Written by The Honorable Robert Backus of Manchester and longtime Sierra Club Member and Supporter.
Robert “Renny” Cushing died on March 7, after a long battle with prostate cancer.
He served 18 years in the New Hampshire House, and before that had been a staffer for the Democratic House office.
His passing resulted in an outpouring of love from, not just from New Hampshire, but from around the country and the world. He had extensive obituaries in both the New York Times and the Washington Post - something probably never before achieved by any member of our 400 member House.
I had the privilege of knowing Renny since the early 1970s and of serving with him in my four terms in the House. He was, and always will be, my personal hero.
Renny will be remembered above all for his passionate and ultimately successful campaign to end the death penalty in New Hampshire. He embarked on this decades- long effort after his father was brutally murdered, in front of his mother, in their home in Hampton in 1988. When many suggested to him that they hoped the killers would hang, Renny was motivated to take the other side, believing that another killing - at the hands of the State - would only do more harm and make matters worse.
Photo: The writer and Renny enjoying a day at Fenway
In the final victory, Renny had to shepard the bill not only to strong majorities in both the House and the Senate, but also to manage an override of a gubernatorial veto. Since Governor Sununu took office, he has issued more vetoes than any other governor, 89, but so far, only the death penalty veto was overridden.
Renny was so much more than just a determined and skilled opponent of the death penalty.
He first achieved statewide recognition in 1976 as a founder of the Clamshell Alliance, leading marches against the proposed Seabrook reactors ( two reactors were planned, only one was completed) . With his fellow Clams, he helped build public opposition from an initial act of civil disobedience with 18 arrests, to one of 180, and ultimately to one of 1,414, all of whom spent jail time in one of three National Guard Armories. When Governor Thomson insisted that the protestors actually serve time, he should have been careful what he wished for.
Those 1,414 formed a bond that continues to this day. It was reflected in the singing, with great gusto of the Clams anthem, “Acres and Acres of Clams,” at his memorial service.
Renny was anything but a gloomy gus about his committed activism. He would dress in Revolutionary War garb, fire off a replica cannon loaded with a firecracker on the Seabrook common, and have a damn good time doing it.
He was creative and imaginative. When he realized that the biggest vulnerability of the Seabrook project was its financial underpinning, and that the main builder, PSNH, wanted to have its customers provide financing when Wall Street was reluctant to keep the financing window open, he founded the Campaign for Ratepayers’Rights, which was instrumental in ending the scheme to accomplish this, known as Construction Work in Progress. Indeed the fight to end “CWIP” helped elect New Hampshire’s first Democratic governor since the New Deal, Hugh Gallen, who campaigned on the promise to “WHIP CWIP.”
At one point, Public Service decided a new name might burnish the project’s image and announced that they planned to create a new subsidiary, to be called “New Hampshire Yankee” to take over the project. (Two other reactors were called Vermont Yankee and Maine Yankee, both since closed.)
As soon as Renny heard about this, he trotted down to the Secretary of State’s office and registered the name - a fact that the company at an awkward press conference had to admit made it unavailable to them.
But Renny’s saga of accomplishment and commitment go far beyond these issues. He was very committed to seeing there was proper oversight and monitoring of the Coakley Land superfund site and opposed the transfer of Hampton’s municipal water supply to a private company.
Beyond his activism and legislative acumen, he also lived a life of adventure and zest. He managed to travel across North America by train, without ever buying a ticket. He worked for the Atlanta sanitation department for a year on the back of garbage truck, the only white person to do so. He mined gold in Ontario.
PHOTO: Renny receiving the NHSC endorsement in 2014 with Political Chair Jim Allmendinger
And he was a loving husband to his wife and fellow Clam, Kristie Conrad and the father of three daughters, of whom he was very proud.
Renny was a proud graduate of Winnicunnet High School, but never obtained a higher level degree. This didn’t stop him from being highly educated, including learning fluent Spanish and more New Hampshire history than almost anyone. He found out, for example, that it was a New Hampshire Governor in the 1840's, Governor Badger, who was the first to oppose the death penalty.
He ever stopped reaching out to people, never put anyone down or made his political opponents enemies. This meant he received accolades from many quarters, including the publisher of the Manchester Union Leader, who opposed almost all of his positions on issues.
Although I will miss him, I am so grateful that I had the opportunity to call him my friend for 50 years.