Rep. Robert Whittaker
Former Representative for Kansas’s 5th District
Whittaker was the representative for Kansas’s 5th congressional district and was a Republican. He served from 1979 to 1990.
Analysis
Ideology–Leadership Chart
Whittaker is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot was a member of the House of Representatives in 1990 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 Whittaker sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 3, 1985 to Oct 27, 1990. See full analysis methodology.
Enacted Legislation
Whittaker was the primary sponsor of 3 bills that were enacted:
- H.R. 2434 (101st): To change the name of “Marion Lake”, located northwest of Marion, Kansas, to “Marion Reservoir”.
- H.R. 2628 (100th): Imported Vehicle Safety Compliance Act of 1988
- H.J.Res. 333 (99th): A joint resolution designating the week beginning on November 10, 1985, as “National Blood Pressure Awareness Week”.
Does 3 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
Whittaker sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:
Transportation and Public Works (32%) Economics and Public Finance (14%) Government Operations and Politics (11%) Agriculture and Food (11%) Health (11%) Social Welfare (7%) Environmental Protection (7%) Labor and Employment (7%)
Recently Introduced Bills
Whittaker recently introduced the following legislation:
- H.R. 5853 (101st): Railroad Workers’ Injury Compensation Act of 1990
- H.Con.Res. 220 (101st): Expressing the sense of the Congress that all railroad retirement benefits are …
- H.R. 2434 (101st): To change the name of “Marion Lake”, located northwest of Marion, Kansas, …
- H.R. 2339 (101st): Railroad User Fee Act of 1989
- H.R. 2315 (101st): Rural Rail Service Preservation Act of 1989
- H.R. 1589 (101st): To amend title VII of the Social Security Act to place the …
- H.R. 1494 (101st): Tobacco and Nicotine Health and Safety Act of 1989
View All » | View Cosponsors »
Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.
Voting Record
Missed Votes
From Jan 1979 to Oct 1990, Whittaker missed 157 of 5,719 roll call votes, which is 2.7%. This is better than the median of 4.8% among the lifetime records of representatives serving in Oct 1990. 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
- 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
- GovInfo.gov, for sponsored bills
