Frank Horton

A
staunch Republican, he represented a political center that has nearly
disappeared.

            Former Rep. Frank J. Horton served
residents of Monroe, Cayuga, Seneca, Wayne, and Oswego counties from
1967 until his retirement from office in 1992. He died Monday, August 30, in
his Virginia home, at the
age of 84.

            Many remember Horton for his
dedication to his constituents. His political career was born out of that
dedication, and he never wavered.

            “Frank was a public-service-oriented
man,” says David Lovenheim, who served as Horton’s
chief of staff from 1967 until 1978. “He was constantly seeking ways to give
his constituents a better life, to enhance their communities, to improve the
way the federal government performed.”

            Horton was an environmentalist who
“had a very strong belief that the federal government had a role to play in
improving the cleanliness of air and water, particularly as a congressman whose
district always included many, many miles of LakeOntario shoreline.”

            Horton held water-pollution hearings
in his district in 1966, well before there was an Environmental Protection
Agency or a national Environmental Policy Act. One outgrowth of those hearings
was the replacement of a single-treatment sewage facility in Durand-EastmanPark that was
responsible for polluting LakeOntario.

            Horton was appointed to the
Committee on Government Operations on his very first day as a congressman, January 3, 1963.

            “That was not a committee that was a
particular plum at the time,” says Lovenheim. “And he
turned that committee into a major force in pioneering new and better ways of
doing government and government oversight.”

            Horton was the prime sponsor of
several bills that created new and reorganized departments in federal
government, streamlining processes and eliminating paperwork. “He was very much
into improving the performance of government, particularly at the federal
level,” Lovenheim says. “But he was also keenly
focused on how all those things could be harnessed to better serve the
communities he represented and the people he represented. That’s where his
heart really was.”

            The House was controlled by
Democrats throughout Horton’s tenure, so he remained in the political minority.
Still, he managed to spearhead important legislative initiatives.

            “The way he got all that done was
not by being the leadership of a vocal minority that objected to everything the
majority party was doing,” Lovenheim says. “He
accomplished those things because of the confidence and the relationship he
built with the chairmen he served with. These people relied on Frank, on his
expertise, on his fairness, on his lack of partisanship, on his objectivity. They were partners in building these legislative solutions to
problems.”

            Horton “had more influence than most
committee chairmen who served for decades, because he had the creativity and
the initiative,” says Lovenheim. “But he also had
built the confidence across party lines.”

            During his last few years in
Congress, Horton began voting against his party’s leadership more frequently.
“That’s not because he was becoming more of a liberal,” Lovenheim
says. “He was still Frank Horton. He had a very steady set of principles and
beliefs. What he was finding himself in was the milieu of a party that was
moving further and further to the right, just as many Democrats elected when he
was elected found their party moving to the left. The center got fairly thin.”

            Horton was a leader of the Wednesday
Club, a group of moderate and liberal-thinking Republicans in the House who met
weekly and set a policy course that sometimes differed greatly from the
Republican Party’s.

            “Frank did not choose to buck his
party,” Lovenheim says. “But he never took his eye
off the ball. And the ball was what was best for his constituency and what was
best for the country.”

            Democratic Rep. Louise Slaughter,
who considered Horton a personal friend, says Horton’s bipartisanship was best
proven by the fact that he was best friends with Congressman Jack Brooks
(D-Texas). “He loved Frank,” Slaughter says. “When Frank had a retirement
party, Jack came up. I admired everything about Frank — his style, his
integrity. So did all the other Democrats. It was a different time. It was a
time when people respected each other.”

This article appears in Sep 8-14, 2004.