William Proxmire

Wisconsin maverick whose Golden Fleece awards mocked waste and whose stubbornness won the genocide treaty.

Overview

Elected to Joe McCarthy's old seat in 1957, Proxmire served until 1989, chairing Banking and pressing budget discipline against Pentagon and bureaucratic excess. From 1967 to 1986 he delivered a speech every single day the Senate was in session, some 3,211 speeches, demanding ratification of the UN Genocide Convention, achieved in 1986. His Golden Fleece awards, singling out questionable federal spending, made him a media fixture and reform symbol. He refused campaign contributions in his later runs and jogged to work in Washington, an early fitness celebrity. He died in 2005.