By Laura McAlister
Journal Editor
When Bill J. Hendrix was born, the doctor predicted he would live only a few days due to his low birth weight. Bill proved him wrong, as well as himself. He thought he would live to be around 65.
Now, at age 79, he figures that just means he has more work to do.
The work that absorbs much of Bill’s time now is that of the Alabama Silver-Haired Legislature (ASHL).
First elected to the Silver-Haired Legislature in 2000, Bill has been re-elected by his peers five times since. He also serves as the chairman of the ASHL’s Jefferson County delegation. The purpose of the nonpartisan model legislature is to educate Alabamians about local and state issues concerning the elderly.
“We’re intimately involved in the background,” Bill said. “But we have a lot of influence. It’s a powerful little group, but a lot don’t know about it.”
Though Bill made his living in sales, he’s been active in politics since high school.
He was a senior at Phillips High School in 1949 when the YMCA started a project called the Alabama Youth Legislature. Bill was a member of that first group and helped introduce and write a bill that would eventually abolish poll taxes in Alabama. It was then he learned one of his first lessons in politics.
“The legislative process takes a long time,” he said. “The poll tax passed the U.S. Congress in 1964, and it took 38 years for Alabama to ratify it. You really have to be patient.”
If a life of politics was in store for Bill, it would have to wait. He joined the U.S. Naval Reserves while still in high school, and shortly after graduation, he was sent to serve in the Korean War. When he returned home, he attended the University of Alabama, where he received a degree in business administration.
From there, everything just sort of “flows,” as Bill likes to put it.
His career in sales started in 1953, and he retired in 1990. He worked hard and managed his money, allowing him to purchase land in Florida without financing. He built a vacation home there himself at age 63.
Retirement left him and his wife, Rita, more time to travel and spend with grandchildren, but Bill knew he also had more work to do.
His brother, a retired attorney for Alabama Power, encouraged him to join the Alabama Silver-Haired Legislature. In order to do so, he had to submit a petition with at least 25 signatures from eligible voters to the secretary of state.
Then, senior citizens had to vote to elect him to represent their district for a two-year term. They did, and Bill is now serving his fifth term on the ASHL.
The organization has 105 members. The delegations meet monthly in their regions, and the entire legislature meets in Montgomery twice a year, once in the fall and again in the summer.
Though all ASHL representatives are volunteers and receive reimbursements only for travel expenses, Bill said they take their work for the state’s senior citizens very seriously.
Since Bill has been serving on the Silver-Haired Legislature, the group has helped pass the state’s voter ID law.
This year, Bill is working to draft legislation that would regulate write-in votes on the ballot. As a chief inspector of elections, he knows write-in votes can cost poll workers lots of time.
“We don’t want to prevent write-ins. We just want to regulate it with this,” he said. “Instead of having to count every single write-in when the polls close, we would just have to count those who registered with the secretary of state.”
That means the chances of Nick Saban or Cam Newton being elected are less likely, Rita joked.
Other top priorities for the ASHL this year are creating a Silver Alert System, similar to the Amber Alert but geared toward the elderly, and ethics reform.
Bill’s work on the Silver-Haired Legislature and his advocacy for the state’s senior citizens have earned him a spot in the state’s Senior Citizens Hall of Fame.
The ASHL, along with other volunteer work with Dawson Memorial Baptist Church, has kept him active. Bill doesn’t expect to slow down anytime soon, either.
“When I was born, I was 3 1/2 pounds. The doctor said I would die in three days,” he said. “The rest is history. Here I am 79 years old. I’ll be 80 in February.
“The secret to staying healthy is staying active. My mother lived to be 96. She stayed active and was sharp as a tack until the day she died.”