Congressman
Reuss was elected as a Democrat from the 5th district to the Eighty-fourth and to the thirteen succeeding Congresses (January 3, 1955-January 3, 1983). He served as chairman of the Committee on Banking, Currency, and Housing in the Ninety-fourth Congress. He served as chairman of the Committee on Banking, Finance, and Urban Affairs in the Ninety-fifth and Ninety-sixth Congresses. He served as chairman of the Joint Economic Committee in the Ninety-seventh Congress.
After the 1974 post-Watergate Democratic landslide victories in Congress, Reuss defeated the more senior Wright Patman of Texas as chairman of the House Banking Committee.
He opposed the war in Vietnam, and supported the campaign of U.S. Senator Eugene J. McCarthy for the 1968 Democratic presidential nomination. He served as an at-large delegate for McCarthy at the Democratic National Convention that year.
He watched as planning, land acquisition, and utility relocation activities occurred for the Park West Freeway in his district (1955–1972). These activities cost the federal, state, and county governments almost $25 million. Only after the Milwaukee County electorate approved construction of the Park West in November 1974 did he come out in opposition to it in May 1975.
Read more about this topic: Henry S. Reuss
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