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State Week: Remembering Jim Edgar

State Week 23 logo (capitol dome)
Brian Mackey
/
NPR Illinois

Jim Edgar served two terms as Illinois governor, leaving office in 1999 with a more than $1 billion budget surplus. Tributes have poured in from all political sides this week after Edgar's death from pancreatic cancer. He was 79.

On this episode, we look back at Edgar's career and why he still commands respect from so many.

We also discuss the upcoming Republican gubernatorial primary, Gov. JB Pritzker's effort to regulate intoxicating hemp products and what may lie ahead for video gambling in Illinois.

Host Sean Crawford is joined by Professor Emeritus Charlie Wheeler and former State Journal-Register political writer and columnist Bernie Schoenburg.

The former director of the Public Affairs Reporting (PAR) graduate program is Professor Charles N. Wheeler III, a veteran newsman who came to the University of Illinois at Springfield following a 24-year career at the Chicago Sun-Times.
Bernie Schoenburg is a former political writer and columnist with the State Journal-Register.