I'm 58 years old, and in that time period I've resided in 13 different Congressional Districts. After yesterday's election, every single one of those Districts will be represented by a Democrat in the 111th Congress. It took a pair of R-->D electoral switches in yesterday's balloting, added to four 2006 R-->D shifts (plus another not-previously-Democratic technicality) to get that done. It's a sweeeet feeling.
I note that happy fact not out of a sense of blue state provincialism, nor as any sort of gloating over yesterday's electoral results. It's more that I'm astonished to see the good people of such a variety of locales display the voting wherewithal to elect people who are so much more likely to be of service to their constituencies and to the nation than Republicans have been and would be.
Follow me below the fold for the N in Seattle travelogue...
Herewith, a chronological roster of my home Congressional Districts during my 58 years on the planet.
- 1950-1960: When I was born, my parents lived in the colonial town of Woodbury NJ, county seat of Gloucester County. Woodbury is in NJ-01, represented since 1989 by Rob Andrews.
- 1960-1968: In 1960, we moved a few miles north to the burgeoning uber-suburb of Cherry Hill NJ, part of NJ-03. That district's long-time GOP Congressman retired, and in yesterday's election the seat was won in a close battle by Democrat John Adler. NJ-03 is one of the two party switches in my CD lifelist.
- 1968-1972: My undergraduate years at Dartmouth College in Hanover NH. In 2006, my classmate Paul Hodes defeated another Big Greener (two years behind us) to wrestle NH-02 into the Democratic column. While at Dartmouth, I briefly lived off-campus in nearby Fairlee VT, which has been represented in the House by Peter Welch since 2007. Before that, of course, VT-AL was represented by now-Senator Bernie Sanders. This, of course, is that technical fifth party switch I talked about earlier.
- 1972-1973: I spent one miserable year in medical school at Temple University in Philadelphia PA. Because the building I lived in is a block east of Broad St., I was in PA-01, represented by Congressman Bob Brady.
- 1973-1975: Moving into epidemiology, I spent two years in graduate school at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst MA. Currently represented in the House by John Olver, MA-01 is the district in which I voted for a Republican for the first and only time in my life. I happily and proudly backed Silvio O. Conte -- environmentalist, supporter of public education and scientific research, liberal -- in the 1974 election.
- 1975-1981: My first job was at the University of Louisville, located of course in Louisville KY. The city is in the 3rd District of Kentucky. After defeating horrid Republican incumbent Anne Northup in 2006, Representative John Yarmuth cruised to victory yesterday, again against Northup.
- 1981-1986, 1987-1994: Grad school, and later employment, at the University of Pittsburgh. The strongly Democratic city is part of PA-14, and has been represented in Congress since 1995 by Mike Doyle.
- 1986-1987: Between those stints at Pitt, I did a post-doc back at Temple (see 1972-1973). This time around, I lived in a different part of Philadelphia, in Chaka Fattah's district PA-02.
- 1994-1995: Briefly becoming a "gentleman farmer" while working at Pitt and then Allegheny General Hospital, I lived in the tiny rural hamlet of Fenelton PA (between Butler and Kittanning, if you really want to know). That town is in PA-03, which is about to send freshman Democrat Kathy Dahlkemper to Washington. She defeated Republican incumbent Phil English, who had been in the House since 1995. In this usually-conservative CD, Dahlkemper's late rush to victory was a real surprise.
- 1995-1996: Still at AGH, but soon unemployed, I spent a disspirited year in an outer suburb of Pittsburgh, Cranberry Township PA. Continuing my tour through the Keystone State's districts, it's in PA-04. This CD went from GOP to Democratic two years ago, when Jason Altmire defeated Melissa Hart. Yesterday, he outpolled Hart again.
- 1996-2001: Moving into Medicare quality improvement research, I made a clean break in relocating to Somersworth and then Portsmouth NH. Both cities are in NH-01, which was the site of perhaps the most amazing House race of 2006. Hugely outspent in both the Democratic primary and the general election, and running against well-entrenched incumbent Jeb Bradley in the latter, Carol Shea-Porter won both times by dint of hard door-to-door work and an army of impassioned volunteers. She confirmed yesterday that New Hampshire is now a blue state, handily defeating Bradley for a second time.
- 2001-now: Leaving the Eastern Time Zone far behind, I came here to ultra-blue Seattle, happily represented in ultra-blue WA-07 by ultra-blue Jim McDermott.
[adapted from a post on my blog Peace Tree Farm]