Two Firsts for Arkansas' Lincoln

By Jonathan Allen | September 9, 2009 4:25 PM | | Comments (0)

Democrat Blanche L. Lincoln's elevation to chairwoman of the Senate Agriculture Committee makes her the first woman -- and the first Arkansan -- to head the committee with jurisdiction over farm policy.

Tiny but very rural Vermont has been home to five Agriculture Committee chairmen, the largest number for any state since the panel's inception in 1825. The last Vermonter to hold the position, from 1987 to 1995, was Patrick J. Leahy, the Democrat who currently heads the Judiciary Committee.

Lincoln is taking the Ag Committee gavel from Democrat Tom Harkin, who was only the second senator from the farm state of Iowa to ever head the panel. Harkin shifted over to take the chairmanship of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee vacated by the Aug. 25 death of Massachusetts Democrat Edward M. Kennedy.

There are three women other than Lincoln who run a total of four Senate committees in the 111th Congress, all members of the Democratic majority:

  • Barbara Boxer of California, who chairs the Environment and Public Works Committee and the Ethics Committee
  • Dianne Feinstein of California, who heads the Select Intelligence Committee
  • Mary L. Landrieu of Louisiana, who chairs the Small Business Committee.

But more important to Lincoln than the firsts is the third term she hopes to win in November 2010. The farm committee gavel can only help in that quest, as my colleague Rachel Kapochunas reports.

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Categories: Election 2010, Legislation, Senate

Tags: Agriculture, Arkansas, Boxer, Feinstein, Harkin, Kennedy, Landrieu, Lincoln. Leahy

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