Wilbur Mills
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Wilbur Daigh Mills (May 24, 1909-May 2, 1992), was a powerful Democratic member of the United States House of Representatives from the state of Arkansas.
Mills was born in Kensett, White County, the son of Ardra Pickens Mills and Daigh Mills. Kensett was the first public school in Arkansas to integrate, under Mr. Mills' father who was first superintendent and then chair of the school board and always the banker for the school district. Mills attended public schools in Kensett, graduated from Searcy High School as valedictorian and later graduated from Hendrix College in Conway, Arkansas as salutarian and with high honors. He studied constitutional law at Harvard University, under Felix Frankfurter, before Frankfurter was nominated and confirmed as Associate Justice of the US Supreme Court. Mills was admitted to the bar in 1933.
Mills served as County Judge of White County, Arkansas during the depression years and began a county-funded program to pay medical bill, prescription drugs, and hospital treatment for the poor.
Mills served in the House of Representatives from 1939 to 1977 and served for eighteen years (1957-1975) as the chair of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, a post he held longer than any other person in American history. Mills was often termed "the most powerful man in Washington" during his tenure.
His accomplishments in Congress included playing a large role in the creation of the Medicare program. Mills initially had reservations about the program because he was worried about the eventual cost, but eventually shepherded it through Congress and had a large hand in shaping its program. Mills was also acknowledged as the primary tax expert in the Congress and a voice for the Tax Reform Act of 1969. Mills favored a conservative fiscal policy and a balanced budget but also supported various liberal programs. He was clearly a fiscal conservative and a liberal on social policy.
Mills ran for President of the United States in the 1972 Democratic primaries. To position himself to appeal to senior citizens during the 1972 presidential campaign, Mills championed the automatic Cost Of Living Adjustment (COLA) to Social Security. His campaign fared poorly in the primaries but he won 33 votes for president from the delegates at the 1972 Democratic National Convention for Senator George McGovern. His name was mentioned as a possible Secretary of Treasury by the McGovern campaign but his defeat to President Richard Nixon made this moot. [1]
Mills is perhaps best known for a drunken incident on October 7, 1974, with an Argentine stripper known as Fanne Foxe. Mills' car, driven by a former Nixon staffer, was stopped by US Park police late at night because the driver had not turned on the lights. Mills was intoxicated, and his face was cut from a scuffle with Foxe. When police approached the car, Foxe leapt from the car and jumped into the nearby Tidal Basin. Mills acknowledged his alcoholism, sought treatment at the West Palm Beach Institute, and joined Alcoholics Anonymous. Despite the scandal, he was re-elected to Congress in November 1974 with 60% of the vote, but in December he drunkenly staggered onstage at a Boston strip club where Ms. Foxe was performing. Soon after this second embarrassment Mills was forced to step down from his chairmanship of the Ways and Means Committee. [2] Mills is one of numerous public officials known to have drinking problems during the time. [3] He did not seek re-election in 1976.
Wilbur Mills died on May 2, 1992, in Searcy, Arkansas. Mills is buried at Kensett Cemetery in Kensett, Arkansas.
Various schools, highways, and other structures in Arkansas are named after Mills.
[edit] See also
- Mills University Studies High School - (Little Rock, Arkansas)
[edit] External links
| Preceded by John E. Miller |
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Arkansas's 2nd congressional district 1939-1977 |
Succeeded by Jim Guy Tucker |
