Former House Agriculture Committee Ranking Member Charlie Stenholm died May 17 at his home in Granbury, Tex. He was 84 years old.
Stenholm was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1979. He served 13 terms and was one of the last conservative-leaning Democrats to hold national office in Texas. He lost his bid for another term in 2004 after the Republican-led Texas Legislature redrew the state’s congressional map, putting him in a heavily GOP-leaning district.
During the 1980s, Stenholm joined a block of Southern Democrats known as the “Boll Weevils” that supported…
