Jim Leach

Jim Leach

James Albert Smith "Jim" Leach (born October 15, 1942) is chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities and a former member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Iowa.

Prior to his appointment as NEH chairman, Leach was the John L. Weinberg Visiting Professor of Public and International Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson School of Princeton University. He also served as the interim director of the Institute of Politics at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University from September 17, 2007, to September 1, 2008, when Bill Purcell was appointed permanent director.

Previously, Leach served 30 years (1977–2007) as a Republican member of the United States House of Representatives, representing Iowa's 2nd congressional district (numbered as the 1st District from 1977 to 2003). In Congress, Leach chaired the House Committee on Banking and Financial Services (1995–2001) and was a senior member of the House Committee on International Relations, serving as Chair of the Committee’s Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific Affairs (2001–2006). He also founded and served as co-chair of the Congressional Humanities Caucus. He lost his 2006 re-election bid to Democrat Dave Loebsack of Mount Vernon, IA.

Leach authored legislation on a range of issues including:

  • the creation of an international AIDS Trust Fund,
  • debt relief for the world’s poorest countries,
  • authorization of an International Monetary Fund quota increase,
  • making the Peace Corps an independent federal agency,
  • requiring the federal government to use soy ink,
  • prohibiting Internet gambling,
  • restraining federal employee growth, and
  • redressing certain Holocaust asset losses.

The legislation he is perhaps best known for is the 1999 Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, one of the seminal pieces of banking legislation of the 20th century.

Read more about Jim Leach:  Biography, Gramm-Leach-Bliley Financial Services Modernization Act, 2006 Election

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