Tom Foley, former speaker of the house

[Grover Cleveland]

Despite being the speaker for 5 years, I never see much written about him....anywhere (except for some glossed-over biographical stuff.) Tell me about the guy. Was he effective? Was he a liberal? Centrist? Bulldog? Pushover?

[whistle]

1. This might help you....

Cage 655
Thomas S. Foley
Congressional Papers, 1964-1997

Congressional papers of Thomas S. Foley, Member of the United States House of Representative for the Fifth District of the state of Washington from 1965 through 1994, were donated to the Washington State University Libraries in 1995. Further materials were transferred in 1997 by the Former Speaker's Office in Spokane. Papers were processed between mid-1995 and early 1998. Employees of the University Libraries who participated in inventory and processing of the papers and in compilation of the guide were: Mary Kay Duffié, Robert Hadlow, Jean Johnson, April O'Riley, Liza Rognas, Lawrence Stark, Scott Stratton, Debra Sutphen, JoséVargas, Anna Vogt, and Baodi Zhou.

Number of Containers ----- 480
Linear feet of Shelf Space ----- 550

<link>
http://www.wsulibs.wsu.edu/holland/masc/foley/FRONT.HTM


BIOGRAPHY

Thomas S. Foley was born at Spokane, Washington, in 1929. He practiced law and worked for the Spokane County Prosecutor from 1957 to 1961, following his education at the University of Washington. From 1961 through 1964 he was on the staff of the Interior Committee of the United States Senate, a position he was introduced to by Senator Henry Jackson. In 1964, Foley won election as the Representative for Washington's Fifth District. Between then and 1994 he won fourteen more elections, ultimately serving in Congress for thirty years. He left Congress after the election of 1994, in which he was unsuccessful.

Foley became Chairman of the House Agriculture Committee in 1974, Majority Whip in 1981, Majority Leader in 1987 and Speaker of the House of Representatives in 1989. He also held other Democratic Party leadership posts in the party caucus and its Steering and Policy Committee. In 1997, he was appointed United States Ambassador to Japan.

[sangh0]

2. I suggest

Google

[sallyseven]

3. The election was a dirty one by repukes.

It was one of the first ones that lies were used to totally ruin a man.

[Grover Cleveland]

4. Done that

I don't care which committees he served on or anything like that. I want to know how people here personally felt about him.

[DrWeird]

6. Great guy. One of the big tragedies of the "94 revolution."

His constituency really fucked up voting him out of office and replacing him with the lying scumbag Nethercutt.

He was a good guy, strong voice for his people, didn't deserve what happened.

[Grover Cleveland]

7. So I take it, he was much more liberal than Gephardt

that's music to my ears!

Nethercutt ran on a promise of 2 terms only too. Lying scumbag.

[charlyvi]

5. I remember that when Foley was Speaker

Newt Gingrich was Minority Whip; a memo (believed to have been put out by the RNC) was circulated smearing Foley as being homosexual. Mark Goodin, author of the memo, was forced to resign and George HW Bush apologized to Foley publically. Robert Dole (Majority Leader at the time) also denounced the memo from the Senate floor as "garbage".

Here's a link:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/special/clinton/frenzy/foley.htm