82R30416 BPG-D
By: Branch H.R. No. 2474
R E S O L U T I O N
WHEREAS, May 27, 2011, marks the 50th anniversary of the
election of John Tower as the Lone Star State's first Republican
United States senator since Reconstruction; and
WHEREAS, Born in Houston on September 29, 1925, John Goodwin
Tower became active in the Republican Party when he was an assistant
professor of political science at Midwestern University; he served
as a delegate to the Republican National Convention in 1956, and in
1960 his party nominated him to run for the U.S. Senate; and
WHEREAS, When Lyndon B. Johnson resigned from the senate to
assume the vice presidency, Senator Tower won the seat in a special
election on May 27, 1961; many hailed this event as heralding the
advent of two-party politics in Texas; Senator Tower was reelected
three times, and over the course of his 24-year career in Congress,
he wielded enormous influence in a variety of domestic and foreign
policy issues, particularly through his service on powerful banking
committees and on the Senate Armed Services Committee; moreover, he
took a leadership role in Republican politics at the state and
national level; after retiring from the U.S. Senate in 1985, he went
on to serve as the nation's chief negotiator at the Strategic Arms
Reduction Talks in Geneva, and he led the group known as the Tower
Commission in an investigation of the Iran-Contra affair; and
WHEREAS, Senator John Tower perished in a commuter plane
crash in 1991, but his accomplishments have resonated through the
years, and his election to the U.S. Senate continues to be regarded
as a turning point in the political history of Texas; now,
therefore, be it
RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives of the 82nd Texas
Legislature hereby commemorate the 50th anniversary of John Tower's
election to the United States Senate.