Sen. James “Jim” Talent
Former Senator for Missouri
![Photo of Sen. James “Jim” Talent [R-MO, 2002-2006]](/static/legislator-photos/300096-200px.jpeg)
Analysis
Ideology–Leadership Chart
Talent is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot was a member of the Senate in 2006 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 Talent sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 22, 2001 to Dec 8, 2006. See full analysis methodology.
Enacted Legislation
Talent was the primary sponsor of 10 bills that were enacted. The most recent include:
- S. 1378 (109th): National Historic Preservation Act Amendments Act of 2006
- S. 4073 (109th): A bill to designate the outpatient clinic of the Department of Veterans Affairs located in Farmington, Missouri, as the “Robert Silvey Department of Veterans Affairs Outpatient Clinic”.
- S. 323 (109th): French Colonial Heritage National Historic Site Study Act of 2005
- S. 2895 (108th): A bill to authorize the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, Missouri, to be illuminated by pink lights in honor of breast cancer awareness month.
- S. 1207 (108th): A bill to redesignate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 120 East Ritchie Avenue in Marceline, Missouri, as the “Walt Disney Post Office …
- H.R. 1568 (106th): Veterans Entrepreneurship and Small Business Development Act of 1999
- H.R. 440 (106th): Microloan Program Technical Corrections Act of 1999
Does 10 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 110th Congress).
Bills Sponsored
Issue Areas
Talent sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:
Foreign Trade and International Finance (28%) Agriculture and Food (14%) Environmental Protection (14%) Government Operations and Politics (14%) Economics and Public Finance (8%) Crime and Law Enforcement (8%) Commerce (7%) Transportation and Public Works (6%)
Recently Introduced Bills
Talent recently introduced the following legislation:
- S. 4073 (109th): A bill to designate the outpatient clinic of the Department of Veterans …
- S. 3862 (109th): A bill to amend the Animal Health Protection Act to prohibit the …
- S. 3817 (109th): Match Act of 2006
- S. 3824 (109th): National Park System Uniform Penalty Amendment Act
- S. 3555 (109th): Veterans Identity Protection Act
- S. 3535 (109th): Expanding American Homeownership Act of 2006
- S. 3063 (109th): A bill to extend the patent term for the badge of the …
View All » | View Cosponsors »
Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.
Voting Record
Missed Votes
From Jan 2003 to Dec 2006, Talent missed 11 of 1,320 roll call votes, which is 0.8%. This is better than the median of 2.0% among the lifetime records of senators serving in Dec 2006. 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.
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
- Congressional Pictorial Directory for the photo
- GovInfo.gov, for sponsored bills
