All in the Family
By William C. Moyers
NOTE: This was originally published for the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation’s monthly Recovery Advocacy Update. If you’d like to receive our advocacy emails, subscribe today.
At first it was impossible for me to see past the image on my computer screen. It’s me, circa 1998, in a C-SPAN video circulated by Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation CEO Dr. Joe Lee in a recent internal communication. As I watched, I was fixated on how young I was, with a full head of hair, not a gray strand anywhere and nary a line of wisdom in my face or a crease of life on life’s terms on my brow.
“Yikes, a lot has changed, and I’ve come a long, long way,” I thought, and instantly I was propelled back to that moment 25 years ago when, as Hazelden’s director of public policy, I testified in front of a Congressional committee. I was advocating for expanded access to treatment and more federal funds for prevention, research and recovery support in the addiction field. It seems like yesterday, in some ways. But when I add up the years it feels like a long time ago.
In the video, my father, the journalist Bill Moyers, sits to my left at the long table in front of the dozen or so Senators on the committee. He was a lot younger too — the age I am today! He testified as the parent, who along with his wife, my mother Judith Davidson Moyers, was baffled and roiled by my substance use disorder. Watching our testimony today, I am struck by what hasn’t changed over the years: their ongoing recovery and mine, and how crucial family services were to them while I was in treatment in 1989 at Hazelden in Center City, Minnesota. I simply could not have made it this far without their love and support. And because of my recovery, today I am steadfast in my love and support for them as they struggle with the inevitable challenges of old age. (Dad is 89 and Mom is 88.)
Editor’s Note: Five days after the historic hearing, Moyers on Addiction: Close to Home premiered on PBS. The five-part series brought much-needed national awareness to the science, treatment, prevention, and politics of addiction. The hearing and TV series helped mark the beginning of a decade-long advocacy effort by people in recovery, clinical experts, families and Congressional champions like Sen. Paul Wellstone, Sen. Pete Domenici, Rep. Jim Ramstad and Rep. Patrick Kennedy — culminating in the 2008 passing of the game-changing Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act.
What was true in my testimony then remains true today: “addiction affects the whole family, but treatment works, and recovery is possible for the whole family, too.”
As the video shows, we were not the only ones who testified on Capitol Hill that day, and as I rewatched it, I spotted among them John Schwarzlose, who added his perspective as the then-CEO of the Betty Ford Center. Buzz Aldrin, the second human to walk on the moon, talked about how treatment had helped him stop drinking. As did singer-songwriter Shawn Colvin, who had just won a Grammy for her hit “Sunny Came Home.” The actress Mackenzie Phillips brought the Hollywood perspective to the hearing as a woman in recovery. Each of them proved with their face and their voice the power of public advocacy in shattering the stigma of addiction. I was humbled to join them, and even more humbled when the audience, in violation of the rules of decorum in the Senate, broke into applause after my father and I completed our testimony. It was at that moment in the video that for the first time the other day, I noticed somebody whose reaction made my heart sink.
The actor Carroll O’Connor played Archie Bunker in the sitcom, All in the Family, which for five straight years in the 1970s was the highest rated program on television and earned him four Emmys. O’Connor came to Washington to testify not about the importance of treatment or the grace of redemption, but to denounce drug dealers, particularly the one he blamed for the suicide of his beloved son, Hugh, three years earlier. His words were borne of grief and sharpened with anger to the point that when our testimony was done, watching the video now, I see that O’Connor was the only person in the room who did not applaud. He sits uncomfortably at the end of the table, unsmiling and seemingly unsure of what to do with his hands. Tragically, I see a man who never recovered from the pain of his loved one’s addiction. It is hard for me to watch knowing my father and I were only a few chairs away, publicly celebrating the power of hope, help and healing for our family.
O’Connor said he would never be able to put his son’s death behind him, telling TV and radio legend Larry King: “I can’t forget it. There isn’t a day that I don’t think of him and want him back and miss him, and I’ll feel that way until I’m not here anymore.”
Addiction is not fair, and it does not discriminate. In the 25 years since that hearing in March 1998, too many people have come to know the tragedy of addiction and the despair of mental illness made worse by the opioid epidemic, the pandemic of COVID-19, expanded access to marijuana and other drugs, and the relentless infusion of social media, particularly into the impressionable brains of our young people. Even though we have made remarkable strides in health insurance coverage and access to effective medications and therapies — while also diluting stigma by rallying people to openly tell their recovery journeys — I believe the problem of addiction today is worse than back then. This why I am heartened by Hazelden Betty Ford’s expanded mission, with an emphasis on mental health; children and families; and raising the millions of dollars necessary to realize our vision of empowering recovery and well-being for all. More than ever, we know the power of our mission is, at its best, “all in the family.”
William C. Moyers is vice president of public affairs and community relations for the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation.
