Government Service
Over the years, he has been appointed to several committees and commissions, including the Office of Patient Protection Executive Committee (a committee formed by the governor of Texas to ensure the rights of patients), the Texas Public Finance Authority Board, and the Texas Department of Corrections. He is also the current chairman of the Texas Funeral Service Commission, a position he was appointed to by then-Texas Governor George W. Bush. In the 1980s, as an appointee of Gov. Bill Clements, he was instrumental in bringing about reforms necessary for Texas to comply with a federal court order that found the state's treatment of its prisoners unconstitutional. Whittington is outspoken about his doubts about the death penalty as it is applied in Texas, especially in regard to defendants who are mentally handicapped.
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Famous quotes containing the words government and/or service:
“I have heard, in such a way as to believe it, of your recently saying that both the Army and the Government needed a Dictator. Of course it was not for this, but in spite of it, that I have given you the command. Only those generals who gain success, can set up dictators.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“Service ... is love in action, love “made flesh”; service is the body, the incarnation of love. Love is the impetus, service the act, and creativity the result with many by-products.”
—Sarah Patton Boyle, U.S. civil rights activist and author. The Desegregated Heart, part 3, ch. 3 (1962)