Political Legend’s Final Bow

Ralph C. Dills of El Segundo is a self-described saxophone-playing teacher who just “got into politics” a few years back. In 1938, that is, in the second term of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s presidency, when California trailed even Ohio in population, winning an Assembly seat from the Long Beach-South Bay area. On Monday, Dills cast his final votes after a public career that has spanned six decades--11 years in the Assembly, 17 as a municipal court judge and the last 32 years as a member of the state Senate.

Dills, 88 and slowed by bad knees and other ailments, sat quietly in the ornate Senate chamber last week as fellow senators extolled him as a living legend. He was remembered for sponsoring legislation that established California State University Long Beach and for being one of only two members of the Assembly to formally oppose the internment of Japanese Americans early in World War II.

Dills won his eighth term in 1994, a tough race in a new district, on the theme “too old to quit.” And, who knows, he might be running again if not for California’s term limits law, which is forcing his retirement. But for that, his son said, “You’d have to blast him out.”

In recent years, Dills has been more of a character than a power in the Senate. But he came to work and continued to serve by a basic rule: “I just try to represent my district.” That’s not a bad standard, even for newly minted legislators of the term limits era.