Rep. Mary Oakar

Former Representative for Ohio’s 20^th District

Oakar was the representative for Ohio’s 20^th congressional district and was a Democrat. She served from 1977 to 1992.

Bioguide

Photo of Rep. Mary Oakar [D-OH20, 1977-1992]

Misconduct

Oakar faced an allegation of lying to the FBI, using the House Bank to convert public money to her own use. On Sep. 30, 1997, she pleaded guitly to two misdemeanors. In 1992, she was not re-elected.

1992	Was not re-elected.
Sep. 30, 1997	Pleaded guitly to two misdemeanors.

Analysis

Ideology–Leadership Chart

Oakar is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot was a member of the House of Representatives in 1992 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 Oakar sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 6, 1987 to Oct 9, 1992. See full analysis methodology.

Enacted Legislation

Oakar was the primary sponsor of 24 bills that were enacted. The most recent include:

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Does 24 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

Oakar sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:

Social Welfare (26%) Government Operations and Politics (21%) Health (21%) Armed Forces and National Security (9%) Economics and Public Finance (6%) Foreign Trade and International Finance (6%) Finance and Financial Sector (6%) Environmental Protection (5%)

Recently Introduced Bills

Oakar 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 1992, Oakar missed 720 of 8,199 roll call votes, which is 8.8%. This is worse than the median of 4.4% among the lifetime records of representatives serving in Oct 1992. 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	21	21.0%	91^st
1977 Apr-Jun	273	7	2.6%	23^rd
1977 Jul-Sep	198	7	3.5%	35^th
1977 Oct-Dec	135	4	3.0%	33^rd
1978 Jan-Mar	150	13	8.7%	58^th
1978 Apr-Jun	300	95	31.7%	94^th
1978 Jul-Sep	308	44	14.3%	76^th
1978 Oct-Oct	76	6	7.9%	62^nd
1979 Jan-Mar	63	10	15.9%	82^nd
1979 Apr-Jun	221	16	7.2%	56^th
1979 Jul-Sep	198	13	6.6%	57^th
1979 Oct-Dec	190	28	14.7%	74^th
1980 Jan-Mar	148	9	6.1%	38^th
1980 Apr-Jun	197	25	12.7%	73^rd
1980 Jul-Sep	192	30	15.6%	82^nd
1980 Oct-Dec	67	1	1.5%	8^th
1981 Jan-Mar	15	0	0.0%	0^th
1981 Apr-Jun	90	7	7.8%	60^th
1981 Jul-Sep	106	7	6.6%	63^rd
1981 Oct-Dec	142	29	20.4%	92^nd
1982 Feb-Mar	48	1	2.1%	27^th
1982 Apr-Jun	119	1	0.8%	10^th
1982 Jul-Sep	193	28	14.5%	85^th
1982 Oct-Dec	99	3	3.0%	22^nd
1983 Jan-Mar	43	1	2.3%	18^th
1983 Apr-Jun	182	1	0.5%	5^th
1983 Jul-Sep	130	3	2.3%	34^th
1983 Oct-Nov	143	4	2.8%	27^th
1984 Jan-Mar	53	1	1.9%	23^rd
1984 Apr-Jun	223	7	3.1%	31^st
1984 Jul-Sep	96	2	2.1%	33^rd
1984 Oct-Oct	36	5	13.9%	78^th
1985 Jan-Mar	36	1	2.8%	22^nd
1985 Apr-Jun	154	5	3.2%	36^th
1985 Jul-Sep	101	2	2.0%	32^nd
1985 Oct-Dec	148	7	4.7%	58^th
1986 Jan-Mar	61	11	18.0%	86^th
1986 Apr-Jun	128	4	3.1%	45^th
1986 Jul-Sep	202	14	6.9%	74^th
1986 Oct-Oct	60	2	3.3%	47^th
1987 Jan-Mar	39	5	12.8%	83^rd
1987 Apr-Jun	187	14	7.5%	71^st
1987 Jul-Sep	95	4	4.2%	58^th
1987 Oct-Dec	167	24	14.4%	91^st
1988 Feb-Mar	49	1	2.0%	28^th
1988 Apr-Jun	161	26	16.1%	94^th
1988 Jul-Sep	152	12	7.9%	72^nd
1988 Oct-Oct	89	0	0.0%	0^th
1989 Jan-Mar	14	0	0.0%	0^th
1989 Apr-Jun	105	0	0.0%	0^th
1989 Jul-Sep	128	5	3.9%	61^st
1989 Oct-Nov	121	15	12.4%	90^th
1990 Jan-Mar	60	13	21.7%	97^th
1990 Apr-Jun	150	15	10.0%	87^th
1990 Jul-Sep	183	6	3.3%	53^rd
1990 Oct-Oct	143	7	4.9%	60^th
1991 Jan-Mar	62	1	1.6%	29^th
1991 Apr-Jun	139	4	2.9%	45^th
1991 Jul-Sep	81	3	3.7%	44^th
1991 Oct-Nov	162	4	2.5%	47^th
1992 Jan-Mar	66	5	7.6%	69^th
1992 Apr-Jun	185	55	29.7%	97^th
1992 Jul-Sep	196	22	11.2%	81^st
1992 Oct-Oct	41	4	9.8%	73^rd

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