Bob Packwood, Oregon Senator and Lead Author of 1986 Tax Reform, Dies at 93

Former Sen. Bob Packwood died Saturday at age 93. His family announced the death in an obituary sent to media outlets that included no further details. Packwood won election to the Senate in 1968 at age 36 by narrowly defeating Democratic Sen. Wayne L.

Morse, who had held the seat for 23 years. He rose quickly in Republican ranks and was elected chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee in 1980.

As chair and later ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, Packwood played the lead role in the 1986 tax reform that lowered the top income tax bracket from 50 percent to 28 percent and eliminated or curtailed many itemized deductions. He was the leading Republican advocate of abortion rights throughout his tenure and was praised by Planned Parenthood and women’s groups for his work on the issue.

Packwood described himself as a social moderate and fiscal conservative who often voted across party lines. He was a great-grandson of a member of the 1857 Oregon Constitutional Convention.

The Washington Post published allegations from former female employees and acquaintances two weeks after Packwood’s 1992 reelection. More than two dozen women accused him of making unwanted or uninvited sexual advances. The Senate Ethics Committee opened an investigation in 1993.

That inquiry expanded to include allegations that Packwood had solicited jobs from lobbyists for his ex-wife, used staff to threaten accusers into silence, and altered his personal diaries to obstruct the inquiry. The Senate held two days of debate in 1993 over a subpoena for the diaries and voted 94-6 to enforce it.

Packwood took the case to federal court and lost. Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist declined to intervene. Packwood resigned from the Senate in September 1995 rather than face an expulsion vote that leaders of both parties said was certain to succeed.

In a November 2002 interview with the Salem Statesman Journal, Packwood said, “People have told me it must have been tough on me, or it seems unfair.