Constitution Award

Honorees

*Deceased

2009

Chief Judge
Robert Henry
United States Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit

In a public service career spanning more than three decades, The Honorable Robert H. Henry has served in each branch of government.

He was a member of the Oklahoma House of Representatives from 1976 to 1986, chairing the Judiciary and Education Committees and the Majority Caucus.

He was elected Attorney General in 1986 and re-elected in 1990. He became the first Attorney General candidate in the state's history to run unopposed.

He held the positions of Dean and Professor of Law at the Oklahoma City University School of Law from 1991 until 1994. He was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit in 1994, and became Chief Judge on January 1, 2008.

Judge Henry is a member of the Board of Directors for the VERA Institute of Justice in New York City and is a Life Member of the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws, serving Oklahoma since 1982. He serves on the Board of Advisors for the National State Attorneys General Program at Columbia University Law School and was selected by Justice Sandra Day O'Connor to serve on the Advisory Board for the Judicial Outreach Program of the American Society of International Law. He served as Chairman of the University of Oklahoma's International Programs Center Board of Visitors. He has been selected to serve on the board of the Foundation for the Future, headquartered in Amman, Jordan.

Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist appointed Judge Henry to the Committee on Codes of Conduct of the Judicial Conference of the United States, on which he served from 2004-2005. In 2005, the Chief Justice named Judge Henry Chair of the International Judicial Relations Committee. He has traveled to the Middle East, North and West Africa, Central and Western Europe, East Asia, Russia, and Canada. He was honored by the Russian Council of Judges and the United States Department of State's Bureau of International Information Programs.

He serves on the Board of the American Bar Association Rule of Law Initiative and chairs the Middle East/North Africa (MENA) Law Initiative. He served on the Committee for the Africa Law Initiative Council and the Committee for State Justice Initiative.

His honors include the Oklahoma Nature Conservancy's Conservationist of the Year, the Oklahoma Human Rights Commission Award, the National Conference of Community and Justice Humanitarian of the Year, and membership in Oklahoma's Hall of Fame.

2008

Governor Frank Keating

Frank Keating took over as president and CEO of the American Council of Life Insurers in January 2003 after serving two terms as Oklahoma's 25th governor.

As president and CEO of ACLI, Governor Keating is the chief representative and spokesman for the life insurance industry in Washington, D.C., and all 50 state capitals.

He and his staff work as advocates for nearly 400 life insurance companies that account for 93 percent of total industry assets, 91 percent of life insurance premiums, and 95 percent of annuity considerations in the United States.

Governor Keating has played a leading role in promoting public policies to boost Americans' retirement security and long-term savings. He regularly advocates on Capitol Hill and to the Bush administration on the need to make Americans' retirement security a national priority.

Born in St. Louis in 1944, Keating grew up in Tulsa. He received his undergraduate degree from Georgetown University and a law degree from the University of Oklahoma. His 30-year career in law enforcement and public service included stints as an FBI agent; U.S. Attorney and state prosecutor; and Oklahoma House and Senate member. He served Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush in the Treasury, Justice, and Housing Departments. His service in Treasury and Justice gave him responsibility for all federal criminal prosecutions in the nation and oversight for such agencies as the Secret Service, U.S. Customs, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, U.S. Marshals, the Bureau of Prisons, and the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

In 1993 he returned to Oklahoma to run for Governor. He won a three-way race by a landslide and was easily re-elected in 1998, becoming only the second governor in Oklahoma history to serve two consecutive terms.

Governor Keating won national acclaim in 1995 for his compassionate and professional handling of the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. In the aftermath of the tragedy, he raised more than six million dollars to fund scholarships for the nearly 200 children left with only one or no parents.

Governor Keating serves on the boards of the National Archives Foundation and Mt. Vernon and is President of the Federal City Council, a non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to improvement of the nation's capital. He also is the author of two award-winning children's books, biographies of Will Rogers and Theodore Roosevelt.

Frank and his wife Cathy live in McLean, Virginia. They have three children and five grandchildren.

2007

Mr. Anthony M. “Tony” Massad

Anthony M. “Tony” Massad, an attorney, former member of the Oklahoma Senate and graduate of the Oklahoma Military Academy from Frederick, Okla., is the recipient of this year’s Constitution Award at Rogers State University.

Massad is a 1947 graduate of OMA, the predecessor institution of RSU.

He was selected as an OMA Distinguished Alumnus in 1997 and inducted into the OMA Hall of Fame in 2000.

He received a law degree in 1955 and a bachelor’s degree in psychology in 1949 from the University of Oklahoma. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of the OU Foundation and the Board of Visitors of the OU Law School.

As a lifelong practicing attorney and former prosecutor in Tillman County, Okla., he is a senior member of the law firm of Massad, Evans and Kent, Inc.

He served as a senator in the Oklahoma Senate for four years. As a member of the Senate, he was a principal legislative author of judicial reform and was selected as an Outstanding Member of the Senate by the Tulsa World.

He received a Presidential Citation and also was made an honorary member of the Cherokee Nation in 1997.

He served on the City Council of Frederick and was attorney for the Frederick Public Schools for 40 years. He is the past president of the Oklahoma Bar Association and Tillman County Bar Association. He has received many honors and awards including the Distinguished Service Award from the American Bar Association, Award of Merit from the Oklahoma Supreme Court, and Governor’s Award for his service on the Oklahoma Council of Judicial Complaints.

His military service includes Retired Reserve – Major in 1968; member of the 95th Division of the Reserves in 1960; 45th Division, Reserves in 1953; overseas duty with the Second Armored Division, 1950-1952; active duty during the Korean War, 1950; Commissioned Second Lieutenant, Tank Corp, 1949; active duty, Camp Hood, Texas, Second Armored Division, 1945; and Reserve Officers Training Corps, 1943-1947.

He and his wife Mary, who are lifelong residents of Frederick, have three children and six grandchildren.

2006

The Honorable Lee R. West
Senior U.S. District Judge, Western District of Oklahoma

The Honorable Judge Lee R. West was appointed U.S. District Judge for the Western District of Oklahoma in 1979 by President Jimmy Carter.

Born in Clayton, Okla., in 1929, Judge West graduated from high school in Antlers, Okla., in 1948. He received a bachelor's degree in government from the University of Oklahoma in 1952. He served 28 months of active duty in Japan and Korea, achieving the rank of captain.

He received a Juris Doctor degree from the University of Oklahoma in 1956 and was selected by the faculty as the outstanding graduate of his law school class. He served as editor of the Oklahoma Law Review and president of the law school student body.

He was admitted to the Oklahoma State Bar in 1956 and engaged in private practice in Ada, Okla., until 1961 when he became a member of the faculty at the University of Oklahoma College of Law where he taught torts, damages, evidence, trial practice and workmen's compensation. During 1962-1963, he was a Ford Foundation Fellow in Law teaching at Harvard Law School where he received an LLM degree. From 1963-1965, he was again in private practice in Ada.

In 1965, Judge West was appointed by Governor Henry Bellmon to serve as District Judge for the 22nd Judicial District of Oklahoma, serving also as Special Justice of the Oklahoma Supreme Court and Court of Criminal Appeals until 1973. In 1966, he graduated from The National College of State Trial Judges. He was appointed by President Richard Nixon to be a member of the Civil Aeronautics Board, Washington, D.C., in 1973 and was designated acting chairman by President Carter on May 1, 1977. He was in private practice in Tulsa from 1978 until his appointment to the federal bench.

Judge West served as Chief Judge of the Western District of Oklahoma from 1993 until he took senior status in 1994. Since that time he has remained active hearing cases at both the District and Circuit level and serving as a settlement judge in complex and protracted cases throughout the 10th Circuit.

He has been married to Mary Ann Ellis of Antlers for more than 50 years and they have two children, the Honorable Kim West, a U.S. Magistrate Judge for the Eastern District of Oklahoma, and Jennifer West of Tulsa. They also have one granddaughter, Mary Ellis Passey, who is presently a student at the University of Indiana.

His biography, “Law and Laughter, The Life of Lee West,” co-authored by Bob Burke and the Honorable David L. Russell, was published by the Oklahoma Heritage Association in 2002 as part of its Oklahoma Trackmaker Series.

2005

Governor George Nigh

Governor George Nigh was first elected to the Oklahoma House of Representatives in 1950 when he was a senior in college, becoming its youngest member at the age of 22. He continued to work as a teacher at McAlester High School while serving in the Legislature.

In 1958, at the age of 30, he was elected Lieutenant Governor, becoming the youngest person to serve in that position in Oklahoma history and, at the time, the youngest in the nation.

In 1978, after 16 years as Lieutenant Governor, he was elected Governor. Four years later, he was re-elected, becoming the first Governor in Oklahoma to gain re-election and the only gubernatorial candidate to carry all of the state's 77 counties.

He has served as Governor of Oklahoma on four occasions, having completed two brief terms when Govs. Howard Edmondson and David Boren resigned when they were elected to the U.S. Senate.

In 1987, upon leaving the Governor's Office, he returned to education to become a Distinguished Statesman in Residence at the University of Central Oklahoma, where he also served as President from 1992 to 1997.

He was later appointed by President Clinton to serve as national chairman of the President's Committee, charged with raising funds for scholarships for surviving children of victims of the Oklahoma City bombing.

He currently serves as President of the Donna Nigh Foundation, named for his wife, which benefits residents in Oklahoma who have developmental disabilities. He also serves on the board of directors of IBC Bank and the advisory board for Express Personnel Services. He recently retired from 12 years of service on the board of directors of the JC Penney Co.

He has been inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame, Oklahoma Vo-Tech Hall of Fame and the U.S. Jaycees Ten Outstanding Americans Hall of Leadership, and received the national Martin Luther King Jr. Award.

2004

The Honorable Charles R. Ford
Oklahoma State Senate

Charles R. Ford, a native Tulsan, attended Oklahoma A&M College, now known as Oklahoma State University. Since 1958, he has owned and operated the Charles R. Ford Co., a real estate investment company in Tulsa.

He was elected to the Oklahoma House of Representatives in 1966 and served for 14 years. In 1981, he was elected to the Oklahoma Senate and retired at the end of the last session. He held numerous leadership positions during his 38 years in the Legislature. He is the second lawmaker to hold the position of Minority Leader in both houses. He is second in total legislative experience since statehood – one half of his lifetime. He has been author of many key legislative proposals. 

He co-authored legislation creating Tulsa Junior College in 1968 and the University of Oklahoma Medical School in Tulsa in the early 1970s. In 1977, he authored a bill allowing for concurrent enrollment of high school students in college. And in 1980, he authored legislation to create the University Center at Tulsa.

In 1998, Ford continued his support of higher education as the author of Senate Bill 1426, which created branches of OSU in Tulsa and Northeastern State University in Broken Arrow, and gave RSU a new mission to seek accreditation as a four-year university.

2004

The Honorable Penny Williams
Oklahoma State Senate

Penny Williams was elected to the Oklahoma House of Representatives in 1980, where she served until 1988. She was elected to the Oklahoma Senate in 1988 and retired at the end of the last session. She authored the historic education reform legislation, House Bill 1017, which overhauled the state’s K-12 education programs and provided increased funding to schools. She also authored 12 other major pieces of approved legislation to improve the state’s K-12 public schools.

In the realm of higher education, she authored legislation creating Oklahoma Tuition Aid Grants (OTAG) for public and private college students, the Oklahoma Higher Learning Access Program (OHLAP) and the Oklahoma Council for the Advancement of Science and Technology (OCAST).

In the past legislative session, she was Chairman of the Senate Education Committee, Vice-Chairman of the Human Resources Committee, and served on the Appropriations Committee, Government Operations and Agency Oversight Committee, and the Transportation Rules Committee.

She attended the University of Tulsa, the University of Teheran and Sarah Lawrence College.

2003

Mr. G. T. Blankenship
Chairman of the University of Oklahoma Board of Regents and former Attorney General of the State of Oklahoma

G.T. Blankenship was appointed to the University of Oklahoma Board of Regents by Governor Henry Bellmon in the spring of 1990 and was reappointed in 1997 by Governor Frank Keating.

He received a bachelor of arts and a law degree from the University of Oklahoma. In 1960, he was elected to the Oklahoma State House of Representatives and served as Minority Floor Leader from 1964 to 1966. He was elected Attorney General of the State of Oklahoma and served from 1966 until 1970. Mr. Blankenship is in the private practice of law in Oklahoma City and is Board Chairman of the Bank of Nichols Hills. He has served as Chairman of the State Centennial Committee, was on the Board of Directors for the U.S. Olympic Festival, and has been active in the Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce. He served as a member of the 1988-89 OU Presidential Search Committee. Regent Blankenship and his wife, Libby, live in Oklahoma City and have three adult children.

2002

The Honorable Thomas R. Brett
Senior Judge  fe U.S. District Court  Northern District of Oklahoma

Judge Thomas R. Brett was appointed as U.S. District Court Judge for the Northern District of Oklahoma in 1979. He presided as Chief Judge from 1994 to 1996 and currently serves as the court’s Senior Judge.

Judge Brett graduated from the University of Oklahoma with a B.B.A. in 1953 and received his LL.B. in 1957 and J.D. in 1971 from the University of Oklahoma Law School. He started his legal career as Assistant County Attorney in Tulsa County before entering private practice with the Tulsa firm of Hudson, Wheaton & Brett in 1958. In 1970, he joined the firm of Jones, Givens, Brett, Gotcher, Doyle &Bogan, Inc. until his appointment to the U.S. District Court.

Judge Brett is a member and past president of the Tulsa County Bar Association as well as the Oklahoma Bar Association. He is a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and a fellow of the American Bar Foundation. He has served as a member of the House of Delegates of the American Bar Association, and a trustee of the Oklahoma Bar Foundation.

In 1991, Judge Brett received the Distinguished Service Award from the University of Oklahoma. He received the Tulsa County Bar Association’s Outstanding Senior Lawyer Award (1992-93) and Golden Rule Award (2000). He has also received the Oklahoma Bar Association’s Judicial Excellence Award (1995) and Ethics Award (2001). In 2000, Judge Brett was named to the Oklahoma Heritage Association’s Hall of Fame. He also was awarded the American Inns of Court Foundation 2002 Professionalism Award for the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals.

He served on the OU Board of Regents from 1971 to 1978, including a term as president from 1977-78. He served as chairman and co-chairman for two presidential search committees for OU. He has also served as director of the OU College of Law Alumni Association.

He is a retired colonel for the U.S. Army Reserve Judge Advocate General. He graduated from the Command and General Staff College, Industrial College of the Armed Forces, and Air War College. He served as director of the National Security Management Course at the 1978 U.S. Army Reserve School in Tulsa.

He was born in Oklahoma City, and has four children and 11 grandchildren. He is married to Mary James Brett.

2001

Mr. Alex Adwan
Senior Editor -  Tulsa World

Alex Adwan joined the Tulsa World as Washington correspondent in 1967. He became associate editor in 1972 and editor of editorial pages in 1981.

Beginning in the early 1980s, Adwan presided over a number of changes in the editorial operations, including creation of the World’s weekly eight-page Opinion Section. The changes gave readers a greater variety of viewpoints on important issues and a more accessible forum for their own opinions.

On his retirement as editorial page editor in 1994, Adwan was named senior editor of the World. He writes a weekly column, frequently on historical subjects as they relate to current news. The columns often deal with constitutional issues.

 A graduate of Rogers State University’s predecessor institution, the Oklahoma Military Academy (Junior College ’48), and the University of Oklahoma (Bachelor’s of Arts, Journalism ’50), Adwan served as a tank platoon leader with the 45th Infantry Division in Korea in 1951-52. He was awarded the Bronze Star with “V”. He worked as reporter and editor and, later, co-owner and co-publisher of the Seminole Producer. He also worked for the Wewoka Times and Pauls Valley Daily Democrat in the 1950s.

From 1960 to 1967, Adwan was with United Press International, serving as a bureau manager in Tulsa, Houston, and Oklahoma City. He covered Houston’s new space center in the early 1960s, reporting on the last of the one-man orbital space missions and the beginnings of Project Apollo, the program to send men to the moon.

Named to the Oklahoma Journalism Hall of Fame in 1991, Adwan received the Oklahoma Press Association’s BeachyMusselman Award for “outstanding contribution to newspaper journalism” in 1995. He has been honored as a distinguished graduate of the University of Oklahoma School of Journalism and of Oklahoma Military Academy. In 1996, he was named a Jefferson Fellow of Rogers State University, the institution’s highest honor, for his support of higher education. He received the Oklahoma Education Association’s Marshall Gregory Award for Educational Media Excellence.

Adwan has served on numerous civic, professional, and education boards, including the Oklahoma Heritage Association, the Oklahoma Academy, Light Opera Oklahoma and the Jasmine Moran Children’s Museum at Seminole. Others include the Board of Visitors of the OU College of Arts and Sciences, the professional advisory committees of the University of Oklahoma School of Journalism and the OU Center for Political Communications, and the former president’s advisory committee at RSU.

Adwan was born in Maud, Oklahoma, and grew up in Seminole, Oklahoma. His wife, Teresa Bradley Adwan, is a retired Tulsa attorney.

1999

Admiral William J. Crowe, Jr.
Senior Advisor, GlobalOptions

A native of Oklahoma, Admiral William J. Crowe, Jr. graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1946. His early naval career was in submarines and he served as the Assistant Naval Attache to President Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1954-55. Later, as a Rear Admiral, he commanded U.S. Naval Forces in the Persian Gulf.

In 1980, Admiral Crowe was named the Commander in Chief of Allied Forces Southern Europe, the NATO command responsible for Italy, Turkey, and Greece, as well as the Mediterranean area. Subsequently, he commanded the U.S. Pacific Command before President Ronald Reagan named him the 11th Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1985.

After retirement from the military in 1989, Admiral Crowe was a Counselor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington and the University Professor of Geopolitics at The University of Oklahoma. His book, "The Line of Fire," was published by Simon and Schuster in 1993. He served on the Boards of Directors of Merrill Lynch, Texaco, General Dynamics, Norfolk & Southern, and Pfizer.

Currently, Admiral Crowe is Senior Advisor to Global Options, an international crisis management firm in Washington, D.C. Previously, he was the U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (1994-1997), the Chairman of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (1993-94), and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (1985-89). In 1998-1999, he chaired the State Department Accountability Review Boards for the embassy bombings in Dar es Salaam and Nairobi.

Admiral Crowe holds a master's degree in education from Stanford University and a Ph.D. in politics from Princeton University. He is the Shapiro Visiting Professor of International Affairs at George Washington University and serves as a trustee of Princeton University. He is married to the former Shirley Grennel and they have three children. They reside in Alexandria, Virginia.