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Charles Walter "Charlie" Stenholm, (born October 26, 1938) is a Democratic Party politician from the State of Texas. He was a member of the United States House of Representatives for 13 terms, from 1979 to 2005. Stenholm was born in Stamford, Texas, near Abilene and he graduated from Texas Tech University — with a B.S. (1961) and an M.S. (1962) in Agriculture Education (1961). He was a member of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon Fraternity. He has operated a cotton farm in Stamford for many years, and also worked as a vocational teacher. == Congressional career == Stenholm was elected to the House as a Democrat in 1978, representing the 17th District. The district, based in Abilene, was a vast and mostly rural district stretching from San Angelo to the western fringes of the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. He became one of the most conservative Democrats in the House, belonged to the Blue Dog Coalition and was a leader of the Boll Weevils during the 1980s. He was one of the more prominent Democratic supporters of Ronald Reagan's tax-cut package in 1981. Like many conservative Texas Democrats, Stenholm opposed abortion and gun control. In 1990 he was one of the only three House Democrats to vote against the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.〔(ADA rollcall. )〕 However, his main interests were in agriculture and budget matters. For six years, he was ranking Democrat on the House Agriculture Committee. He worked very closely with the committee's chairman, Republican Larry Combest of the neighboring 19th District (and himself a farmer), to shepherd the 2002 Farm Bill through Congress. He was a longtime supporter of a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. Stenholm frequently clashed with President Bill Clinton, and voted for three of the four articles of impeachment against him. However, he was a severe critic of the Bush Administration's fiscal policy. He voted against making Bush's tax cut permanent, as he now opposed cutting taxes unless the budget was balanced. From 1980 to 1990, Stenholm was reelected without major-party opposition, even running unopposed in 1980 and from 1984 to 1990. This occurred even as the 17th was trending more and more Republican at the national level. However, in 1994, Stenholm was held to only 53 percent of the vote against an unknown Republican in an election that saw dozens of other moderate and conservative Democrats toppled. Indeed, when his children heard the initial returns, they were so certain he'd lost that they traveled to the family farm to console him. Afterwards, he ran for House Minority Whip, losing to David E. Bonior.〔Horn, Richard. (Stenholm: I want to be more than one vote ). Abilene Reporter-News, 1996-09-22.〕 While he was reelected four more times after that, he never crossed the 60 percent mark again, and was nearly defeated in 1996 and 2002. By the end of the 20th century, Stenholm was the only elected Democrat above the county level in much of the district. It was considered very likely that he would be succeeded by a Republican once he retired. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Charles Stenholm」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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