my .emacs looks like:
;;
;; .emacs of HAu
;;
;;
;;
;; comply to oracle coding standard format
;;
(setq load-path (cons "/oa/oa/elisp" load-path))
(load "orastd" t t) ; oracle standard editing
(load "fns" t t)
(load "keys" t t)
;;
;; use emacs version 19 highlight
;;
(cond (window-system
(setq hilit-mode-enable-list '(not text-mode)
hilit-background-mode 'light
hilit-inhibit-hooks nil
hilit-inhibit-rebinding nil)
(require 'hilit19)
))
;;
;; always use auto-fill minor mode
;;
(setq-default auto-fill-hook 'do-auto-fill)
;;
;; that doesn't work
;;
(add-hook 'text-mode-hook 'turn-on-auto-fill)
(add-hook 'c-mode 'turn-on-auto-fill)
(add-hook 'c++-mode 'turn-on-auto-fill)
(add-hook 'latex-mode 'turn-on-auto-fill)
(add-hook 'tex-mode 'turn-on-auto-fill)
(add-hook 'lisp-mode 'turn-on-auto-fill)
(add-hook 'sql-mode 'turn-on-auto-fill)
(add-hook 'nroff-mode 'turn-on-auto-fill)
;;
;; turn on various editing modes based on file extension
;;
(setq auto-mode-alist
'(("\\.text$" . text-mode)
("\\.text~$" . text-mode)
("\\.txt$" . text-mode) ("\\.txt~$" . text-mode)
("\\.texinfo$" . texinfo-mode)
("\\.texinfo~$" . texinfo-mode)
("\\.tex$" . latex-mode)
("\\.tex~$" . latex-mode)
("\\.bib$" . bibtex-mode)
("^/tmp/Re" . text-mode)
("/Message[0-9]*$" . text-mode)
("\\.c$" . c-mode) ("\\.c~$" . c-mode)
("\\.C$" . c++-mode) ("\\.c~$" . c++-mode)
("\\.h$" . c++-mode) ("\\.h~$" . c++-mode)
("\\.y$" . c++-mode) ("\\.y~$" . c++-mode)
("\\.cc$" . c++-mode) ("\\.y~$" . c++-mode)
("\\.scm$" . lisp-mode) ("\\.scm~$" . lisp-mode)
("\\..*emacs" . lisp-mode)
("\\.el$" . lisp-mode) ("\\.el~$" . lisp-mode)
("\\.ml$" . lisp-mode) ("\\.ml~$" . lisp-mode)
("\\.lisp$" . lisp-mode) ("\\.lisp~$" . lisp-mode)
("\\.lsp$" . lisp-mode) ("\\.lsp~$" . lisp-mode)
("\\.l$" . lisp-mode) ("\\.l~$" . lisp-mode)
("\\.nroff$" . nroff-mode) ("\\.nroff~$" . nroff-mode)))
;;
;; display the date and time on status bar
;;
(setq display-time-day-and-date t)
(display-time)
;;
;; highlight selected region
;;
(transient-mark-mode t)
;;
;; highlight matching parenthesis
;;
(require 'paren)
;;
;; display line number
;;
(setq line-number-mode t)
but auto-fill-mode is not automatically turned on for any major mode.