Welcome back. And let me tell you, what we have
for you today is an incredible story. It really
is. If you're joining us for the first time,
or I mean, even if you're a longtime listener,
you know the drill. We love taking something
that looks entirely ordinary on the surface and
finding hidden gold inside. Right. So today our
mission is to take a seemingly dry historical
document, literally just a Wikipedia page titled
List of United States Senators from Washington.
Sounds thrilling, I know. Right. It sounds completely
dry. But we are going to extract the human drama,
the bizarre political plot twists, and the massive
historical milestones hidden right there within
its table. There's so much packed into that one
page. Exactly. You might think a simple roster
of names, dates, and party affiliations is just
trivia. But I promise you, by the end of this
deep dive, you're going to see a sweeping epic
of American history. OK, let's unpack this. What's
fascinating here is that a simple timeline of
senators is actually a mirror. Yeah, it is reflecting
the entire evolution of American politics. When
you look closely at these columns and rows, you
aren't just seeing who held a job. You're seeing
the whole system change. Precisely. You are watching
a state go from the chaotic, really messy frontier
days of new statehood all the way to the highly
structured modern political landscape we recognize
today. It's all there in the data, if you know
how to read it. And to read it, I think we have
to start at the very beginning to establish our
baseline. The foundation. Right. Washington was
officially admitted to the union on November
11th, 1889, and they did not waste any time getting
their representation sorted out. No, they really
didn't. Mere days later, on November 20th, the
state elected its first two U .S. senators, John
B. Allen and Watson C. Squire. The founding pair.
Now, the table lists Allen taking what is called
a class one seat and Squire taking a class three
seat. For anyone who might be a little rusty
on their constitutional civics, how does that
class system actually work? Well, the Constitution.
mandates that the Senate is a continuing body.
Meaning it never completely empties out. Exactly.
The founders didn't want the entire Senate up
for re -election all at once because that could
lead to total whiplash in the federal government
during a volatile election year. That makes sense.
So all Senate seats are divided into three classes.
Class 1, Class 2, and Class 3. And each class
is up for election in a different two -year cycle.
So when a new state When a new state like Washington
joins the union, their two new senators are assigned
to two different classes. This instantly integrates
them into that staggered rotating system. Washington
received class one and class three. That guaranteed
that the state's elections would always be slightly
out of sync with each other. Which sounds incredibly
organized and functional on paper. On paper,
yes. But then you look at the very first major
anomaly in this timeline, which happens almost
immediately. Oh, the 1890s. We are in the Wild
West of the 1890s, and we hit what I'm calling
the empty chair. That's a great name for it.
In 1893, John B. Allen's Class I term ends. But
the table shows that from March 4, 1893, until
February 19, 1893, That seat is just listed as
vacant. Completely empty. Two whole years. The
state legislature just completely failed to elect
a class one senator. You have to keep in mind
the historical backdrop here. This is before
the 17th Amendment was ratified. Remind us what
that did again. Senators were not elected by
popular vote yet. They were chosen directly by
state legislatures in what were often chaotic
backroom deals. Oh, right. The smoke -filled
rooms. Exactly. In 1893, the Washington state
legislature was so severely deadlocked, just
fractured by regional and political disputes,
that they simply couldn't agree on a candidate
before the federal deadline hit. It's like being
handed the keys to the company car by your manager
because you finally got promoted, and then corporate
immediately comes and tows it away because your
managers couldn't agree on who pays for the gas.
Ha! That is a very accurate analogy. The state's
governor actually tried to step in and fix the
mess. He appointed the incumbent, John Allen,
to just keep the seat warm so the state wouldn't
lose its vote. But it didn't work. No. The U
.S. Senate completely rejected his credentials.
They flat out refused to seat him. Because the
U .S. Senate was sending a very clear, uncompromising
message to Washington state and really to all
the new Western states joining the union at that
time. What was the message? They were establishing
the supremacy of federal rules over state level
dysfunction. The message was, we don't care about
your internal political gridlock. You have to
follow the constitutional process. Wow. So they
just had to deal with it. Washington was penalized.
They had to suffer with only half of their representation
in the Senate for nearly two years until John
L. Wilson was finally seated in 1895 to finish
the term. That is wild. It perfectly illustrates
how fragile the Democratic machinery can be when
it's first being set up in a frontier state.
Fragile and incredibly fluid. Which brings us
out of the 1890s and into the 1910s. I was scanning
down the rows of the timeline, looking at the
party affiliations. And they start shifting.
It's exactly what you'd expect at first. Republican,
Republican, Democrat, Republican. And then I
hit the curious case of Senator Miles Poindexter.
Ah, yes. Poindexter. Looking strictly at the
table, Poindexter was elected to the class one
seat in 1911 as a Republican. But then during
what is listed as the 63rd Congress, his party
affiliation abruptly changes to progressive.
Sudden pivot. Right. And then just as suddenly,
he switches back to Republican for the 64th Congress
and actually gets reelected in 1916. Before we
dig into that, just to anchor us, what exact
years are we talking about for the 63rd Congress?
The 63rd Congress covers the period from roughly
March 1913 to March 1915. OK, here's where it
gets really interesting. We're talking about
a sitting United States senator changing his
official party label midstream while in office,
serving under a totally different banner for
a couple of years and then flipping back to his
original party without losing his job. It's quite
the maneuver. But I have to push back a little
here. Is this an example? of genuine ideological
shift or is this just pure cynical political
opportunism? Was he actually changing his beliefs
or just reading the room to keep his job? This
race is an important question, doesn't it? Yeah.
How does he get away with it? How does a politician
survive that kind of whiplash without alienating
their entire base? To understand Poindexter,
you have to look at the massive ideological earthquakes
of the early 20th century. The progressive era.
Without taking any political sides, observe...
Serving this single row in the timeline illustrates
the sheer power of the progressive movement of
that era. In 1912, former President Theodore
Roosevelt famously fractured the Republican establishment.
By forming the Progressive Party. The Bull Moose
Party, yes. So Poindexter was essentially riding
that Bull Moose wave. Precisely. And the Pacific
Northwest at that time was a hotbed for populist
and labor movements. There were deep tensions
between massive industrial interests. Like the
timber barons and railroads. Exactly. Timber
and railroads clashing with the working class.
Yeah. So when Poindexter switched to progressive,
he wasn't necessarily abandoning his voters.
He was following them. He was reflecting a very
real. very deep fracture within the electorate
itself. The fact that a sitting senator could
officially change his party for a single Congress
and then return to the Republican fold and still
get reelected by his state. It's crazy to think
about today. It shows a level of party fluidity
that is almost unimaginable in today's highly
polarized, rigidly structured political environment.
They were voting for the person, not just the
team color. Voters in Washington during the 1910s
were clearly prioritizing individual platforms
and regional issues over strict, unwavering party
loyalty. It's like watching a real -time identity
crisis play out in a spreadsheet. That's a great
way to put it. But that era of ideological experimentation
eventually gives way to something much darker
as we move down into the 1930s and 1940s. The
turnover gets intense here. I started noticing
a really grim trend in the data. Let's look at
Wesley Elgin. A very long serving senator. Yeah,
a long serving Republican, first elected in 1909.
He gets reelected time and time again, all the
way through the 1920s. He wins reelection in
1928. But the 1932 election changes everything.
He loses his next reelection bid in 1932. And
then, bizarrely, he dies in office in November
1932, right after losing the election, but before
his term actually ends. Yes, he died during what
we call the lame duck period. Just so we're all
on the same page. Today, a lame duck period is
only a couple of months. You lose in November,
you're out in January. That's true today. But
back in the 1930s, how long did a defeated politician
actually stay in office? That is a crucial distinction.
Before the 20th Amendment was fully implemented
to move inaugurations to January, a congressional
term didn't end until March 4th of the following
year. Wow. So an incumbent who lost in early
November had to sit there for four solid months,
entirely stripped of their political mandate,
just waiting for the clock to run out. That sounds
agonizing. It was certainly an awkward period
for governance. And the chaos of this era doesn't
stop with Jones. Just a few years later, in the
state's other seat, you have Democrat Louis B.
Schwellenbach. Another fascinating career arc.
He's elected in 1934, reelected in 1938. But
then he abruptly resigns in December 1940. And
the timeline tells us exactly why. He resigned
to become a judge on the United States Court
of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. A lifetime
appointment. When you synthesize these events,
a sudden death during a drawn -out lame duck
session and a sudden midterm resignation for
a lifetime judicial appointment, you get a master
class in the mechanics of congressional succession.
Because someone has to fill the seat. When these
sudden vacancies occur, the system relies on
a fail -safe mechanism. The state governor steps
in to appoint someone to fill the void. And it
leads to this frantic game of political musical
chairs. Oh, absolutely. When Jones died, a man
named Elijah S. Grammer was appointed by the
governor to finish the term. He served from late
November 1932 to early March 1933. Just a few
months. That is a Senate career of just over
three months. You barely figure out where the
bathrooms are in the Capitol building by then.
Let alone pass any meaningful legislation. Exactly.
And when Schwellenbach left for the federal bench,
Monrad Walgren was appointed in December 1940
to bridge the gap. Which creates a very unique
type of public servant, a placeholder. Just keeping
the lights on. These appointees often know they're
only there to keep things running until the next
election, or in some cases, just for a few weeks
until the newly elected senator can be sworn
in. It must be strange knowing your expiration
date from day one. It highlights a massive tension
in American governance. The Senate is designed
to operate at a slow, deliberate, insulated pace.
Right. But it constantly collides with the sudden,
unpredictable nature of human life, mortality
and shifting career ambitions. That friction
is so palpable in the 1930s Rose. But just as
you get used to the constant turnover, the resignations,
the short term placeholders, you hit the 1940s
and the data takes a massive, undeniable turn.
A complete paradigm shift. I'm looking at the
table and the chaos just vanishes. It is replaced
by an era of monumental, almost unbelievable
stability. The era of the Titans. First, we have
Democrat Warren Magnuson. He served an astounding
36 years. From December 1944 all the way to January
1981, he remains the state's longest serving
senator. A towering figure in Washington history.
And right alongside him in the other seat, you
have Henry M. Jackson. Another Democrat who served
for 30 years from January 1953 until his death
in office in September 1983. Unprecedented continuity.
But I'm looking at Warren Magnuson's start date
in 1944 and the math isn't mathing here. Oh,
the December start. Yeah. He won the 1944 election,
but normally freshman senators wouldn't start
their term until January of the following year.
How did he officially start his term a month
before he was supposed to? That is one of the
most brilliant tactical moves in the history
of the Senate. Really? The incumbent at the time,
Homer Bone, resigned in November 1944 to take
a judicial appointment. Another judge appointment.
Right. Now, Magnuson had already won the election
for the upcoming full term. But instead of leaving
the seat vacant until January, the governor appointed
Magnuson to finish the final few weeks of Homer
Bone's term on December 14th, 1944. It's like
a political cheat code. It absolutely was. He
essentially got a multi -week head start on his
official start date over all the other freshman
senators elected in that exact same year. And
that tiny adjustment in his start date gave him
a permanent seniority advantage over his entire
freshman class. Because seniority is everything
in the Senate. In the Senate. Seniority dictates
committee assignments, chairmanships, and ultimately
raw power. So what does this all mean? If we
connect this massive, decades -long tenure to
the bigger picture, it is no coincidence that
Washington state suddenly locked in its senators.
Because of the era. You are looking at the dawn
of the post -World War II era. The United States
was stepping into its role as a global superpower,
and the federal government was expanding rapidly
in infrastructure, defense and social programs.
And Washington state wanted a piece of that pie.
Voters in Washington and really across the country
realized that seniority in the Senate equaled
immense federal funding for their home states.
Keeping the same two men in office for decades
wasn't just a political choice. It was an economic
strategy. The stability of Magnuson and Jackson
brought enormous federal investments to the Pacific
Northwest, from massive Columbia River dams to
defense contracts for Boeing. The data from this
era reflects the stabilizing of American political
institutions during the Cold War. But eventually,
even the longest streaks come to an end. Magnuson
finally loses his seat in the 1980 election to
a Republican named Slade Gorton. A major upset.
Which brings us to a chapter of the timeline
I'm calling the comeback kid. Let's track the
rollercoaster career of Slade Gorton. He's elected
to the class three seat in 1980. He serves one
term and then he loses his reelection bid in
1986 to Democrat Brock Adams. Which is usually
the final chapter. Normally, looking at political
history, that's the end of the story. You lose
as an incumbent, you write your memoirs, you
go into consulting, and you fade away. The historical
precedent is very clear on that. Incumbents who
are ousted by voters rarely make a successful
return to the exact same political arena. But
Gordon doesn't fade away. No, he doesn't. Instead
of giving up, he waits two years, and in 1988,
he runs for Washington's other Senate seat, the
class one seat, and he wins. It's an incredible
pivot. He comes back and serves two more full
terms from 1989 until 2001 before finally losing
a very close race to Maria Cantwell. The resilience
required for that kind of political resurrection
is remarkable. When we analyze electoral history,
we see how incredibly difficult it is to lose
an incumbent seat. Because voters have already
fired you once. Exactly. A loss usually carries
a heavy stigma of voter rejection. To successfully
pivot and conquer the state's other seat just
two years later requires a politician to completely
retool their coalition. They have to change the
narrative. They have to convince the electorate
that their previous defeat was a situational
fluke, perhaps tied to a specific national mood
or a temporary economic downturn, rather than
a fundamental rejection of their policies. Which
he clearly managed to do. rebrand and secure
the other class seat is a very rare electoral
feat that speaks to the shifting political tides
of Washington in the late 80s and 90s. It's the
ultimate dust yourself off and try again story.
And the person who eventually defeats Gordon
in 2001, Maria Cantwell, perfectly transitions
us into the modern era and really the final major
takeaway from our timeline. The contemporary
delegation. Bringing us right up to the present
day, Washington's current Senate delegation consists
of two Democrats, Patty Murray, who has been
serving since 1993, and Marie Cantwell, serving
since 2001. A very stable pairing. Now, Washington
is one of only four states in the entire U .S.
to currently have two female U .S. senators.
The other three, for those keeping score at home,
are Minnesota, Nevada and New Hampshire. It is
a profound milestone when you look at the entirety
of the timeline we've just discussed. Because
the whole list before them. For over a century,
from 1889 well into the 1990s, that list of senators
was exclusively male. The back -to -back elections
of Murray and Cantwell and their subsequent decades
of reelections demonstrate a massive shift in
the electorate's values, representation priorities,
and the breaking down of historical barriers
in the Pacific Northwest. And to paint the full
modern picture, we can't just look at the Senate.
The state's current House delegation tells a
really vital story about the political geography
of Washington today. It's much more varied than
the Senate seats might suggest. When you look
at the House members, you see a sharp contrast.
like Susan Delben, Rick Larson, Pramila Jayapal.
And Adam Smith, Marilyn Strickland. Right. And
Marie Glusenkamp -Perez, Kim Schrier, representing
these booming, highly populated areas, serving
alongside Republicans like Dan Newhouse, Michael
Baumgartner. Don't forget Emily Randall on the
Democratic side as well, shaking up the map.
Right. So you have this mix where Republicans
like Newhouse represent the massive, crucial
agricultural center in the central and eastern
parts of the state. Contrasting those specific
districts provides essential context. While the
Senate seats in the modern era have skewed heavily
Democratic, which is a stark contrast to the
state's solid Republican beginnings back in 1889.
The map looks totally different depending on
how close you zoom in. The House delegation shows
that both major political perspectives remain
deeply entrenched in Washington today. It reminds
us that while statewide races might trend one
way based on heavy population centers, the regional
district by district landscape of a state is
often much more complex. It's not a monolith.
The urban rural divide shapes the daily lives
and the local economies of millions of people.
And that is reflected vividly in the House. It
really is a patchwork quilt of representation.
So I want to speak directly to you, the listener.
Why does any of this matter to you? Why read
the list at all? Why spend time unpacking a Wikipedia?
a list of United States senators from Washington?
Because scanning a list of dates, parties, and
names isn't just about memorizing facts for a
trivia night. No, it's a narrative. It is a literal
time -lapse photograph of a society's changing
values. It's the evolution of its rules from
the messy, deadlock -prone frontier of the 1890s
to the strategic procedural mastery of the 1940s.
It's the story of institutions growing up. It
is proof of the endurance of our democratic system.
Bumps, bruises, empty chairs and all. Knowledge
is most valuable when we can step back and see
the patterns. When you connect the dots, you
see how in 1893 rejected credential by the federal
government forced a young state to mature and
conform to a national standard. It forced them
to get in line. You see how a 1913 party flip
reflected a nation deeply questioning its political
identities amidst major labor and industrial
shifts. Those chaotic early moments paved the
way for the stable, history -making delegations
of today. The stability we almost take for granted
now. History isn't just a list of things that
happened in the past. It's the foundation of
the very political realities we're living in
right now. Before we let you go, I want to leave
you with one final provocative thought to mull
over on your own. It builds right on the very
first thing we discussed today. Those electoral
classes. The staggered system. Remember, every
single senator on this list. belong strictly
to either a Class 1 or a Class 3 electoral cycle.
Their elections fall on very specific, rotating
years. This is a system designed at the very
dawn of the republic so the Senate would never
turn over all at once. A safeguard against sudden
radical shifts. But I want you to consider the
arbitrary nature of those assigned classes. How
much does the mere timing of an electoral cycle
dictate a state's entire historical trajectory?
It's a fascinating variable. Say a Class 1 seat
happens to be up for re -election. in a politically
volatile year, a year with an unexpected economic
crash or a major global conflict. While the class
three seat is up in a quiet, prosperous year,
the outcomes could be entirely different. The
exact same voters might make wildly different
choices based simply on the mood of the nation
in that specific 12 month window. How much of
the fate of the people on this list and the massive
generational laws they went on to pass was determined
by pure merit and how much of it was determined
by the sheer arbitrary luck of the calendar.
Climbing is everything in politics. It really
is. It's something to think about the next time
you head to the ballot box. Thank you so much
for joining us on this deep dive. We'll be back
next time with another stack of sources and another
hidden story. Until then keep digging.