Weicker, Lowell Palmer, Jr.,
, 1931–2023 , American politician, b. Paris, France,
Yale Univ. (B.A., 1953), Univ. of Virginia School of Law (J.D., 1958).
Weicker served in the Army (1953–55) and then completed his law
degree. From 1963–69, he served in the Connecticut State House of
Representatives and as Greenwich's First Selectman, before his election to
the U.S. House of Representatives (1968–70). He was elected Senator in
1970, serving three terms (1971–89). He gained national attention as a
member of the Senate Watergate
committee, and unsuccessfully ran in the Republican presidential primary in
1980. Increasingly ostracized within his own party because of his
traditional, "Rockefeller Republican" positions, he was defeated in his
final Senate run in 1988 by Democrat Joseph Lieberman, who won the support of
conservative Republicans. After briefly teaching at George Washington Univ.
Law School (1988–90), he was elected governor of Connecticut in 1990
running under the umbrella of his own A Connecticut Party; he served one
term in this position. Faced with a large state deficit, he initially
opposed implementing an income tax, but changed his views on his entering
office, leading to further criticism from the state's conservatives. Weicker
supported Democrat Ned Lamont for Senate in 2006, but Lieberman held his
seat running as an Independent. He has criticized the Republican party for
its embrace of Donald Trump , filing an
amicus brief during the 2020 campaign supporting the fairness of
Pennsylvania's vote tally, helping Joe Biden defeat this challenge to his
election.
See his Maverick: A Life in Politics (1995, with B. Sussman).
The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. Copyright © 2024, Columbia University Press. All rights reserved.
See more Encyclopedia articles on: U.S. History: Biographies
