Alan Cranston, former Senator for California

Cranston was a senator from California as a Democrat. He served from 1969 to 1992.

Alleged misconduct & resolution

In 1989, Sen. Cranston (along with Sens. DeConcini, Glenn, McCain and Riegle) was accused of improperly intervening with federal banking regulators on behalf of Charles Keating, Jr. and his savings and loan business. Because Keating's campaign contributions came so close in time to Cranston's actions, he was reprimanded by the Senate Select Committee on Ethics in front of the full Senate. An odd aspect of Cranston's "punishment" was that he was allowed to rebut his reprimand on the floor of the Senate. To his colleagues' displeasure, he declared that if he was guilty of wrongdoing, then so was the entire Senate. He did not run for re-election in 1992.

1991	Senate Select Committee on Ethics issued a reprimand on behalf of and in front of the full U.S. Senate, but no formal action was taken by the full Senate
Nov. 20, 1991	Senate Select Committee on Ethics published a report on the investigation of Sen. Cranston (Senate Select Comm. on Ethics, Investigation of Sen. Alan Cranston, S. Rep. 102-223, 102d Cong., 1st Sess. (1991))
1992	Did not run for re-election.

Photo of Sen. Alan Cranston [D-CA, 1969-1992]

Analysis

Ideology–Leadership Chart

Cranston is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot was a member of the Senate in 1992 positioned according to our liberal–conservative ideology score (left to right) and our leadership score (leaders are toward the top).

The chart is based on the bills Cranston sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 6, 1987 to Oct 8, 1992. See full analysis methodology.

Enacted Legislation

Cranston was the primary sponsor of 87 bills that were enacted. The most recent include:

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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

Cranston sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:

Armed Forces and National Security (41%) Government Operations and Politics (15%) Health (13%) International Affairs (10%) Housing and Community Development (7%) Foreign Trade and International Finance (5%)

Recent Bills

Some of Cranston’s most recently sponsored bills include...

View All » | View Cosponsors »

Voting Record

Missed Votes

From Jan 1969 to Oct 1992, Cranston missed 1,096 of 10,635 roll call votes, which is 10.3%. This is much worse than the median of 4.7% among the lifetime records of senators serving in Oct 1992. The chart below reports missed votes over time.

Show the numbers...

Time Period	Votes Eligible	Missed Votes	Percent	Percentile
1969 Jan-Mar	17	0	0.0%	0^th
1969 Apr-Jun	26	9	34.6%	92^nd
1969 Jul-Sep	44	0	0.0%	0^th
1969 Oct-Dec	158	32	20.3%	58^th
1970 Jan-Mar	100	21	21.0%	67^th
1970 Apr-Jun	92	3	3.3%	0^th
1970 Jul-Sep	123	13	10.6%	17^th
1970 Oct-Dec	106	13	12.3%	25^th
1971 Feb-Mar	25	4	16.0%	29^th
1971 Apr-Jun	89	6	6.7%	14^th
1971 Jul-Sep	109	8	7.3%	21^st
1971 Oct-Dec	202	19	9.4%	29^th
1972 Jan-Mar	119	10	8.4%	36^th
1972 Apr-Jun	130	16	12.3%	43^rd
1972 Jul-Sep	206	15	7.3%	50^th
1972 Oct-Oct	75	5	6.7%	21^st
1973 Jan-Mar	67	30	44.8%	95^th
1973 Apr-Jun	192	20	10.4%	63^rd
1973 Jul-Sep	167	7	4.2%	47^th
1973 Oct-Dec	168	14	8.3%	47^th
1974 Jan-Mar	94	5	5.3%	30^th
1974 Apr-Jun	179	13	7.3%	45^th
1974 Jul-Sep	138	15	10.9%	70^th
1974 Oct-Dec	133	9	6.8%	40^th
1975 Jan-Mar	118	1	0.8%	25^th
1975 Apr-Jun	141	4	2.8%	17^th
1975 Jul-Sep	170	2	1.2%	4^th
1975 Oct-Dec	182	4	2.2%	8^th
1976 Jan-Mar	109	6	5.5%	46^th
1976 Apr-Jun	263	21	8.0%	46^th
1976 Jul-Sep	315	62	19.7%	71^st
1976 Oct-Oct	13	11	84.6%	75^th
1977 Jan-Mar	92	8	8.7%	58^th
1977 Apr-Jun	178	29	16.3%	83^rd
1977 Jul-Sep	233	9	3.9%	39^th
1977 Oct-Dec	133	3	2.3%	14^th
1978 Jan-Mar	78	7	9.0%	58^th
1978 Apr-Jun	119	0	0.0%	0^th
1978 Jul-Sep	237	24	10.1%	50^th
1978 Oct-Oct	86	2	2.3%	28^th
1979 Feb-Mar	32	2	6.2%	56^th
1979 Apr-Jun	121	3	2.5%	22^nd
1979 Jul-Sep	171	7	4.1%	28^th
1979 Oct-Dec	184	14	7.6%	52^nd
1980 Jan-Mar	67	5	7.5%	56^th
1980 Apr-Jun	216	57	26.4%	94^th
1980 Jul-Sep	179	15	8.4%	67^th
1980 Oct-Dec	84	2	2.4%	20^th
1981 Jan-Mar	57	6	10.5%	87^th
1981 Apr-Jun	125	20	16.0%	95^th
1981 Jul-Sep	122	18	14.8%	95^th
1981 Oct-Dec	193	13	6.7%	58^th
1982 Feb-Mar	79	1	1.3%	29^th
1982 Apr-Jun	127	12	9.4%	73^rd
1982 Jul-Sep	177	5	2.8%	45^th
1982 Oct-Dec	86	31	36.0%	97^th
1983 Feb-Mar	54	19	35.2%	97^th
1983 Apr-Jun	122	31	25.4%	95^th
1983 Jul-Sep	92	49	53.3%	98^th
1983 Oct-Nov	103	65	63.1%	97^th
1984 Jan-Mar	45	35	77.8%	98^th
1984 Apr-Jun	144	16	11.1%	84^th
1984 Jul-Sep	68	7	10.3%	78^th
1984 Oct-Oct	34	1	2.9%	39^th
1985 Jan-Mar	22	0	0.0%	0^th
1985 Apr-Jun	116	3	2.6%	51^st
1985 Jul-Sep	60	0	0.0%	0^th
1985 Oct-Dec	183	13	7.1%	76^th
1986 Jan-Mar	51	0	0.0%	0^th
1986 Apr-Jun	103	5	4.9%	70^th
1986 Jul-Sep	149	9	6.0%	87^th
1986 Oct-Oct	56	8	14.3%	93^rd
1987 Jan-Mar	50	11	22.0%	95^th
1987 Apr-Jun	123	3	2.4%	40^th
1987 Jul-Sep	120	3	2.5%	40^th
1987 Oct-Dec	127	3	2.4%	29^th
1988 Jan-Mar	84	5	6.0%	37^th
1988 Apr-Jun	137	17	12.4%	93^rd
1988 Jul-Sep	127	17	13.4%	90^th
1988 Oct-Oct	31	4	12.9%	65^th
1989 Jan-Mar	26	0	0.0%	0^th
1989 Apr-Jun	77	2	2.6%	67^th
1989 Jul-Sep	118	1	0.8%	49^th
1989 Oct-Nov	91	0	0.0%	0^th
1990 Jan-Mar	48	0	0.0%	0^th
1990 Apr-Jun	95	0	0.0%	0^th
1990 Jul-Sep	114	2	1.8%	64^th
1990 Oct-Oct	69	3	4.3%	81^st
1991 Jan-Mar	41	21	51.2%	99^th
1991 Apr-Jun	74	2	2.7%	81^st
1991 Jul-Sep	96	5	5.2%	90^th
1991 Oct-Nov	69	18	26.1%	97^th
1992 Jan-Mar	61	6	9.8%	92^nd
1992 Apr-Jun	74	4	5.4%	72^nd
1992 Jul-Sep	117	17	14.5%	89^th
1992 Oct-Oct	18	0	0.0%	0^th

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
Biographical Directory of the United States Congress for the photo
GovInfo.gov, for sponsored bills

Sen. Alan Cranston

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