Tony Shipley, in a letter to his colleagues regarding his bill about medical privacy, accused the Tennessee Department of Health and its chief medical officer, Dr. Veronica Gunn, of deliberate “misdirection and misrepresentations.” In lay terms, Shipley said that Dr. Gunn flatly lied to the legislature. Dr. Gunn trained at Vanderbilt and Johns Hopkins and has a distinguished career serving the state.

Shipley’s charge is serious. If true, Dr. Gunn may face disciplinary action by her professional society and sanction by the state. If it’s not true, then Dr. Gunn still suffers a damaged reputation in and beyond Nashville. Given that Dr. Gunn has received the explicit backing of Commissioner of Health Susan Cooper and the Tennessee Medical Association, I seriously doubt Shipley’s accusation. Shipley may not have even realized the implications of the letter that he wrote. In fairness, he probably made his statements in the heat of the moment — and assumed it was just part of politics.

In a letter Tony Shipley wrote to one of my sons some 20 years ago, he borrowed some lines from James Clarke Freeman: “There is a wide difference between the politician and the statesman. A politician, for example, is a man who thinks of the next election; while the statesman thinks of the next generation. The politician thinks of the success of his party, the statesman of the good of his country. The politician wishes to carry this or that measure, the statesman to establish this or the other principle.”

My son found these words inspiring. Maybe Tony Shipley should, too. After calm reconsideration, perhaps his bearings will re-emerge. The least Tony should do is withdraw his letter. But a statesman would do more — he would apologize to those he has wronged and learn from his mistake. What Shipley does next will tell us a good deal about the man he is and the path as a legislator he will follow.

Bill Haile

Kingsport

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