Former Sen. Edmund Muskie Dies At 81 -- One-Time Presidential Hopeful From Maine Led Campaigns To Help Ensure A Clean Environment, Fiscal Responsibility

WASHINGTON - Former Secretary of State Edmund S. Muskie, a longtime Maine senator whose emotional defense of his wife may have cost him the Democratic presidential nomination in 1972, died early today at Georgetown University Hospital after suffering a heart attack. He was 81.

He underwent successful surgery last week to clear a blocked artery in his leg but suffered a heart attack a few days later while still in the hospital, said his assistant, Carole Parmelee of the law firm Chadbourne and Parke.

Mr. Muskie joined the law firm in 1981 after serving as secretary of state under President Carter.

In 1972, Mr. Muskie was an early favorite to win the Democratic presidential nomination but lost to then-Sen. George McGovern of South Dakota.

Campaigning in the New Hampshire primary, Mr. Muskie was speaking from a flatbed trailer outside the Manchester Union Leader newspaper, denouncing a story critical of his wife, when he broke down in angry emotion.

The episode came to symbolize the collapse of his quest for the White House. "It changed people's minds about me, of what kind of guy I was," he later told author Theodore White. "They were looking for a strong, steady man, and here I was weak."

"Going down in front of that Union-Leader building was a mistake. . . . It was a whopper," Mr. Muskie said in a 1994 interview.

Mr. Muskie won the New Hampshire primary but without the clear majority his managers had forecast over McGovern, who went on to win the nomination.

Recalling the incident, McGovern said today, "I never believed that . . . diminished him in the least. Indeed, it was an indication of his humanity and his essential decency."

McGovern ultimately won the 1972 nomination - losing in a landslide to President Richard Nixon in the general election - and Mr. Muskie resumed his Senate duties.

Mr. Muskie, who led a Democratic resurgence in Maine during the 1950s, gained national prominence in 1968 when Democratic presidential nominee Hubert Humphrey chose him as running mate. They lost to Nixon and Spiro Agnew, but Mr. Muskie emerged a national figure.

The rugged, lanky 6-foot-4 senator impressed onlookers by inviting hecklers to share the speaking platform with him.

Mr. Muskie served as senator from Maine from 1959 to 1980 and helped lead the push for laws to control water and air pollution, which won him the nickname "Mr. Clean."

He was a leading voice on domestic issues during his 22 years in the Senate. He considered it ironic that his final months in public life were spent in the foreign-policy sphere as secretary of state.

"It's funny," he once confided to an interviewer. "Of all the jobs I've been ambitious for, this is one that never crossed my mind."

Given his ambitions earlier in his career, Mr. Muskie's selection as secretary of state seemed almost a consolation prize: He came within an eyelash of becoming vice president in 1968 and was the odds-on favorite when he set out for the Democratic presidential nomination four years later.

Following his retirement from politics, Mr. Muskie became a partner in the Washington law firm where he worked until the time of his death.

A Democratic elder statesman, he took on such tasks as coauthoring the Tower Commission report on President Reagan and the Iran-contra affair.

Mr. Muskie was born in Rumford, a western Maine paper-mill town, on March 28, 1914, the son of Stephen and Josephine Muskie. His father was a Polish-born tailor whose name had been shortened from Marciszewski by immigration officials.

Mr. Muskie worked his way through Bates College and went on to Cornell Law School before setting up a law practice in Waterville, Maine. After interrupting his career to serve aboard destroyer escorts during World War II, he returned to Waterville and was elected to the state Legislature in 1946.

He married Jane Gray of Waterville in 1948, and they had two sons and three daughters.

Mr. Muskie spent six years in the Maine House and was chosen as his party's gubernatorial candidate in 1954.

Maine voters elected him the state's first Democratic governor in 20 years. He followed a non-partisan course, pushing economic and educational programs and steering most of his programs through the Republican Legislature.

At election time, his ability to draw support from members of the opposing party gave rise to a class of voters known as "Muskie Republicans."

After a second two-year term, he went on in 1958 to become the first popularly elected Democratic senator in Maine's history.

Mr. Muskie, whose home state had felt the bad effects of polluted air and water, was in the forefront of those who drafted the 1963 Clean Air Act and the 1965 Water Quality Act and pushed them through the Senate.

During the mid 1970s, he emerged as a champion of fiscal discipline as Congress created its own budget-making process. Mr. Muskie was picked to chair the new and powerful Senate Budget Committee.

In his new role as budget watchdog, he chastised his colleagues for budget-busting legislation and appealed for curbs on spending in order to control inflation and rein in the federal deficit. On occasion, Mr. Muskie's battles to restrict veterans' benefits or school-lunch subsidies drew scorn from fellow liberals and unaccustomed praise from conservatives.

But Mr. Muskie, who viewed the budget process as his final Senate legacy, never flinched from a challenge that forced him into the role of legislative pinchpenny.

"Too often in the past," he said, "members of Congress have won re-election with a two-part strategy: Talk like Scrooge on the campaign trail. Vote like Santa Claus on the Senate floor."

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On Mr. Muskie's death.

"A dedicated legislator and caring public servant . . . a leader in the best sense. He spoke from his heart and acted with conviction. Generations to come will benefit from his steadfast commitment to protecting the land." - President Clinton

"I have never known any American leader who was more highly qualified to be president of the United States. His coolness under pressure and his sound judgment helped him play a crucial role in bringing all the American hostages home from Iran to safety and freedom, and he was always careful to give credit to others for this achievement." - Former President Carter

"Ed Muskie gave us a rare combination of a tough mind, a caring heart, an unquestioned character, a unique humor and a steady commitment to the public interest." - George McGovern