Gwyn Shea
Encyclopedia
Gwyn Clarkston Shea is a former Republican
member of the Texas House of Representatives
from suburban Irving
in Dallas County
, Texas
, who served from 1983-1993. She is also the second of thus far six secretaries of state
under Governor
Rick Perry
, having served from January 7, 2002, to August 4, 2003.
run-off for State House District 114 after their districts were drawn together. Harnett won the general election and remains a state representative to this day.
for Precinct 2, including Irving, Coppell
, and North Dallas. (All Texas counties have four such precincts regardless of population.) She was elected constable in 1994 (remaining two-years of a four-year term), 1996, and 2000. During her time as constable, Shea’s office collected more than an $1 million annually in hot check restitutions.
In 1995, Governor George W. Bush
appointed Shea to the Texas Worker's Compensation Insurance Facility, which was thereafter privatized. In 1997, Bush named her as president of the Texas Healthy Kids Corporation, a public/private partnership to promote better health among the young.
Shea attended the University of North Texas in Denton
and is a member of the University of North Texas System Board of Regents, under appointment from Governor Perry in 2007. She also studied at Dallas Baptist University
. Shea is a former director of the Irving Chamber of Commerce
and a past president of the chamber’s women’s division. She has also served on the advisory boards of the Irving Infant Intervention Center and Irving CARES. She is a member of the First Baptist
Church in Irving.
, Mark White
, John Luke Hill, Bob Bullock
, Crawford Martin
, Joseph Wilson Baines (grandfather of Lyndon B. Johnson
), Ron Kirk
, George Strake, Jr.
, Jack Rains
, Alberto Gonzales
, and Tony Garza
.
On January 7, 2002, Shea succeeded the Democrat Henry Cuellar
of Laredo
, the seat of Webb County
in South Texas
, after Cuellar, himself a former state representative and Shea colleague, suddenly resigned after only nine months as secretary of state. Under Texas law, the secretary of state cannot engage in fund raising for another office. Cuellar left the post and thereafter ran unsuccessfully for the 23rd District seat in the United States House of Representatives
against the Republican former Representative Henry Bonilla
of San Antonio
. In 2004, Cuellar won the 28th District seat in Congress and still holds the position.
In making his selection of Shea to succeed Cuellar, Perry described Shea as a "public servant of impeccable character and extraordinary energy. I have known her since we served together in the Texas Legislature, and she has proven herself as an outstanding leader and a committed public servant." For the swearing-in ceremony, Perry invited his future intraparty rival, U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison
, who lauded Shea’s accomplishments: "Gwyn Shea has blazed trails throughout her life, and the milestone of becoming secretary of state is simply one more in her long and distinguished career. I am confident that she will be excellent in all of the responsibilities of this position." As secretary of state, Shea launched an initiative to reach graduating high school
seniors with a voter registration kit. She unveiled the program in San Antonio in the spring of 2002. She also sponsored in elementary schools the essay contest "What Voting Means to Americans".
of the Texas state lottery
. Shea was succeeded by Perry’s third choice for the position, Geoff Connor
. Ironically, Connor had been the acting secretary of state for the three months between the Cuellar and Shea tenures, and he continued as deputy secretary of state under Shea. Connor in turn was succeeded as secretary of state by businessman Roger Williams
, Phil Wilson
, and the current holder of the position, Hope Andrade of San Antonio.
Shea's public papers have been deposited with the City of Irving. On her death, Shea will be interred beside her husband, John Joseph Shea (June 26, 1932–February 22, 1997), originally from Michigan
, at the Texas State Cemetery
in Austin
. She has two children and two grandchildren.
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
member of the Texas House of Representatives
Texas House of Representatives
The Texas House of Representatives is the lower house of the Texas Legislature. The House is composed of 150 members elected from single-member districts across the state. The average district has about 150,000 people. Representatives are elected to two-year terms with no term limits...
from suburban Irving
Irving, Texas
Irving is a city located in the U.S. state of Texas within Dallas County. According to the 2010 U.S. Census, the city population was 216,290. Irving is within the Dallas–Plano–Irving metropolitan division of the Dallas–Fort Worth–Arlington metropolitan area, designated...
in Dallas County
Dallas County, Texas
As of the census of 2000, there were 2,218,899 people, 807,621 households, and 533,837 families residing in the county. The population density was 2,523 people per square mile . There were 854,119 housing units at an average density of 971/sq mi...
, Texas
Texas
Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
, who served from 1983-1993. She is also the second of thus far six secretaries of state
Secretary of State of Texas
The Secretary of State of Texas is one of six state officials designated by the Texas Constitution to form the executive department of that U.S. state...
under Governor
Governor of Texas
The governor of Texas is the head of the executive branch of Texas's government and the commander-in-chief of the state's military forces. The governor has the power to either approve or veto bills passed by the Texas Legislature, and to convene the legislature...
Rick Perry
Rick Perry
James Richard "Rick" Perry is the 47th and current Governor of Texas. A Republican, Perry was elected Lieutenant Governor of Texas in 1998 and assumed the governorship in December 2000 when then-governor George W. Bush resigned to become President of the United States. Perry was elected to full...
, having served from January 7, 2002, to August 4, 2003.
Legislative years
Prior to her election in 1982 to the Texas House District 98 seat, Shea had served for ten years as legislative assistant to Representative Bob Davis. In the House, she was the first woman to have served on the influential Ways and Means Committee. Her work for the House Insurance Committee earned her national recognition and election as president of the National Council of Insurance Legislators. She is also a recipient of the Texas Chamber of Commerce Legislative Leadership Award for outstanding public service. After redistricting in 1991 Shea was defeated by a 58% to 42% margin by Rep. Will Hartnett in the 1992 Republican primaryPrimary election
A primary election is an election in which party members or voters select candidates for a subsequent election. Primary elections are one means by which a political party nominates candidates for the next general election....
run-off for State House District 114 after their districts were drawn together. Harnett won the general election and remains a state representative to this day.
Other public service
In February 1993, Shea was appointed to serve as Dallas County constableConstable
A constable is a person holding a particular office, most commonly in law enforcement. The office of constable can vary significantly in different jurisdictions.-Etymology:...
for Precinct 2, including Irving, Coppell
Coppell, Texas
-Demographics:As of the census of 2000, there were 35,958 people, 12,211 households, and 9,781 families residing in the city. The population density was 2,418.5 people per square mile . There were 12,587 housing units at an average density of 846.6 per square mile...
, and North Dallas. (All Texas counties have four such precincts regardless of population.) She was elected constable in 1994 (remaining two-years of a four-year term), 1996, and 2000. During her time as constable, Shea’s office collected more than an $1 million annually in hot check restitutions.
In 1995, Governor George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
appointed Shea to the Texas Worker's Compensation Insurance Facility, which was thereafter privatized. In 1997, Bush named her as president of the Texas Healthy Kids Corporation, a public/private partnership to promote better health among the young.
Shea attended the University of North Texas in Denton
Denton, Texas
The city of Denton is the county seat of Denton County, Texas in the United States. Its population was 119,454 according to the 2010 U.S. Census, making it the eleventh largest city in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex...
and is a member of the University of North Texas System Board of Regents, under appointment from Governor Perry in 2007. She also studied at Dallas Baptist University
Dallas Baptist University
Dallas Baptist University , formerly known as Dallas Baptist College, is a Christian liberal arts university located in Dallas, Texas. The main campus is located approximately fifteen miles southwest of downtown Dallas overlooking Mountain Creek Lake...
. Shea is a former director of the Irving Chamber of Commerce
Chamber of commerce
A chamber of commerce is a form of business network, e.g., a local organization of businesses whose goal is to further the interests of businesses. Business owners in towns and cities form these local societies to advocate on behalf of the business community...
and a past president of the chamber’s women’s division. She has also served on the advisory boards of the Irving Infant Intervention Center and Irving CARES. She is a member of the First Baptist
Baptist
Baptists comprise a group of Christian denominations and churches that subscribe to a doctrine that baptism should be performed only for professing believers , and that it must be done by immersion...
Church in Irving.
As secretary of state
The office of secretary of state in Texas is an administrative position concerned with keeping state election records and other documents. The office website maintains election returns since 1992 for national, state, and regional elections in Texas, but not local offices. Among well-known Texas politicians who have previously served as secretary of state are John Ben ShepperdJohn Ben Shepperd
John Ben Shepperd was the segregationist Texas attorney general from 1953–1957 who led resistance to the desegregation of public schools mandated by the 1954 Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka...
, Mark White
Mark White
Mark Wells White is an American lawyer, who served as the 43rd Governor of Texas from January 18,1983-January 20,1987.-Biography:...
, John Luke Hill, Bob Bullock
Bob Bullock
Robert Douglas Bullock, known as Bob Bullock , was a Democratic politician from Texas, whose career spanned four decades. His service culminated in his term as Lieutenant Governor of Texas from January 15, 1991–January 19, 1999 during the terms of Governors Ann Richards and George W...
, Crawford Martin
Crawford Martin
Crawford Collins Martin was a Texas State Senator, Texas Secretary of State and Attorney General of Texas from 1967 until his death.-Early life:...
, Joseph Wilson Baines (grandfather of Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon B. Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson , often referred to as LBJ, was the 36th President of the United States after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States...
), Ron Kirk
Ron Kirk
Ronald "Ron" Kirk is the 16th United States Trade Representative, serving in the Obama administration. He served as mayor of Dallas, Texas from 1995 to 2002; he also ran for the United States Senate in 2002.-Early life and career:...
, George Strake, Jr.
George Strake, Jr.
George William Strake, Jr. , is a Houston, Texas, businessman and philanthropist who served as Texas secretary of state from January 16, 1979–October 6, 1981, during the administration of Republican Governor William Perry Clements, Jr...
, Jack Rains
Jack Rains
Jack Morris Rains is a Houston, Texas, attorney who was the 95th Secretary of State of Texas, having served from 1987-1989. He left the position to contest unsuccessfully for the Republican gubernatorial nomination in 1990. He lost to businessman Clayton W...
, Alberto Gonzales
Alberto Gonzales
Alberto R. Gonzales was the 80th Attorney General of the United States. Gonzales was appointed to the post in February 2005 by President George W. Bush. Gonzales was the first Hispanic Attorney General in U.S. history and the highest-ranking Hispanic government official ever...
, and Tony Garza
Tony Garza
Antonio Oscar "Tony" Garza, Jr. , an American lawyer and former county judge in Texas, was the United States Ambassador to Mexico from 2002 to 2009.-Early life and education:...
.
On January 7, 2002, Shea succeeded the Democrat Henry Cuellar
Henry Cuellar
Henry Roberto Cuellar is the U.S Representative for , serving since 2005. He is a member of the Democratic Party. The district extends from the Rio Grande to the suburbs of San Antonio, including Guadalupe County and nearby Wilson County.Outside of politics, he has served as a professor at the...
of Laredo
Laredo, Texas
Laredo is the county seat of Webb County, Texas, United States, located on the north bank of the Rio Grande in South Texas, across from Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, Mexico. According to the 2010 census, the city population was 236,091 making it the 3rd largest on the United States-Mexican border,...
, the seat of Webb County
Webb County, Texas
Webb County is a county located in the U.S. state of Texas. The official 2010 population for the county is 250,304. In 2000, its population was 193,117, and in 2006 its population had been estimated to have reached to 231,470. Its county seat is Laredo...
in South Texas
South Texas
South Texas is a region of the U.S. state of Texas that lies roughly south of and including San Antonio. The southern and western boundary is the Rio Grande River, and to the east it is the Gulf of Mexico. The population of this region is about 3.7 million. The southern portion of this region is...
, after Cuellar, himself a former state representative and Shea colleague, suddenly resigned after only nine months as secretary of state. Under Texas law, the secretary of state cannot engage in fund raising for another office. Cuellar left the post and thereafter ran unsuccessfully for the 23rd District seat in the United States House of Representatives
United States House of Representatives
The United States House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the United States Congress, the bicameral legislature which also includes the Senate.The composition and powers of the House are established in Article One of the Constitution...
against the Republican former Representative Henry Bonilla
Henry Bonilla
Henry Bonilla is a former congressman who represented Texas's 23rd congressional district in the United States House of Representatives. He was defeated in his bid for re-election by Ciro Davis Rodriguez, a former Democratic member of Congress, in a special election runoff held on December 12, 2006...
of San Antonio
San Antonio, Texas
San Antonio is the seventh-largest city in the United States of America and the second-largest city within the state of Texas, with a population of 1.33 million. Located in the American Southwest and the south–central part of Texas, the city serves as the seat of Bexar County. In 2011,...
. In 2004, Cuellar won the 28th District seat in Congress and still holds the position.
In making his selection of Shea to succeed Cuellar, Perry described Shea as a "public servant of impeccable character and extraordinary energy. I have known her since we served together in the Texas Legislature, and she has proven herself as an outstanding leader and a committed public servant." For the swearing-in ceremony, Perry invited his future intraparty rival, U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison
Kay Bailey Hutchison
Kathryn Ann Bailey Hutchison, known as Kay Bailey Hutchison , is the senior United States Senator from Texas.She is a member of the Republican Party. In 2001, she was named one of the thirty most powerful women in America by Ladies Home Journal. The first woman to represent Texas in the U.S....
, who lauded Shea’s accomplishments: "Gwyn Shea has blazed trails throughout her life, and the milestone of becoming secretary of state is simply one more in her long and distinguished career. I am confident that she will be excellent in all of the responsibilities of this position." As secretary of state, Shea launched an initiative to reach graduating high school
High school
High school is a term used in parts of the English speaking world to describe institutions which provide all or part of secondary education. The term is often incorporated into the name of such institutions....
seniors with a voter registration kit. She unveiled the program in San Antonio in the spring of 2002. She also sponsored in elementary schools the essay contest "What Voting Means to Americans".
Later years
Shea resigned as secretary of state after less than two years in the position to accept employment with Harrah’s Entertainment Company. She lobbied for the privatizationPrivatization
Privatization is the incidence or process of transferring ownership of a business, enterprise, agency or public service from the public sector to the private sector or to private non-profit organizations...
of the Texas state lottery
Lottery
A lottery is a form of gambling which involves the drawing of lots for a prize.Lottery is outlawed by some governments, while others endorse it to the extent of organizing a national or state lottery. It is common to find some degree of regulation of lottery by governments...
. Shea was succeeded by Perry’s third choice for the position, Geoff Connor
Geoff Connor
Geoffrey Scott Connor is an American politician, attorney, and entrepreneur from the state of Texas. Connor has been an aide or appointee of several Republican Governors of Texas, including William P. Clements, Jr., George W. Bush, and Rick Perry. Most notably, Connor served as the 104th...
. Ironically, Connor had been the acting secretary of state for the three months between the Cuellar and Shea tenures, and he continued as deputy secretary of state under Shea. Connor in turn was succeeded as secretary of state by businessman Roger Williams
Roger Williams (US politician)
John Roger Williams is the former Secretary of State of Texas, having served from November 2004 until his resignation effective July 1, 2007.-Early life and career:...
, Phil Wilson
Phil Wilson (Texas politician)
Samuel Philip "Phil" Wilson is the former Texas Secretary of State, the state's chief elections officer. He was appointed effective July 1, 2007, by Republican Governor Rick Perry. Wilson was the 106th person to hold the position and the fifth individual to have served since Perry assumed the...
, and the current holder of the position, Hope Andrade of San Antonio.
Shea's public papers have been deposited with the City of Irving. On her death, Shea will be interred beside her husband, John Joseph Shea (June 26, 1932–February 22, 1997), originally from Michigan
Michigan
Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....
, at the Texas State Cemetery
Texas State Cemetery
The Texas State Cemetery is a cemetery located on about just east of downtown Austin, the capital of Texas. Originally the burial place of Edward Burleson, Texas Revolutionary general and Vice-President of the Republic of Texas, it was expanded into a Confederate cemetery during the Civil War...
in Austin
Austin, Texas
Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of :Texas and the seat of Travis County. Located in Central Texas on the eastern edge of the American Southwest, it is the fourth-largest city in Texas and the 14th most populous city in the United States. It was the third-fastest-growing large city in...
. She has two children and two grandchildren.