
was the apparent front-runner for the 1988 Democratic presidential
nomination.
But the filing deadline came and went, and Cuomo's reputation as a
reticent, Hamlet-like figure began to grow.
[to top of second column] |
A similar scenario came about in 1992 with Cuomo again the focus of
Democratic presidential anticipation. But he said state budget
problems needed his attention and declined to run again. ITALIAN
ROOTS
Mario Matthew Cuomo was born in the New York City borough of Queens
on June 15, 1932, the son of parents who arrived from Salerno,
Italy, during a wave of immigration in the 1920s.
His father dug ditches to earn money to buy a pushcart, then opened
a small grocery store in a tough neighborhood.
Mario earned a name first as a baseball player, signing a minor
league contract with the Pittsburgh Pirates after high school. An
injury ended his career and he went back to college and law school
at St. John's University.
His law practice brought him into politics in the mid-1960s when he
helped residents fight a city plan to level small scrap-processing
plants near the site of the 1964 World's Fair. Cuomo won the fight
and saved hundreds of jobs.
For the next 10 years he repeatedly fought the power structure,
winning concessions for residents in housing, education and welfare.
When a law school friend, Hugh Carey, was elected governor in 1974,
Cuomo joined his administration as secretary of state. In 1977 he
returned to New York City to run for mayor.
He finished a close second but lost the run-off to Ed Koch, who
blistered Cuomo's opposition to the death penalty in what became a
long-running Democratic rivalry. He then beat Koch in their run for
the governorship in 1982 with heavy support from upstate New York.
As governor, Cuomo increased spending for education and social
welfare, cut the state's highest income taxes and spoke out against
the death penalty and for minority rights.
But budget problems and voter weariness after 12 years in power
helped little-known George Pataki, a Republican, knock off Cuomo in
1994, and he later retired from politics.
In addition to his two sons, Cuomo is survived by his wife of 60
years, Matilda, and their three daughters, Maria, Margaret and
Madeline, and 14 grandchildren.
The governor's office said funeral arrangements would be announced
soon.
(Reporting by T.G. Branfalt in Albany; Additional reporting by Bill
Trott, Will Dunham and Barbara Goldberg; Writing by Steve Gorman;
Editing by Sandra Maler, Bernard Orr, Robert Birsel and Ryan Woo)
[© 2014 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2014 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
 |
