Editorials

SAN FRANCISCO — John W. Gardner, a trailblazing advocate of democratic participation and volunteerism who became known as “the father of campaign finance reform,” died Saturday. He was 89. 

Gardner helped launch Medicare, founded Common Cause, led the Carnegie Corporation and kept engaged in the nation’s intellectual life until he was bedridden in January from complications with prostate cancer was first diagnosed two years ago. 

He died about 3:30 p.m. at his home on Stanford University’s campus, according to his daughter, Francesca Gardner.Gardner was secretary of health, education and welfare at the height of President Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society and the cabinet’s token Republican. It was a post he occupied from Medicare’s first year in 1965 until he resigned in 1968 after concluding Johnson should not run again. 

“We are going to build a true ’citizens’ lobby — a lobby concerned not with the advancement of special interests but with the well-being of the nation,” Gardner said in 1970 as he introduced a group that quickly became a player in national politics. 

Gardner was secretary of health, education and welfare at the height of President Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society and the cabinet’s token Republican. It was a post he occupied from Medicare’s first year in 1965 until he resigned in 1968 after concluding Johnson should not run again. 

Gardner said that in his youth he preferred reflection to action. But World War II — he served as a Marine officer in Europe — jolted him into a more activist role. Gardner is survived by his wife of 67 years, Aida; two daughters, Stephanie Gardner Trimble and Francesca Gardner and his brother, Louis.