RightDataUSA


Howard Metzenbaum

[Congressional biography]

Born: June 4, 1917 in Cleveland, OH
Died: March 12, 2008 in Aventura, FL

Education:

  • Ohio State University, B.A., 1939, LL.B., 1941

Career:

  • Lawyer
  • Businessman
  • Campaign manager for Sen. Stephen Young, 1958, 1964
  • Chairman of Consumer Federation of America

Elected Office:

  • OH House, 1943-1947
  • OH Senate, 1947-1951
  • Appointed to the U.S. Senate on January 4, 1974 to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of William Saxbe


Election Results for Howard Metzenbaum


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

YearAgeStatePartyOfficeDistrictStagePosVotes%
1970 53 OH D U.S. Senate Class 1 Primary 1 430,469 46.3%
1970 53 OH D U.S. Senate Class 1 General 2 1,495,262 47.4%
1974 57 OH D U.S. Senate Class 3 Primary 2 480,123 45.6%
1976 59 OH D U.S. Senate Class 1 Primary 1 576,124 53.6%
1976 59 OH D U.S. Senate Class 1 General 1 1,941,113 49.5%
1982 65 OH D U.S. Senate Class 1 Primary 1 810,785 82.9%
1982 65 OH D U.S. Senate Class 1 General 1 1,923,767 56.7%
1988 71 OH D U.S. Senate Class 1 Primary 1 1,070,934 83.6%
1988 71 OH D U.S. Senate Class 1 General 1 2,480,038 57.0%


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



Ideology Data for Howard Metzenbaum


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
1974 57 Senate 7 75 71 10 R 24 60 83 90* 20
1977 60 Senate 6 93 88 10 D 80 20 98 95 0
1978 61 Senate 13 84 86 12 D 83 16 98 100 13
1979 62 Senate 13 80 86 10 D 88 11 97 89 6
1980 63 Senate 12 85 84 13 D 71 22 96 94 10
1981 64 Senate 7 81 82 5 R 30 59 87 85 0
1982 65 Senate 4 85 88 5 R 32 64 94 100 24
1983 66 Senate 11 86 80 19 R 36 60 96 100 12
1984 67 Senate 4 91 79 16 R 26 69 95 95 5
1985 68 Senate 17 83 87 10 R 26 72 99 100 0
1986 69 Senate 5 93 86 13 R 24 76 99 100 5
1987 70 Senate 3 91 88 9 R 32 65 96 100 4
1988 71 Senate 24 68 87 6 R 36 55 92 89 4
1989 72 Senate 8 89 92 7 R 39 59 99 95 8
1990 73 Senate 8 89 85 10 R 27 68 97 88 10
1991 74 Senate 10 91 93 6 R 27 69 99 100 0
1992 75 Senate 5 95 91 6 R 25 72 97 100 0
1993 76 Senate 10 90 92 6 D 91 8 97 100 8
1994 77 Senate 3 94 91 4 D 81 16 94 100 0
Lifetime conservative rating:   6%


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.