RightDataUSA


William Knowland

[Congressional biography]

Born: June 26, 1908 in Alameda, CA
Died: February 23, 1974 near Guerneville, CA (suicide)

Education:

  • University of California, 1929

Military Service:

  • World War II

Career:

  • Newspaper publisher
  • Member of RNC, 1938-1942

Elected Office:

  • CA Assembly, 1933-1935
  • CA Senate, 1935-1939
  • Appointed to the U.S. Senate on August 26, 1945 to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Hiram Johnson


Election Results for William Knowland


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

YearAgeStatePartyOfficeDistrictStagePosVotes%
1946 38 CA R U.S. Senate Class 1 Primary 1 514,667 64.8%
1946 38 CA D U.S. Senate Class 1 Primary 3 226,182 21.4%
1946 38 CA R U.S. Senate Class 1 General 1 1,428,067 54.1%
1946 38 CA R U.S. Senate Class 1 Special 1 425,273 77.5%
1952 44 CA R U.S. Senate Class 1 Primary 1 1,341,170 87.7%
1952 44 CA D U.S. Senate Class 1 Primary 1 966,881 55.5%
1952 44 CA R,D U.S. Senate Class 1 General 1 3,982,448 87.7%
1958 50 CA R Governor Primary 1 1,290,106 77.5%
1958 50 CA D Governor Primary 2 313,385 13.7%
1958 50 CA R Governor General 2 2,110,911 40.2%


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



Ideology Data for William Knowland


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
1945 37 Senate 28 10 D 40
1946 38 Senate 50 47 D 97
1947 39 Senate 78 16 D 94 30
1948 40 Senate 65 27 D 92 44
1949 41 Senate 72 22 D 96 29
1950 42 Senate 71 22 D 91 31
1951 43 Senate 60 29 D 88 33
1952 44 Senate 58 10 D 69 50
1953 45 Senate 90 10 R 87 96 27
1954 46 Senate 98 2 R 91 6 96 31
1955 47 Senate 100 0 R 94 6 100 0
1956 48 Senate 94 4 R 88 12 98 21
1957 49 Senate 87 0 R 93 5 93 58
1958 50 Senate 85 7 R 82 8 94 17


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.