Barry Goldwater, former Senator for Arizona

Goldwater was a senator from Arizona and was a Republican. He served from 1969 to 1986.

He was previously a senator from Arizona as a Republican from 1953 to 1964.

Photo of Sen. Barry Goldwater [R-AZ, 1969-1986]

Analysis

Ideology–Leadership Chart

Goldwater is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot was a member of the Senate in 1986 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 Goldwater sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 5, 1981 to Oct 18, 1986. See full analysis methodology.

Enacted Legislation

Goldwater was the primary sponsor of 38 bills that were enacted. The most recent include:

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Does 38 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

Goldwater sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:

Government Operations and Politics (29%) Economics and Public Finance (17%) Armed Forces and National Security (13%) Arts, Culture, Religion (12%) Science, Technology, Communications (9%) International Affairs (9%) Native Americans (6%) Health (5%)

Recently Introduced Bills

Goldwater recently introduced the following legislation:

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Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.

Voting Record

Missed Votes

From Jan 1953 to Oct 1986, Goldwater missed 3,598 of 10,827 roll call votes, which is 33.2%. This is much worse than the median of 6.0% among the lifetime records of senators serving in Oct 1986. 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
1953 Jan-Mar	9	1	11.1%	33^rd
1953 Apr-Jun	43	7	16.3%	33^rd
1953 Jul-Jul	38	0	0.0%	0^th
1954 Jan-Mar	32	9	28.1%	67^th
1954 Apr-Jun	50	3	6.0%	33^rd
1954 Jul-Sep	91	5	5.5%	67^th
1954 Dec-Dec	8	0	0.0%	0^th
1955 Jan-Mar	26	3	11.5%	75^th
1955 Apr-Jun	38	3	7.9%	75^th
1955 Jul-Aug	23	1	4.3%	75^th
1956 Jan-Mar	47	0	0.0%	0^th
1956 Apr-Jun	50	4	8.0%	33^rd
1956 Jul-Jul	33	5	15.2%	67^th
1957 Jan-Mar	16	0	0.0%	0^th
1957 Apr-Jun	45	5	11.1%	75^th
1957 Jul-Aug	46	5	10.9%	80^th
1958 Feb-Mar	38	2	5.3%	60^th
1958 Apr-Jun	86	18	20.9%	80^th
1958 Jul-Aug	76	6	7.9%	80^th
1959 Jan-Apr	57	3	5.3%	67^th
1959 May-Aug	128	20	15.6%	67^th
1959 Sep-Sep	30	8	26.7%	83^rd
1960 Jan-Apr	79	16	20.3%	83^rd
1960 May-Aug	123	21	17.1%	86^th
1960 Sep-Sep	5	0	0.0%	0^th
1961 Jan-Apr	31	7	22.6%	88^th
1961 May-Aug	137	34	24.8%	88^th
1961 Sep-Sep	36	10	27.8%	75^th
1962 Jan-Mar	22	6	27.3%	88^th
1962 Apr-Jun	62	14	22.6%	75^th
1962 Jul-Sep	122	32	26.2%	88^th
1962 Oct-Oct	18	1	5.6%	50^th
1963 Jan-Mar	8	0	0.0%	0^th
1963 Apr-Jun	73	9	12.3%	90^th
1963 Jul-Sep	61	5	8.2%	40^th
1963 Oct-Dec	87	31	35.6%	80^th
1964 Jan-Mar	60	23	38.3%	90^th
1964 Apr-Jun	138	2	1.4%	40^th
1964 Jul-Sep	106	16	15.1%	70^th
1964 Oct-Oct	1	0	0.0%	0^th
1969 Jan-Mar	17	4	23.5%	94^th
1969 Apr-Jun	26	5	19.2%	72^nd
1969 Jul-Sep	44	12	27.3%	94^th
1969 Oct-Dec	158	108	68.4%	94^th
1970 Jan-Mar	100	53	53.0%	94^th
1970 Apr-Jun	92	45	48.9%	94^th
1970 Jul-Sep	123	67	54.5%	94^th
1970 Oct-Dec	106	75	70.8%	94^th
1971 Feb-Mar	25	17	68.0%	95^th
1971 Apr-Jun	89	42	47.2%	91^st
1971 Jul-Sep	109	32	29.4%	91^st
1971 Oct-Dec	202	108	53.5%	96^th
1972 Jan-Mar	119	29	24.4%	91^st
1972 Apr-Jun	130	100	76.9%	96^th
1972 Jul-Sep	206	104	50.5%	91^st
1972 Oct-Oct	75	61	81.3%	96^th
1973 Jan-Mar	67	35	52.2%	93^rd
1973 Apr-Jun	192	98	51.0%	93^rd
1973 Jul-Sep	167	69	41.3%	93^rd
1973 Oct-Dec	168	60	35.7%	90^th
1974 Jan-Mar	94	19	20.2%	74^th
1974 Apr-Jun	179	46	25.7%	84^th
1974 Jul-Sep	138	27	19.6%	77^th
1974 Oct-Dec	133	45	33.8%	84^th
1975 Jan-Mar	118	29	24.6%	92^nd
1975 Apr-Jun	141	30	21.3%	83^rd
1975 Jul-Sep	170	82	48.2%	97^th
1975 Oct-Dec	182	59	32.4%	97^th
1976 Jan-Mar	109	33	30.3%	94^th
1976 Apr-Jun	263	174	66.2%	97^th
1976 Jul-Sep	315	158	50.2%	97^th
1976 Oct-Oct	13	13	100.0%	81^st
1977 Jan-Mar	92	32	34.8%	98^th
1977 Apr-Jun	178	55	30.9%	98^th
1977 Jul-Sep	233	60	25.8%	94^th
1977 Oct-Dec	133	67	50.4%	98^th
1978 Jan-Mar	78	33	42.3%	98^th
1978 Apr-Jun	119	15	12.6%	76^th
1978 Jul-Sep	237	59	24.9%	90^th
1978 Oct-Oct	86	31	36.0%	94^th
1979 Feb-Mar	32	2	6.2%	49^th
1979 Apr-Jun	121	12	9.9%	69^th
1979 Jul-Sep	171	32	18.7%	91^st
1979 Oct-Dec	184	67	36.4%	97^th
1980 Jan-Mar	67	16	23.9%	93^rd
1980 Apr-Jun	216	100	46.3%	97^th
1980 Jul-Sep	179	110	61.5%	97^th
1980 Oct-Dec	84	8	9.5%	46^th
1981 Jan-Mar	57	5	8.8%	84^th
1981 Apr-Jun	125	8	6.4%	78^th
1981 Jul-Sep	122	18	14.8%	91^st
1981 Oct-Dec	193	164	85.0%	99^th
1982 Feb-Mar	79	18	22.8%	94^th
1982 Apr-Jun	127	13	10.2%	77^th
1982 Jul-Sep	177	22	12.4%	93^rd
1982 Oct-Dec	86	81	94.2%	99^th
1983 Feb-Mar	54	12	22.2%	93^rd
1983 Apr-Jun	122	36	29.5%	96^th
1983 Jul-Sep	92	52	56.5%	99^th
1983 Oct-Nov	103	43	41.7%	92^nd
1984 Jan-Mar	45	6	13.3%	76^th
1984 Apr-Jun	144	34	23.6%	98^th
1984 Jul-Sep	68	1	1.5%	24^th
1984 Oct-Oct	34	8	23.5%	92^nd
1985 Jan-Mar	22	7	31.8%	95^th
1985 Apr-Jun	116	7	6.0%	75^th
1985 Jul-Sep	60	7	11.7%	86^th
1985 Oct-Dec	183	65	35.5%	98^th
1986 Jan-Mar	51	12	23.5%	95^th
1986 Apr-Jun	103	35	34.0%	98^th
1986 Jul-Sep	149	56	37.6%	99^th
1986 Oct-Oct	56	15	26.8%	96^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
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. Barry Goldwater

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