Connie Morella
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Connie Morella | |
 |
|
|
|
|
| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office October 8, 2003 |
|
| Preceded by | Jeanne L. Phillips |
|---|---|
|
|
|
| In office January 3, 1987 – January 3, 2003 |
|
| Preceded by | Michael D. Barnes |
| Succeeded by | Chris Van Hollen |
|
|
|
| Born | February 12, 1931 Somerville, Massachusetts |
| Political party | Republican |
| Spouse | Anthony Morella |
Constance Albanese "Connie" Morella (born February 12, 1931) is a Republican United States politician currently serving as Permanent Representative to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
Contents |
[edit] Early life
She was born Constance Albanese in Somerville, Massachusetts. After graduating from Somerville High School in 1948 she earned an Associate of Arts from Boston University in 1950 and an A.B. from the same institution in 1954. Although raised in a family of blue-collar Democrats, she became a Republican after meeting Anthony C. Morella, who had worked for liberal Republicans John Lindsay, Nelson Rockefeller, Charles Mathias, and others. After they wed, the couple moved to Bethesda, Maryland.
Connie Morella became a secondary school teacher in the Montgomery County, Maryland, public schools from 1957 to 1961. She graduated from American University with an M.A. in 1967 and was an instructor there from 1968 to 1970, when she became a professor at Montgomery College in Rockville, Maryland. She continued to teach until 1985, but her political career gradually displaced her educational one.
[edit] Political career
Morella was appointed as a founding member to the Montgomery County Commission for Women, an advisory women's advocacy body, in 1971, and elected its president in 1973. She also became active in the League of Women Voters. In 1974, she ran unsuccessfully for the Maryland House of Delegates from the 16th District (Bethesda). She ran again in 1978, not only winning a seat but receiving more votes than the three previous incumbents. She was returned to the state legislature for an additional term, before running for United States Congress.
[edit] Congressional career
In 1986, Morella ran for the open Congressional seat previously held by Democrat Michael Barnes, who was pursuing an unsuccessful bid for the Democratic nomination to the U.S. Senate. Morella's opponent in the general election was State Senator Stewart Bainum, a multimillionaire business executive who consistently outpolled her throughout most of the campaign. A major turning point came when Morella unexpectedly won endorsements from the Baltimore Sun and the Washington Post, an unusual feat for a Republican candidate in the race for an open Congressional seat in Maryland. Many analysts credit the endorsements for Morella's eventual success in November, when she was narrowly elected to be the U.S. Representative from the 8th Congressional District. She was the first woman to hold this seat. Although a Republican in an area that had become heavily Democratic, she proved highly popular among her constituents and won re-election seven times, serving until 2002.
Morella was able to survive as a Republican in a heavily Democratic district by earning a reputation for independence. She opposed her party's positions on abortion, gun control, gay rights, and the environmental movement, voted for government funding of contraceptives and needle exchange programs for drug addicts, and favored the legalization of medical marijuana. She also received some support from organized labor and opposed many tax cuts. She voted against declaring English the official language of the United States and in 1996 against a bill overwhelmingly approved by Congress and signed by President Bill Clinton, to combat illegal immigration. In 1998 she was one of only three Republicans to vote against renaming the Washington National Airport the Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. Morella was the only Republican in the entire Congress to have voted against approving both the use of military force in Iraq in 1991 and in 2002. Indeed, by many surveys, her voting record was consistently one of the most liberal of any Republican in the House.
Morella was active in human rights, women's health, and domestic violence issues in Congress, and served on the Science and Government Reform Committees. She was U.S. representative to the 1994 U.N. International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo and co-chair of the Congressional delegation to the 1995 U.N. Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing. Among the legislation she sponsored were the 1992 Battered Women's Testimony Act, which provided funds for indigent women to hire expert testimony in domestic abuse cases, and the Judicial Training Act, which funded programs to educate judges about domestic violence, especially in child custody cases.
Morella's politics came under pressure after her party took control of the House in 1994 Congressional elections. Although she signed the Contract with America developed by Newt Gingrich, she had a mixed record supporting the subsequent Republican majority in Congress. She did not openly challenge the new House leadership until 1997 when she voted "present" for Speaker of the House instead of for the incumbent, Newt Gingrich. In 1998, she was one of five Republicans to oppose all four articles of impeachment against Clinton.
As a Republican congresswoman representing a wealthy Democratic district in an increasingly Democratic state, Morella did face a succession of increasingly strong Democratic challengers. The low popularity of the Republican-controlled Congress undermined her. She tried to portray herself as giving her district a place at the table, but Democrats claimed that a vote for Morella was a vote to keep Tom DeLay and other Republicans unpopular in her district in power. It was virtually taken for granted that Morella would be succeeded by a Democrat if she retired. It was also taken for granted that if Morella retired or was defeated in an election, it would be a long time before another Republican won the seat.
Maryland Senate President Thomas V. "Mike" Miller specifically stated that he intended to draw Morella's district out from under her after her relatively narrow reelection in 2000. During redistricting after the 2000 Census, one proposal went so far as to divide her district in two, effectively giving one to State Senator Chris Van Hollen and forcing Morella to run against popular Delegate and Kennedy political family member Mark Shriver.
The final redistricting plan was less ambitious but still made the already Democratic 8th district even more Democratic. It restored a heavily Democratic spur of eastern Montgomery County removed in the 1990 redistricting and added a dozen precincts in strongly Democratic Prince George's County. Although it forced Van Hollen and Shriver to run against each other in an expensive primary, Van Hollen defeated Morella in 2002 with 52% of the vote to Morella's 47%.
Many pundits believed that the 8th had been redrawn to make it difficult, if not impossible, for Morella to win. Van Hollen trounced her in the Prince George's portion of the district, an area that Morella did not know and that did not know her. However, it is worth noting that Van Hollen narrowly defeated Morella in the Montgomery County portion of the district, nearly all of which she had represented at one time or another. However, Morella carried the precincts that had been in her old district.
[edit] Ambassador to the OECD
President George W. Bush appointed her United States Permanent Representative to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) on July 11, 2003. She was unanimously confirmed by the United States Senate on July 31 and sworn in on October 8 of that year, becoming the first former member of Congress to serve as ambassador to the OECD. She is a honorary board member of the National Organization of Italian American Women.
In November 2007, she was succeeded by Christopher Egan, son of Richard Egan.
[edit] Awards and Honors
Morella has received honorary doctorates from American University, 1988; Norwich University, 1989; Dickinson College, 1989; Mt. Vernon College, 1995; University of Maryland University College, 1996; University of Maryland, 1997; Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, 1997; Elizabethtown College, 1999; Washington College, 2000; National Labor College, 2004. Her numerous awards and recognitions include induction into the Maryland Women's Hall of Fame[1], the Ron Brown Standards Leadership Award, and public service awards from the American Medical Association, the American Bar Association, and the prestigious Hubert H. Humphrey Civil Rights Award from the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights "for selfless and devoted service in the cause of equality." The Republic of Italy awarded her the Medal of the Legion of Merit.
[edit] External links
- Constance A. Morella Papers at the University of Maryland Libraries
- Connie Morella at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
[edit] References and notes
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Michael D. Barnes |
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Maryland's 8th congressional district 1987–2003 |
Succeeded by Chris Van Hollen |
| Diplomatic posts | ||
| Preceded by Jeanne L. Phillips |
United States Ambassador to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development 2003 – present |
Incumbent |
