Rep. William Gray

Former Representative for Pennsylvania’s 2^nd District

Gray was the representative for Pennsylvania’s 2^nd congressional district and was a Democrat. He served from 1979 to 1991.

Bioguide

Photo of Rep. William Gray [D-PA2, 1979-1991]

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Analysis

Ideology–Leadership Chart

Gray is shown as a purple triangle ▲ in our ideology-leadership chart below. Each dot was a member of the House of Representatives in 1992 positioned according to our ideology score (left to right) and our leadership score (leaders are toward the top).

The chart is based on the bills Gray sponsored and cosponsored from Jan 6, 1987 to Oct 9, 1992. See full analysis methodology.

Enacted Legislation

Gray was the primary sponsor of 7 bills that were enacted:

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Does 7 not sound like a lot? Very few bills are ever enacted — most legislators sponsor only a handful that are signed into law. But there are other legislative activities that we don’t track that are also important, including offering amendments, committee work and oversight of the other branches, and constituent services.

We consider a bill enacted if one of the following is true: a) it is enacted itself, b) it has a companion bill in the other chamber (as identified by Congress) which was enacted, or c) if at least about half of its provisions were incorporated into bills that were enacted (as determined by an automated text analysis, applicable beginning with bills in the 110^th Congress).

Bills Sponsored

Issue Areas

Gray sponsored bills primarily in these issue areas:

International Affairs (20%) Economics and Public Finance (18%) Taxation (14%) Armed Forces and National Security (12%) Finance and Financial Sector (10%) Labor and Employment (8%) Health (8%) Education (8%)

Recently Introduced Bills

Gray recently introduced the following legislation:

View All » | View Cosponsors »

Most legislation has no activity after being introduced.

Voting Record

Missed Votes

From Jan 1979 to Aug 1991, Gray missed 763 of 5,979 roll call votes, which is 12.8%. This is much worse than the median of 4.4% among the lifetime records of representatives serving in Aug 1991. The chart below reports missed votes over time.

We don’t track why legislators miss votes, but it’s often due to medical absenses, major life events, and running for higher office.

Show the numbers...

Time Period	Votes Eligible	Missed Votes	Percent	Percentile
1979 Jan-Mar	63	2	3.2%	47^th
1979 Apr-Jun	221	20	9.0%	65^th
1979 Jul-Sep	198	15	7.6%	63^rd
1979 Oct-Dec	190	17	8.9%	47^th
1980 Jan-Mar	148	21	14.2%	76^th
1980 Apr-Jun	197	32	16.2%	86^th
1980 Jul-Sep	192	38	19.8%	91^st
1980 Oct-Dec	67	3	4.5%	30^th
1981 Jan-Mar	15	1	6.7%	46^th
1981 Apr-Jun	90	23	25.6%	95^th
1981 Jul-Sep	106	7	6.6%	63^rd
1981 Oct-Dec	142	17	12.0%	74^th
1982 Feb-Mar	48	3	6.2%	54^th
1982 Apr-Jun	119	23	19.3%	94^th
1982 Jul-Sep	193	34	17.6%	91^st
1982 Oct-Dec	99	15	15.2%	74^th
1983 Jan-Mar	43	8	18.6%	86^th
1983 Apr-Jun	182	27	14.8%	85^th
1983 Jul-Sep	130	3	2.3%	34^th
1983 Oct-Nov	143	7	4.9%	46^th
1984 Jan-Mar	53	5	9.4%	65^th
1984 Apr-Jun	223	18	8.1%	62^nd
1984 Jul-Sep	96	2	2.1%	33^rd
1984 Oct-Oct	36	13	36.1%	95^th
1985 Jan-Mar	36	8	22.2%	93^rd
1985 Apr-Jun	154	11	7.1%	70^th
1985 Jul-Sep	101	23	22.8%	98^th
1985 Oct-Dec	148	18	12.2%	92^nd
1986 Jan-Mar	61	7	11.5%	70^th
1986 Apr-Jun	128	9	7.0%	75^th
1986 Jul-Sep	202	17	8.4%	80^th
1986 Oct-Oct	60	10	16.7%	90^th
1987 Jan-Mar	39	4	10.3%	79^th
1987 Apr-Jun	187	39	20.9%	96^th
1987 Jul-Sep	95	6	6.3%	69^th
1987 Oct-Dec	167	17	10.2%	77^th
1988 Feb-Mar	49	13	26.5%	96^th
1988 Apr-Jun	161	27	16.8%	95^th
1988 Jul-Sep	152	26	17.1%	92^nd
1988 Oct-Oct	89	7	7.9%	73^rd
1989 Jan-Mar	14	0	0.0%	0^th
1989 Apr-Jun	105	11	10.5%	89^th
1989 Jul-Sep	128	5	3.9%	61^st
1989 Oct-Nov	121	18	14.9%	94^th
1990 Jan-Mar	60	6	10.0%	85^th
1990 Apr-Jun	150	9	6.0%	74^th
1990 Jul-Sep	183	32	17.5%	97^th
1990 Oct-Oct	143	12	8.4%	78^th
1991 Jan-Mar	61	2	3.3%	64^th
1991 Apr-Jun	139	53	38.1%	99^th
1991 Jul-Sep	52	19	36.5%	99^th

Primary Sources

The information on this page is originally sourced from a variety of materials, including:

unitedstates/congress-legislators, a community project gathering congressional information
The House and Senate websites, for committee membership and voting records
United States Congressional Roll Call Voting Records, 1789-1990 by Howard L. Rosenthal and Keith T. Poole.
Martis’s “The Historical Atlas of Political Parties in the United States Congress”, via Keith Poole’s roll call votes data set, for political party affiliation for Members of Congress from 1789 through about year 2000
Biographical Directory of the United States Congress for the photo
GovInfo.gov, for sponsored bills