John Tower, former Senator for Texas

Tower was a senator from Texas and was a Republican. He served from 1961 to 1984.

Photo of Sen. John Tower [R-TX, 1961-1984]

Analysis

Ideology–Leadership Chart

Tower is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot was a member of the Senate in 1984 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 Tower sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 15, 1979 to Oct 12, 1984. See full analysis methodology.

Enacted Legislation

Tower was the primary sponsor of 11 bills that were enacted. The most recent include:

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Does 11 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

Tower sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:

Armed Forces and National Security (20%) Private Legislation (18%) Government Operations and Politics (15%) Economics and Public Finance (12%) Education (12%) Taxation (9%) Immigration (8%) Housing and Community Development (6%)

Recently Introduced Bills

Tower recently introduced the following legislation:

View All » | View Cosponsors »

Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.

Voting Record

Missed Votes

From Jun 1961 to Oct 1984, Tower missed 1,861 of 9,887 roll call votes, which is 18.8%. This is much worse than the median of 6.9% among the lifetime records of senators serving in Oct 1984. 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
1961 May-Aug	92	7	7.6%	64^th
1961 Sep-Sep	36	7	19.4%	73^rd
1962 Jan-Mar	22	1	4.5%	45^th
1962 Apr-Jun	62	14	22.6%	73^rd
1962 Jul-Sep	122	30	24.6%	82^nd
1962 Oct-Oct	18	15	83.3%	91^st
1963 Jan-Mar	8	0	0.0%	0^th
1963 Apr-Jun	73	8	11.0%	77^th
1963 Jul-Sep	61	8	13.1%	54^th
1963 Oct-Dec	87	30	34.5%	77^th
1964 Jan-Mar	60	6	10.0%	54^th
1964 Apr-Jun	138	54	39.1%	92^nd
1964 Jul-Sep	106	33	31.1%	77^th
1964 Oct-Oct	1	1	100.0%	67^th
1965 Jan-Mar	32	5	15.6%	67^th
1965 Apr-Jun	106	14	13.2%	58^th
1965 Jul-Sep	106	16	15.1%	83^rd
1965 Oct-Oct	15	7	46.7%	83^rd
1966 Jan-Mar	28	2	7.1%	33^rd
1966 Apr-Jun	56	23	41.1%	92^nd
1966 Jul-Sep	119	21	17.6%	92^nd
1966 Oct-Oct	35	28	80.0%	92^nd
1967 Jan-Mar	53	27	50.9%	94^th
1967 Apr-Jun	70	33	47.1%	88^th
1967 Jul-Sep	81	17	21.0%	69^th
1967 Oct-Dec	111	72	64.9%	94^th
1968 Jan-Mar	69	8	11.6%	50^th
1968 Apr-Jun	96	21	21.9%	56^th
1968 Jul-Sep	89	53	59.6%	88^th
1968 Oct-Oct	27	22	81.5%	88^th
1969 Jan-Mar	17	2	11.8%	61^st
1969 Apr-Jun	26	1	3.8%	17^th
1969 Jul-Sep	44	2	4.5%	43^rd
1969 Oct-Dec	158	48	30.4%	87^th
1970 Jan-Mar	100	42	42.0%	87^th
1970 Apr-Jun	92	18	19.6%	65^th
1970 Jul-Sep	123	54	43.9%	91^st
1970 Oct-Dec	106	76	71.7%	96^th
1971 Feb-Mar	25	9	36.0%	78^th
1971 Apr-Jun	89	17	19.1%	54^th
1971 Jul-Sep	109	15	13.8%	57^th
1971 Oct-Dec	202	54	26.7%	86^th
1972 Jan-Mar	119	33	27.7%	93^rd
1972 Apr-Jun	130	14	10.8%	36^th
1972 Jul-Sep	206	62	30.1%	82^nd
1972 Oct-Oct	75	69	92.0%	96^th
1973 Jan-Mar	67	19	28.4%	80^th
1973 Apr-Jun	192	14	7.3%	29^th
1973 Jul-Sep	167	7	4.2%	34^th
1973 Oct-Dec	168	25	14.9%	66^th
1974 Jan-Mar	94	11	11.7%	57^th
1974 Apr-Jun	179	5	2.8%	22^nd
1974 Jul-Sep	138	16	11.6%	68^th
1974 Oct-Dec	133	24	18.0%	57^th
1975 Jan-Mar	118	10	8.5%	64^th
1975 Apr-Jun	141	6	4.3%	17^th
1975 Jul-Sep	170	8	4.7%	33^rd
1975 Oct-Dec	182	4	2.2%	7^th
1976 Jan-Mar	109	5	4.6%	36^th
1976 Apr-Jun	263	36	13.7%	60^th
1976 Jul-Sep	315	19	6.0%	21^st
1976 Oct-Oct	13	4	30.8%	50^th
1977 Jan-Mar	92	16	17.4%	77^th
1977 Apr-Jun	178	35	19.7%	89^th
1977 Jul-Sep	233	1	0.4%	5^th
1977 Oct-Dec	133	8	6.0%	30^th
1978 Jan-Mar	78	14	17.9%	81^st
1978 Apr-Jun	119	7	5.9%	40^th
1978 Jul-Sep	237	61	25.7%	89^th
1978 Oct-Oct	86	78	90.7%	98^th
1979 Feb-Mar	32	0	0.0%	0^th
1979 Apr-Jun	121	10	8.3%	62^nd
1979 Jul-Sep	171	21	12.3%	72^nd
1979 Oct-Dec	184	4	2.2%	13^th
1980 Jan-Mar	67	3	4.5%	43^rd
1980 Apr-Jun	216	27	12.5%	75^th
1980 Jul-Sep	179	53	29.6%	95^th
1980 Oct-Dec	84	34	40.5%	96^th
1981 Jan-Mar	57	7	12.3%	88^th
1981 Apr-Jun	125	21	16.8%	96^th
1981 Jul-Sep	122	12	9.8%	77^th
1981 Oct-Dec	193	36	18.7%	95^th
1982 Feb-Mar	79	5	6.3%	73^rd
1982 Apr-Jun	127	9	7.1%	65^th
1982 Jul-Sep	177	6	3.4%	47^th
1982 Oct-Dec	86	1	1.2%	32^nd
1983 Feb-Mar	54	4	7.4%	63^rd
1983 Apr-Jun	122	2	1.6%	29^th
1983 Jul-Sep	92	9	9.8%	77^th
1983 Oct-Nov	103	24	23.3%	87^th
1984 Jan-Mar	45	12	26.7%	90^th
1984 Apr-Jun	144	9	6.2%	47^th
1984 Jul-Sep	68	16	23.5%	94^th
1984 Oct-Oct	34	4	11.8%	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
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. John Tower

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