Doing Our Part

Dedication of the Michael O. Leavitt Building

August 21, 2026

I was 11 years old in 1963 when my father was elected as a member of the Utah Legislature. Our family lived in Cedar City.

That year, and several after, I spent a week with him during the legislative session.

I had a routine during those visits. Each morning, I sat on a bench inside the legislative chamber listening to the floor debate. When my interest waned, I would quietly slip out to explore the Capitol.

The walls inside the legislative area of the Capitol were covered with pictures of the people who served in each session since statehood. I found them fascinating. These were ordinary people who left their fields, their shops, classrooms, offices, factories, and families to serve their neighbors.

Session after session they came. Each one committed to do their part.

One place in the Capitol especially fascinated me — the Gold Room. It is a beautiful, ornate room that our state’s founders aspired to be the most beautiful room in the Capitol.

It troubled me that for decades the room was never used. It seemed to exist so people could lean across the braided rope barrier to get a peek.

Two decades later, I was elected governor. The inaugural committee proposed a reception.

“Yes,” I said, “and we’re going to hold it in the Gold Room.”

I called Neil Stowe, who headed state facilities management, and said, “Neil, in my first executive act as governor, I’m liberating the Gold Room—that rope across the door is coming down.”

For the next nearly 4,000 days after that Gold Room reception, it was my privilege to work on Capitol Hill on behalf of Utah’s people.

It was time for me to “do my part.”

Serving the people of Utah was a sacred trust, and the State Capitol is the sanctuary where the rituals of our democracy are conducted.

It was that feeling that resulted in the 1998 establishment of the State Capitol Preservation Board. The word “preservation” was very carefully chosen. The phrase “permanent stewardship” is used in the statute to describe its mission. It was created to hold permanent stewardship of Capitol Hill.

On August 11, 1999, about one year later, a deadly tornado uprooted 93 trees on the Capitol lawn. The tornado traveled straight up State Street and across the Capitol lawn. Just feet from the columns upon which the building rested, the tornado took a hard right turn, averting what engineering studies later confirmed likely would have caused our Capitol to collapse.

Then, and now—I credit divine intervention in preserving our Capitol. The realization of how close we were to losing our treasured capitol building in that storm galvanized a grand commitment by our state to renew our Capitol Hill.

Today, Governor Spencer J. Cox acts as Chair of the Preservation Board. Senate President J. Stuart Adams and Speaker Mike Schultz are vice chairs. Other members represent the Legislature and other statewide officers and the courts.

Several of them are here today.

Many other office holders have previously served. To all who have occupied these important roles over the past 27 years, I offer the following declaration.

My public service has taken me to every state capitol in the United States.

Every single one.

Most of them, multiple times.

No other state capitol complex surpasses the magnificence, the dignity, and the functionality of what you have created on Utah’s Capitol Hill. Every Utahn can feel a sense of satisfaction and perpetual pride in this symbol of our state’s place in the world.

The building we celebrate today is a masterpiece.

In January, during the final week of this building’s preparation (and without any inclination that we would gather for our purpose today), I walked through this building.

The next morning, I messaged Governor Cox, the Senate President and Speaker. I told them that as I walked into the lobby of this building—I had the same feeling of awe I feel standing in the Rotunda of the Capitol. I love the way the Georgian marble matches the Capitol, the depth and quality of the woodwork, the stained glass, and the functional design.

The building forms part of the Utah State Capitol.  It has a feeling of permanence, stability and strength. It symbolizes our aspiration for what government should be. It stands as not only as a house of the people, but it is also a monument to the ethos of democracy—do your part.

I humbly acknowledge the significance of having my name permanently associated with this glorious part of the State Capitol complex.

No recognition could be more satisfying or feel more consequential to me. None.

Thank you.

I express appreciation that so many of my family members and former colleagues in service are here today. They, and others who serve alongside us, share this collective recognition. I recognize only two by name. My Jackie, who served so ably as First Lady of our State.

The other is Governor Olene Walker, who served as Lieutenant Governor during my tenure and finished our third term when I was appointed to serve in Washington, D.C.

A noted religious leader spoke of a precious gem and an elegant box that was built to hold it. Often, people admired the box—but too often ignored the gem.

We have built a beautiful building. But the gem will always be the work of citizens who come here to “do their part.”

Each year yellow buses bring tens of thousands of Utah schoolchildren to visit the State Capitol. They come to experience democracy and to learn the values of our state.

It is my prayer that, as each generation of school children who wander through these halls will see noble examples of men and woman doing their part.  That is the gem we must preserve.

And somewhere among them will be another 11-year-old who comes here, looks around, and begins to understand that one day it will be their turn to do their part.