RPCV Earl Sholley Challenges Jacques For Massachusetts State Senate
Sholley Challenges Jacques For Senate
By Ed Oliver
October 2002 Print Edition
Conservative Republican Earl Henry Sholley, North Attleboro, is fighting an uphill battle to unseat liberal Sen. Cheryl Jacques D-Needham, in the Norfolk, Bristol & Middlesex District.
He is a businessman and a divorced father who feels that the current Senator "has a problem with truthfulness and honesty."
He continues, "This time around my best campaign worker is the incumbent Senator. Each time she opens her mouth she seems to be calling for a new law that infringes on fundamental liberty. The founding fathers must be rolling in their graves."
Sholley said his big issues are taxes, education, health care, the proper role of government, legal reform and the support and promotion of strong families.
Earl Henry Sholley believes we need to restore some measurement of common sense and decency to state government.
In stark contrast to Sholley, the incumbent Jacques is a extreme liberal Democrat. The openly lesbian legislator is noted for her promotion of the gay agenda in the public schools, as well as her hostility to gun rights and pro-family initiatives such as the Protection of Marriage Amendment.
Sholley, 54, ran unsuccessfully against Jacques in 2000, garnering 30.1 percent of the vote. He said he had only lived in the District for a year at that point and the biggest town in the District is Needham, where the incumbent lives, making the job tougher.
"I think this time we'll do a lot better," said Sholley. "Her negatives were quite high the last time, and I think they've since gone up more. So I think we have a very good chance.
"Everything she does is just so foul. She just constantly ignores our constitutional rights. She has alienated the Boy Scouts. She has refused to attend any Courts of Honor for Eagle Scouts. She opposed additional funding of veteran homes. She voted against the flag burning amendment during her first term. There are a lot of veterans who are going to be deserting her.
"Her anti-terrorism bill that they are going to be using up there on Beacon Hill will be used to harm more innocent people. They are going to be arresting protestors - fathers who are protesting the gender justice being dispensed by the family court - whatever it can be. Now they have more excuses to arrest people and deprive them of their First Amendment rights."
During a discussion of this year's constitutional conventions (where Senate President Tom Birmingham and Senator Jacques applauded the tactics used to avoid a vote on several constitutional issues) Sholley believes they violated the constitution. "They broke the law and that makes the Senate President a tyrant. He violated his oath of office."
Why Vote for Sholley?
"I will work to cut out waste, eliminate unnecessary programs, downsize government, and work for a part-time legislature thereby reducing the tax burden on families."
"We need to restore integrity, First of all, the fraud that has been perpetuated on this state as far as the so called fiscal crisis is concerned has to be addressed. There should be a tax revolt. Taxes are a big issue. It's not a revenue problem it's a spending problem. Those people are spending money like drunken sailors."
Sholley believes that some measure of common sense and decency needs to be restored to state government. "The Massachusetts Legislature is really more influenced by emotion and hysteria than facts and clear evidence. It's a politically correct body. Cheryl Jacques is pushing a left wing agenda, a social elitist agenda, a feminist agenda. She stands against everything that is traditional. These people will not be satisfied until they have destroyed everything traditional in this country.
"I work for a living, I am not a politician. I know how difficult it is to raise a family and put bread on the table. I will represent all the people. We do not have special group rights in America. Our country is based on individual rights.
"Many people don't like her lifestyle choice. She came out of the closet almost flaunting it and saying this is who I am and if you don't like it, then too bad. Her whole attitude is that she thinks that women are superior to men. This is problematic when raising children. She thinks that she can be a father and she can raise two boys and they don't have to know how they originated and who their father was. How is that going to make them feel when they get to the age of reason?"
Mr. Sholley feels that tolerance in one thing but legitimizing the anything-is-a-family theory is dangerous to children, "A lot of people who were willing to give her a free ride on that during the last election did not know that she was of that orientation. They didn't find out until after the last election was over. Maybe a lot of people still don't care in a tolerant state like Massachusetts. But when it involves two young children, most people don't feel it is fair to the kids. They don't deserve this. Don't involve them in your social experiment or your personal choices. That issue is going to hurt her."
Sen. Jacques came under fire in the recent past for giving numerous pay raises to a female employee whom she later dated. She was accused by a government watchdog group two years ago of criminally misusing federal youth workers to boost the tepid attendance of her gun control rally.
"My opponent is a tax-and-spend liberal in traditional Massachusetts fashion," said Sholley. "She hasn't met a program that she doesn't like. She is constantly raising taxes and looking for ways to intrude into the family, looking for ways to suspend the Constitution, passing a lot of zany laws- for example, she has been working for the self extinguishing cigarette.
"She has annoyed so many different groups, from dry cleaners, where she wanted to pass a law that would have shirts charged the same rate as blouses for women, to hairdressers, where men would have to pay the same price as women or vice versa. She thought it was discriminatory to charge women more. Nobody told her that a man could get a haircut in ten minutes and it might take an hour for a woman.
"She banned crossbows, of course, and my feeling is, what's next? She's trying to take away our guns. We have a Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. It's an individual right, not a right of militias as many would say.
"My opponent is an extremist. Even some of the worst liberals up at the State House think she's way out on the far left, because she's an extremist. She's been in there for five terms and I think it is time that we retire her to the dreaded private sector."
Sholley, the son of a Pennsylvania iron ore miner, is the proud father of two "very bright and accomplished daughters." He is the former owner of a retail flower shop and garden center and currently owns the "Grassroots Lawn and Landscape Company."
He grew up in Lebanon, Pennsylvania and is a graduate of the University of Scranton (BS History 1970) and U-Mass Amherst (BS Plant and Soil Sciences 1978). He also studied at the Univ. of Madrid, Spain, on the Georgetown University Junior Year Abroad Program, 1968-69. He is an army veteran and Eagle Scout. He has served in the Peace Corps and worked in the areas of race relations, advocacy for fathers and families, and legal reform. He has also been a delegate to his party's state and national conventions. He is a member of the Knights of Columbus, The American Legion, The Appalachian Mountain Club and the Wrentham Sportsman's Club, and is a two-time finisher of the Boston Marathon.
The Senate District includes Attleboro, North Attleboro, Millis, Norfolk, Natick, (Pct. 6, 7, 9, 10), Needham, Plainville, Sherborn, Wrentham, Wellesley (pct. B, F, G).
Contributions may be sent to: Friends of Earl Henry Sholley, P.O. Box 1375, North Attleboro, MA 02763.
