Amory Houghton Jr., Who Went From Corning to Congress, Dies at 93

Before the 1998 Clinton impeachment vote, Mr. Houghton declared, “The main issue is how to heal, rather than further divide, the nation.” He was a co-author of a censure resolution and urged the Republican leadership to put it to a vote rather than pursue impeachment. It would have required the president to pay a $500,000 fine but would have avoided a Senate trial and Mr. Clinton’s possible removal from office. The leadership refused, and after impeachment, the president was acquitted by the Senate on both charges.

Mr. Houghton also differed from most Republican colleagues on raising the minimum wage (he favored it) and on abortion rights (he generally supported them). He also broke with most of his colleagues in voting to reform campaign financing by banning so-called soft money, donations given in ways to avoid regulations or limits.

Though calling himself a proud member of the National Rifle Association, he supported a ban on military-style assault weapons, saying they “have no place” in the nation’s cities. When Republican legislation was put forward in 1998 to amend the Constitution to allow organized prayer in public schools, he opposed it.

“People are screaming about getting the government off our backs,” he said, “but they turn around and have the government tell our children how to pray.”

After the 1994 elections gave Republicans control of the House for the first time in 40 years, and the divide with Democrats grew deeper under the new speaker, Newt Gingrich, Mr. Houghton helped establish a bipartisan retreat for members of Congress and their families on the theory that civility and personal friendship would foster cooperation on Capitol Hill.

He also founded, in 1997, the Republican Main Street Partnership, a policy group (it calls itself “the governing wing of the Republican Party”) for party members in and out of government who, according to the group, are “mainstream fiscally conservative” and support “pragmatic common-sense solutions to the challenges our country faces.”

In 2004, after announcing at age 77 that he would not run that year for a 10th term, Mr. Houghton lamented that he was one of “a dying breed” of Republican moderates.

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