“When I first started voting in the state, four members of our House delegation were women, and the first woman I ever voted for Senate was Barbara Mikulski,” she said last week. “We are on the verge of not having any representation of women in our state in the Senate and I think it’s pretty compelling and something that makes me think about it even more.”
Three of those women were GOP: Marjorie Holt from Anne Arundel County; Helen Delich Bentley from Baltimore County; and Constance “Connie” Morella from Montgomery County. The fourth, Beverly Byron, was a “Boll Weevil” ‘Rat from western MD who inherited her husband’s seat after he vapor locked while jogging on the C&O Canal towpath circa 1978 (the Byron family controlled the western MD district for something like 50 years). Actually, there was one other woman from MD in Congress at the time, a left wing moonbat, Gladys Noon Spellman from Prince George’s County, who took a massive stroke about a week before her last election (circa 1980), and was never able to take the oath of office (her seat was declared vacant, and former state senator Steny Hoyer won what was (as I remember) a 14-way ‘Rat primary to succeed her.
Some more MD political history (I lived in MD between 1981 and 2011): Barf Mikulski was a city councilcritter in Baltimore and led the fight against building interstate highways through the city (I-70 and the southern end of I-83 were never completed)—this ended up really hurting the development of Baltimore, so, of course, she got elected to Congress from the “white district” of Baltimore City and eastern Baltimore County in 1976 when the corrupt Edward Garmatz stepped down.
In 1986, RINO republican Sen. Charles Mathias retired (Mathias was a part of the RINO coalition that included over the years such as Jacob Javits, Clifford Case, Lowell Weicker, Charles Percy, Caleb Boggs, Robert Packwood, etc.). 1986 was a bad year for the GOP, as they had passed bad legislation such as TEFRA; they would go on to lose control of the Senate which they had held since 1981; they wouldn’t get it back until January, 1995. Linda Chavez was the GOP nominee to replace Mathias. Mikulski was up against two liberals, Stephen Sachs, the elected Attorney General of MD, and Michael Barnes, an odious creep who was then the Montgomery County representative in Congress. Mikulski won the primary with about 40% of the vote; Sachs and Barnes presumably splitting the male vote.
Thanks for the colorful rundown.
: )
We were in MD for that Kathleen Kennedy Townsend - Bob Ehrlich election - actually got to vote against a Kennedy!
Ehrlich and others got the ICC pushed through.
Back in Texas now.
“1986 was a bad year for the GOP, as they had passed bad legislation such as TEFRA”
TEFRA was passed in 1982. The Tax Reform Act (TRA) was passed in 1986.
Regarding the Byrons, William Devereux Byron first won the seat in 1938 but he died in a Georgia plane crash while in office in 1941 and his widow, Katherine (herself the granddaughter of MD Republican Senator Louis Emory McComas), filled out the seat for the remainder of the term. Republican J. Glenn Beall, Sr. took the 6th district seat in 1942 and aside from a single Dem fluke winner in 1958, would remain GOP until 1971 (producing 3 of the last 4 GOP Senators from MD, both Bealls (Sr. & Jr.) and ultraleftist Chuck Mathias).
Goodloe Byron (son of William & Katherine) won the seat when Beall, Jr. moved up to the Senate in 1971, serving until his death in 1978 (and then widow Beverly from 1979-93), so they controlled the seat for 26 out of 54 years.
You’ve got a great knowledge of MD politics that I lack. I just know MD always disappoints. Even Spiro Agnew could not hold it for Nixon in 1968 (nor could Paul Ryan hold WI for Romney).