Jack Kemp
Jack French Kemp was an American politician, professional football player, and U.S. Army veteran who served as the ninth U.S. secretary of housing and urban development in the administration of President George H. W. Bush from 1989 to 1993. A member of the Republican Party from New York, he previously served nine terms in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1971 to 1989. He was the Republican Party's vice presidential nominee in the 1996 election, as the running mate of Bob Dole; they lost to incumbent president Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore. Kemp had previously contended for the presidential nomination in the 1988 Republican primaries.
Before entering politics, Kemp briefly played in the National Football League and the Canadian Football League, but became a star in the American Football League. He served as a captain of both the Los Angeles / San Diego Chargers and the Buffalo Bills, earning the AFL Most Valuable Player award in 1965 after leading the Bills to a second consecutive championship. He played in the AFL for all 10 years of its existence, appeared in its All-Star game seven times, played in its championship game five times, and set many of the league's career passing records. Kemp also co-founded the AFL Players Association, for which he served five terms as president. During his early football career, he served in the United States Army Reserve.
As an economic conservative, Kemp advocated low taxes and supply-side policies during his political career. His positions spanned the social spectrum, ranging from his conservative opposition to abortion to his more libertarian stances advocating immigration reform. As a proponent of both Chicago school and supply-side economics, he is notable as an influence upon Ronald Reagan's political agenda and the architect of the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981, which is known as the Kemp–Roth tax cut.
After his days in political office, Kemp remained active as a political advocate and commentator; he served on corporate and nonprofit organization boards. He also authored, co-authored, and edited several books. He promoted American football and advocated for retired professional football players. Kemp was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009 by President Barack Obama.
Early life
Youth
Born and raised in Los Angeles, Kemp was the third of four sons of Frances Elizabeth and Paul Robert Kemp Sr. Paul turned his motorcycle messenger service into a trucking company that grew from one to 14 trucks. Frances was a social worker and Spanish teacher. Kemp grew up in the heavily Jewish Wilshire district of West Los Angeles, but his tight-knit middle-class family attended the Church of Christ, Scientist. In his youth, sports consumed Kemp, who once chose the forward pass as the subject of a school essay on important inventions, although his mother attempted to broaden his horizons with piano lessons and trips to the Hollywood Bowl.Kemp attended Melrose Avenue's Fairfax High School, which was, at the time, known for its high concentration of both Jewish students and children of celebrities. Over 95% of Kemp's classmates were Jewish, and he later became a supporter of Jewish causes. His classmates included musician Herb Alpert, baseball pitcher Larry Sherry, and academic Judith A. Reisman. During his years in high school, Kemp worked with his brothers at his father's trucking company in downtown Los Angeles. In his spare time, he was a rigorous reader, preferring history and philosophy books.
College
After graduating from high school in 1953, he attended Occidental College, a founding member of the NCAA Division III Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference. Kemp selected Occidental because its football team used professional formations and plays, which he hoped would help him to become a professional quarterback. At and, he considered himself too small to play for the USC Trojans or UCLA Bruins, the major Southern California college football programs.At Occidental, Kemp was a record-setting javelin hurler and played several positions on the football team: quarterback, defensive back, place kicker, and punter. Although he was near-sighted, Kemp was tenacious on the field. During his years as starting quarterback, the 1955 and 1956 Occidental teams posted 6–2 and 3–6 records. Kemp was named a Little All-America player one year in which he threw for over 1,100 yards. That year, he led the nation's small colleges in passing. He and close friend Jim Mora, who later became an NFL head coach, were members of the Alpha Tau Omega fraternity. Another teammate in college was Ron Botchan. Kemp declined to become involved in student government. After graduating from Occidental with a degree in physical education, he pursued postgraduate studies in economics at Long Beach State University and California Western University in San Diego, and served in the military from 1958 to 1962.
Marriage, family, and faith
Kemp graduated from Occidental in 1957 and married Joanne Main, his college sweetheart, after she graduated from Occidental in 1958. Main had grown up in Fillmore, California, and attended Fillmore High School in Ventura County. Kemp's Biblical Literature professor, Keith Beebe, presided over the wedding. The Kemps had two sons. Both were professional football quarterbacks: Jeff Kemp played in the NFL from 1981 to 1991, and Jimmy Kemp played in the CFL from 1994 to 2002. Significantly for a man with his demanding schedule, Jack never missed one of their games as children or in college. They also had two daughters: Jennifer Kemp Andrews and Judith Kemp.Joanne Kemp once suffered a miscarriage, which Kemp later said made him re-evaluate the sanctity of human life and affirmed his opposition to abortion.
Following his wedding, Kemp converted to his wife's Presbyterian faith. He identified as a born-again Christian.
Kemp was a 33rd degree Freemason in the Northern Masonic Jurisdiction.
Football career
After being selected by the Detroit Lions in the 17th round of the 1957 NFL draft, Kemp was cut from the team before the 1957 NFL season began. He spent 1957 with the Pittsburgh Steelers and 1958 on the taxi squads of the San Francisco 49ers and New York Giants. The Giants hosted the NFL championship game, known as the "Greatest Game Ever Played" and the first overtime NFL playoff game, but, as a third-string quarterback member of the taxi squad, Kemp did not take the field.In 1958, Kemp joined the United States Army Reserve and he served a year on active duty as a private to complete his initial training. He was a member of the San Diego–based 977th Transportation Company from 1958 to 1962. When his unit was activated for the Berlin Crisis of 1961, Kemp received a medical exemption for his chronically separated left shoulder. The injury led to his discharge from the Reserve in July 1962.
In 1959, Kemp played one game for the Calgary Stampeders of the Canadian Football League, which made him ineligible for the NFL, in 1959. According to his older brother Tom, his parents drove him from California to Calgary, Alberta, only to see him cut. By this time, Kemp had been cut from five professional teams and his family encouraged him to get on with his life. On February 9 and 11, 1960, the newly formed AFL agreed to "no tampering" policies with the NFL and CFL respectively, protecting each league's players. Players like Kemp, with modest NFL experience, were often signed by the AFL at the time. Kemp signed as a free agent with the AFL's Los Angeles Chargers.
Sid Gillman era (1960–1962)
In 1960, Kemp led the Chargers to a Western Division Championship with a 10–4 record. He finished second in the league to Frank Tripucka in passing attempts, completions, and yards, led the AFL in yards per completion and times sacked, and finished one rushing touchdown short of the league lead. Under Kemp, the Chargers' offense averaged 46 points over its last four games and scored more than 41 points in five of its last nine games. In the AFL championship game, he led the team to field goals on its first two possessions, but after the Houston Oilers posted a touchdown in the second quarter for a 7–6 lead, the Chargers never recovered.In 1961, San Diego Union editor Jack Murphy convinced Barron Hilton to move the Chargers from Los Angeles to San Diego. Kemp led the relocated team to a 12–2 record and a repeat Western Division Championship. He again finished second in passing yards. The Chargers earned an AFL championship game rematch against the Oilers. However, this time the Chargers were unable to score until a fourth-quarter field goal in a 10–3 loss.
In 1962, Kemp broke his middle finger when he struck a helmet against the New York Titans in the second game of the season and was unable to play. He persuaded his doctors to set his broken finger around a football, so that his grip would not be affected once the finger healed. Chargers coach Sid Gillman put Kemp on waivers to try to "hide" him. Buffalo Bills coach Lou Saban noticed that Kemp was available and claimed him for a $100 waiver fee on September 25, 1962, in what sportswriter Randy Schultz has called one of the biggest bargains in professional football history. The Dallas Texans and Denver Broncos also attempted to claim Kemp, but he was awarded to Buffalo by AFL commissioner Joe Foss.
Lou Saban era (1962–1965)
According to Billy Shaw, Kemp's acquisition solved the Bills' quarterback problem, but Kemp was not excited about coming to Buffalo. According to Van Miller, "Jack's a skier, and he wanted to go to Denver and play for the Broncos. He hated the thought of coming to Buffalo." In Buffalo, he would become known for his love of reading a broad range of books including those by Henry Thoreau, which led to chidings from Saban.Injuries, including the broken finger, kept Kemp from playing for most of 1962. That season, Kemp received a military draft notice for service in the Vietnam War but was granted a draft waiver because of a knee problem. The injuries healed, and Kemp debuted for Buffalo on November 18, 1962, by directing the only touchdown drive in a 10–6 win over the Oakland Raiders. His start on December 8 versus New York, combined with his start against New York for San Diego months earlier, made Kemp the first quarterback to ever start against the same team twice while playing for two different teams. As of 2025, six other quarterbacks have joined Kemp in this distinction, but only Kemp was successful in winning both starts. He played only four games for Buffalo in 1962, but made the AFL All-Star team. The Bills won three of their last four games to finish 7–6–1.
On December 14, 1962, the Bills outbid the Green Bay Packers for Notre Dame quarterback Daryle Lamonica. In 1963, a four-season starting quarterback battle began that continued until Lamonica left for the Raiders. Lamonica felt he "learned a lot from Jack about quarterbacking. And I truly believe that we were a great one-two punch at the position for the Bills." In 1963, Kemp led the Bills from a slow start to a tie for the AFL Eastern Division lead with a 7–6–1 record. Kemp again placed second in passing attempts, completions, and yards, and he also finished second to teammate Cookie Gilchrist in rushing touchdowns. The Bills played the Boston Patriots in an Eastern Division playoff game to determine the division title on December 28, in weather. Buffalo replaced Kemp with Lamonica after falling behind 16–0, but still lost 26–8.
Kemp was said to be the "clubhouse lawyer" for the Bills because of his role in mediating conflicts. In 1964, he managed personalities such as Gilchrist, who walked off the field when plays were not being called for him, and Saban, whom he kept from cutting Gilchrist the following week. He also managed the politics of his quarterback battle with Lamonica, who engineered four winning touchdown drives in the Bills' first seven games. Kemp was the first and only professional football player to pass for three touchdowns in the first quarter of a season-opening game, against the Kansas City Chiefs in 1964, until the record was tied but not broken, 47 years later in 2011 by Aaron Rodgers. The 1964 team won its first nine games and went 12–2 for the regular season, winning the Eastern Division with a final game victory over the Patriots at Fenway Park. Kemp led the league in yards per attempt and finished one rushing touchdown short of the league lead, which was shared by Gilchrist and Sid Blanks. In the AFL championship game, he scored the final touchdown with just over nine minutes left in a 20–7 victory. Not long after, Kemp played a key role in an off the field decision. Kemp was part of the All-Star Game played three weeks after the Championship Game alongside teammates such as Cookie Gilchrist and Ernie Warlick, with the game scheduled to be played in New Orleans, Louisiana. However, Gilchrist led a movement of African American players wanting to boycott the game due to experiencing discrimination by cab drivers and others during their time in New Orleans; Kemp saw this firsthand when Gilchrist, and Warlick were not allowed to share a cab with him. Kemp attended a boycott meeting and alongside Ron Mix convinced the white players to go with the idea of a boycott. One day after the players left the city, AFL Commissioner Joe Foss moved the game to Houston, Texas.
According to Lamonica, the 1965 team had a new emphasis: "In '64 we had depended a lot on Gilchrist and our running attack to carry us. . .But that all changed in '65. The Bills had traded Gilchrist in the off season to the Denver Broncos. So we went to a pass-oriented game more that season than we ever had before. We not only went to our receivers, but we threw a lot to our running backs. And I really think it brought out the best in Jack that year." In 1965, the Bills finished with a 10–3–1 record. Kemp finished the season second in the league in pass completions. In the 1965 AFL Championship Game, Buffalo defeated the Chargers 23–0; for Kemp, the victory was special because it came against his former team. Kemp's role in leading the Bills to a repeat championship without Gilchrist and with star receiver Elbert Dubenion playing only three games earned him a share of the AFL MVP awards that he split with former Charger teammate, Paul Lowe. Kemp also won the Associated Press award and the Championship Game Most Valuable Player award.