Langevin's Votes
(These votes were probably accidental – not malicious)
Congress gets about a 30-percent approval rating from the public -- recently down to 25 percent. So why do incumbents running for re-election win 98 percent of the time?
The problem is that citizens have no idea how their own representative votes. And it’s not easy to find out. Before the primary one Rhode Island paper endorsed Congressman James R. Langevin over Jennifer Lawless saying "Langevin has done a generally diligent job for his constituents."
Rep. Langevin is an amiable young man. But unfortunately in the General Assembly he learned that to get ahead politically you just vote with the leaders. It's not necessary to read the bills. Here are a few examples of the results:
In the RI House, following the Speaker:
- Langevin voted to impose off-track betting on RI just after the voters had overwhelmingly rejected it (May 31, 1991). Now he says he opposes expansion of gambling.
- Langevin voted to outlaw certain weapons including blackjacks, slingshots and brass knuckles, providing also that it is illegal to sell these weapons to a child unless he brings a note from his mother (May 14, 1991). This law dramatically illustrates the absurdity that can occur when legislators don't pay attention. It remains on the books today, 15 years later. (See www.rilin.state.ri.us/Statutes/TITLE11/11-47/11-47-42.HTM.)
- Langevin voted five times to grant teaching certificates to applicants who flunk the teachers’ test (May 10, 1989, May 3, 1990, July 6, 1990, May 1, 1991 and June 11, 1991). It took three years to get it into law because I fought it in the House, in the Senate and in the Governor’s office. This peculiar state law was eventually repealed in 2002 under pressure from federal law.
- Langevin voted against requiring a one-year waiting period before a legislator could take a newly-created judgeship (May 31, 1991). Months later, when the Speaker changed his mind, Langevin changed his mind.
- Langevin voted to create the infamous traffic court with 12-year tenure for its political-appointee administrator (June 30, 1992).
- Langevin voted to exempt a group of multi-millionaire employees of American Power Conversion from the RI capital gains tax on their windfall profits (July 15, 1993).
- When House leaders wanted to rush to adjourn, Langevin joined them in voting to even deny other representatives the opportunity to read bills before voting (June 6, 1991 and July 11, 1992).
Rod Driver opposed each of these.
In Congress, following the Republican leaders:
- Langevin voted against moving money from the missile program to renewable energy. And he voted for eight luxury 737 jets for Pentagon admirals and generals (2001 Roll Calls 172 and 201). Now he says he supports renewable energy.
- Langevin voted for the "Patriot Act" (2001 Roll Call 386). Later he admitted he hadn’t read it.
- Under intense pressure from his constituents Langevin voted against the 2002 authorization to use force against Iraq (2002 Roll Call 296). However he had voted for an earlier generic use-of-force resolution (2001 Roll Call 342). And since 2002 he has voted every time to continue funding the illegal war in Iraq, passing the costs on to our grandchildren.
- Langevin even votes against asking Mr. Bush to start developing an exit plan from Iraq, instead telling Bush to keep our forces in Iraq until his "foreign policy goals" are achieved (2005 Roll Calls 220, 397 and 648).
- Langevin voted to continue detaining and "interrogating" people at Guantanamo without a trial (2005 Roll Call 396).
- Langevin voted to tell Mr. Bush that it’s OK to attack more countries if he wants to without the constitutionally-required authorization from Congress (2005 Roll Call 285).
- Langevin voted five times to imprison people (for 10 years) for participating in therapeutic cloning (2001 Roll Calls 300, 302, 303, 304 and 2003 Roll Call 39). These bills would have even permitted imprisonment of a patient who traveled abroad for treatment using embryonic stem cells. Fortunately such bills never passed the Senate. Later Langevin explained that he hadn’t understood, and he really supports embryonic stem cell research. (See his op-ed in Providence Journal, Nov. 27, 2004.)
- Langevin voted against asking the United Nations to begin negotiations for an international treaty banning space-based weapons (2005 Roll Call 391).
- Langevin voted to continue prosecuting cancer patients for using medical marijuana (2005 Roll Call 255).
The congressional votes can be verified at thomas.loc.gov. At the bottom of the page click on Roll Call Votes. The General Assembly votes are found in the Journals of the RI House for the dates listed. If the above list isn't enough to raise doubts about Langevin doing a "generally diligent job for his constituents," there are many more examples.
In addition to the advantage of having an uninformed electorate, Langevin has taken millions of dollars from special interest PACs such as airline pilots, beer wholesalers, military contractors, their unions, the AMA, the American Optometric Association, accounting firms, real-estate agents and the Association of Trial Lawyers. A challenger gets none of this, and I wouldn't take PAC money if it were offered.
Yet Langevin makes the taxpayers cover a big part of his campaign expense. In each re-election campaign Congressman Langevin sends to every mailing addresses in the second district a slick flyer about himself. With a magnifying glass you might be able to read the fine print: "This mailing was prepared, published and mailed at taxpayer expense."