McClure of Idaho, by William L. Smallwood, Caxton Press, Caldwell ID (2007).
In thinking back on James McClure, who was a senator from Idaho for 18 years through 1990 and a U.S. representative six years before that, you don't recall either an overwhelming personality or riotous controversy; the mental picture can seem a little blurred, some of the normal shorthand - that he was a "conservative Republican" - doesn't quite seem to cut it, especially for what the terms mean in this decade.
The new - release is set for September 1 - biography, McClure of Idaho, brings some focus. Get hold of two basic points and you have a fair sense of this guy who, improbably in some ways, has been one of Idaho's most successful politicians.
One is this: He never really left the small, socially conservative, rural town of Payette where he grew up and established himself professionally. Politicians like to say such things about themselves, but in McClure's case it seems generally true, generating the range of positives and negative you get from that background.
The other, less obvious to most of the public but clear to those who worked around or across from him, is implied by this passage: "You need to know that Jim McClure fancies himself as the consummate do-it-yourselfer. He did all the wiring and plumbing and heating installations in his Payette house during the years when it was undergoing remodeling, and he did the same thing in his cabin on Payette Lake outside of McCall. There isn't anything around a house that he thinks he can't install or repair." McClure was (is presumably), to a degree unusual for a legislator, a highly focused detail man, happier working on the precise language of legislation or on a stubborn electrical wiring job, than in blasting off on the ills of the world.
Put the two pieces together, and you have a basis for evaluating McClure. This book, too - in an analogous sense, it too has these qualities. It is very much an "authorized" biography, and its mood and attitude is suffused by McClure's and the community of family, friends and associates around him. But its 485 pages are also packed with loads of detail, and it's an easy recommended read for anyone interested in one of Idaho's leading political figures and the impact - considerable - he has had on the state.