Moise Dennery Dies Of Cancer Lawyer Focused On Public Service
Submitted By N.O.V.A. July 2005
Times Picayune 08-27-1997


*************************************************
Copyright. All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm
************************************************  


Moise W. Dennery, a courtly New Orleanian who used his passion for the law and
public policy to help reshape the government of his native city and state, died
Tuesday at Touro Infirmary of cancer. He was 82.

Mr. Dennery, who compiled a record of public service that spanned his 60-year
career as a lawyer, was a key member of the committee that wrote New Orleans' City
Charter in the early 1950s.

He was a voting delegate to, and secretary of, the 1973 convention that wrote a
new Louisiana Constitution, and he was president of the Louisiana Civil Service
Commission for six years and a member for 10 years.

Although such work was time-consuming and often tedious, "he felt that was his way
to contribute to making a better world," said New Orleans restaurateur Ella
Brennan, a longtime friend.

A tall, lean man with soulful eyes and a ready smile - and, more often than not, a
good joke - Mr. Dennery was "an inspirational friend," Brennan said. "When you
spent time with Moise, you came away a better person. There was an aura around him
of great decency."

In the early 1950s, Mr. Dennery's major civic task was helping to write the city's
home-rule charter, which spells out how New Orleans is governed and gave back to
the city powers it had lost in the Huey Long era. Voters approved the document,
creating a mayor-council form of government, in 1952, and it went into effect in
1954.

Mr. Dennery knew "more about (the charter) and its implementation and its nuances
than anyone I know of," said Jim Brandt, president of the Bureau of Governmental
Research. "He's Mr. City Charter. . . . He's been called upon by several mayors
for his knowledge and expertise."

When Mr. Dennery left the Civil Service Commission in 1962, he was praised at a
banquet for his dedication to freeing the state's 50,000 classified employees from
"political bondage" so they could perform their jobs "without partisan domination
or influence."

His passion for civil service didn't stop then. A few years ago, Mr. Dennery was
one of the attorneys for people who filed the litigation that brought civil
service to Plaquemines Parish, state Supreme Court Chief Justice Pascal Calogero
Jr. said.

In carrying out such civic tasks, Mr. Dennery "approached change through positive,
affirmative steps without being flamboyant or mean or any of the other
characteristics that sometimes accompany change," said former U.S. Rep. Lindy
Boggs, a close friend since their undergraduate days at Tulane University in the
1930s.

Boggs, who described Mr. Dennery as "a renaissance man with an 'aw, shucks'
attitude," said his guiding philosophy was simple: "You don't just try to change
the people in government. You try to make government better."

His leadership style was subtle, said Dave Dixon, the French Quarter businessman
best known for championing the Superdome. As a member of the Governor's Advisory
Committee to the Domed Stadium and, later, chairman of the Superdome Management
Advisory Committee, Mr. Dennery worked with Dixon during the stadium's
construction and its first year of operation, 1975.

"He was a gentle sort of guy when it came to leading," Dixon said. "You wouldn't
even know you were being led, and you'd end up at his position, which I liked
because his position was always my position."

Mr. Dennery assumed leadership roles on an array of boards and committees. He was
a former president of the Bureau of Governmental Research, chairman of the
Louisiana Educational Television Authority and a board member of the Greater New
Orleans Foundation, the Chamber of Commerce and the Metropolitan Area Committee.

During the tumult over the desegregation of New Orleans' public schools in the
1960-61 term, when the Legislature tried to halt the process by freezing the
school system's bank accounts, Mr. Dennery thwarted that move with a taxpayer suit
that he carried to the state Supreme Court.

"He's had his finger in everything," Dixon said. "Moise was born a good citizen. .
. . I think that had a lot to do with his interest in community affairs: He cared
for the city, and he cared for people."

His zeal started early. "I think it was instilled in him as a child that you're
taking something out of the city and you must give something back," said Colette
Newman, a longtime friend.

Marian Mayer Berkett, a distant relative, remembered a conversation when they were
Tulane Law School classmates.

"I remember his telling me that when he got out of law school, he was going to
donate at least 30 percent of his time to community affairs," said Berkett, one of
two women in the Class of 1937. "I think he's done that."

He was the son of Harry and Augusta Waldhorn Dennery. His father died when he was
13.

Mr. Dennery graduated from Isidore Newman School, where he was editor of the
school newspaper and a part-time sports reporter for The New Orleans Item.

In 1949, Mr. Dennery was elected to Newman's board of trustees. He later served as
its chairman, and he received the school's Distinguished Alumnus Award in 1991.

As a Tulane undergraduate, he was sports editor of the Jambalaya, the school
yearbook, and the Hullabaloo, the student newspaper. His Hullabaloo colleagues
included future television news commentator Howard K. Smith as well as Corinne
"Lindy" Claiborne and the future congressman she married, Hale Boggs.

Mr. Dennery managed the basketball team and was a fast walker for Tulane's track
team.

He was president of his fraternity, Zeta Beta Tau, and chairman of the Panhellenic
Council, which regulated Greek life on campus. He was selected for two leadership
fraternities, Omicron Delta Kappa and Kappa Delta Phi.

In law school, Mr. Dennery was on the Tulane Law Review's board of editors and was
selected for the Order of the Coif, a scholastic honor.

After graduating and passing the bar in 1937, he was an associate in Schwarz,
Guste, Barnett & Redmann until 1941, when he became a partner in McCloskey,
Dennery, Page & Hennessy. From 1985 until his death, Mr. Dennery was a partner in
Lemle & Kelleher.

In his work, Mr. Dennery was a reminder of "the age of the generalist," said John
Page Jr., a colleague since 1960. "When he started practicing law, there was
virtually no specialization."

He practiced in corporate, tax, estate and trust areas, Page said, and was called
upon by state Attorney General William Guste Jr. to be a special counsel to his
office. He also represented the state Supreme Court when it was sued in federal
court.

Mr. Dennery was "a lawyer's lawyer," Calogero said. "I think he had a remarkable
legal career."

"He was a good friend and a good lawyer, someone you could always depend on," said
David Oreck, a New Orleans businessman who was a client of Mr. Dennery's for 35
years.

Characterizing Mr. Dennery as someone with a "core of kindness," Oreck described
him as "gentle, kind and soft-spoken." But, he said, "in no way did that detract
from his legal abilities. I could trust him with anything."

Mr. Dennery was a past president of the New Orleans Bar Association. In 1991, he
received its first Presidents' Award. He was president of Tulane's Law Alumni Club
and received the law school's Distinguished Alumnus Award in 1990.

In 1941, Mr. Dennery married Phyllis Sugarman of New York City. Once she settled
in New Orleans, she became an active volunteer in civic projects on her own,
including the founding and development of WYES-TV. She died in February 1991.

"She came into a situation where she was an outsider and wanted very much to be a
part of the community, a part of Moise's life and his circle of friends and family
members," Boggs said. "I think she wanted to pull her oar and feel she had
something to offer and do it very well and be respected for it."

Perhaps her longest-lasting contribution was a section of federal law bearing her
name, the Dennery Amendment to the Telecommunications Act of 1978, which set a
monetary value on the time volunteer workers contribute to public stations and let
the stations count that as "income" in applying for federal matching money.

Although Mrs. Dennery lobbied persistently for the amendment's passage, the idea
for it came from a conversation with her husband, who asked why WYES didn't get
any credit for her volunteer work.

"They were a great team," said Dot Shushan, a longtime friend. "He was certainly
Phyllis' greatest supporter."

During the Constitutional Convention, Mrs. Dennery accompanied her husband on his
daily drives to Baton Rouge, often working on needlepoint, Shushan said. One
project from that period was a pillow for him displaying the state seal.

Shortly after their marriage, the United States entered World War II. Mr. Dennery
entered the Louisiana Wing of the Civil Air Patrol and became deputy executive
officer. He flew with the Air Transport Command as a co-pilot for Pennsylvania-
Central Airlines and was a qualified ground instructor in meteorology.

Aviation held a lifelong fascination for Mr. Dennery, friends said. After the war,
he was appointed to the commission that ran the terminal now known as Lakefront
Airport. He was president of the New Orleans Chapter of the National Aeronautic
Association, founder and president of the Wings Club of New Orleans and chairman
of the Chamber of Commerce's Aviation Committee.

Mr. Dennery was a vice president of Touro Synagogue and Lakewood Country Club, and
a member of the boards of International House, Touro Infirmary, the New Orleans
Jewish Welfare Federation and the American Jewish Committee. He was a member of
The Times-Picayune's Editorial Advisory Board, the New Orleans Archdiocese's
Social Apostolate Advisory Board and the League of Women Voters' advisory board.

He received the Louisiana Civil Service League's Monte M. Lemann Award and
Lifetime Achievement Award, the Weiss Brotherhood Award of the National Conference
of Christians and Jews, the Volunteer Activist Award and the Louisiana Attorney
General's Award. The French government named him a knight in its national Order of
Merit.

Mr. Dennery was a lifelong Democrat. During Al Gore's campaign for the party's
1988 presidential nomination, the Dennerys threw a party for him. Gore stayed with
the couple, and Mr. Dennery accompanied him to Baton Rouge for a speech to an
audience that included politicians and political aficionados Mr. Dennery had known
for decades.

As the men left the meeting, Gore noted the number of people crowding around Mr.
Dennery in hopes of catching his ear. With wry amusement, Gore asked, "Just which
one of us is running for president?"

Survivors include two sons, Harry Dennery of Louisville, Ky., and Richard E.
Dennery of Bath, England, and three grandchildren.

A memorial service will be held today at 2 p.m. in Forgotston Chapel of Touro
Synagogue, St. Charles Avenue at Gen. Pershing Street. Visitation will begin at
noon. The body was donated to science.

Tharp-Sontheimer-Tharp Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements.