Editing Bill Clements (section)

== Second term as Governor of Texas (1987–1991) ==
Clements's second term was marred by a startling revelation he made two months after taking office. On March 3, 1987, Clements admitted that he and the other members of the SMU board of governors had approved a secret plan to [[Southern Methodist University football scandal|continue payments to 13 football players]] from a [[slush fund]] provided by a booster. Clements said that the board agreed to "phase out" the slush fund at the end of the 1986 season but that it felt duty-bound to honour prior commitments to the players. The decision to continue the payments ultimately led to the [[NCAA]] shutting down the football program for the 1987 season—the so-called "[[death penalty (NCAA)|death penalty]]."  SMU then opted not to field a team in 1988 either, claiming it could not put together a competitive squad. The shutdown and other sanctions left the once-proud Mustang football program in ruin; SMU would not procure another bowl bid until 2009, and it would also be another ten years before they would be ranked in the top 25 in the [[Amway Coaches Poll]] by [[USA Today]].  A few months later, the College of Bishops of the [[United Methodist Church]] released a report detailing an investigation of its own into the scandal. It revealed that Clements had met with athletic director Bob Hitch, and the two agreed that the payments had to continue because the football program had "a payroll to meet."<ref name="ExpresNews">Wangrin, Mark.  [http://www.mysanantonio.com/sports/football/stories/MYSA030307.01A.smu-clements.36d2bf0.html 20 years after SMU's football scandal] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090803020250/http://www.mysanantonio.com/sports/MYSA030307_01A_smu-clements_36d2bf0_html12919.html |date=August 3, 2009 }}.  ''[[San Antonio Express-News]]'', March 3, 2007.</ref>

According to the report, in late 1985, then SMU President [[L. Donald Shields]] and board of trustees chairman Edwin L. Cox wanted to stop the payments completely, in opposition to Clements and Hitch. The four held a "most important meeting" in August 1985 in Shields's office in the SMU administration building, Perkins Hall.  Shields and Cox noted that although earlier in the year a phase-out of the payments had been agreed upon by SMU leadership, the NCAA had just enacted the "death penalty" for repeat violators (of which SMU was one, having been cited six times to that point by the organization and twice in the last five years) for violations occurring on or after September 1 of that year, and thus the situation had changed. But Clements, admitting his way would be "taking a chance," argued that if the payments were stopped immediately, star players receiving them would be sure to leave SMU and publicly announce why. Nothing was formally decided at the meeting, but afterwards, Clements and Hitch talked for about fifteen minutes in the Perkins Hall parking lot. Hitch remembered Clements asking him if the payments could be continued and, upon hearing that they could, telling him in no uncertain terms to "do it." And the payments continued (on at least two occasions starting in 1983, after President Shields expressed outrage over the payments and said they had to stop, Clements, an SMU dropout, told the PhD holder Shields to "stay out of it" and to "go run the university").<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.smudailycampus.com/polopoly_fs/1.1377705!/bishops.pdf |title=Archived copy |access-date=November 13, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120406025150/http://www.smudailycampus.com/polopoly_fs/1.1377705%21/bishops.pdf |archive-date=April 6, 2012 }}</ref>

A week later, Clements apologised for his role in continuing the payments. He said that he had learned about the slush fund in 1984, and an investigation by the board of governors revealed that players had been paid to play since the mid-1970s. Clements said that rather than shutting down the payments immediately, the board "reluctantly and uncomfortably" decided to continue paying players who had already been guaranteed payments. However, he said, in hindsight, the board "should have stopped (the payments) immediately," rather than merely phase them out.<ref>Munoz, T. James.  [https://web.archive.org/web/20121020151854/http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-1310625.html Clements apologizes for SMU role; governor fails to name others involved in football payments].  ''[[The Washington Post]]'', March 11, 1987.</ref>

Clements faced calls for his [[impeachment in the United States|impeachment]] as a result of these statements; two state legislators argued that he would have never been elected had he honestly addressed his role in the scandal. Under the circumstances, he opted not to run for a third term as governor and was succeeded on January 15, 1991, by Democratic State Treasurer [[Ann Richards]].

During his second term, Clements worked to reduce crime, improve education, boost the Texas economy, and foster better relations with Mexico, especially on issues important to the mutual borders, such as immigration and the [[War on Drugs]]. However, he did not push as pledged for the [[Popular initiative|initiative]] and [[referendum]] reforms advocated by [[Texas State Senate|State Senator]] [[Walter Mengden]] of [[Houston, Texas|Houston]], based on the principle of [[California]]'s [[Proposition 13]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Initiative and Referendum Institute |url=http://www.iandrinstitute.org/Texas.htm |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120118125336/http://www.iandrinstitute.org/Texas.htm |archive-date=January 18, 2012 |access-date=September 10, 2011 |publisher=iandrinstitute.org}}</ref>