RightDataUSA


Phil Gramm

[Congressional biography]

Born: July 8, 1942 in Fort Benning, GA

Education:

  • University of Georgia, B.A., 1964, Ph.D., 1967

Career:

  • Economics professor at Texas A&M University, 1967-1978
  • Author

Other notes:

  • Changed party affiliation to Republican in January, 1983
  • Resigned from Congress after switching parties, and won the special election to succeed himself


Election Results for Phil Gramm


Click on the Year to see the results of that election.

YearAgeStatePartyOfficeDistrictStagePosVotes%
1976 33 TX D U.S. Senate Class 1 Primary 2 427,597 28.0%
1978 35 TX D U.S. House District 06 Primary 2 22,275 26.8%
1978 35 TX D U.S. House District 06 Primary Runoff 1 23,762 52.9%
1978 35 TX D U.S. House District 06 General 1 66,025 65.1%
1980 37 TX D U.S. House District 06 General 1 144,816 70.9%
1982 39 TX D U.S. House District 06 Primary 1 41,150 61.6%
1982 39 TX D U.S. House District 06 General 1 91,546 94.5%
1983 40 TX R U.S. House District 06 Special 1 46,371 55.3%
1984 41 TX R U.S. Senate Class 2 Primary 1 246,716 73.2%
1984 41 TX R U.S. Senate Class 2 General 1 3,116,348 58.6%
1990 47 TX R U.S. Senate Class 2 General 1 2,302,357 60.2%
1996 53 TX R U.S. Senate Class 2 Primary 1 838,339 85.0%
1996 53 TX R U.S. Senate Class 2 General 1 3,027,680 54.8%


Age: Age as of July 1 of the year pertaining to this election.



Ideology Data for Phil Gramm


Click on the number in the 'Conserv.' column to see all of the key votes for that year.

YearAgeBodyConservative
Coalition		Party UnityPresidential
Support		Vote %LiberalConserv.
P
1979 36 House 91 6 26 69 D 37 61 96 0 82
1980 37 House 92 4 24 72 D 39 59 96 0 89
1981 38 House 99 0 20 77 R 75 22 95 0 92
1982 39 House 89 10 10 87 R 84 14 97 11 91
1983 40 House 93 0 79 1 R 73 16 81 0 100
1984 41 House 69 8 58 5 R 37 27 58 15 67
1985 42 Senate 88 12 95 5 R 87 13 98 0 95
1986 43 Senate 97 1 95 4 R 99 1 98 0 90
1987 44 Senate 84 13 92 5 R 87 9 97 5 100
1988 45 Senate 92 3 85 4 R 78 15 90 0 95
1989 46 Senate 82 16 91 6 R 86 12 97 0 96
1990 47 Senate 100 0 88 8 R 78 14 96 0 91
1991 48 Senate 90 3 92 5 R 93 4 97 0 95
1992 49 Senate 89 5 91 1 R 90 10 94 0 92
1993 50 Senate 93 0 94 2 D 21 76 93 5 92
1994 51 Senate 88 6 87 5 D 32 56 90 6 100
1995 52 Senate 84 2 88 3 D 17 72 89 0 100
1996 53 Senate 92 3 93 1 D 24 71 93 0 100
1997 54 Senate 92 8 99 1 D 56 44 100 0 100
1998 55 Senate 88 13 97 3 D 32 64 99 0 96
1999 56 Senate 97 3 97 2 D 29 71 99 0 96
2000 57 Senate 97 3 97 3 D 35 65 100 0 100
2001 58 Senate 91 3 R 87 3 96 5 96
2002 59 Senate 93 4 R 94 2 96 0 100
Lifetime conservative rating:   94%


Age: Age as of July 1 of the year pertaining to this row.


Conservative Coalition: According to the publication "Congressional Quarterly" (CQ), this is an alliance of Republicans and Southern Democrats (from back when Southern Democrats tended to be conservative or at least moderate) against Northern Democrats in Congress.

This concept had significant meaning perhaps through the 1980's. These statistics stopped being computed after 2000 because conservative Democrats no longer existed except in very rare cases. The number under the green check is the percentage of time this Representative or Senator voted with the coalition; the number under the red X is the percentage of the time he opposed the coalition. The numbers often do not add to 100% because of instances where no vote was cast.


Party Unity: According to CQ, a Party Unity vote in Congress is one in which the parties were split, with a majority of Democrats opposing a majority of Republicans.

The number under the green check is the percentage of time this Representative or Senator voted with his party; the number under the red X is the percentage of the time he opposed the party. The numbers often do not add to 100% because of instances where no vote was cast.


Presidential Support: These are votes for which the President has stated his position, either in via a message to Congress, by press conference remarks or other public statements and documents.

The number under the green check is the percentage of time this Representative or Senator voted with the President; the number under the red X is the percentage of the time he opposed the President. The numbers often do not add to 100% because of instances where no vote was cast. The "P" column indicates the party of the President in each year.


Vote %: The percentage of roll-call votes in which this Representaive or Senator participated by voting "Yes" or "No" (as opposed to "Present" or not voting at all.)


Liberal Rating: These ratings are based on key votes as identifed by the ultra-liberal advocacy organization called "Americans for Democratic Action" (ADA). They have been rating members of Congress since 1947. The number shown is the percentage of the time this Representative or Senator took the liberal position on a key issue. The methodology behind the calculation can be found here. Ratings followed by an asterisk were calculated the "ADA way" due to missing data regarding key votes in the ADA source material.


Conservative Rating: These ratings are based on key votes as identifed by the conservative advocacy organization called the "American Conservative Union" (ACU). They have been rating members of Congress since 1971. The number shown is the percentage of the time this Representative or Senator took the conservative position on a key issue.

The liberal and conservative ratings are not expected to add to 100% because the two groups use different sets of key votes to determine their ratings. Conservative ratings from 1961 through 1970 (and for 2024) were calculated based on key votes as selected by the creators of this website.