Rep. Douglas Walgren

Former Representative for Pennsylvania’s 18^th District

Walgren was the representative for Pennsylvania’s 18^th congressional district and was a Democrat. He served from 1977 to 1990.

Bioguide

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Analysis

Ideology–Leadership Chart

Walgren is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot was a member of the House of Representatives in 1990 positioned according to our ideology score (left to right) and our leadership score (leaders are toward the top).

The chart is based on the bills Walgren sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 3, 1985 to Oct 27, 1990. See full analysis methodology.

Enacted Legislation

Walgren was the primary sponsor of 13 bills that were enacted. The most recent include:

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Does 13 not sound like a lot? Very few bills are ever enacted — most legislators sponsor only a handful that are signed into law. But there are other legislative activities that we don’t track that are also important, including offering amendments, committee work and oversight of the other branches, and constituent services.

We consider a bill enacted if one of the following is true: a) it is enacted itself, b) it has a companion bill in the other chamber (as identified by Congress) which was enacted, or c) if at least about half of its provisions were incorporated into bills that were enacted (as determined by an automated text analysis, applicable beginning with bills in the 110^th Congress).

Bills Sponsored

Issue Areas

Walgren sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:

Health (22%) Science, Technology, Communications (15%) Foreign Trade and International Finance (12%) Economics and Public Finance (11%) Government Operations and Politics (10%) Education (10%) Social Welfare (10%) Environmental Protection (10%)

Recently Introduced Bills

Walgren recently introduced the following legislation:

View All » | View Cosponsors »

Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.

Voting Record

Missed Votes

From Jan 1977 to Oct 1990, Walgren missed 400 of 7,267 roll call votes, which is 5.5%. This is on par with the median of 4.8% among the lifetime records of representatives serving in Oct 1990. The chart below reports missed votes over time.

We don’t track why legislators miss votes, but it’s often due to medical absenses, major life events, and running for higher office.

Show the numbers...

Time Period	Votes Eligible	Missed Votes	Percent	Percentile
1977 Jan-Mar	100	12	12.0%	80^th
1977 Apr-Jun	273	24	8.8%	65^th
1977 Jul-Sep	198	0	0.0%	0^th
1977 Oct-Dec	135	3	2.2%	27^th
1978 Jan-Mar	150	3	2.0%	19^th
1978 Apr-Jun	300	24	8.0%	52^nd
1978 Jul-Sep	308	9	2.9%	21^st
1978 Oct-Oct	76	17	22.4%	90^th
1979 Jan-Mar	63	0	0.0%	0^th
1979 Apr-Jun	221	23	10.4%	73^rd
1979 Jul-Sep	198	30	15.2%	84^th
1979 Oct-Dec	190	13	6.8%	35^th
1980 Jan-Mar	148	7	4.7%	29^th
1980 Apr-Jun	197	4	2.0%	12^th
1980 Jul-Sep	192	3	1.6%	14^th
1980 Oct-Dec	67	3	4.5%	29^th
1981 Jan-Mar	15	0	0.0%	0^th
1981 Apr-Jun	90	0	0.0%	0^th
1981 Jul-Sep	106	1	0.9%	15^th
1981 Oct-Dec	142	10	7.0%	55^th
1982 Feb-Mar	48	2	4.2%	39^th
1982 Apr-Jun	119	2	1.7%	22^nd
1982 Jul-Sep	193	10	5.2%	45^th
1982 Oct-Dec	99	12	12.1%	68^th
1983 Jan-Mar	43	4	9.3%	62^nd
1983 Apr-Jun	182	12	6.6%	50^th
1983 Jul-Sep	130	0	0.0%	0^th
1983 Oct-Nov	143	8	5.6%	52^nd
1984 Jan-Mar	53	1	1.9%	23^rd
1984 Apr-Jun	223	13	5.8%	47^th
1984 Jul-Sep	96	7	7.3%	65^th
1984 Oct-Oct	36	6	16.7%	81^st
1985 Jan-Mar	36	1	2.8%	21^st
1985 Apr-Jun	154	4	2.6%	29^th
1985 Jul-Sep	101	1	1.0%	20^th
1985 Oct-Dec	148	14	9.5%	83^rd
1986 Jan-Mar	61	12	19.7%	88^th
1986 Apr-Jun	128	10	7.8%	79^th
1986 Jul-Sep	202	2	1.0%	19^th
1986 Oct-Oct	60	3	5.0%	56^th
1987 Jan-Mar	39	2	5.1%	59^th
1987 Apr-Jun	187	8	4.3%	48^th
1987 Jul-Sep	95	1	1.1%	20^th
1987 Oct-Dec	167	18	10.8%	78^th
1988 Feb-Mar	49	3	6.1%	56^th
1988 Apr-Jun	161	7	4.3%	53^rd
1988 Jul-Sep	152	9	5.9%	59^th
1988 Oct-Oct	89	12	13.5%	87^th
1989 Jan-Mar	14	3	21.4%	93^rd
1989 Apr-Jun	105	0	0.0%	0^th
1989 Jul-Sep	128	4	3.1%	52^nd
1989 Oct-Nov	121	4	3.3%	40^th
1990 Jan-Mar	60	1	1.7%	30^th
1990 Apr-Jun	150	3	2.0%	39^th
1990 Jul-Sep	183	1	0.5%	13^th
1990 Oct-Oct	143	14	9.8%	81^st

Primary Sources

The information on this page is originally sourced from a variety of materials, including:

unitedstates/congress-legislators, a community project gathering congressional information
The House and Senate websites, for committee membership and voting records
United States Congressional Roll Call Voting Records, 1789-1990 by Howard L. Rosenthal and Keith T. Poole.
Martis’s “The Historical Atlas of Political Parties in the United States Congress”, via Keith Poole’s roll call votes data set, for political party affiliation for Members of Congress from 1789 through about year 2000
GovInfo.gov, for sponsored bills